Paramount faced an unusually logistical publicity crisis when Monica Vitti reportedly refused to promote the film in the United States because of her fear of flying. The studio tried to engineer an elaborate workaround, offering to send her across the Atlantic by ship and then arrange a chartered train journey across America. Even that plan failed to make the publicity tour viable, and Paramount cancelled the first leg of the North American campaign altogether. For a film whose commercial prospects depended heavily on the glamour and star power of the Italian actress, losing Vitti from the promotional circuit was a serious handicap. Her absence was not presented as a Hollywood urban legend or a studio publicity stunt; contemporary reports and later accounts treated the fear as genuine, though it remains one of the production's strangest practical obstacles.
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AI concept artworkArchive Record · 1970s
Monica Vitti's Fear of Flying Cancelled Paramount's American Publicity Tour
Monica Vitti / 1970s
Paramount faced an unusually logistical publicity crisis when Monica Vitti reportedly refused to promote the film in the United States because of her fear of flying. The studio tried to engineer an elaborate workaround, offering to send her across the Atlantic by ship and then arrange a chartered train journey across America. Even that plan failed to make the publicity tour viable, and Paramount cancelled the first leg of the North American campaign altogether. For a film whose commercial prospects depended heavily on the glamour and star power of the Italian actress, losing Vitti from the promotional circuit was a serious handicap. Her absence was not presented as a Hollywood urban legend or a studio publicity stunt; contemporary reports and later accounts treated the fear as genuine, though it remains one of the production's strangest practical obstacles.
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