Today is the birthday of the famous Italian comic actor and director Roberto Benini, who won the Oscar for Best Actor for the film “Life is Beautiful” (La Vita è Bella).

The ever-smiling and goofy Benini is turning 70 and still enjoying the love of the world, thanks to the sweet and heartwarming film that made him world famous – as well as his catchphrase “buongiorno principessa!”

Benini’s Best Actor Oscar win marks the second time in the history of the award that an actor has won the award by directing himself. The previous one was Laurence Olivier in Hamlet in 1948.

It was also the second time the award went to a role performed exclusively in Italian. The previous winner was Sophia Loren for La Ciociara in 1960.

In 2021, Benini was honored by the Venice Film Festival with the honorary “Golden Lion” for his body of work (center photo)

Biography

Benini was born on October 27, 1952 in Manciano la Misericordia, at Tuscany of Italy.

He became famous in the 1970s with his participation in the television show Televacca by Renzo Arbore. However, the audacity of the show, combined with the strictness of censorship at the time, led to its interruption.

His embrace during a demonstration with the leader of the Communist Party Enrico Berlinguer (Enrico Berlinguer) created a scandal, due to the formality of the politicians of the time. In the 1980s he was censored for making offensive remarks about Pope John Paul II in a major live television broadcast.

He began directing in 1983 and also starred in several projects with Nicoletta Braschi, whom he married in 1991.

He became famous “on the same day” with the tragic comedy film Life is beautiful (1997), where he presents the conditions faced by Jewish prisoners in a German concentration camp.

His father, Luigi Benini, had spent two years in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. The film starring a little boy and himself, as well as directed by him, was nominated for seven Oscars and received the Oscars for foreign language film (the award is given to the entire cast of the film, but the director receives it), Best Actor (Benin ) and Music (Nicolas Piovani).

In April 2013, he was awarded an honorary doctorate by the Department of Italian Language and Philology of the AUTH.