Stefano Dionisi

"Farinelli" proved he was not afraid of controversial roles and led to his first English-language part as Pharaoh in the TNT miniseries "Moses" (1995), starring Ben Kingsley. After acting with Marcello Mastroianni in "Pereira Declares" (also 1995; released in the USA in 1998), Dionisi bleached his hair blond to play Valeria Marini's gay brother in "Bambola" (1996) and lost weight and sported a buzz cut to play an Auschwitz survivor and friend to Primo Levi (John Turturro) for Francesco Rosi's "The Truce/La Truega" (1997). He reteamed with Antonio Tibaldi, who had previously directed him in "Running Against/Correre Contro" (1996), for "Claudine's Return" (1998), starring Christina Applegate as a bohemian laundress trying to escape her painful childhood memories. Dionisi then did some globe-trotting, appearing in Mike Figgis' British-made "The Loss of Sexual Innocence" and the German movie "Gloomy Sunday" (both 1999) and the French biopic "Les Enfants du siecle/Children of the Century" (lensed 1999), supporting Juliette Binoche as pioneering feminist writer George Sand.