0:00:19 > 0:00:22As a child growing up in poverty in Italy,
0:00:22 > 0:00:27Sophia Loren was so skinny she was nicknamed the toothpick.
0:00:27 > 0:00:32Then someone once said, "When they gave up femininity,
0:00:32 > 0:00:34"they issued Loren with a double ration."
0:00:35 > 0:00:38After being discovered in a beauty contest by a film producer
0:00:38 > 0:00:43and future husband, Carlo Ponti, she exploded into film
0:00:43 > 0:00:48and became one of the cinema's ultimate international sex symbols.
0:00:48 > 0:00:50Cary Grant proposed to her.
0:00:50 > 0:00:53Peter Sellers fell in love with her.
0:00:53 > 0:00:55Noel Coward once said,
0:00:55 > 0:00:59"She should've been sculpted in chocolate truffles
0:00:59 > 0:01:01"so the world could devour her."
0:01:02 > 0:01:04In those early days,
0:01:04 > 0:01:07it was all about her striking looks rather than her acting talent
0:01:07 > 0:01:11as this BBC interview with Cliff Michelmore displays.
0:01:15 > 0:01:18Miss Loren, you've made the grade with nothing very much
0:01:18 > 0:01:22except your face, your figure and your own determination.
0:01:22 > 0:01:26Are you surprised at the success you've achieved?
0:01:27 > 0:01:29Well, I've been working very hard on it,
0:01:29 > 0:01:32you know, I've been working since I was 15 years old.
0:01:33 > 0:01:36And I'm very glad what I am now.
0:01:36 > 0:01:37But...
0:01:39 > 0:01:41..of course, you have to work very hard all the time.
0:01:41 > 0:01:44But you've come out, haven't you, as a star in the past, what?
0:01:44 > 0:01:48- Four or five years?- I think six...yes, yes.- You count it at six?
0:01:48 > 0:01:50Yes. I started when I was six, yes.
0:01:50 > 0:01:52This is a surprisingly short time, isn't it?
0:01:52 > 0:01:56- To achieve the amount of success that you've got.- Yes.
0:01:56 > 0:01:59Now, it's often been reported that you were a scraggy,
0:01:59 > 0:02:01ugly little girl and I quote.
0:02:01 > 0:02:05What do you enjoy most about now being a world famous beauty?
0:02:08 > 0:02:10Immense admiration.
0:02:13 > 0:02:15- Maybe I didn't understand... - Yes, you did.- Really?
0:02:15 > 0:02:19I was waiting for you to go on. I was hoping that you'd go on.
0:02:19 > 0:02:21Well, what can I say more?
0:02:21 > 0:02:25When did you first think that you ought to be a film star?
0:02:25 > 0:02:28Is there a moment in your life? How old were you?
0:02:28 > 0:02:29Oh, I was very, very young
0:02:29 > 0:02:35when I was seen in Pozzuoli which is a little town where I lived and...
0:02:36 > 0:02:39- Where you lived with your very beautiful sister too.- Oh, yes.
0:02:39 > 0:02:41She was beautiful.
0:02:41 > 0:02:42As a matter of fact,
0:02:42 > 0:02:45she was the most beautiful girl I have ever seen in my life.
0:02:45 > 0:02:49She was blonde and very fat, she won many contests
0:02:49 > 0:02:52and I was always in the shadow and I was hidden.
0:02:54 > 0:02:55But I've seen the pictures,
0:02:55 > 0:02:58especially the American pictures I liked very much.
0:02:58 > 0:03:04The fairy tale, the pictures that Yvonne De Carlo made in colour
0:03:04 > 0:03:09and while I was seeing that pictures I never thought that
0:03:09 > 0:03:13I really could sometime be a star.
0:03:13 > 0:03:15- Let me go back to your sister.- Yes.
0:03:15 > 0:03:18- You said you were always in the shadow.- Do you know her?
0:03:18 > 0:03:21No, I've seen her picture on several occasions though in magazines.
0:03:21 > 0:03:22Yeah.
0:03:22 > 0:03:26Did you like being in the shadow or did you resent being
0:03:26 > 0:03:28overshadowed by your sister?
0:03:28 > 0:03:32Well, she was my sister, she was not a stranger so I liked it.
0:03:33 > 0:03:36- Miss Loren, thank you very much indeed.- Thank you.
0:03:36 > 0:03:39The balance shifted for Loren in 1960
0:03:39 > 0:03:44when she won an Oscar for the harrowing war drama Two Women.
