High Season

Background:

An African-born director, screenwriter and producer first known as the co-writer of Michelangelo Antonioni’s classic Zabriskie Point (1970) and husband Bernardo Bertolucci’s La Luna (1979), Clare Peploe received good respond for her work in her feature directorial debut, High Season (1987), which netted a San Sebastian International Film Festival Award. She gained additional attention with her next movie, Triumph of Love (2001), a romantic-comedy starring Mira Sorvino that earned a Golden Lion nomination at the Venice Film Festival. Other memorable credits include the short Couples and Robbers (1982) and Bertolucci’s Besieged (1998).

As for her private life, the Tanzanian beauty has been married to Italian filmmaker Bernardo Bertolucci since 1990.


Tanzanian

Childhood and Family:

Older sister of screenwriter-director Mark Peploe, Clare Peploe was born in 1942 in Tanzania, Africa. She majored in French and Italian at Sorbonne and Perugia universities. In 1990, she married Italian director Bernardo Bertolucci (born March 16, 1940) after his marriage to Italian actress Adriana Asti ended in divorce.


Triumph of Love

Career:

Clare Peploe’s career in cinematic industry took place in 1970, when she teamed up with the renowned Italian filmmaker Michelangelo Antonioni to write the script of his classic Zabriskie Point. Nine years later, she collaborated with future husband Bernardo Bertolucci for drama film La Luna, where she served as co-writer and assistant director. Peploe eventually had the opportunity to direct her first film in 1982 with the short Couples and Robbers, which she also wrote, and which earned an Academy Award and BAFTA nominations for Best Short Film.

Following several years break, Peploe made an auspicious comeback in 1987 when she wrote and directed the acclaimed movie High Season, a comedy starring James Fox and Jacqueline Bissett. It won a Silver Shell at the 1987 San Sebastian Film Festival. She scored another victory when she co-directed “Sauce for the Goose,” an episode of television series “Chillers” (1990), which nabbed the Prix dù Public at the Festival de Cognac.

Back to films, Peploe helmed Bridget Fonda and Russell Crowe in the 1950s-set Rough Magic (1995) before reuniting with her director-husband, Bernardo Bertolucci, in his drama film Besieged (1998), starring Thandie Newton. Here, she took a double job as a screenwriter and associate producer. For her effort, the screenwriter received a Silver Ribbon nod for Best Screenplay at Italian National Syndicate of Film Journalists, sharing with Bertolucci.

Peploe resumed her directing and screenwriting career in 2001 with an enterprising modern adaptation of a 300 year-old romantic-comedy, Triumph of Love. Starring Mira Sorvino, the film was nominated a Golden Lion at the 2001 Venice Film Festival.


Awards:

- San Sebastián International Film Festival: Silver Seashell, High Season, 1987