Light in the Piazza (film) Light in the Piazza (film) Light in the Piazza is a 1962 American romantic drama film directed by Guy Green and starring Olivia de Havilland, Rossano Brazzi, Yvette Mimieux, George Hamilton, and Barry Sullivan. Based on the 1960 novel "The Light in the Piazza" by Elizabeth Spencer, the film is about a beautiful but mentally disabled young American woman traveling in Italy with her mother and the Italian man they meet during one leg of their trip. Distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, "Light in the Piazza" is notable for its extensive location shooting in 1960s Florence and Rome by the award-winning cinematographer
The Light in the Piazza (novel) The Light in the Piazza (novel) The Light in the Piazza is a 1960 novella by Mississippi writer Elizabeth Spencer. At its core are Margaret Johnson and her daughter Clara, on vacation in Italy, where Clara becomes enamored of local Florentine Fabrizio. What appears on the surface to be nothing more than a romantic story of young love slowly dissolves into a more tragic tale involving a past accident with serious consequences, dark family secrets, deception, and a conflict between maternal love and responsibility and an innocent girl's physical and emotional desires as she becomes aware of her awakening sexuality.