0:03:44 > 0:03:48It was the first time Hollywood had given an Academy Award
0:03:48 > 0:03:52to a non-English acting role.
0:03:52 > 0:03:55The breakthrough confirmed she was a great actress as well as
0:03:55 > 0:04:00a great beauty and would ultimately lead to other opportunities
0:04:00 > 0:04:03like a judging role at the Cannes Film Festival.
0:04:03 > 0:04:07This year with Sophia Loren president of the jury,
0:04:07 > 0:04:09things are even more simplified or confused than usual
0:04:09 > 0:04:11in that direction.
0:04:11 > 0:04:15Sophia is out of time and space but not everybody is.
0:04:15 > 0:04:17If you're another actress,
0:04:17 > 0:04:20be careful about the hour at which you arrive at Nice airport.
0:04:20 > 0:04:23The festival can treat you cruelly.
0:04:23 > 0:04:27While Sophia Loren was pursued into a car in a trail of glory,
0:04:27 > 0:04:31another actress Leslie Caron, once equally famous,
0:04:31 > 0:04:34was left with three photographers,
0:04:34 > 0:04:37such is the penalty for getting on the wrong plane.
0:04:37 > 0:04:39Yesterday at the airport,
0:04:39 > 0:04:45you were welcomed mythically as you usually are and at the same time
0:04:45 > 0:04:50another star, who had perhaps picked the wrong time to arrive,
0:04:50 > 0:04:55and a very famous one, only had three photographers around her.
0:04:55 > 0:04:57Does this sort of thing worry you?
0:04:58 > 0:05:02It's unfair of you to ask me that kind of question.
0:05:02 > 0:05:03I don't wish to talk about it, no.
0:05:05 > 0:05:07What do you look for in a film?
0:05:08 > 0:05:11I like honest films.
0:05:11 > 0:05:16I like films that are a great deal to do with real life.
0:05:16 > 0:05:18I like real characters in the films
0:05:18 > 0:05:24and which very, quite rarely you see nowadays because every feeling
0:05:24 > 0:05:31is so mixed up and you can't really see a wonderful, sincere love story.
0:05:33 > 0:05:36Why were you chosen as president?
0:05:36 > 0:05:38Well, I've no idea really.
0:05:38 > 0:05:42I'm very flattered as matter of fact and surprised by this choice
0:05:42 > 0:05:48because generally the presidents of such an important jury
0:05:48 > 0:05:54as the film festival in Cannes is always given to people
0:05:54 > 0:06:00who have behind them an artistic career much longer than mine.
0:06:02 > 0:06:04So this thing really flatters me a great deal.
0:06:04 > 0:06:08Do you think that the fact that your husband is a well-known
0:06:08 > 0:06:11film producer had anything to do with it?
0:06:11 > 0:06:16- I don't think so, no.- Nor the fact that he became French recently?
0:06:16 > 0:06:18Not really, because I was supposed to be part of the jury
0:06:18 > 0:06:20even last year and I couldn't make it.
0:06:20 > 0:06:25How does it feel to be president of a jury of presidents?
0:06:25 > 0:06:28Since this jury is a very special one
0:06:28 > 0:06:31composed of presidents of all the last years.
0:06:31 > 0:06:34It's not easy, you know, to be seated among these important people,
0:06:34 > 0:06:38these great thinkers and many of them, some of them are even
0:06:38 > 0:06:42- immortels L'Academie Francaise... - Yes, members of the French Academy.
0:06:42 > 0:06:43- That's right.- Immortals.
0:06:43 > 0:06:48Immortals, it's not really easy but I think they have adopted me
0:06:48 > 0:06:52in a very nice way and they are marvellous to be with.
0:06:52 > 0:06:56Now, you're going to judge colleagues officially.
0:06:58 > 0:07:01- What problems does that raise? - Well, I have no idea.
0:07:01 > 0:07:05- This problem is not risen. Risen? - Well, for the moment...
0:07:05 > 0:07:08Arisen yet so I don't know what's going to happen.
0:07:08 > 0:07:11For the moment, as far as we can see,
0:07:11 > 0:07:13they're two queens of the festival.
0:07:13 > 0:07:17There's yourself and from the selection of films it seems
0:07:17 > 0:07:20- that Jeanne Moreau is going to be the other queen.- Yes.
0:07:20 > 0:07:22What do you think of her as an actress?
