Pier Angeli

Pier Angeli (19 June 1932 – 10 September 1971), also credited under her real name, Anna Maria Pierangeli, was an Italian-born film and television actress, singer and model, who starred in American, British and European films throughout her career. Her American motion picture debut was in the starring role of the film Teresa (1951), for which she won a Golden Globe Award for Young Star of the Year - Actress. Besides this film, she is best remembered for her roles in, Domani è troppo tardi (1950), Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956) and The Angry Silence (1960).

Early life

Born Anna Maria Pierangeli to Enrichetta (née Romiti) and Luigi Pierangeli in Cagliari, Sardinia, Italy. Her twin sister is the actress Marisa Pavan.

Angeli spent World War II in Rome; she was ten when the Nazis occupied Rome, experiencing both food shortages and bomb shelters. She was deeply affected by her experiences during the war, recalling later: "What was in the world, I didn't want to know." Angeli made her film debut with Vittorio De Sica's Italian film, Domani è troppo tardi (1950) after being spotted by director Léonide Moguy and De Sica while studying arts in Rome, at the age of sixteen. Her work was so impressive that she won an Italian award for Best Actress, and caught the eye of MGM producers, who offered her a contract with the studio.

Personal life and death

Angeli was fluent in Italian and English, and near fluent in French. She was good friends with Debbie Reynolds, Louis Jourdan, and Richard Attenborough. Because she travelled so much, she encountered many artists throughout her life.

According to Kirk Douglas' autobiography The Ragman's Son, he and Angeli were engaged in the 1950s after meeting on the set of the film The Story of Three Loves (1953). Angeli also had a passionate romantic relationship with James Dean. They met while she was shooting The Silver Chalice (1954) and he was shooting East of Eden (1955), on an adjoining Warner lot. Much against her will, she was forced to break it off mainly because her mother was not happy with their relationship as Dean was not Catholic. There were rumors that she and Dean secretly saw each other up until his death. She would later say that he was the love of her life: "He is the only man I ever loved deeply as a woman should love a man." Friends of Angeli have said she never fully recovered from his death and that she had nightmares about him up until her own death.

Angeli was married to singer and actor Vic Damone from 1954 to 1958. Singer and actor Dean Martin performed at their wedding. She had one son with Vic Damone; their divorce was followed by highly publicized court battles for the custody of their only child, son Perry (1955–2014).

Angeli next married Italian composer Armando Trovajoli in 1962 with whom she had another son, Howard, in 1963. She and Trovajoli separated in 1969.

In the early 1970s she returned to California after having lived in Britain and Europe throughout the 1960s, and briefly lived with her close friend Debbie Reynolds until she found a little apartment in Beverly Hills. On 10 September 1971, at the age of 39, Angeli was found dead of a barbiturate overdose at her home in Beverly Hills. On the day of her death, Angeli had been given an injection of Compazine by her doctor to calm her down (she was unable to sleep and had run out of Doriden which the doctor refused to give her). Death due to anaphylaxis has been suggested; however, it is not supported by the findings of her autopsy. Her former lover Kirk Douglas and his wife Anne Buydens were among those who were invited to her funeral. She is interred in the Cimetière des Bulvis in Rueil-Malmaison, Hauts-de-Seine, France.