Maria Pia Pagani, Eleonora Duse: a Diva on the Screen

From a historiographical point of view, the stardom of Eleonora Duse (Vigevano 1858 – Pittsburgh 1924) provides a very important international case-study. This is because Duse is still considered the greatest of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century Italian theatre actresses. Although enormously famous, is relevant to consider her celebrity before and after her only film performance in Cenere (Ashes, Italy 1916), a movie taken from the homonymous novel by Grazia Deledda (Nobel Prize for Literature in 1926). For this reason, after a century from the death of Duse (21st April 1924 – 21st April 2024), this paper explores her myth of Duse on the screen and its vitality in the New Millennium.