Andrea Prodan
Encyclopedia
Andrea Prodan Scottish-Italian film actor, composer and musician is the younger brother of Argentine rock star Luca Prodan
. The Prodan family, after suffering internment in a Japanese concentration camp during WW II, was expelled from China due to Mao
. Andrea's Italian father was an author and talented sportsman, and had run a prosperous business, with expertise in ancient Chinese pottery. His mother is Scottish.
The family moved to Rome and Tuscany
in 1948 where Andrea spent his early years. He was educated in England, and aged 12, became head chorister at The King's School, Canterbury
. As solo voice he recorded "A Song for All Seasons". He started in films as a sound assistant on Krull
and also on The Vatican Story, with Gregory Peck
.
In 1983, he dropped out of Exeter University to join his elder sister Michela on the set of Italian International Films production in Monastir, Tunisia
, producing with NBC a sequel to Franco Zeffirelli
's Jesus of Nazareth. A.D., an NBC miniseries, the story of the Acts of the Apostles
was directed by Stuart Cooper
. Andrea Prodan became (for two years), the assistant operator and interpreter for the Italian director of photography, Ennio Guarnieri. A.D. stars included Ava Gardner
, James Mason
, Denis Quilley
and Fernando Rey
. He played alongside Ava Gardner as "Britannicus
". During that time he filmed a short film, in the Sahara, which won an ICA prize in 1984.
He went on to work with Federico Fellini
on a series of rare commercials directed by the film giant, and lit by Guarnieri.
Fluent in English and Italian, Andrea Prodan pursued a career mainly in Italian films. In 1985, he appeared in Giochi d'Estate and as a co-protagonist in the film The Berlin Affair
(Interno Berlinese) by Liliana Cavani
. Following this he appeared in films with the Taviani brothers
(Good Morning, Babylon) and Peter Greenaway
(Il ventre dell'Architetto - The Belly of an Architect
). In 1987, he played the role of Ettore Majorana
in the film I ragazzi di via Panisperna
by Gianni Amelio
. There followed work with various directors such as Giuseppe Bertolucci, Guido Chiesa, and Alex and Fiorella Infascelli
.
In 1991, he played the mentally disabled but handsome "Marco", who breaks up a romance between characters played by Bruno Ganz
and teaming up, once again, with Ornella Muti
in the third mysterious short story of La Domenica Specialmente. Muti and Prodan had become friends on the set of 'A Season of Giants', a U.S. mini-series in which he portrayed renaissance painter Raphael, and Muti his muse, Onoria.
In 1995, he travelled to Argentina
and with Felix Valls at the console, recorded "Viva Voce", a record in which he impersonates all the instruments, using nothing but his voice. The disc received warm reviews and the musician Peter Gabriel
called it his favourite record of the year. In 2001, Andrea decided to settle in Argentina. In 2005, he worked with Emmanuele Crialese in the film Nuovomondo; Leone d'Argento at the Venice Film Festival
(2006). He composed the film score for two Argentinian films (El Jardin Primitivo and Caballos en la Ciudad) and for innumerable advertising spots. A series of TV commercials in which he depicts the fictitious, toothy, comic character 'Al Dentice' was aired nationwide in Italy. He lives in Buenos Aires
and in Córdoba, Argentina
and has two children. He heads the rock band Romapagana and hosts Metiendo Púa, a radio show. He is pursuing his film acting career and is a point of reference regarding his brother, Luca, who died in 1987.
On December 31st 2009, ROMAPAGANA released their first album, which was recorded by Mariano Iezzi in CCCI Studios, Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Luca Prodan
Luca Prodan was a Scottish musician.He was the son of an Italian father and a Scottish mother, born in Rome after the return of the Prodan family from China, where Luca's father had set up a prosperous business becoming an expert in ancient Chinese pottery, because of the Japanese invasion...
. The Prodan family, after suffering internment in a Japanese concentration camp during WW II, was expelled from China due to Mao
Mao Zedong
Mao Zedong, also transliterated as Mao Tse-tung , and commonly referred to as Chairman Mao , was a Chinese Communist revolutionary, guerrilla warfare strategist, Marxist political philosopher, and leader of the Chinese Revolution...
. Andrea's Italian father was an author and talented sportsman, and had run a prosperous business, with expertise in ancient Chinese pottery. His mother is Scottish.
The family moved to Rome and Tuscany
Tuscany
Tuscany is a region in Italy. It has an area of about 23,000 square kilometres and a population of about 3.75 million inhabitants. The regional capital is Florence ....
in 1948 where Andrea spent his early years. He was educated in England, and aged 12, became head chorister at The King's School, Canterbury
The King's School, Canterbury
The King's School is a British co-educational independent school for both day and boarding pupils in the historic English cathedral city of Canterbury in Kent. It is a member of the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference and the Eton Group....
