Residence Sea Tuscany :: Villa Mazzanta

A RESIDENTIAL HOTEL IN CLARA CALAMAI’S VILLA
(article extracted from the newspaper Il Tirreno,19/06/2005)

Many from Rosignano, who were young in the sixties and seventies, can still picture actress Clara Calamai sunbathing on the private beach of her villa at “ La Mazzanta”.
Proprio quella casa maestosa, prima residenza di lusso costruita nella zona sud di Rosignano, oggi diventa un residence...Come l’araba fenice che risorge dalle ceneri della distruzione, anche la villa dell’attrice cinematografica pratese (divenne contessa sposando il conte Alberto Bonzi e molto discussa per i suoi comportamenti anticonformisti, anche davanti la macchina da presa) ha avuto una storia molto tormentata.
This imposing villa, which used to be a sumptuous dwelling, situated in the south of Rosignano, has been transformed into a residential hotel. Just like the phoenix, this villa rises again from the ashes of destruction. The famous movie actress, native of Prato, became countess by marrying count Alberto Bonzi, and was greatly criticized for her eccentric behaviour, even on film set). The villa at issue has a long troubled past.
It was built in the forties as a luxurious maritime residence, totally immersed in the green and isolated, with its own private beach. It changed many owners during the past years: at the beginning of the fifties, Clara Calamai turned the villa over to a gentleman from North Italy, while part of the property was acquired by the owners of the Max Mayer paint factory. In 1952 the villa and most of the surrounding land were turned over to Salvatore Ciarlo. Recently, from 1975 circa, while Mazzanta was going through an impressive urbanistic growth, it became a summer camp for children, property of the Volterra Local Health Corporation (Asl), It fell into disuse during the first decade of the nineties, and then put on the sales market by the Asl. The Villa was acquired by Massimo Sobrini’s property company in 2001 for 850 thousand euros. For the Sobrini, Villa Mazzanta represents a further investment in the tourist accommodation sector: they are also the owners of the “Stella del Mare residential hotel and own a partnership in a local camping site, the “Mare Blu”.
“In all these years - says Massimo Sobrini – we have never been able to trace back to the exact date of construction of the villa, but we believe it was edified in the forties. It was one of the first villas erected in the Mazzanta: at that time, there were only a few farmhouses in the area, besides the building which was seat of the drainage company. The structure bears many architectural features similar to the Calabrone holiday camps”.
“During the years the Villa has undergone three important restorations. We have not found any signs of the actress’s stay - continues Sobrini – except for a tile bearing the coat of arms of the Bonzi family, to which she belonged to after marrying count Alberto”.
Clara Calamai was the first actress who exposed her naked breast on the screen of the Italian film industry, in 1941, during the shooting of the “La cena delle beffe”, by Alessandro, Blasetti, taken from Sam Benelli’s homonymous play.
Clara Calamai was born in Prato, in September 1915, according to her official version that remained unaltered for a lifetime. It was only after her death, which occurred in 1998 in Rimini, that the world discovered that she was actually born in 1909. She had lived in Prato in via Della Robbia until she was about 18. She was daugher to Priamo Grazzini, a Florentine station-master. She left Prato as a young girl because she wanted to forget a luckless love story with an elder man. It was the beginning of a new life that eventually led her to a long and brilliant career in the film industry. Her beauty could not pass unnoticed: in fact, the first one who noticed her was the film producer Eugenio Fontana, in search of new faces for the film “Pietro Micca”.
Director Aldo Vergano was present at the beginning of Clara Calamai’s brilliant career: in twenty years she had acted in more than 30 films, amongst which unforgettable movies like Ossessione and Le notti bianche by Luchino Visconti, as well as L'adultera (1946) byDuilio Coletti, thanks to which she won a Nastro d'Argento awards.
Many years later, after her retirement from the film industry, Dario Argento seeked her participation in the film Profondo rosso (1975): her character, along with the film itself, became a cult for film lovers.
Clara Calamai spent many summers at the villa at Mazzanta, especially after her marriage to count Bonzi. The residents knew when she was around and often stood outside her villa to try catch a glimpse of her beauty

Clara Calamai, who died in Rimini at the age of 89, was probably one of the first «vip» to visit our beaches. Long before Castiglioncello became the destination of many «film makers » of the Sixties (Sordi, Mastroianni, Gassman…), Clara Calamai had already chosen this secluded area of the Mazzanta as her shelter, during breaks when she was on set, mostly in summertime. This “secret” shelter, during the forties and up to the first decade of the fifties, was nothing more than a nice villa surrounded by fields and a handful of farmhouses; at that time the actress was at the height of her career; from her villa she could reach the beach, and since it was rather desert at that time, she could enjoy the sun and the sea undisturbed.
Just like a legend, villagers still recall the beautiful actress being caught unintentionally by some fishermen while sunbathing in the nude, laying a little boat on the sea of Molino a Fuoco.
An extraordinary event for those days, a long distant memory, that contributed to create the star that she actually was, and the first actress to appear with her breasts uncovered in a scene of the film «La cena delle beffe», released back in 1942. In Mazzanta, that was still a reminiscent of an uncontaminated Maremma, Clara Calamai managed to keep her shelter well hidden from the crowd, even though she had commissioned the building of a small private landing strip to reach her holiday resort by plane. There were no«Paparazzis» in those days, neither TV, and journalists were not crazy to pursue film stars on holiday like they are today. La Mazzanta only consisted of three or four farmhouses scattered in the midst of boundless fields; also Vada – where there was no cinema – was too busy with reconstruction after the war to be interested at all in the film industry.