Elsa De Giorgi (26 January 1914 – 12 September 1997) was an Italian film actress and writer. She appeared in twenty seven films, including Duilio Coletti's Captain Fracasse (1940).
Biography
De Giorgi was born in Pesaro, Marche, from a family originally from Bevagna, a small town close to Spoleto in Umbria. When she was 18, she worked as a model, and was spotted by Mario Camerini, who offered her a role in his film T'amerò sempre (1933). De Giorgi then took up acting full-time, and worked with many Italian directors, including Pier Paolo Pasolini, Luigi Zampa, Mario Soldati and Alberto Sordi. In 1974 she wrote, directed and produced the film Sangue più fango uguale logos passione.
In 1955, De Giorgi published her first book, I coetanei (The Peers), a recapitulation of her time during Italian Civil War as well as a tribute to her husband, Sandrino Contini Bonacossi. The book was published by Einaudi with a preface by Gaetano Salvemini. It won the Premio Viareggio.
In the late 1950s De Giorgi had a romantic relationship with Italo Calvino. Their time together is chronicled in her 1992 book Ho visto partire il tuo treno (I Saw Your Train Rolling).
In the early 1960s she worked as a theatre critic for the Rome-based magazine Pensiero Nazionale.
De Giorgi's archive is housed at the Centre for the Studies of Contemporary and Modern Writers at University of Pavia.