Franco Zeffirelli Filmography

Born:: February 12, 1923 in Florence, Italy
Occupation:: Director, Production Designer, Producer, Set Designer, Screenwriter
Biography:: Italian director Franco Zeffirelli started out as an actor in the stage productions of Luchino Visconti, then worked as an assistant on several Visconti-directed films. After World War II, Zeffirelli launched a career designing, costuming, and directing operas, a field of entertainment to which...Read More

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La Bohème

Crew: Producer, Set Designer

Actors: Angela Gheorghiu

Synopsis: Experience Franco Zeffirelli's lavish production of the Puccini favorite La Bohème in this release of a live performance conducted by Nicola Luisotti, and featuring the magnificent voices of Angela Gheorghiu, Ainhoa Arteta, and Ramón Vargas. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide Read More

4/5/08
Sunshine Superman: The Journey of Donovan

Actors: Donovan, Bob Dylan, Pete Seeger, Arlo Guthrie, Mickie Most

2008
Carmen

Crew: Director

Actors: Marina Domashenko

Synopsis: This 2003 performance of Georges Bizet's 19th century opera Carmen was produced and directed by filmmaker and stage director Franco Zeffirelli, best known to many for the Academy Award-winning big-screen adaptation of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Shot at the Arena di Verona, the production Read More

2003
Callas Forever

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Fanny Ardant, Jeremy Irons, Joan Plowright, Jay Rodan, Gabriel Garko

Synopsis: A mournful look at the last days of opera diva Maria Callas, director Franco Zeffirelli's biographical drama attempts to explore the irresistible allure of a comeback for a fallen star who hungers for the success of her past. Weathered from the excess of the previous decade and with her best Read More

9/18/02
La Traviata (Teatro Verdi di Busseto)

Crew: Set Designer, Stage Director

Actors: Scott Piper, Renato Bruson, Stefania Bonfadelli

Synopsis: As mounted by the Teatro Giuseppe Verdi in Busseto, Parma, and helmed by stage and film director Franco Zeffirelli (Endless Love), this 2002 production of Verdi's iconic opera La Traviata stars Violetta Valery as Stefania Bonfadelli, Flora Bervoix as Annely Peebo, and Annina as Paola Leveroni. El Read More

2002
The Life and Times of Count Luchino Visconti

Actors: Helmut Berger, Meralda Caracciolo Di Melito, Claudia Cardinale, Luchino Gastel, Annie Girardot

Synopsis: Legendary Italian filmmaker Luchino Visconti's life and remarkable cinematic achievements are investigated in depth in Adam Low's 2002 documentary produced by the BBC entitled The Life and Times of Count Luchino Visconti. Born into Italian aristocracy in 1906, Visconti's life was one of Read More

2002
Aida

Crew: Director, Set Designer

Synopsis: Perhaps best known as the director of such films as Tea With Mussolini and 1968's Oscar-winning Romeo and Juliet, Franco Zeffirelli is also a Tony Award winner and has made a name for himself for his work on the stage. With direction and set design by Zeffirelli, this release from TDK Mediactive Read More

2001
Tea With Mussolini

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Cher, Judi Dench, Joan Plowright, Maggie Smith, Lily Tomlin

Synopsis: Based in part on his autobiography, director Franco Zeffirelli's Tea With Mussolini is a drama with comic accents about a group of British and American travelers on an indefinite visit to Italy in 1935, when, as one character puts it, "Mussolini was just a man who made the trains run on time." Read More

5/14/99
Jane Eyre

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: William Hurt, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Joan Plowright, Anna Paquin, Geraldine Chaplin

Synopsis: Director Franco Zeffirelli stresses emotional realism over gothic chills in this restrained adaptation of Charlotte Bronte's classic. The screenplay, by Zeffirelli and Hugh Whitmore, remains relatively faithful to the original story, beginning with a condensed look at the troubled childhood of Read More

1996
Storia Di Una Capinera

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Angela Bettis, Johnathon Schaech, Sinéad Cusack, John Castle, Vanessa Redgrave

Synopsis: It is the 19th century in Italy, and Maria (Angela Bettis) has joined a convent in order to explore her strong feeling that she has a calling to become a nun. She has adapted to live at the convent quite nicely, and is relatively untroubled, but a cholera outbreak sends her back to be with her Read More

1993
Hamlet

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Mel Gibson, Glenn Close, Alan Bates, Paul Scofield, Ian Holm

Synopsis: Franco Zeffirelli directs his third Shakespeare adaptation (after Romeo and Juliet and Otello) with this film version of the tragedy Hamlet. The titular prince of Denmark (Mel Gibson), returns home to his family's castle of Elsinore after years of attending school in Germany to find out his father Read More

