Mario Lanza

Lanza Lives Big

By Marva Peterson, Modern Screen, November 1953

Mario

He had a constant battle with his weight, blowing up, then trimming down, constantly yo yoing

Did a fad diet and it killed him.

He was a pig a drunk and a crude sex ual groper - read what Katherine Grayson said about him. Made his wife's life a hell and was a thoughtless parent.

Killed himself because he knew he could never be as great as Caruso.

I wonder if he played on both sides of the street??

Didn't he die by falling down some stairs or under questionable circumstances? Meaning, there was a question that it was a mob hit because he owed someone some money or he had pissed off the wrong people.

that's what we all presume

My mom loved this guy, so I heard his music a lot while growing up. Without an autopsy, I guess they assume he died of a pulmonary embolism due to the immobilization?

Per Wikipedia: [quote]He made three more films before dying of an apparent pulmonary embolism at the age of 38. ... In April 1959, Lanza reportedly suffered a minor heart attack followed in August by double pneumonia. On September 25, 1959, he entered Rome's Valle Giulia clinic for the purpose of losing weight for an upcoming film. While in the clinic, he underwent a controversial weight loss program colloquially known as "the twilight sleep treatment", which required its patients to be kept immobile and sedated for prolonged periods. On October 7, a day before his scheduled discharge, he died at the age of 38. No autopsy was performed. He left a shattered wife and four children. His wife returned to Hollywood completely devastated. She died five months later of a drug overdose. He was buried at the Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California.[28] Maria Caniglia, Franco Fabrizi and Enzo Fiermonte attended the funeral. Frank Sinatra sent his condolences by telegram.

He had the kind of large, "operatic" voice which is unfashionable in pop music today. The irony is that he performed comparatively little opera on stage.

He was murdered, according to Darwin Porter.

Obviously you are going to get pneumonia if you are immobilized. That's a given.

Gruesome end for the couple alors

R11, that's because people's musical "tastes" are stunted today.

His popularity and appeal (and Kathryn Grayson's, too!) are a total enigma to modern audiences.

I even prefer Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy.

I liked Eddy and Lanza, not so much the girls. Both of the latter had trouble controlling their vibratos and their voices were thinner.

I think Eddy and MacDonald benefited from the subtlety of black & white film. They never seemed quite as pompous and vulgar as Lanza and Grayson in garish Metro Technicolor.

Hey, you forgot to acknowledge my vocal talents!

he was such a lard ass, to get him to quit eating they had to put him in a coma, which kilt him.

When he'd go on food binges, he'd neglect his hygiene, could go for weeks without changing his socks...shudder.

When I was about 12, I had a friend of the same age who was IN LOVE with Mario Lanza. This was in 1983. We were suburban tween girls. I have no idea how she even knew about him; I’d never heard of him and when she played me a record, I was weirded out. The rest of us drooled over Sting.

I’m guessing her grandmother or something. They were Italian-American and her gran had a parrot that she’d let fly around and poop on the drapes. They had gory portraits of Jesus with the crown of thorns making his forehead bleed, and a giant crucifix with red paint on his wounds. It was a little bit of culture shock

He was at his cutest in his first (?) movie, That Midnight Kiss, especially in his short leather jacket.