. As solo voice he recorded "A Song for All Seasons". He started in films as a sound assistant on Krull
Krull (film)
Krull is a 1983 heroic fantasy film directed by Peter Yates and produced by Ron Silverman. Released by Columbia Pictures, it stars Ken Marshall as Prince Colwyn and Lysette Anthony as Princess Lyssa....
and also on The Vatican Story, with Gregory Peck
Gregory Peck
Eldred Gregory Peck was an American actor.One of 20th Century Fox's most popular film stars from the 1940s to the 1960s, Peck continued to play important roles well into the 1980s. His notable performances include that of Atticus Finch in the 1962 film To Kill a Mockingbird, for which he won an...
.
In 1983, he dropped out of Exeter University to join his elder sister Michela on the set of Italian International Films production in Monastir, Tunisia
Monastir, Tunisia
-Areas within Monastir:Monastir's north-eastern territories lead into a place called Route de la Falaise, through which you will reach its most notable suburb, Skanes, which is 6 miles from Monastir's town centre...
, producing with NBC a sequel to Franco Zeffirelli
Franco Zeffirelli
Franco Zeffirelli KBE is an Italian director and producer of films and television. He is also a director and designer of operas and a former senator for the Italian center-right Forza Italia party....
's Jesus of Nazareth. A.D., an NBC miniseries, the story of the Acts of the Apostles
Acts of the Apostles
The Acts of the Apostles , usually referred to simply as Acts, is the fifth book of the New Testament; Acts outlines the history of the Apostolic Age...
was directed by Stuart Cooper
Stuart Cooper
Stuart W. Cooper is an American filmmaker, actor and writer.Cooper was a resident in the United Kingdom in the 1960s and 1970s where his most notable film appearance was as one of The Dirty Dozen, Roscoe Lever....
. Andrea Prodan became (for two years), the assistant operator and interpreter for the Italian director of photography, Ennio Guarnieri. A.D. stars included Ava Gardner
Ava Gardner
Ava Lavinia Gardner was an American actress.She was signed to a contract by MGM Studios in 1941 and appeared mainly in small roles until she drew attention with her performance in The Killers . She became one of Hollywood's leading actresses, considered one of the most beautiful women of her day...
, James Mason
James Mason
James Neville Mason was an English actor who attained stardom in both British and American films. Mason remained a powerful figure in the industry throughout his career and was nominated for three Academy Awards as well as three Golden Globes .- Early life :Mason was born in Huddersfield, in the...
, Denis Quilley
Denis Quilley
Denis Clifford Quilley OBE was an English theatre, television and film actor who was long associated with the Royal National Theatre....
and Fernando Rey
Fernando Rey
Fernando Casado Arambillet , best known as Fernando Rey, was a Spanish film, theatre, and TV actor, who worked in both Europe and the United States...
. He played alongside Ava Gardner as "Britannicus
Britannicus
Tiberius Claudius Caesar Britannicus was the son of the Roman emperor Claudius and his third wife Valeria Messalina. He became the heir-designate of the empire at his birth, less than a month into his father's reign. He was still a young boy at the time of his mother's downfall and Claudius'...
". During that time he filmed a short film, in the Sahara, which won an ICA prize in 1984.
He went on to work with Federico Fellini
Federico Fellini
Federico Fellini, Cavaliere di Gran Croce OMRI , was an Italian film director and scriptwriter. Known for a distinct style that blends fantasy and baroque images, he is considered one of the most influential and widely revered filmmakers of the 20th century...
on a series of rare commercials directed by the film giant, and lit by Guarnieri.
Fluent in English and Italian, Andrea Prodan pursued a career mainly in Italian films. In 1985, he appeared in Giochi d'Estate and as a co-protagonist in the film The Berlin Affair
The Berlin Affair
The Berlin Affair is a 1985 Italo-German film, directed by Liliana Cavani and starring Gudrun Landgrebe, Kevin McNally and Mio Takaki. Set in Berlin, 1938, it sees the wife of a rising Nazi diplomat fall in love with Mitsuko Matsugae, the daughter of the Japanese Ambassador and an artist. Her...
(Interno Berlinese) by Liliana Cavani
Liliana Cavani
Liliana Cavani is an Italian film director and screenwriter. She belongs to a generation of Italian filmmakers that came into prominence in the 1970s and includes Bernardo Bertolucci, Pier Paolo Pasolini and Marco Bellochio. Cavani became internationally known after the success of her 1974 feature...
