Romano Scarpa(1927-2005)

Romano Scarpa was born in Venice in 1927 and growing up there he developed a particular love for American cartoons and Disney comics, that, at the time, were published in the big format of the "Topolino Giornale" which was then printing now classic Floyd Gottfredson's stories. In the Forties he opened an Animation Studio in Venice in which he produced his first works: some commercials, a short named _E poi venne il diluvio_ and another very good short, named _La piccola fiammiferaia (1953)_, distributed in Italy together with Robert Aldrich's Attack (1956). Right after that he stopped working in animation for a while and dedicated wholly to creating Disney comics. In the late Fifties and up to about 1963 he wrote and penciled some of the best-known comic masterpieces of all time: stories like "Topolino e la collana Chirikawa" (1960) or "Paperino e la leggenda dello Scozzese volante" (1957) that have, later, been translated in lots of different languages throughout the world. Many of these stories have their backgrounds in movies, for example "Topolino nel favoloso regno di Shan Grillà" (1961) is based upon Frank Capra's Lost Horizon (1937); not to talk about all the stories starring Snow White or the Seven Dwarfs, obviously based on Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937). Sometimes the exact opposite happens; Will Our Heroes Be Able to Find Their Friend Who Has Mysteriously Disappeared in Africa? (1968) is based on Scarpa's story "Topolino e il Pippotarzan" (1957). Around 1963 he relaxed a bit and practically stopped writing his stories for 6 or 7 years, while still penciling stories written by other people, generally not up to the same high standards of his. Then, in the Seventies he went back to writing too, and he's still doing it now, though he has moved to Spain and is working for a different publisher. Among the last things he made while he was still in Italy, at the beginning of the Nineties, there are some wonderful strip stories, the same kind of stories that he loved when he was a child. One of these, "Topolino e l'enigma di Brigaboom" (1989) was partially based on Brigadoon (1954). In the meanwhile he has had time enough for some more animation, so we have _Aihnoo degli Icebergs (1972)_, The Fourth King (1977) and a new TV series, _The Adventures of Marco and Gina (Sopra i tetti di Venezia) (2001)_. In his career Scarpa created many characters that are now widely accepted by everybody to be part of the Disney Universe, characters like Brigitta McBridge, Dickie Duck and Ellsworth's adoptive son, Bruto. Since 1988 some of his comic stories have been published in the USA by Gladstone (a publisher); it was the first time that this happened to an Italian Disney author.