Alighiero Noschese

Who was Alighiero Noschese?

Alighiero Noschese was an Italian TV impersonator and actor.

Noschese was born in Naples. After an unsuccessful attempt to work as journalist, he debuted for Italian radio as imitator and parodist. After some theatre appearances under Garinei e Giovannini, he became popular with the TV show Doppia coppia, where, for the first time in Italian then wholly state-controlled television, an actor was allowed to imitate politicians.

Noschese became popular for his outstanding capability to imitate not only voice of characters, but also their physical features and attitudes. In an interview just before his death, Noschese listed a total of 1,156 voices he had imitated in his career.

On December 3, 1979, at the top of his career, Noschese shot himself while under care for clinical depression in Rome.