1990
Bill Moyers: The Power of the Past - Florence

Synopsis: In this PBS program, journalist Bill Moyers introduces viewers to Florence, Italy. Special attention is paid to the city's museum collections, architectural structures, and Renaissance culture as Moyers talks with art historians, including author Umberto Eco, and filmmaker Franco Zeffirelli. Time Read More

1990
Young Toscanini

Crew: Director

Actors: C. Thomas Howell, Elizabeth Taylor, Sophie Ward, Pat Heywood, John Rhys-Davies

Synopsis: This biographical costume drama from director Franco Zeffirelli covers the early life of Arturo Toscanini and stars C. Thomas Howell as the famous composer. When Arturo lands a job with the orchestra of Claudio Rossi (John Rhys-Davies), he soon finds himself bound for a tour of South America and Read More

10/7/88
Maria Callas: Life and Art

Synopsis: This documentary chronicles the life of the most exciting opera singer of her generation. Her soprano voice, with its exceptional expressive powers, enabled Maria Callas to become the first singer in a century to perform in the intricate Romantic style, conveying tremendous emotional range and Read More

1987
Bellissimo: Images of the Italian Cinema

Synopsis: Survey of the history of Italian cinema, featuring clips from such classics as "Open City," "8-1/2," and "Seven Beauties," and interviews with illustrious stars and filmmakers, including Sophia Loren, Marcello Mastroianni, Toto, Monica Vitti, Anna Magnani, Vittorio DeSica, Federico Fellini, Pier Paolo Pasolini Read More

9/13/86
Otello

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Plácido Domingo, Katia Ricciarelli, Justino Diaz, Petra Malakova, Urbano Barberini

Synopsis: Having previously staged Verdi's 1887 opera Otello at the Met and La Scala, filmmaker Franco Zeffirelli committed his production to film in 1986. Starring as the fatally jealous Moor of Venice is Placido Domingo, who had also headlined Zeffirelli's 1976 La Scala staging (production on the film was Read More

9/12/86
Tosca

Crew: Director

Synopsis: Franco Zeffirelli both stage-directed and designed the sets for this 1985 Metropolitan Opera production of Puccini's romantic opera Tosca. The story revolves around the singer Floria Tosca (Hildegard Behrens), who is jealous of her lover, painter Mario Cavaradossi (Placido Domingo). The corrupt Read More

1985
Cavalleria Rusticana

Crew: Director, Producer

Synopsis: Franco Zeffirelli directed this lavish staging of Mascagni's opera about live among the poor in Sicily on an Easter Sunday. Produced to celebrate the centennial of the La Scala Opera, Cavalleria Rusticana stars Placido Domingo and Elena Obraztova, with Georges Pretre conducting the La Scalla Opera Read More

1985
La Traviata

Crew: Director, Production Designer, Screenwriter

Actors: Teresa Stratas, Plácido Domingo, Cornell MacNeil, Alan Monk, Axelle Gall

Synopsis: Tenor Plácido Domingo and soprano Teresa Stratas star in director Franco Zeffirelli's lushly cinematic version of Verdi's opera La Traviata ("The Woman Gone Astray"), a story of doomed love in 1840s Paris. Violetta (Stratas), who is the mistress of a wealthy baron, hosts a lavish party to Read More

2/18/83
I Pagliacci

Crew: Director

Synopsis: A musical presentation featuring Pretre and the LaScala Orchestra and Chorus with soloists Domingo, Stratas and Pons. Outstanding work by Zeffirelli. ~ All Movie Guide Read More

1983
Turandot (Arena Di Verona)

Crew: Director

Synopsis: Franco Zefferelli directs the Metropolitan Opera production of Puccini's Turandot in this live on-stage recording fromPolygram. Starring legendary performers Placido Domingo, James Levine, and Eva Marton, this opera is presented in the original Italian with English subtitles. Turandot tells the Read More

1983
Endless Love

Crew: Director

Actors: Brooke Shields, Martin Hewitt, Shirley Knight, Don Murray, Richard Kiley

Synopsis: Based on a novel by Scott Spencer, Endless Love details the doomed romance between 17-year-old David (Martin Hewitt) and 15-year-old Jade (Brooke Shields). Banished from Jade's home by her daddy Hugh (Don Murray), David obsessively cooks up a scheme to get back into the family's good graces. Since Read More

1981
The Champ

Crew: Director

Actors: Jon Voight, Faye Dunaway, Rick Schroder, Jack Warden, Arthur Hill, Strother Martin

