Carlo Ponti, wed to Sophia Loren

ROME - Carlo Ponti, the Italian producer who discovered a teenage Sophia Loren, launched her film career and later married her despite threats of bigamy charges and excommunication, died yesterday. He was 94.

Ponti produced more than 100 films, including "Doctor Zhivago," "The Firemen's Ball" and "The Great Day," which were nominated for Oscars. In 1956, "La Strada," which he co-produced, won the Academy Award for best foreign film, as did "Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow" in 1964.

Ponti was a lawyer before moving into film production in the late 1930s. He was married to his first wife when he met Loren - then Sofia Lazzaro - about 1950. At the time she was only 15 and he a quarter-century older.

They tried to keep their relationship a secret, while Ponti's lawyers went to Mexico to obtain a divorce from his first wife. Divorce was not yet legal in Italy.

Ponti and Loren were married by proxy in Mexico in 1957, but Ponti was nonetheless charged with bigamy. The couple first lived in exile and then, after the annulment of their Mexican marriage, in secret in Italy.

During this period, Ponti produced "La Ciociara" - known in English as "Two Women" - for which Loren won a best actress Oscar in 1962.

Ponti was briefly imprisoned by the Fascist government in Italy during World War II for producing "Piccolo Mondo Antico," considered anti-German.

He later had tax problems and it took years for him to obtain the return of his art collection, which had been seized by authorities and given to Italian museums. *

Associated Press