The formidable artistic coincidences between Maria Callas and Anna Magnani

In this year that marks half a century from the death of the actress and the centenary of the singer’s birth, biopics are being prepared for both. Women like none are born anymore. The loves, the fatal letters, the directors: Pasolini, Visconti and Zeffirelli

Such women, ancient and tragic Mediterranean sorceresses, are no longer born in this part of the world. The affirmation sounds peremptory but undisturbed if I ask myself what Anna Magnani and Maria Callas had in common – if they ever did. Two divas of different generations that an astral conjunction, a cabalistic joke, places on the same timeline. Indeed, here is the magnificent soprano, with Maria Malibran the greatest of all time, and Nannarella come back together in this stormy year, which marks half a century from the death of Magnani (1973) and the centenary of the birth of Callas (1923). While, in a busyness of celebrations, Angelina Jolie is preparing to play Callas in the new biopic of Pablo Larraín and Monica Guerritore wants to make a film about Magnani.