Giovanna Mezzogiorno

Mediterranean actress Giovanna Mezzogiorno grew up in Rome, then entered formal dramatic studies under the aegis of the legendary Peter Brook at his Paris-based International Center of Theatre Research. Early roles waxed exclusively continental, so that Mezzogiorno's work in projects including Il Viaggio Della Sposa (1997), Un Uomo Perbene (1999), and Nobel (2001) did little to carry her beyond Adriatic borders. A few pivotal crossover efforts, however, began to reverse this trend, notably Cristina Comencini's Don't Tell (2005) -- a child abuse-themed drama that received positive critical notices thanks largely to Mezzogiorno's evocation of post-incest trauma -- and director Mike Newell's Love in the Time of Cholera (2007), with Mezzogiorno as the sole female member of a South American love triangle that also includes Javier Bardem and Liev Schreiber.