Sophia Loren had her breakout moment at 20 years old when she went to Cannes to support Vittorio De Sica’s The Gold of Naples, one of her earliest starring roles, and quickly realized she was the most photographed person at the festival that year
They didn’t know each other at all, but Loren and bombshell actress Jayne Mansfield will always be cosmically bonded by this legendary photo.
Cary Grant and Loren had begun a romance while filming 1957’s The Pride and the Passion. Though she declined his marriage proposal, he continued to woo her during the making of this comedy.
”I didn’t know Elvis at all, but we were both making films at Paramount and eating in the cafeteria and we both thought, ‘Oh, I want to meet you.’ And so I sat in his lap and we laughed like two kids.
Photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt, who shot Loren for seven LIFE magazine covers, snapped this photo of the actress playfully berating her film producer husband.
Charlton Heston said that Loren never complained about the frigid weather and skimpy wardrobe she endured while making this costume epic.
Loren was just 25 when she portrayed a shopkeeper enduring the horrors of World War II with her adolescent daughter in Vittorio De Sica’s landmark drama.
”I look very happy next to my Oscar, no?” says Loren. ”And with the cigarette in my hand, of course, even though I don’t smoke. I never smoked.
She celebrated her Best Actress win for Two Women with her mother, Romilda (center), and sister, Maria (right). ”We’re in Rome, just talking in bed together, in the house I bought with the first money I received.”
