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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World
Angela Giuffrida in Rome

‘This gesture made history’: watch given to Gina Lollobrigida by Fidel Castro is to go on sale

Gina Lollobrigida, with long hair and some hair puffed out above a slight fringe, in a brocade jacket with a big horizontal brooch, , looking serious
‘I asked myself whether it would not be dangerous’: Gina Lollobrigida, in a 1969 portrait by Jane Bown, on interviewing Fidel Castro. Photograph: Jane Bown/The Observer

It was one of the most unusual interviews: she was the glamorous 1950s Italian film star, once described as the “most beautiful woman in the world”; he was the gruff communist leader of Cuba.

But Gina Lollobrigida and Fidel Castro clearly hit it off. He was so taken with his interrogator, who had become a photojournalist after her film career ended, that he took off his watch and gave it to her.

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