Ilona Staller, Italo Disco Queen

How Staller Made a Mark on the 1980s European Music Scene With Synths, Sex, and Sylph-like Vocals.

Hungarian-born Ilona Staller had many incarnations: a radical politician, a muse to the likes of Jeff Koons, a dead ringer for a Botticelli female figure (in that particular late-70s/80s color palette), and a famed adult-entertainment performer. Yet we would be remiss to neglect her Italo disco career, and now that she is giving interviews in magazines for the re-release of her memoir, we thought it was the right time to highlight her musical output—hey, in 1978, she almost made it to Sanremo, with the song “Cappuccetto Rosso” (Little Red Riding Hood), authored by one Vito Tommaso, a storied Mia Martini collaborator who then found his fortune with anime opening themes for the Italian market.