Edoardo Ballerini Biography

Edoardo Ballerini is an actor, writer, director and film producer. He is best known for his work on screen as junkie Corky Caporale in The Sopranos (2006"2007), a hotheaded chef in the indie hit Dinner Rush (2001), and an NFL businessman in the blockbuster Romeo Must Die (2000). He has appeared in numerous films and television series, from I Shot Andy Warhol (1996) to the upcoming Omphalos (2013). His directorial debut, Good Night Valentino, premiered at the 2003 Sundance Film Festival. Ballerini starred in the film as silent film idol Rudolph Valentino.

Career

Early roles

Edoardo Ballerini's first professional role was as an autistic teenager on Law & Order (1995). Two years later, he starred in the John Leguizamo comedy The Pest (1997) and, after that, appeared in Whit Stillman's The Last Days of Disco (1998) and Amos Kollek's Sue (1998).

Major roles

Ballerini was cast as the "star chef" in Bob Giraldi's Dinner Rush (2001) opposite Danny Aiello. The film grossed only $638,227 but received largely positive reviews. Internationally, the film did much better and broke into the top ten in box office receipts in Japan in 2003.

Valentino

The same year, Ballerini wrote, directed and starred in a short film about 1920's film icon Rudolph Valentino. The film premiered at the 2003 Sundance Film Festival and was entered into the permanent archive at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Los Angeles. The film was also presented at the National Museum of Cinema in Turin, Italy in 2009 as part of a Valentino retrospective. Emily Leider, in her biography Dark Lover (Farrar, Strouss & Giroux, 2003), wrote that Ballerini "infuses his [Valentino] with exactly the right mix of pride, elegance, grace and anguish... on screen, Ballerini's resemblance to Valentino is uncanny."

Ballerini was also cast as another famous 1920's Italian, the anarchist and labor leader Carlo Tresca, in No God, No Master (2011).

Theater

Ballerini made his first professional appearance on stage as a child in 1980 at Theater for the New City, New York, in Mario Prosperi's "Uncle Mario." He subsequently joined the Italian Commedia dell'Arte troupe for several performances. Stage credits as an adult include Stefanie Zadravec's "Honey Brown Eyes" (Theater Row), John Jesurun's "Chang in a Void Moon" (The Kitchen), "The End of Cinematics" (St. Ann's Space), "Crossroads" (The Henry Street Settlement), and several pieces in "The Eugene O'Neill Project" (The Actors Studio, The Eugene O'Neill Center).

Audiobooks

Ballerini is also a frequent and Award-winning narrator of audiobooks. He received an "Earphones" Awards from Audiofile Magazine (subscription required) for his recordings of Stephen Greenblatt's National Book Award Winning "The Swerve," Paul Farmer's "Haiti: After the Earthquake" (with Meryl Streep and Eric Conger), and Kristopher Jansma's The Unchangeable Spots of Leopards. Other titles include Nobel Prize Winner Kenzaburo Oe's "Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids," Jonathan Carroll's "The Land of Laughs", Jonathan Evison's "West of Here", and the first four novels in Robert McCammon's Matthew Corbett series.

Upcoming

Future projects include Gabriel Judet-Weinshel's "Omphalos," with Emmanuelle Chriqui and Austin Pendleton, which Ballerini also produced, "Hellbenders" with Clifton Collins, Jr, and "Run," with William Mosely and Adrian Pasdar.

Personal life

Edoardo Ballerini was born to an Italian father, the poet Luigi Ballerini, and an American mother. He grew up between New York City and Milan, Italy. He is a dual citizen, and bilingual. His early schooling took place in New York, at P.S. 41 and later Friends Seminary, before he left home at age 14 for boarding school. From there, he attended Wesleyan University. The summer following his graduation with Honors, Ballerini was given a scholarship to study Latin in Rome. In Italy, he discovered a group of ex-pat actors who were forming a theater company. He joined the troupe. The following fall he attended regular acting classes in New York at HB Studios and The Lee Strasberg Theater Institute. He later became an observer at The Actor's Studio. After living for several years in New York, Ballerini moved to Los Angeles in 2000 before eventually returning to New York, where he continues his career.

Filmography

• Ripper Street (2013)
• Omphalos (2013)
• Run (2013)
• Hellbenders (2012)
• Body of Proof - Episode 3: "Helping Hand"
• No God, No Master (2011)
• Boardwalk Empire (2010)
• Trophy Kids (2010) (uncredited)
• Life is Hot in Cracktown (2009)
• Batman: The Brave and the Bold (TV, 2009) (voice)
• The Caller (2008)
• Moonlight (TV, 2008)
• Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (TV, 2008)
• No Exit (2008)
• The Sopranos (TV, 2006"2007)
• Protect and Serve (TV Pilot, 2007)
• Without a Trace (TV, 2006)
• El Cortez (2006)
• Medium (TV, 2006)
• A Year and a Day (2005)
• Freezerburn (2005)
• The F Word (2005)
• Charmed (TV, 2004)
• Threat Matrix (TV, 2003)
• Good Night Valentino (Short, 2003)
• Malevolent (2002)

• 24 (TV, 2002)
• NYPD Blue (TV, 2002)
• Going to California (TV, 2002)
• Drowning Lessons (Short, 2002)
• Free (Film) (2001) (uncredited)
• Dinner Rush (2001)
• Romeo Must Die (2000)
• Homicide: Life on the Street (TV, 1999)
• Suits (1999)
• Looking for an Echo (1998)
• Vig (1998)
• The Last Days of Disco (1998)
• The Substitute 2: School's Out (1998)
• Sue (1997)
• The Pest (1997)
• I'm Not Rappaport (1996)
• 5 Dead on the Crimson Canvas (1996)
• The Pallbearer (1996)
• I Shot Andy Warhol (1996)
• Law & Order (TV, 1995)