Terence Hill

Hill was born on 29 March 1939 in Venice, Italy.[2] Hill's mother, Hildegard Girotti (née Thieme), was a German, from Dresden; his father, Girolamo Girotti, was Italian, and a chemist by occupation.[3]

During his childhood, Hill lived in the small town of Lommatzsch, Saxony. He was there through the end of World War II (1943–1945) and survived the Bombing of Dresden.[4]

He was discovered by Italian filmmaker Dino Risi at a swimming meet at the age of 12, and became a child actor, appearing in Risi's Il viale della speranza (1953), billed as "Girolamo Girotti". He would act as "Mario Girotti". "They were looking for a boy gang leader and they found me," he later said.[5]

He had small roles in Voice of Silence (1953) with Jean Marais, Too Young for Love (1953), and It Happened in the Park (1953), and had a particularly good part in Vacation with a Gangster (1953) with an imported star, Marc Lawrence.[2]

He was in La vena d'oro (1954) with Marta Toren and Richard Basehart, The Abandoned (1955) and Folgore Division (1955).

Girotti had his first lead in Guaglione (1956). He could also be seen in Mamma sconosciuta (1956), I vagabondi delle stelle (1956), La grande strada azzurra (1956) with Yves Montand and Alida Valli, and Lazzarella (1957).[6]

Girotti did Anna of Brooklyn (1958) with Gina Lollobrigida, The Sword and the Cross (1958) with Yvonne de Carlo (playing Lazarus of Bethany), and a TV version of The Picture of Dorian Gray (1958).[7]

He had support parts in Il padrone delle ferriere (1959) with Virna Lisi, Juke box - Urli d'amore (1959), and Hannibal (1959) with Victor Mature and Carlo Pedersoli, who would later become known as Bud Spencer. Girotti had the lead roles in Spavaldi e innamorati (1959) and Cerasella (1959), a teen comedy.

It was back to support roles with Carthage in Flames (1960), Un militare e mezzo (1960), and The Story of Joseph and His Brethren (1961) with Geoffrey Horne and Robert Morley, directed by Irving Rapper.[8]

Girotti had support parts in The Wonders of Aladdin (1961) with Donald O'Connor and directed by Henry Levin and Mario Bava, Pecado de amor (1961), Seven Seas to Calais (1962) with Rod Taylor, and The Shortest Day (1963).[7][9]

Girotti secured a substantial supporting role in Luchino Visconti's film epic The Leopard (1963) alongside Burt Lancaster and Alain Delon, in which he unsuccessfully tries to court the daughter of Lancaster's character. During this time he studied classical literature for three years at an Italian university.[5]

In 1964, he returned to Germany and there appeared in a series of Heimatfilme, adventure and western films, based on novels by German author Karl May.[10] These included Last of the Renegades (1964) with Lex Barker; three films with Stewart Granger, Amongst Vultures (1964), The Oil Prince (1965) and Old Surehand (1965); Shots in 3/4 Time (1965); Duel at Sundown (1965) with Peter Van Eyck; Call of the Forest (1965), an Austrian movie; Die Nibelungen, Teil 1 - Siegfried (1965) and Die Nibelungen, Teil 2 - Kriemhilds Rache (1967).

In 1967, he returned to Italy to make Io non protesto, io amo (1967), co starring Caterina Caselli.

Hill has stated in interviews that My Name Is Nobody (1973), in which he co-starred with Henry Fonda,[12] is his personal favorite of all his films.[12] The film was based on an idea for Sergio Leone.

Hill and Spencer appeared in Watch Out, We're Mad (1974) and Two Missionaries (1974) then without him he made the spaghetti Western A Genius, Two Partners and a Dupe (1975). He moved from Italy to live in the US and settled in the Berkeshires.[7]

Dino De Laurentiis cast Hill in his first American film, Mr. Billion (1977), directed by Jonathan Kaplan for 20th Century Fox co starring Valerie Perrine and Jackie Gleason. It was a box office flop.[13][14]

Hill returned to Italy for Crime Busters (1977) with Spencer, then he made another English language movie, March or Die (1977), an $8 million French Foreign Legion tale for Lew Grade, co starring Gene Hackman and Catherine Deneuve. It was a box office disappointment.[15][5]

Despite being fluent in Italian and English, Hill was usually dubbed by other actors in both languages. In the Italian versions of his films, his voice was provided by a variety of actors until the late 1960s, where he was primarily dubbed by Sergio Graziani; from 1970 to 1983, Hill was voiced by Pino Locchi, and by Michele Gammino from 1983 to 1996. For English dubs, Hill was dubbed by Lloyd Battista in six films, including the "Cat Stevens and Hutch Bessy" trilogy, while Roger Browne dubbed him in most of his early 1970s films (They Call Me Trinity to A Genius, Two Partners and a Dupe); from Mr. Billion onward, Hill dubbed his own English voice.[16][17]

Terence Hill in Dresden in August 2018

Hill and Spencer starred in Odds and Evens (1978), I'm for the Hippopotamus (1979), Who Finds a Friend Finds a Treasure (1981), and Go for It (1983). Without Spencer, Hill made Org (1979), which he also produced, and Super Fuzz (1980).[18]

Hill did The World of Don Camillo (1984), which he also produced and directed. He teamed with Spencer for Double Trouble (1984), and Miami Supercops (1985), then did They Call Me Renegade (1987), based on a story by Hill.