Chelo Alonso

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Chelo Alonso is a former Cuban actress who became a star in Italian cinema, and ultimately a 60's cult film heroine and sex symbol in the U.S. She was well-known for playing femme fatales with fiery tempers and sensual dance scenes.

[edit] Biography

Alonso was born Isabella Garcia on April 10, 1933 in Central Lugareno, Camaguey, Cuba to a Cuban father and Mexican mother. She initially achieved recognition in Cuba for her dancing ability, becoming a sensation at Cuba's National Theatre in Havana.

Soon after, she emerged as a new exotic dancing talent at the Folies-Bergere in Paris. She was billed as the "new Josephine Baker", who had also performed and become famous at the Folies. Alonso was billed as the "Cuban H-Bomb", and mixed Afro-Cuban rhythms from her homeland with "bump and grind".

Most of Alonso's films were adventure movies in the style of Fatiche di Ercole, Le (Hercules). Hercules starred Steve Reeves and was a wildly popular new genre in film. It paved the way for movies attempting to emulate it. These films required exotic talent, and Alonso's dark beauty fit the bill; she even starred with Steve Reeves himself in Goliath and the Barbarians in 1959. Goliath and the Barbarians earned Alonso the award of "Italian Cinema's Female Discovery".

Alonso was first noticed internationally in the 1959 film, Nel segno di Roma (Sign of the Gladiator), which starred Anita Ekberg and Georges Marchal. Due to a particularly erotic dance number, her picture and name became more prominent on the movie's publicity posters than either of the two leads, much to Ekberg's dismay.

Following Desert War in 1962, Alonso left film for a time to turn her attention to television. She did not return until 1966's spaghetti western The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly - her most widely distributed film - ironically playing a small, non-speaking role.

In 1961, Alonso married Aldo Pomilia, a production manager and producer for many of her films. She has one son, Aldino Pomilia.

After the death of her husband, Alonso moved to the city of Siena in Tuscany, Italy. She retired from film and started a cat-breeding business, as well as a four-star hotel.

[edit] Filmography

Year	Title	Role
1959	Reali de Francia,I (Attack of the Moors)	Suleima
	Guardatele ma non toccatele	Un'ausiliaria
	Nel segno di Roma (Sign of the Gladiator)	Erica
	Tunisi Top Secret	Sherazad/Soraya
	Scimitarra del Saraceno, La (The Pirate and the Slave Girl)	Princess Miriam
	Terrore dei barbari, Il (Goliath and the Barbarians)	Londo
1960	Strada dei giganti, La (Road of the Giants)	Stella Von Kruger
	Le Signore
	Maciste nella valle dei re (Son of Samson)	Queen Smedes
	Gastone	Carmencita
	Terrore della maschera rossa (Terror of the Red Mask)	Karima
1961	Ragazza sotto il lenzuolo, La (Girl Under the Sheet)	Maria Celeste Cortez
	Regina dei tartari, La (The Huns)	Tanya, Queen of the Tartars
	Maciste nella terra dei ciclopi (Atlas Against the Cyclops)	Capys
	Morgan il pirata (Morgan the Pirate)	Concepcion
1962	Quattro notti don Alba (Desert War)	Alba
1966	Buono, il brutto, il cattivo, Il (The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly)	Stevens' Wife
1968	Corri uomo corri (Big Gundown 2)	Dolores
1970	Notte dei serpenti, La (Night of the Serpent)