Tomás Milián

Tomás Milián, real name Tomás Quintín Rodriguez (born March 3, 1932), is a Cuban-American actor.

Career

Milian was born in Havana. The son of a Cuban general, he settled in the United States to study in New York's Actor's Studio and became an American citizen.

After an unsuccessful start in the United States, he relocated to pursued acting jobs in Italy, where he gradually became a very successful performer. He lived in Italy for over 25 years. Although his voice was dubbed most of the time due to his accent, Milian performed his lines in Italian (or in English, depending on the film). He initially starred in arthouse movies and worked with directors such as Mauro Bolognini and Luchino Visconti. He soon became a star in spaghetti westerns, where he often played Mexican bandits or revolutionaries, roles in which he spoke in his real voice. As the genre dwindled, Milian remained a star in many genre films, often playing the villain in poliziotteschi movies. He starred with Barbara Bouchet in " Non si sevizia un paperino". He later turned to comedy, playing the recurrent characters of petty thief Monnezza and Serpico-like police officer Nico Giraldi in a variety of films. Although his voice was dubbed most of the time by Ferruccio Amendola, Milian wrote his own lines in Roman slang. Milian's inventive use of "romanesco" (roman dialect) made him somewhat of a cult performer in Italy, even though his later films were critically panned.

As he aged, Milian found himself less in demand after renouncing his previous screen personas. He eventually decided to go back to the US, where he pursued a low-key career as a character actor. He has played many roles on stage. He could be seen in such movies as Sidney Pollack's "Havana", Steven Spielberg's "Amistad", Steven Soderbergh's "Traffic" as well as Andy Garcia's "The Lost City", about Revolutionary Cuba.

Milian now resides in Miami. His estranged son, Tomaso Milian, is the creative director for the History Book Club, based in Garden City, NY.

Partial filmography

*"Il bell'Antonio" (1960, Mauro Bolognini) - with Marcello Mastroianni, Pierre Brasseur
*"Boccaccio '70" (1962, Luchino Visconti) - with Romy Schneider
*"La resa dei conti" (1966, Sergio Sollima) - with Lee Van Cleef
*"Faccia a faccia" (1967, Sergio Sollima) - with Gian Maria Volontè
*"Se sei vivo spara" (1967, Giulio Questi) - with Ray Lovelock
*"Death Sentence" (1968)
*"Corri uomo corri" (1968, Sergio Sollima)
*"Tepepa" (1968, Giulio Petroni) - with Orson Welles
*"Vamos a matar, compañeros" (1970, Sergio Corbucci) - with Franco Nero, Jack Palance and Fernando Rey
*"The Last Movie" (1971, Dennis Hopper)
*" Non si sevizia un paperino" (1972, Lucio Fulci)
*"" (1974, Umberto Lenzi) - with Henry Silva
*"" (1975, Sergio Martino) - with Mel Ferrer and Luc Merenda
*"Il giustiziere sfida la città" (1975, Umberto Lenzi)
*"I quattro dell'apocalisse" (1975, Lucio Fulci) - with Fabio Testi
*"Roma a mano armata" (1976, Umberto Lenzi) - with Maurizio Merli
*"Squadra antiscippo" (1976, Bruno Corbucci) - with Jack Palance
*"Squadra antifurto" (1976, Bruno Corbucci)
*"Il trucido e lo sbirro" (1977, Umberto Lenzi) - with Claudio Cassinelli, Nicoletta Machiavelli
*"La banda del gobbo" (1977, Umberto Lenzi) - with Maurizio Merli
*"La banda del trucido" (1977, Stelvio Massi) - with Luc Merenda
*"Squadra antitruffa" (197, Bruno Corbucci) - with David Hemmings
*"Squadra antimafia" (1978, Bruno Corbucci) - with Alberto Farnese, Lilli Carati, Roberto Messina
*"Squadra antigangsters" (1979, Bruno Corbucci)
*"Assassinio sul Tevere" (1979, Bruno Corbucci)
*"Delitto a Porta Romana" (1980, Bruno Corbucci)
*"Manolesta" (1981, Pasquale Festa Campanile) - with Giovanna Ralli
*"Delitto al ristorante cinese" (1981, Bruno Corbucci)
*"Delitto sull'autostrada" (1982, Bruno Corbucci)
*"Cane e gatto" (1982 Bruno Corbucci) with Bud Spencer
*"Delitto in Formula Uno" (1983, Bruno Corbucci)
*"Delitto al Blue Gay" (1984, Bruno Corbucci)
*"Cat Chaser" (1989)
*"Money" (1991, Steven Hilliard Stern)
*"Amistad" (1997, Steven Spielberg) - with Djimon Hounsou, Morgan Freeman, Anthony Hopkins
*"Traffic" (2000, Steven Soderbergh) - with Michael Douglas, Benicio del Toro
*"The Yards" (2000, James Gray) - with Mark Wahlberg, Charlize Theron
*"Washington Heights" (2002)
*"The Lost City" (2005, Andy Garcia) - with Andy Garcia, Inés Sastre, Dustin Hoffman, Bill Murray

External links

*imdb name|id=0587401|name=Tomas Milian
* [http://www.italo-phile.net Fan site about Italian genre cinema, including a Tomas Milian tribute page]