Handsome, occasionally grandiloquent, Vittorio Gassman has been a popular and successful stage and screen actor in his native Italy for well over fifty years. American cineastes will recall his performances in such classics as "Bitter Rice" (1948) and "Big Deal on Madonna Street" (1956). Less discerning filmgoers may remember him as Anatole in King Vidor's 1956 version of "War and Peace" or the crime lord King Benny in Barry Levinson's "Sleepers" (1996).

Born in Genoa but raised in Rome, Gassman first studied for a law degree before attending the National Dramatic Academy. He joined the Elsa