Synopsis: Billy (Jon Voight) is on the road with his son T.J. (Ricky Schroder), fighting low-end boxing matches for drinking money before moving on to the next town for another match. When his ex-wife (and T.J.'s mother) Annie (Faye Dunaway) shows up, it's to tell him that she wants custody of the boy. She Read More

1979
La Boheme

Crew: Director, Production Designer

Actors: Ileana Cotrubas, Fernando Pavarotti

1979
Callas: A Documentary Plus Bonus

Synopsis: As the subject of several recent documentaries, books, and a feature film, Maria Callas - the most infamous operatic diva of the mid-late Twentieth century - receives her fullest biographical portrait in the 1978 made-for-television documentary Callas: A Documentary Plus Bonus. Narrated by Read More

1978
Jesus of Nazareth

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Robert Powell, Olivia Hussey, Peter Ustinov, Christopher Plummer, Anne Bancroft, James Mason, Ian McShane, Laurence Olivier, Rod Steiger

Synopsis: Because director Franco Zeffirelli noted publicly that he intended to depict Jesus Christ as a human being rather than a religious icon, his expensive made-for-TV miniseries Jesus of Nazareth fell victim to protestors long before its April 3, 1977, debut. Despite the pullout of several sponsors Read More

1977
Brother Sun, Sister Moon

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Graham Faulkner, Judi Bowker, Alec Guinness, Leigh Lawson, Kenneth Cranham

Synopsis: St. Francis of Assisi was an extraordinarily complex and difficult figure whose effect on his contemporary society was electrifying. Even today, many people are moved by his visionary message of universal toleration. Twelfth-century Italy had an exceptionally grim and regimented society, but the Read More

3/28/72
Romeo and Juliet

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Olivia Hussey, Leonard Whiting, Milo O'Shea, Michael York, John McEnery

Synopsis: Director Franco Zeffirelli's 1968 version of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet was touted at the time of its release (successfully, if the box-office receipts are any indication), as something of a "youth trip" movie. This is because Zeffirelli broke the long-standing tradition of casting over-aged Read More

10/19/68
The Taming of the Shrew

Crew: Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Alfred Lynch, Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor, Michael York, Vernon Dobtcheff, Michael Hordern, Natasha Pyne, Victor Spinetti

Synopsis: Franco Zeffirelli's adaptation of William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew is a zesty version of the classic comedy, highlighted by performances by Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor and Nino Rota's score. Instead of simply filming a play, Zeffirelli turned Shakespeare's text into a lively Read More

3/23/67
Much Ado About Nothing

Crew: Director

Synopsis: The victorious Don Pedro is returning to Messina after his latest successful skirmish. His troops include his wicked brother Don John, young Claudio and Benedick, a witty confirmed bachelor from Padua. They are welcomed by the governor, Leonato, as well as by his beautiful daughter Hero and Hero's Read More

1967
Per Firenze

Crew: Director

Actors: Richard Burton

1966
La Boheme

Crew: Director, Production Designer

Actors: Gianni Raimondi, Mirella Freni, Rolando Panerai, Gianni Maffeo, Ivo Vinco

Synopsis: The second of Franco Zeffirelli's filmed operas (it was originally made for TV), La Boheme is of course based on the masterwork by Giacomo Puccini, itself based on a novel by Henri Murger. Mirella Freni plays the tragic Mimi, who is devoted to fickle "starving artist" Rodolfo (Gianni Raimondi). Adriana Martino Read More

1965
La Terra Trema

Crew: First Assistant Director

Synopsis: Luchino Visconti's pseudo-documentary look at the exploitation of Sicilian fishermen was based on Giovanni Verga's 1881 novel I Malavoglia. The townspeople of Aci Trezza, Sicily, portrayed themselves, speaking in their native dialects and fretting about economic hardship for over 160 minutes of Read More

9/2/48
L'Onorevole Angelina

Actors: Anna Magnani, Nando Bruno, Ave Ninchi

Synopsis: Anna Magnani won Best Actress at the 1947 Venice Film Festival for her stirring comic performance in this charming film, which she co-wrote with director Luigi Zampa, [$Suso Cecchio D'Amico}, and Piero Tellini. Magnani portrays Angelina, an impoverished housewife who begins a passionate battle to Read More

11/12/47
Aida (La Scala)

Crew: Producer, Set Designer

Actors: Marco Spotti, Ildiko Komlosi, Violeta Urmana, Roberto Alagna, Giorgio Giuseppini

Synopsis: The legendary director Franco Zeffirelli is arguably as well known for his operatic stage work as for his filmmaking; he helms this production of Giuseppe Verdi's Aida, staged at Teatro la Scala in Milan. Roberto Alagna and Violeta Urmana co-star as the leads. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide Read More