0:07:22 > 0:07:25Well, I've always admired her very much.
0:07:25 > 0:07:28I think she's a great actress, Jeanne Moreau.
0:07:28 > 0:07:30Very different from yourself?
0:07:30 > 0:07:32Oh, yes. Quite different, yes.
0:07:32 > 0:07:37- Now, today we're being shown La Religieuse...- Yes.- The Nun.
0:07:37 > 0:07:41The film that was banned by the French Minister of Information
0:07:41 > 0:07:46and offered as an official French entry by the Minister of Culture.
0:07:46 > 0:07:50- How do you react to this so curious censorship game?- Well, I can't...
0:07:50 > 0:07:52- I know that you've had your own problems...- I think it's forbidden.
0:07:52 > 0:07:55- ..with the Catholic church. - No, no, it's not that.
0:07:55 > 0:07:58I can't talk about the films that are in competition
0:07:58 > 0:08:02because generally a member of the jury can never talk about it.
0:08:03 > 0:08:06How do you feel about the whole censorship business?
0:08:06 > 0:08:08Well, of course I feel very strongly about it
0:08:08 > 0:08:10but I think that in life
0:08:10 > 0:08:16and in movies you can do anything with style and elegance really and
0:08:16 > 0:08:20there is no censorship that is going to forbid you
0:08:20 > 0:08:23a certain kind of story if it's done with good taste.
0:08:24 > 0:08:28Years later, Loren would talk about acting and Two Women,
0:08:28 > 0:08:31the film that changed perceptions of her
0:08:31 > 0:08:33in an interview with Pebble Mill
0:08:33 > 0:08:37timed to coincide with the release of her autobiography.
0:08:53 > 0:08:56Do you know what they have done? Those heroes that you command?
0:08:56 > 0:09:00Do you know what your great soldiers have done in a holy church?
0:09:00 > 0:09:01Under the eyes of the Madonna?
0:09:01 > 0:09:03Do you know what they have done?
0:09:03 > 0:09:07- Peace, peace.- Yes, peace. Beautiful peace.
0:09:07 > 0:09:12You've ruined my little daughter forever. Now she's worse than dead.
0:09:12 > 0:09:15No, I'm not mad! I'm not mad!
0:09:15 > 0:09:16Look at her!
0:09:16 > 0:09:20- Look at her and tell me if I am mad!- No!
0:09:26 > 0:09:30Rotten, filthy bastards! You know what you've done!
0:09:36 > 0:09:40The power that blazes across the screen there is what really
0:09:40 > 0:09:44does separate you from a lot of actresses who simply were
0:09:44 > 0:09:49beautiful but who couldn't deliver the real power of acting.
0:09:49 > 0:09:51Acting was always very important to you, wasn't it?
0:09:51 > 0:09:53From the very beginning.
0:09:54 > 0:09:56For me, acting is a kind of...
0:09:56 > 0:10:00I'm sorry because I'm still very moved by the scene I've seen so far.
0:10:01 > 0:10:05And I think that for me there's a...
0:10:05 > 0:10:09It's a release feeling and
0:10:09 > 0:10:13I don't think I could live without acting in my life
0:10:13 > 0:10:19because I adore my profession and I love the work I do, very much indeed.
0:10:19 > 0:10:21When you were a young girl,
0:10:21 > 0:10:24when you first saw the Hollywood films in the one and only cinema
0:10:24 > 0:10:28in your native town, you fell in love with Tyrone Power, I know.
0:10:28 > 0:10:31Yeah, I was about eight, nine years old.
0:10:31 > 0:10:33But it wasn't the glamour and living in Beverly Hills
0:10:33 > 0:10:36and the swimming pool as a dream that attracted you, was it?
0:10:36 > 0:10:40I was never attracted by the glamour of an actor
0:10:40 > 0:10:45because by being an actor you could have so much money and buy furs
0:10:45 > 0:10:48and a Cadillac at that moment and a house.
0:10:48 > 0:10:50No.
0:10:50 > 0:10:52I thought that I wanted to be an actress
0:10:52 > 0:10:56just because maybe I was living in a little town like Pozzuoli
0:10:56 > 0:11:01and I really wanted to get away on anonymity
0:11:01 > 0:11:05and to become an individual and to do something in life
0:11:05 > 0:11:08and the only thing I thought, I don't know why,
0:11:08 > 0:11:11I could do was to be an actress.