. Following this he appeared in films with the Taviani brothers
Paolo and Vittorio Taviani
Paolo and Vittorio Taviani are noted Italian film directors and screenwriters...
(Good Morning, Babylon) and Peter Greenaway
Peter Greenaway
Peter Greenaway, CBE is a British film director. His films are noted for the distinct influence of Renaissance and Baroque painting, and Flemish painting in particular...
(Il ventre dell'Architetto - The Belly of an Architect
The Belly of an Architect
The Belly of an Architect is a 1987 film drama written and directed by Peter Greenaway, featuring original music by Glenn Branca and Wim Mertens....
). In 1987, he played the role of Ettore Majorana
Ettore Majorana
Ettore Majorana was an Italian theoretical physicist who began work on neutrino masses. He disappeared suddenly in mysterious circumstances. He is noted for the eponymous Majorana equation and for Majorana fermions.-Gifted in mathematics:Majorana was born in Catania, Sicily...
in the film I ragazzi di via Panisperna
I ragazzi di via Panisperna
is an Italian movie by director Gianni Amelio, telling the enthusiasms, fears, joys and disappointments of the life of a well-known group of boys fond of physics and mathematics, who just made history as the Via Panisperna boys.-Plot:The story is inspired by a real life fact and set in the...
by Gianni Amelio
Gianni Amelio
Gianni Amelio is an Italian film director.-Biography:Amelio was born in San Pietro di Magisano, province of Catanzaro, Calabria. His father moved to Argentina soon after his birth. He spent his youth and adolescence with his mother and his grandmother...
. There followed work with various directors such as Giuseppe Bertolucci, Guido Chiesa, and Alex and Fiorella Infascelli
Fiorella Infascelli
Fiorella Infascelli is an Italian film director and screenwriter. She has directed eight films between 1980 and 2003. Her film The Mask was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 1988 Cannes Film Festival.-Filmography:...
.
In 1991, he played the mentally disabled but handsome "Marco", who breaks up a romance between characters played by Bruno Ganz
Bruno Ganz
Bruno Ganz is a Swiss actor, known for his roles as Damiel in Wings of Desire and Adolf Hitler in Downfall.- Early life :Bruno Ganz was born in Zürich to a Swiss mechanic father and a northern Italian mother. He had decided to pursue an acting career by the time he entered university...
and teaming up, once again, with Ornella Muti
Ornella Muti
Ornella Muti is an Italian actress. She was born in Rome as Francesca Romana Rivelli, to a Neapolitan father and Russian mother. Her maternal grandparents immigrated from Leningrad , Russia, to Estonia...
in the third mysterious short story of La Domenica Specialmente. Muti and Prodan had become friends on the set of 'A Season of Giants', a U.S. mini-series in which he portrayed renaissance painter Raphael, and Muti his muse, Onoria.
In 1995, he travelled to Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
and with Felix Valls at the console, recorded "Viva Voce", a record in which he impersonates all the instruments, using nothing but his voice. The disc received warm reviews and the musician Peter Gabriel
Peter Gabriel
Peter Brian Gabriel is an English singer, musician, and songwriter who rose to fame as the lead vocalist and flautist of the progressive rock group Genesis. After leaving Genesis, Gabriel went on to a successful solo career...
called it his favourite record of the year. In 2001, Andrea decided to settle in Argentina. In 2005, he worked with Emmanuele Crialese in the film Nuovomondo; Leone d'Argento at the Venice Film Festival
Venice Film Festival
The Venice International Film Festival is the oldest international film festival in the world. Founded by Count Giuseppe Volpi in 1932 as the "Esposizione Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica", the festival has since taken place every year in late August or early September on the island of the...
(2006). He composed the film score for two Argentinian films (El Jardin Primitivo and Caballos en la Ciudad) and for innumerable advertising spots. A series of TV commercials in which he depicts the fictitious, toothy, comic character 'Al Dentice' was aired nationwide in Italy. He lives in Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
and in Córdoba, Argentina
Córdoba, Argentina
Córdoba is a city located near the geographical center of Argentina, in the foothills of the Sierras Chicas on the Suquía River, about northwest of Buenos Aires. It is the capital of Córdoba Province. Córdoba is the second-largest city in Argentina after the federal capital Buenos Aires, with...
and has two children. He heads the rock band Romapagana and hosts Metiendo Púa, a radio show. He is pursuing his film acting career and is a point of reference regarding his brother, Luca, who died in 1987.
On December 31st 2009, ROMAPAGANA released their first album, which was recorded by Mariano Iezzi in CCCI Studios, Buenos Aires, Argentina.