Swedish actress Anita Ekberg, whose iconic role in the Italian film classic La Dolce Vita made her an international sex symbol, died on Sunday aged 83.
Her accountant, Massimo Morais, confirmed Italian press reports indicating that Ekberg died in the San Raffaele clinic in Rocca di Papa, on the outskirts of Rome. He said her death followed “a long illness”.
In Federico Fellini’s 1960 movie, Ekberg was immortalised wading into Rome’s Trevi Fountain wearing a black strapless dress, and sensually calling on co-star Marcello Mastroianni to follow her. “Marcello, come here, hurry up,” she says.
One of the most famous moments in film history, Ekberg said it was drawn from her real life experience.
“I was doing a photographic session and I cut my foot… so suddenly this Fontana di Trevi arrived in front of me, and I thought, ‘how, how marvellous, I am going to wash my cut,” she told Dutch Tros television in 1994.
She said she turned to the photographer and told him: “Pierluigi, come here, it is so wonderful and cool.”
Instead, he took pictures, which were later seen by Fellini, who decided to re-enact the scene for La Dolce Vita.
When Ekberg was made to dip into the fountain again, however, it was winter.
“It was freezing,” she recalled in the interview.
Fellini elected Ekberg as his muse, and picked her to star in two other full-length movies – 1970’s The Clowns and 1987’s Intervista – as well as in a section of the 1962 Boccaccio ’70, a four-chapter film to which three other directors contributed.
Born in Malmo on September 29, 1931, as the sixth of eight children, Ekberg won the Miss Sweden title in 1950 and moved to the US a year later, where she got into Hollywood, playing relatively minor roles.
Ekberg won a Golden Globe as Best Upcoming Actress in 1956, and was later sent to work in Rome, known at the time as “Hollywood on the Tiber.” Her big break came with Fellini, who spotted her in traffic, driving a luxury Mercedes convertible.
Her career, however, plateaued after La Dolce Vita, and had markedly faded by the 1970s. She quit acting altogether in 2002, after taking part in a series for Italian TV.
She was twice married and divorced, to actors Anthony Steel and Rik Van Nutter, and has been rumoured to have had affairs with stars, such as Tyrone Power, Frank Sinatra and Italian car magnate Gianni Agnelli.
The actress was in poor health and dire financial straits after being burgled and recovering from a thigh bone injury. – Sapa-dpa