0:11:11 > 0:11:14One of the most moving parts of the book
0:11:14 > 0:11:17and it's a very brief part of the book but I thought very significant.
0:11:17 > 0:11:20A lot of people have asked you about your reaction to Cary Grant
0:11:20 > 0:11:23and Clark Gable and, you know, the male actors that you've met
0:11:23 > 0:11:26but I found one of the most significant moments was
0:11:26 > 0:11:27when your husband told you that
0:11:27 > 0:11:30Marilyn Monroe had committed suicide.
0:11:30 > 0:11:32- You had never met her...- No.
0:11:32 > 0:11:34..but you felt you had a deep insight
0:11:34 > 0:11:35in to the sort of person she was.
0:11:37 > 0:11:42Well, because, I don't know why, I never met Marilyn
0:11:42 > 0:11:47but I thought that she died because she could, she couldn't...
0:11:50 > 0:11:53..endure herself no longer to be alone.
0:11:53 > 0:11:56I think that she had no friends and she killed herself
0:11:56 > 0:12:00not because she was getting too old because when she killed herself
0:12:00 > 0:12:05she was about 36, 35 years old so she was very young,
0:12:05 > 0:12:07but I thought she couldn't stand any longer to be alone
0:12:07 > 0:12:10and she had no friends to talk to
0:12:10 > 0:12:14and really to release her soul of the burdens that maybe she had.
0:12:14 > 0:12:16I don't know.
0:12:16 > 0:12:19Because you make a very clear distinction between solitude,
0:12:19 > 0:12:22which you enjoy greatly, just going away from everyone and enjoying...
0:12:22 > 0:12:24- I like to be alone.- Yes.- Yes.
0:12:24 > 0:12:28But that's very different from loneliness, isn't it?
0:12:28 > 0:12:29Oh, well, I think so.
0:12:29 > 0:12:34Marilyn was lonely. I like to be alone sometimes
0:12:34 > 0:12:36because I choose to be alone sometimes
0:12:36 > 0:12:41because I like to talk to myself and ask myself what I want from life.
0:12:42 > 0:12:46Yes, it's very easy for all of us to be amateur psychiatrists
0:12:46 > 0:12:49but it is irresistible in reading your book.
0:12:49 > 0:12:52- You really think we are amateur psychiatrists?- Well, I think all of
0:12:52 > 0:12:54us try to be and read into things perhaps that we're not...
0:12:54 > 0:12:57- I think we're very good ones. - ..qualified to do.- Well, maybe.
0:12:57 > 0:13:00Because reading about your attitude to your father who abandoned
0:13:00 > 0:13:05your mother more than once and who gave you his name but little else
0:13:05 > 0:13:07and yet when he died you...
0:13:07 > 0:13:12He didn't only give me his name, he gave me life...
0:13:12 > 0:13:16- Yes.- ..and I'm here talking to you because of him.
0:13:16 > 0:13:19That's why I forgive anything he did
0:13:19 > 0:13:23and there's nothing I can reproach on my father. Nothing.
0:13:23 > 0:13:25Well, it's an enigmatic part of the book.
0:13:25 > 0:13:28I think a lot of people might feel very differently to you.
0:13:28 > 0:13:30It's remarkable forgiving...
0:13:30 > 0:13:33But I'm not everybody, I am myself and that's the way I think.
0:13:33 > 0:13:36- Now comes the amateur psychiatrist bit.- Oh.
0:13:36 > 0:13:38- The fact that you were without a father...- Yes.
0:13:38 > 0:13:42For, in every sense of the word, throughout your life,
0:13:42 > 0:13:47your husband Carlo Ponti, again as an enigmatic figure for some people
0:13:47 > 0:13:52who cannot understand that the depth of the relationship that you have.
0:13:52 > 0:13:55Was he, in any way for you, the father that you never had?
0:13:55 > 0:13:57As well as husband and lover?
0:13:57 > 0:14:00Well, it goes without saying that in life, I mean,
0:14:00 > 0:14:05we choose always the people that we think are good for us
0:14:05 > 0:14:08and I thought I had a great complex
0:14:08 > 0:14:12because my father never married my mother and I had a father complex.
0:14:12 > 0:14:14It goes without saying.
0:14:14 > 0:14:16That's why I was always attracted in life, I think,
0:14:16 > 0:14:21by men who was older than I was because I needed a father,
0:14:21 > 0:14:24because I needed to be protected
0:14:24 > 0:14:28and because I needed a family of my own
0:14:28 > 0:14:31and I needed legality and I needed children,
0:14:31 > 0:14:35I needed a family all my own in few words, just to be,
0:14:35 > 0:14:39to find a balance in my life,
0:14:39 > 0:14:41to find an equilibrium in my life.
