Interview with Marina Spada

Abstract

Marina Spada was born in Milan, where she still lives. She graduated with a music history degree from the University of Milan and the Dramatic Arts School of Piccolo Teatro. She started her career in filmmaking during the 1970s, collaborating with RAI Television, and in 1984 she worked as an assistant to Roberto Benigni and Massimo Troisi on the film Non ci resta che piangere (Nothing Left to Do but Cry). During the 1980s she directed many commercials and documentary films. Since 1993, she has been teaching film production and direction at the School of Cinema of Milan, while writing and directing many video portraits of Italian artists such as Pietro Lingeri, Fernanda Pivano, Arnaldo Pomodoro, Francesco Leonetti, Gabriele Basilico, and Mimmo Jodice. In 2000, she self-produced her first feature film, Forza cani (Come on Dogs!). In 2006, her second film, Come l’ombra As the Shadow also partially self-produced, was distributed by Kairos Film and presented at the Venice Film Festival and other international festivals, winning numerous awards. In 2009 Spada shot Poesia che mi guardi (Poetry You See Me), a documentary about the Italian poet Antonia Pozzi. Her fourth movie, Il mio domani (My Tomorrow), was released in 2011. It was well received at both the International Film Festival of Rome and Lincoln Center’s Italian Film Festival “Open Roads” in New York City.