Dark Lover

The author of Becoming Mae West (1997) tackles silent-screen sensation Rudolph Valentino.

Born in the southern Italian town of Castellaneta, Rodolfo Guglielmi's pleasure-loving indolence so alarmed his family that in 1913 they packed the good-looking 18-year-old off to New York. After working as a taxi dancer and playing a few bit parts, he headed west to Hollywood, where at first he seemed doomed to roles as shady fortune-hunters. Renamed Rudolph Valentino, he became a star with his electrifying tango in The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1921), and with the release of The Sheik six months later redefined American women's ideal of their dream lover. Masterful but vulnerable, flashing eyes that promised rapture, and raining down kisses that delivered it, Valentino's onscreen persona was "not like the nice boy who takes you to all the high-school dances," commented Picture Play magazine in 1922. In real life, Rudy (as he preferred to be called) was a rather passive, good-natured guy willing to leave the decisions to his second wife, flamboyant designer Natacha Rambova. His career never really recovered from a two-year absence from the screen caused by the couple's disagreements with Famous Players-Lasky, although he seemed poised for a comeback when peritonitis killed him in 1926. Leider, who previously managed to make Mae West rather dull, again proves that she can understand a sexy, subversive performer's appeal without persuasively conveying it. She dutifully lays out the chronology of Valentino's short life, but doesn't provide enough context to illuminate his cultural impact. At the very least, the exotic, ambiguous sexuality that made women faint and led men to scornfully dub him "a pink powder puff" demands sharper analysis. Valentino's first wife was a lesbian, Rambova was bisexual, Valentino by the author's own account had at least one affair with a man, but Leider does nothing with these facts except state them and move on to more descriptions of clothes, cars, contractual disputes, and spending sprees.

No sizzle at all: Valentino's legendary allure remains a mystery.