0:14:42 > 0:14:45And I'm very happy now that I did.
0:14:45 > 0:14:47Because from the very earliest days,
0:14:47 > 0:14:51you said that you had a sense of your own destiny even with very
0:14:51 > 0:14:55little evidence that it was going to be a successful life.
0:14:55 > 0:14:59Even in poverty as a young child, you felt, "I'm going to be someone."
0:15:01 > 0:15:04Well, it's something you feel when you are very desperate.
0:15:04 > 0:15:08It's the only thing, "I'm sure I'm going to be somebody somewhere." And,
0:15:08 > 0:15:14you know, later in life but I never knew what was going to happen to me.
0:15:14 > 0:15:16- How could I know?- Indeed.
0:15:16 > 0:15:19But I know that I worked very hard for whatever I had.
0:15:19 > 0:15:23I work very hard to be somebody in my profession.
0:15:23 > 0:15:26I worked very hard to have a husband.
0:15:26 > 0:15:29I worked very hard to have two children
0:15:29 > 0:15:32and I'm very happy that I did.
0:15:32 > 0:15:35The interesting thing about this book or one of the most
0:15:35 > 0:15:39interesting things is why you felt now that you were prepared to
0:15:39 > 0:15:44open out your life because you have been known as a very private person.
0:15:44 > 0:15:46I'm still a very private person
0:15:46 > 0:15:51but I think that since I was terribly young,
0:15:51 > 0:15:54I was about 18 or 20 years old,
0:15:54 > 0:15:56there'd been...
0:15:57 > 0:16:00..writing a great deal of books about me,
0:16:00 > 0:16:03about maybe ten or 12,
0:16:03 > 0:16:08and none of them gave of me the image that I like of myself.
0:16:08 > 0:16:14So I thought that the time had come for me to write a book
0:16:14 > 0:16:19about the most important things that really happen in my life
0:16:19 > 0:16:24but besides that to talk about the truth, my own truth.
0:16:24 > 0:16:26It is a very honest book and I wonder
0:16:26 > 0:16:29if I could start with the beginnings of your life.
0:16:29 > 0:16:33The term poverty can mean very different things
0:16:33 > 0:16:34in very different countries.
0:16:34 > 0:16:38You say poverty in the Italy of the late '30s, early '40s and wartime.
0:16:38 > 0:16:41Just how bad were conditions?
0:16:41 > 0:16:47Well, there was war and when there is war there is a lot of poverty.
0:16:47 > 0:16:49There is no money to buy food,
0:16:49 > 0:16:54no money to buy things to light the fire.
0:16:56 > 0:17:00And besides that, you have to struggle for your own food,
0:17:00 > 0:17:05for the things you have to eat day by day or hour by hour,
0:17:05 > 0:17:11and besides that, you don't know where to go to sleep because
0:17:11 > 0:17:16there's bombing every night so we used to go in a tunnel
0:17:16 > 0:17:21and sleep there and I think that we went to this tunnel for about...
0:17:22 > 0:17:26..seven, eight months, you know, bringing our mattress
0:17:26 > 0:17:29and every night, every night the same routine.
0:17:29 > 0:17:33What is equally strong and powerful in the book is that apart from that
0:17:33 > 0:17:36poverty, which was a time of poverty and squalor
0:17:36 > 0:17:39and fear of starvation,
0:17:39 > 0:17:43there was also though a compensating warmth of the family,
0:17:43 > 0:17:46the large family, your uncles and aunts and your grandparents
0:17:46 > 0:17:50who really did bring a tremendous amount of comfort to one another.
0:17:50 > 0:17:54Well, that's the only comfort you can have if you are very poor.
0:17:54 > 0:17:58It's your family, it's your mother, it's your grandmother,
0:17:58 > 0:18:01your grandfather, your uncle, your sister
0:18:01 > 0:18:04and that's how you survive.
0:18:04 > 0:18:06Sophia's struggles as a child
0:18:06 > 0:18:10and the first days of her career would come up in another interview
0:18:10 > 0:18:13around this time for the programme Arena,
0:18:13 > 0:18:17starting with how she got a role as an extra
0:18:17 > 0:18:20in the 1951 Biblical epic Quo Vadis.
