In the summer of 1926, Rudolph Valentino could never have imagined what would happen in the event of his death. Few thirty-one-year-olds ever think about their own demise, let alone anticipate how it might unfold afterward. Valentino could never have fathomed what transpired; the legal distortions, the narrative wars and the exploitation of silence itself.
During those months just before his untimely death, he believed his affairs were in order. He had a will secured in his office safe and his complicated business matters were being managed by the capable George Ullman. He had every reason to believe his future and his legacy were protected. Fate had other plans.
Valentino could never have imagined that exactly one hundred years later, I would be recording this message to announce the completion of a book titled Valentino Fugitive; a book not constructed from myth or legend but from record.
In the hours and days following Valentino’s death, a myth was deliberately constructed, upheld and enforced. For decades, anyone who dared to challenge that fabrication was systematically silenced by a self-appointed authority of family members, collectors and loyalists. This became the protocol.
With the advent of the internet and public access to documents, the historical record began to surface. Rather than ending the distortions, this intensified efforts to maintain the myth and suppress contradiction.
Over the years the attempt to silence me was carefully documented primarily by my late husband Renato Floris. He preserved the record and encouraged me to write this account based on evidence. I have.
Valentino Fugitive is now complete and will appear on Amazon in the coming days. It is not only the story of a sustained effort to censor, silence and bury our work, but also the story of Renato and my life and love together. We did not experience a single day without attack from those determined to preserve the myth, as we sought justice and historical clarity.
I move this effort forward.
Every book we published was met with coordinated one-star attacks and false claims of authority, repeated to undermine credibility and suppress sales. These tactics are now familiar and barely concealed. Valentino Fugitive will likely receive the same reception but in this instance those reviews will reinforce my narrative and prove I tell the truth.
The book exists because of the life Renato and I lived together and the truth I continue to live with today. It stands as a concise, documented account of how this happened and is set within the framework of our shared life and work.
Rudolph Valentino was in the process of writing his autobiography when he died one hundred years ago. I believe he intended to correct the fictionalized version of his life, not repeat it. Why else begin such a work at all?
His death prevented him from ever completing his autobiography. What followed his death resulted in the capture of his truth. Valentino Fugitive is part of my effort to restore truth to Valentino’s power.
If he could never have imagined this book or the century-long struggle which made it necessary, that does not render it speculative.
Valentino Fugitive is fact.
It is record.
It happened.
