Sergio Rigoletto

Sergio Rigoletto is an Assistant Professor of Film Studies at the University of Groningen, Faculty of Arts. Previously, he held an Associate Professor position in Cinema Studies and Italian at the University of Oregon, USA. His research focuses on the intersection of film aesthetics with social change, queer media cultures, and Italian cinema. Key areas include transnational queer imaginaries in Mediterranean media, stardom in Neorealist cinema, and gendered labor in film industries.

Education: PhD from the University of Reading, MA from Birkbeck College, London, and BA/MA from the University of Catania, Italy. His publications include Masculinity and Italian Cinema: Sexual Politics, Social Conflict and Male Crisis in the 1970s (2014) and Le norme traviate (2020). Current projects involve a monograph on Anna Magnani and Queer from the South: Film, Video Art and Media Activism in the Mediterranean.

Research interests span queer media activism, Italian film history, and international television. He has contributed to journals like Journal of Cinema and Media Studies and New Review of Film and Television Studies, analyzing topics such as Xavier Dolan’s cinematic techniques and spectrality in Call Me by Your Name.

Rigoletto’s work emphasizes interdisciplinary approaches to film, blending cultural theory with close textual analysis. His recent focus on Mediterranean queer media highlights transnational collaborations and challenges traditional national narratives in cinema.