0:18:21 > 0:18:23On Quo Vadis, I went to Rome
0:18:23 > 0:18:28and we didn't even have the money to make a phone call
0:18:28 > 0:18:32so we walked from the station to Cinecitta
0:18:32 > 0:18:37because we knew that Quo Vadis was, they were shooting Quo Vadis
0:18:37 > 0:18:40and they needed a lot of people to be extras in it,
0:18:40 > 0:18:46so just to make a little money we went then to Cinecitta
0:18:46 > 0:18:48and we saw Mervyn LeRoy.
0:18:49 > 0:18:54And he spotted me right away and he said, "Come. Come."
0:18:54 > 0:18:57So he did this, so I understood that he said, "Come."
0:18:57 > 0:19:00Because I didn't speak a word of English.
0:19:00 > 0:19:05So I did go in his office and he started to ask me many questions
0:19:05 > 0:19:10and my mother said, "You always say yes. You always say yes.
0:19:10 > 0:19:12"No matter what he asks you, you say yes."
0:19:14 > 0:19:18And finally after half an hour he really found out that
0:19:18 > 0:19:20I didn't speak any word of English
0:19:20 > 0:19:23because otherwise he would've given me my first chance
0:19:23 > 0:19:25in an American film in Quo Vadis,
0:19:25 > 0:19:27a small part but I had to speak English.
0:19:29 > 0:19:32But the fact that you took that part as an extra,
0:19:32 > 0:19:35that wasn't really the thing that made you decide,
0:19:35 > 0:19:38"Oh, I must be an actress." You'd already decided that way back.
0:19:38 > 0:19:40I mean, on the trip. Oh, yes, absolutely.
0:19:42 > 0:19:47I wanted to, maybe it was the feeling I wanted to get out of anonymity,
0:19:47 > 0:19:51I wanted to do something. I needed to work, I didn't have any money.
0:19:51 > 0:19:54I had no future, I had nothing.
0:19:54 > 0:19:57Listen, my Hollywood period I consider it a very positive one
0:19:57 > 0:20:00because I had a chance to work with so many actors.
0:20:01 > 0:20:05Big actors, I mean, I could give you a very long list,
0:20:05 > 0:20:08Clark Gable, Cary Grant, Peter Sellers...
0:20:08 > 0:20:13But and also because I had the opportunity to learn
0:20:13 > 0:20:16the language that I didn't know.
0:20:16 > 0:20:21So for me it was like going to school and learn and when I was there,
0:20:21 > 0:20:25I was just about 21, 22.
0:20:25 > 0:20:28So it was a good school for me to go to America.
0:20:28 > 0:20:33And then when I came back I did Two Women with De Sica in Italian.
0:20:33 > 0:20:36Do you see yourself doing more of those sort of roles?
0:20:38 > 0:20:43Well, you know, this is part of my, it's part of my life.
0:20:43 > 0:20:46I mean, when I shoot a picture in Italy,
0:20:46 > 0:20:50all the little treasure that you carry with you since your childhood,
0:20:50 > 0:20:56it comes out because you really work in your own country.
0:20:56 > 0:20:58You speak your own language
0:20:58 > 0:21:05so you can express yourself in a wonderful way.
0:21:05 > 0:21:07I know that I speak English quite well
0:21:07 > 0:21:12but it's not my own native language and the characters that I can
0:21:12 > 0:21:19do in Italy, they are familiar to me and I think I'm best in these roles.
0:21:19 > 0:21:23Was it the hard struggle that you had in your childhood,
0:21:23 > 0:21:25do you think, that gave you the ambition
0:21:25 > 0:21:28and the drive to become the success that you are?
0:21:31 > 0:21:34- It can be part of it, yes.- I mean, it's true that you were hungry...
0:21:34 > 0:21:37But you can be ambitious.
0:21:37 > 0:21:38You can...
0:21:40 > 0:21:42You can dream about success.
0:21:43 > 0:21:46You can have it but I don't think,
0:21:46 > 0:21:50if you don't have a talent you can't last very long.
0:21:50 > 0:21:52Impossible.
0:21:53 > 0:21:56Are you sure that you had a talent that you were born with or
0:21:56 > 0:21:58- did you learn...?- Well, then,
0:21:58 > 0:22:01I was not sure but I think now for the things that I have done,
0:22:01 > 0:22:04maybe a little talent I have.
0:22:04 > 0:22:06I mean, of course you have,
0:22:06 > 0:22:08but did you learn that talent or did you have it when...?
