Silvana Pampanini (25 September 1925 – 6 January 2016) was an Italian actress. She was Miss Italy in 1946 and the following year she started her movie career.

Life and career

Born in Rome, Pampanini became one of the most popular movie actresses in her country and was considered a sex symbol in the 1950s. In 1955 she visited New York, Denver and Hollywood but rejected job offers because she could not speak English properly and had some problems with the tax office.

She was also appreciated in France, where they nicknamed her Ninì Pampan, Spain, where she appeared in Tirma, South America, especially in Mexico, where she starred in Sed de Amor with Pedro Armendáriz, and Egypt. She also worked with other internationally important actors and directors such as Buster Keaton, Vittorio Gassman, Marcello Mastroianni, Alberto Sordi, Totò, Jean Gabin, Henri Vidal, Abel Gance, Vittorio De Sica. She preceded the more popular Italian stars Sophia Loren and Gina Lollobrigida who appeared as extras in some of her early films. According to the press, she flirted with personalities such as Tyrone Power, William Holden, Orson Welles, Omar Sharif, George DeWitt,Marcos Pérez Jiménez and Fidel Castro; nevertheless, she never married and had no children.

Her success was not long-lasting and in the mid-1960s she quit her career to care for of her parents, preferring to work only occasionally on radio and television. In 1996 she published her autobiography, Shockingly Respectable.

Pampanini was the niece of soprano Rosetta Pampanini.

Filmography

• Il segreto di Don Giovanni (1947)
• Arrivederci papà (1948)
• Baron Carlo Mazza (1948)
• Anthony of Padua (1949)
• The Firemen of Viggiù (1949)
• Marechiaro (1949)
• Snow White and the Seven Thieves (1949)
• Lo sparviero del Nilo (1950)
• Io sono il capataz (1950)
• È arrivato il cavaliere! (1950)
• La bisarca (1950)
• Il richiamo nella tempesta (1950)
• L'inafferrabile 12 (1950)
• 47 morto che parla (1950)
• Bellezze in bicicletta (1951)
• Don Juan's Night of Love (1951)
• Era lui... sì! sì! (1951)
• Miracolo a Viggiù (1951)
• Una bruna indiavolata! (1951)
• Ha fatto 13! (1951)
• O.K. Nerone (1951)
• La paura fa 90 (1951)
• Half a Century of Song (1952)
• Mademoiselle Gobete (1952)
• The City Stands Trial (1952)
• Girls Marked Danger (1952)
• The Woman Who Invented Love(1952)
• Viva il cinema! (1952)
• La peccatrice dell'isola (1952)
• Bufere (1953)
• Canzoni, canzoni, canzoni (1953)
• Un giorno in pretura (1953)
• L'incantevole nemica (1953)
• Koenigsmark (1953)
• A Husband for Anna (1953)
• Noi cannibali (1953)
• Torna! (1953)
• The Cheerful Squadron (1954)
• Mid-Century Loves (1954)
• Marriage (1954)
• Schiava del peccato (1954)
• Orient Express (1954)
• The Island Princess (1955)
• La torre di Nesle (1955)
• The Belle of Rome (1955)
• Racconti romani (1955)
• Canzoni di tutta Italia (1956)
• Law of the Streets (1956)
• Saranno uomini (1957)
• The Road a Year Long (1958)
• Sete d'amore (1959)
• Guns of the Black Witch (1961)
• Mariti a congresso (1961)
• Oh Islam (1962)
• Napoleoncito (1964)
• Il Gaucho (1964)
• Mondo pazzo, gente matta (1965)
• Tres mil kilometros de amor (1966)
• Mazzabubù...quante corna stanno laggiù (1971)
• Il tassinaro (1983)

• Melodie a Sant'Agata (1958