| Franca Rame | |
|---|---|
| Born | July 18, 1928 Parabiago (Italy) |
| Nationality | Italian |
| Occupation | Theater actress, Playwright |
| Years active | 1950–present |
| Spouse | Dario Fo (m. 1950–present) |
| Website | |
| http://www.francarame.it/ | |
Franca Rame (born 18 July 1928) is an Italian theatre actress and playwright. She is also the wife of Nobel Prize winning author Dario Fo and the mother of the writer Jacopo Fo.
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Franca Rame was born in Parabiago, Lombardy, into a family with a long theatre tradition. She made her theatrical debut in 1951. Shortly thereafter, she met Dario Fo, whom she married in 1954. Their son, Jacopo was born on March 31, 1955. In 1958, she co-founded the Dario Fo–Franca Rame Theatre Company in Milan, with Fo as the director and writer, and Rame the leading actress and administrator.
Rame continued working with Fo through many plays and several theatre companies, popular success and government censorship. In the 1970s, Rame began writing plays (often stage monologues) of her own, such as Grasso è bello! and Tutta casa, letto e chiesa, which displayed a markedly feminist bent. In 1973, Rame was abducted, tortured and raped by a fascist group commissioned by high ranking officials in Milan's Carabinieri, the Italian military police.[1] She returned to the stage after two months with new anti-fascist monologues.
Due to the activist, political nature of Fo's and Rame's plays, it is unsurprising that Rame herself became involved in politics. She was a member of the Italian Senate representing the centre-left anti-political corruption Italy of Values (IDV - Italia dei Valori) party, abandoned in 2008 [2] due to political choices of government. From 2010 she is, also with her husband, an independent member of the Communist Refoundation Party (PRC - Partito della Rifondazione Comunista).[3]