0:22:08 > 0:22:12You can't learn talent, whether you got it or not.
0:22:12 > 0:22:16I mean, they can't teach you how to have talent. Who can teach you?
0:22:16 > 0:22:19Then it would be very easy.
0:22:19 > 0:22:21Whether you've got it or not,
0:22:21 > 0:22:24it's something that you're born with, I think.
0:22:24 > 0:22:28You can learn technique, yes,
0:22:28 > 0:22:30but talent, it's there or not.
0:22:32 > 0:22:35Is there anyone you see around you now, ten years younger,
0:22:35 > 0:22:3915 years younger who's going to be another Sophia Loren?
0:22:43 > 0:22:47I don't know. No, for the moment. Do you mean in Italian movies?
0:22:47 > 0:22:49In world movies.
0:22:52 > 0:22:55- What does that mean to be another Sophia Loren?- Exactly.
0:22:59 > 0:23:03This next interview from Barry Norman's Film 79 programme
0:23:03 > 0:23:06finds Sophia discussing her appearance in one of
0:23:06 > 0:23:10cinema's most famous stripping scenes from the film
0:23:10 > 0:23:15Yesterday, Today And Tomorrow, a classic Italian comedy,
0:23:15 > 0:23:19featuring her most frequent co-star Marcello Mastroianni.
0:23:19 > 0:23:23I think that every Neapolitan has sense of humour, I don't know
0:23:23 > 0:23:27if it's great sense of humour but some sense of humour we have.
0:23:27 > 0:23:32A very realistic one because we laugh about the tragedy of life sometimes.
0:23:32 > 0:23:36That's where our comedies are based upon, you know,
0:23:36 > 0:23:38when we make comedies in Italy.
0:23:38 > 0:23:40Woo!
0:23:50 > 0:23:56'Being a very shy person, I don't like to rehearse a scene
0:23:56 > 0:23:58'but when the camera is rolling and I have to do the scene
0:23:58 > 0:24:02'so I just go all the way because I feel very much
0:24:02 > 0:24:07'protected by the character that I'm playing and I feel fine.'
0:24:19 > 0:24:23'You can't talk about any other couple that is working
0:24:23 > 0:24:26together on the screen nowadays like Marcello and myself
0:24:26 > 0:24:29'when we are in the film together.'
0:24:29 > 0:24:34I don't know if there is something that clicks on the screen that
0:24:34 > 0:24:39I've never had with any other partner since I've been in this business.
0:25:09 > 0:25:11There were so many cameramens.
0:25:11 > 0:25:17They said that my nose looked too long and they couldn't light it
0:25:17 > 0:25:21so when my husband told me that I, maybe I should've shortened my nose
0:25:21 > 0:25:24a little bit, I said, "I don't think so.
0:25:24 > 0:25:26"I think that I like to stick to my nose
0:25:26 > 0:25:31"because I like the way I look and I think you have to change cameramen
0:25:31 > 0:25:35"and if you do change cameramen, maybe I have a chance in the movies.
0:25:35 > 0:25:38"Otherwise I change everything or maybe I will never be in the
0:25:38 > 0:25:43"movies because I like the way I look, I've no complex about my nose."
0:25:43 > 0:25:45So I didn't and here I am with my nose.
0:25:45 > 0:25:48- Long nose...- Long!- ..but nice.
0:25:48 > 0:25:52The '70s and '80s would see Sophia focusing on motherhood
0:25:52 > 0:25:56over acting, bringing up her two young sons.
0:25:56 > 0:25:59In 1982, there was a sensation
0:25:59 > 0:26:02when she was found guilty of tax evasion
0:26:02 > 0:26:05and spent 18 days in an Italian prison,
0:26:05 > 0:26:07an experience she spoke about
0:26:07 > 0:26:11on a visit to the Wogan programme, two years later.
0:26:11 > 0:26:15In 1982, you went to prison.
0:26:15 > 0:26:18- Yes.- Yes, was that...? - There's nothing to laugh about.
0:26:18 > 0:26:20No, I'm sure there isn't.
0:26:20 > 0:26:24That... What sort of effect did that have on you?
0:26:24 > 0:26:27Did it change your life? Did it change your approach to life?
0:26:27 > 0:26:32Listen, I decided to do that on my own because I thought
0:26:32 > 0:26:34it was the only...
