Where it was filmed 'I Vitelloni'

Set in a seashore town that could be Rimini, the birthplace of Federico Fellini, the film was actually shot in Viterbo, Ostia, Rome and Florence. The opening scenes are set on a late summer evening at the Kursaal restaurant where a beauty pageant is taking place: this is in Castel Fusano on the Roman coast and is the same place where Leopoldo (Trieste) is invited to the dock by an actor who seems interested in a comedy script he has written. After Sandra (Leonora Ruffo) is elected Miss Sirena, Fausto races down an unpaved road in Ostia Antica, refusing to respect any of his responsibilities. The man is heading to the home he shares with his father and younger sister in Lido di Ostia.

The inner streets and squares of the town are actually those of Viterbo. Piazza delle Erbe, recognisable by its 17^th century fountain, is present in many scenes where the five layabouts do nothing: in one, Moraldo (Franco Interlenghi) is waiting for Fausto who has been spending time with a dancer. The Carnival scenes were shot in via Saffi (also the setting for the shop where Fausto attempts to get a job) and piazza Fontana Grande. On the morning after the party, piazza della Rocca features a mask hanging from the top of the Farnese fountain. The location also provides the exteriors of the theatre where the party was held (various scenes show Porta Fiorentina) and when a drunk and melancholy Alberto (Sordi) is assisted by Moraldo. The interiors meanwhile are Florence’s Teatro Goldoni and used several scenes later for a variety show.

Fausto and Sandra leave for their honeymoon in Rome from the station of Porta Fiorentina in viale Trento, where Moraldo also boards a train in the final scenes. The newly-married couple live in corso Trieste with her parents. Fausto is at the cinema with Sandra in the Appio Latino neighbourhood in Rome, but leaves before the end of the film to follow the woman who was sitting next to him and who lives nearby in via Susa.

One of the most famous scenes in Italian cinema, which features Alberto insulting labourers hard at work, was shot on what is today the grande raccordo anulare (Ring Road) near via Magliana in Rome. The office where Alberto’s sister, Olga, works is in Rome, as is the Convent of San Bonaventura al Palatino where Fausto and Moraldo try to sell an angel statue to a nun before hiding it in a hut on the Ostia shorefront. Ostia also provides the bar where the Vitelloni gather.