Luca Guadagnino

Guadagnino and Ingeborga Dapkunaite, 2010 – Photo Credit: Insidefoto / PR Photos 

Place of Birth: Palermo, Sicily, Italy

Date of Birth: 10 August, 1971

Ethnicity:
*father – Italian/Sicilian
*mother – Algerian

Luca Guadagnino is an Italian film director, producer, and screenwriter. He has directed the films The Protagonists, which he wrote; Melissa P., I Am Love, both of which he co-wrote; A Bigger Splash, Call Me by Your Name, Suspiria (2018), Bones and All, Challengers, and Queer (2024). His work is known for its emotional complexity, often including themes of eroticism and settings in striking locations. He also directed the show We Are Who We Are, which he co-created and wrote for. Among the short films he has directed are The Staggering Girl and Fiori, Fiori, Fiori, the latter of which he also wrote; and among the documentaries he has directed are The Making of Lotus, Bertolucci on Bertolucci, and Salvatore: Shoemaker of Dreams. He also directed the music videos “Tell Me You Love Me” and “Toy Boy,” and advertisements for Fendi and Salvatore Ferragamo. He founded production company Frenesy Film Company.

Luca was born in Palermo, Sicily, Italy, to a Sicilian/Italian father, Gino, from Canicattì, Province of Agrigento, and an Algerian mother, Alia Boutaher; his mother was said to have been raised in Casablanca, Morocco. He spent part of his childhood in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, where his father worked as teacher at a technical school.

He has said:

I’m dark-skinned because my mother is Algerian; when I came back to Palermo, my classmates starting calling me “n—-r.” I will never forget that. I learned very quickly how to be an outsider, and how to stay on the outside of the frame yet always look at what’s happening in the center.

Sources: http://www.iodonna.it
https://en.vogue.me