0:26:35 > 0:26:40..possibility for me to go back to Italy and to see my mother,
0:26:40 > 0:26:45my sister and my nieces and my other relatives
0:26:45 > 0:26:48and I couldn't do anything else,
0:26:48 > 0:26:51so I went but I didn't know...
0:26:53 > 0:26:57..what I was going to find there and...
0:27:00 > 0:27:04..it's something, it's an experience that I will never forget and...
0:27:06 > 0:27:12..it's a traumatic experience for me and, of course, it leaves...
0:27:15 > 0:27:18- ..a scar.- Of course.
0:27:18 > 0:27:21- And...- Did they treat you like every other prisoner?
0:27:22 > 0:27:24Why should it have been different?
0:27:24 > 0:27:26Because you're Sophia Loren obviously.
0:27:26 > 0:27:28Yeah, because you've been reading the wrong papers.
0:27:28 > 0:27:31I read in the papers that I had a...
0:27:31 > 0:27:33No, it was only a question, I didn't read it in any of them.
0:27:33 > 0:27:38..pink carpet on the floor, that I had a big bathroom
0:27:38 > 0:27:42and that I was treated, I had a television, a colour television.
0:27:45 > 0:27:47You believe me?
0:27:47 > 0:27:52I was in prison like everybody else and I had to be among all these
0:27:52 > 0:27:59girls that had committed crimes and it was not an easy experience for me.
0:27:59 > 0:28:04- But you're glad you faced up to it, surely?- I'm not glad.
0:28:04 > 0:28:11- I think that this kind of experiences enrich, enriches you.- Enrich, yeah.
0:28:11 > 0:28:14Enrich you very much and...
0:28:16 > 0:28:21But if they would ask me to do it again, I would run.
0:28:22 > 0:28:26I wouldn't go there any more. It has been terrible.
0:28:26 > 0:28:29Many top Hollywood stars are now,
0:28:29 > 0:28:33as TV continues to go from strength to strength.
0:28:33 > 0:28:35I mean, TV's soap operas.
0:28:35 > 0:28:38Now I had Rock Hudson on the show couple of weeks ago
0:28:38 > 0:28:42and he never told me he was going to go into Dynasty, he kept it from me.
0:28:42 > 0:28:46You're not thinking of moving into any one of these soap operas?
0:28:46 > 0:28:49Is it not true that you were at one time approached to take
0:28:49 > 0:28:52- one of these soap opera parts? - Oh, yeah, I have been approached
0:28:52 > 0:28:55many times to do some series on television
0:28:55 > 0:28:59but I always reacted in a very instinctive way.
0:29:01 > 0:29:03Erm...
0:29:03 > 0:29:05Not reasoning really, I said no.
0:29:07 > 0:29:14But then I thought, "I'm an actress, if I go in a series,
0:29:14 > 0:29:19"I have to play this character for months and, if I am successful,
0:29:19 > 0:29:25"maybe for years and how would I feel inside to play always,
0:29:25 > 0:29:28"all the time, all over again the same character?"
0:29:28 > 0:29:33The wonderful thing, the magic thing of our profession is to be able to
0:29:33 > 0:29:39go from one film to another, changing character and disguise yourself
0:29:39 > 0:29:41and I think this is, it's wonderful
0:29:41 > 0:29:44and in a series on television you can't do that
0:29:44 > 0:29:47so that's why I never accepted it.
0:29:47 > 0:29:51Is it true that you were offered the Alexis Carrington part?
0:29:51 > 0:29:54- The part that Joan Collins subsequently took.- Yes.
0:29:55 > 0:29:59- I can't quite see you in that part. - No, I'm too good.- You are too good!
0:29:59 > 0:30:01LAUGHTER
0:30:01 > 0:30:04APPLAUSE
0:30:07 > 0:30:10It took 30 years for the Italian Supreme Court to clear
0:30:10 > 0:30:14Sophia of those tax evasion charges.
0:30:14 > 0:30:15In the meantime,
0:30:15 > 0:30:19she embraced new roles like that of UN Goodwill ambassador
0:30:19 > 0:30:22raising awareness of poverty in Africa.
0:30:22 > 0:30:26She's continued to act and she's continued to pick up awards,
0:30:26 > 0:30:30being honoured for her lifetime's work by numerous
0:30:30 > 0:30:32international film organisations,
0:30:32 > 0:30:38all recognising her as one of the last of the great screen goddesses
0:30:38 > 0:30:41and a genuine treasure of world cinema.