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Hollywood on the Tiber
by Hank Kaufman and Gene Lerner
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Hollywood on the Tiber is a dazzling blend of the epic and intimate featuring a glittering cast of screen gods and goddesses. This vibrant chronicle recounts how Hank Kaufman and Gene Lerner became unsung movers and shakers of a unique and unrepeatable era: the rise of Rome as the center of Europe's film industry in the 1950s and '60s.
Kaufman and Lerner, partners in both life and work, arrived in Italy from the U.S. in 1953 with little more than courage and intuition, and established a talent agency that became the nerve center for cross-continental co-productions between Italy, Europe and Hollywood. For nearly two decades, they were not just agents and managers but confidants, collaborators and problem-solvers for their world-famous clientele, who shared their professional adventures and successes as well as personal uncertainties and disappointments. Hank and Gene navigated the ambitions and eccentricities of legends Anita Ekberg, Ava Gardner, Anna Magnani and Simone Signoret, they calmed a furious Marlon Brando, faced down domineering Italian producers with an impromptu actors' strike, and struck a secret deal with Charlie Chaplin. Hank went dress shopping with Shelley Winters in Cannes and Gene rushed to the London Savoy to rescue Gardner from a raging George C. Scott. Their work was equal parts diplomacy, ingenuity and sheer nerve.
Written in the late 1970s and now published in English for the first time, this edition features a new foreword by Sandy Lieberson, who worked alongside Kaufman and Lerner in Rome. Hollywood on the Tiber - which features Robert Aldrich, Federico Fellini, Hedy Lamarr, Gina Lollobrigida, Irene Papas, Lee Strasberg and Franco Zeffirelli - is a moving, honest and impassioned treasure trove of anecdotes and insights about the first paparazzi era, offering an unflinching look at the glamour and grit of celebrity and filmmaking. As Gene Lerner explains: "Hollywood on the Tiber seemed dazzling, but in reality, it harmed Italian cinema. It depersonalized it by introducing distant and culturally alien models, which contaminated stronger traditions and pushed major Italian producers abroad. I coined the slogan 'Hollywood on the Tiber, ' but I've always denounced its toxins."
At once action-packed, heartfelt and clear-eyed, Hollywood on the Tiber is a compelling portrait of an extraordinary era and the people - innovative and creative, fragile and vulnerable - who defined it.
An absorbing and fascinating look back at Rome's Dolce Vita era of the '50s and '60s and at the film folk that made global headlines in those heady, colorful days. - Variety
Affectionate, sincere, and therefore unintentionally ruthless. A vivid mural of successes, grand illusions, personal heartbreak and tragedy. - La Stampa
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