Mario Brega
Italian actor (1923-1994)
Mario Brega (25 March 1923 – 23 July 1994) was an Italian character actor. His heavy build meant that he regularly portrayed a thug in his films, particularly earlier in his career in westerns. Later in his career, however, he featured in numerous Italian comedy films. Brega stood at 6 feet 4 inches (1.93 m) and well over 250 pounds (110 kg) at his heaviest but after the 1960s slimmed down significantly.
Biography
Brega was born in Rome. He was a butcher before he drifted into acting, where his heavy physique ensured him a plethora of character roles. Debuting with director Dino Risi, he then played some minor roles in Sergio Leone's Spaghetti Western movies: A Fistful of Dollars, as Chico; For a Few Dollars More, as Niño; The Good, the Bad and the Ugly as Corporal Wallace; and also as a gangster in Once Upon a Time in America. He appeared in many other Spaghetti Westerns, including Death Rides a Horse, The Great Silence, and My Name is Nobody. Later in his career he had comical roles with director Carlo Verdone, such as in Un sacco bello and Talcum Powder.
He died of a heart attack in Rome in 1994.
“Mario Brega” enters the record as italian actor (1923-1994). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Mario, Brega and Italian can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 31, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1040908. The first chronological checks are 1923 and 1994.
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This entry incorporates text from “Mario Brega” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.