Isabella Rossellini
Isabella Rossellini
Isabella Fiorella Elettra Giovanna Rossellini is an Italian-American actress, filmmaker, author, philanthropist, and model. The daughter of Swedish actress Ingrid Bergman, Rossellini is noted for her successful tenure as a Lancôme model, and for her roles in films such as Blue Velvetand Death Becomes Her. She also received a Golden Globe Award nomination for her performance in Crime of the Century...
NationalityItalian
ProfessionMovie Actress
Date of Birth18 June 1952
CityRome, Italy
CountryItaly
When I was a teenager, I thought maybe I'll be a filmmaker, making film documentaries. My dream when I was a girl was I would be hired by 'National Geographic' or work with David Attenborough, but it didn't happen. I became a model.
I became an actress way into my 30s because I thought that I had to find my own way, and that's why I worked so much in modelling, until I realised that the differences between acting and modelling weren't that great. I always say that modelling is a little bit like being a silent actress.
Every time you work, it's a new film, and generally when you work with auteurs, people that write and direct their films, there's always an originality.
I always say that in my career as an actress, I've always worked with people like David Lynch or Guy Maddin or Peter Weir who are considered not mainstream directors and that could be because they are like my dad. They are pioneers, and pioneers, by definition, invent something new.
I don't wear much makeup, except during work. I felt lucky to be chosen to be a model. I used to joke, 'The next best thing to winning the lottery is having a beauty contract.'
As I grew older, I worked less as an actor and as a model, and I went back to what I had tried to do when I was young but wasn't really available. I'm so glad now to be in my sixties and to be able to go back to school.
disappeared or haven't been restored or rights haven't cleared.
I forgot to say, 'Mama, Ingrid Bergman,' ... The one time that I needed it, they don't get it.
When I grew up, we always had our chickens, and we ate our eggs, and we ate our chickens. The family always had a pig, and we would kill it at Christmas and eat it for three or four months afterwards.
There are consequences with age, so you have to evolve. I've loved becoming a filmmaker. But I would love to continue modeling, and there isn't really any job for me. It's being marginalized - that's the sad part.
The problem with middle age, at least when it comes to modeling, is you seldom see a model who is past 27, 28. If they use anyone older, then it becomes automatically a 'personality' story.
That is the great pleasure of working with great directors. You get to look at the world through many different prisms. I guess I love talent, whatever form it takes.
People use mobile phones in this very distracting environment where you probably don't have time to watch a 30-minute film, but you might have time to look at a film for a minute and learn something you didn't expect while you walk on the streets.
My father's films are often very slow for the modern audiences, which are used to a lot of editing. It's the audience that watches the film instead of the director dictating the reaction he wants from you.