Vittorio Caprioli Biography
Vittorio Caprioli was born in Naples in 1921. He acted in films of various genres and often produced surprising results, characterized by bittersweet reflections and the ability to tell stories with acumen both as an actor and as a director, interpreting an always scrutinized "human comedy". through the satirical lens of social criticism. His Neapolitan roots endowed him with a biting and disenchanted sense of humor, as well as an ironic observer's spirit, which allowed him to express the essence of a character even in minor roles, using only a few significant traits. Caprioli came from a Neapolitan intellectual environment, whose enlightened lucidity and sarcasm pushed him towards innovative and refined choices.
In 1941 he moved to Rome to attend the Silvio D'Amico Academy of Dramatic Arts and after an apprenticeship at the L. Carli-C. Racca, Caprioli acted alongside well-known actors of the time such as Vittorio De Sica, Vivi Goi and Sergio Tofano. He soon moved from tradition to innovation, gaining experience for the first time in 1948 with William Shakespeare's 'The Tempest' at the Piccolo Teatro in Milan, directed by Giorgio Strehler, a pioneer of public theatre. Between 1950 and 1951 he created the Teatro dei Gobbi with Alberto Bonucci, Luciano Salce and Carlo Mazzarella. From the end of the 1950s, his cinematographic career intensifies and he begins to represent examples of humanity on the screen often characterized as petty, obsequious, mellifluous and ambiguous, in which, through his precise and slightly detached interpretative performance and his ability to create satirical material, his tragicomic heroism can be discerned.
He made his directorial debut with a liberal adaptation of the novel "Wounded to Death" by R. La Capria. From that literary portrait of the uncertainties and indolences of young Neapolitan bourgeois on holiday between Capri and Amalfi, Caprioli creates a representation full of suffocated bitterness and ironic detachment in the film 'Leoni al Sole' (1961), playing the role of the clumsy Giuggiù. After divorcing Valeri in 1974, he married Virginia Antonioli, who dedicated the book 'Vittorio e io' to him in 1997, an important document for the reconstruction of the actor's life. In recent years Caprioli returns to his beloved theatre, giving great proof of stage intelligence in the adaptations of the film "A particular day" by Ettore Scola, then in La bottega del caffè by Carlo Goldoni, and in directing Giuseppe's theatre-in-theatre Griffi patrons. Pirandello's theatrical trilogy.
