Actor

Don Lurio

1 film on Movie OTT

Don Lurio — born Donald Benjamin Lurio on November 15, 1929, in New York City — was one of those rare performers who could do everything: dance, act, sing, choreograph, host. An American who made Italy his home, he spent the better part of five decades reshaping Italian entertainment from the inside out, becoming a fixture on RAI television at a time when the network was essentially building the country's pop-culture identity from scratch. What's striking is how thoroughly he committed to his adopted country, settling in Rome in 1957 and never really looking back.

About Don Lurio

Before Italy, though, there was Broadway — and a dance studio he ran alongside Bob Fosse and Jack Cole (yes, that Bob Fosse), which tells you something about the caliber of company Lurio kept early in his career (Wikipedia). He choreographed the interval act for the Eurovision Song Contest 1970, leading his ensemble The Don Lurio Dancers in a performance that reached an audience most American entertainers of his generation couldn't have imagined. His film credits span four decades, from Casinò de Paris in 1957 to The Fish in Love in 1999, with Italian productions like Rocco e le sorelle (1961) and Pugni pupe e marinai (1961) landing in between.

He died on January 26, 2003, in Rome, from respiratory failure (TMDB). He was 73. In his will, he established a grant at the National Dance Academy in Rome bearing his name — a fitting legacy for someone who spent a lifetime teaching as much as performing.

Early life & background

Don Lurio was born Donald Benjamin Lurio on November 15, 1929, in New York City, New York (TMDB). Some sources cite 1927 as his birth year, though TMDB and the majority of records point to 1929. Beyond his New York origins and his early work in the American dance world — including operating a Broadway dance studio alongside choreographers Bob Fosse and Jack Cole — detailed facts about his family background, formal education, or early training are not well documented in available public sources. What is clear is that he was working at a professional level in New York before relocating permanently to Italy in 1957, suggesting a dance career that took shape well before he turned thirty.

Career

Lurio's career doesn't fit neatly into any one category, which is probably why he isn't better known outside Italy. A dancer first, he was operating a Broadway studio with Bob Fosse and Jack Cole in his early years — a detail that tends to get buried under everything that came after. His 1957 move to Italy wasn't a retreat; it was a pivot that turned out to be the smartest career move he ever made. Once in Rome, he became a central figure in Italian television for RAI, appearing in variety programs like Crociera d'estate and Studio Uno. These weren't minor gigs — Studio Uno was one of RAI's flagship variety shows, and Lurio's presence there put him in front of millions of Italian viewers during television's formative years in the country. His film work ran parallel: Casinò de Paris (1957), Rocco e le sorelle (1961), Pugni pupe e marinai (1961), and Toto's First Night (1962) all landed within his first decade in Italy, establishing him as a recognizable face on screen as well as on stage. The Eurovision 1970 choreography — he led his own ensemble, The Don Lurio Dancers, in the contest's interval act — is the credit that international audiences are most likely to recognize today. Hard to say if he anticipated how durable that moment would become for Eurovision historians, but it's become one of the more-cited entries in his filmography. He kept working well into the 1990s, choreographing the 1999 Sanremo Festival alongside model Laetitia Casta and appearing in The Fish in Love (1999), his last known film credit. A career that stretched from postwar Broadway to the turn of the millennium. Not bad.

Personal life

Lurio was openly gay and maintained a long-term relationship with Livio Costagli, with whom he was partnered for much of his adult life in Rome. He died in Rome on January 26, 2003, from respiratory failure, having made Italy his permanent home since 1957. In his will, he left provisions establishing a grant in his name at the National Dance Academy in Rome — a public-facing gesture toward the dance community he'd been part of for decades. No additional details about family members or other residences are confirmed in available sources.

Cite this page

For Wikipedia, journalism, or academic references — copy the citation below:

Movie OTT. "Don Lurio." Accessed Aug 21, 2026. https://movieott.com/talent/don-lurio

Cross-references: Wikipedia

Last updated July 7, 2026 · Sources: tmdb+wikipedia+perplexity+tmdb-credits+ai-claude

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