Marta Abba, Acclaimed Italian Actress, Dies

Marta Abba, a leading Italian stage performer of the 1920s and ‘30s and the favorite actress of Sicilian playwright Luigi Pirandello, died on her 88th birthday Friday after suffering a stroke, her family announced Saturday.

Abba began her career in 1923 with the stage company of director Ettore Paladini and drew acclaim the following year in Virgilio Talli’s production of Chekhov’s “Gabbiano.” In 1925, she became the lead actress for Pirandello, who won the 1934 Nobel Prize in literature.

After spending years in Rome performing such plays as “Six Characters in Search of an Author,” Pirandello and Abba went on tour in Italy and abroad. Pirandello wrote several plays specifically for Abba, including “Come Tu Mi Vuoi” (As You Desire Me) in 1930.

In 1928-29, Abba formed a company of young actors, who mostly performed plays of her mentor. In 1938, Abba married an American, S.A. Millikin, grandson of a Cleveland steel baron, retired and settled in the United States.

After the marriage broke up, she moved back to Milan in 1953, returning briefly to the stage with a company in her own name. Two years ago, Abba donated to Princeton University the 560 letters that Pirandello had written her.