I often think that South Italians, especially Sicilians and Calabrians, look very similar to people from southern Portugal. I don't know if that makes sense genetically, but considering both regions have a lot of EEF with some minor Levantine-like admixture and of course some minor "northern" (steppe-related) elements, I'd say there must be a connection. I know many of them would pass very easily (perfectly, in fact) as white Brazilians, most of whom have a phenotype that immediately cries "Portuguese!!!" or at the furthest "Portuguese with some Italian mixed in".
True story. The last time I went to Disney World in Florida my children were in their teens. There were a lot of school groups from other countries there that day. By far the most attractive were a group of teen age girls from Brazil. Perhaps I didn't notice the differences, but my memory of them is that they were almost all rather below the average height of American girls, fine boned, with lovely slim figures, long shiny dark hair, dark eyes, Med features, and they were a sort of honey tan in skin color. How much of that was natural and how much was a tan I don't know, but they had a gorgeous skin color.
There are Sicilian girls who look like that, but a lot have stronger bone structure, if you know what I mean, some are more "Alpine" looking, and there's more variation in coloring. That's just my subjective opinion, of course.
They actually looked a lot like this actress, who has an Italian last name, but whom I actually thought was South American of some sort.
Morena Baccarin:
In some pictures I see more of the Italian.
A lot of the girls looked like Taina Muller too.
On these Boards a lot of people seem to think that Northern Portuguese are fairer. I won't dispute it. I haven't been all over Portugal. That's not the impression anyone would get by looking at Portuguese Americans here, however, even the ones from Portugal itself, not Azoreans etc. My nanny for years, who became like a member of our family, is from Porto, and she and her whole family and her groom are very dark. There's variation in the community, of course, but I wouldn't describe any of them as really fair.
These are people from her Portuguese Club. To my knowledge, a lot of them are from her home town. Going strictly by their features I don't think I'd mistake them for a group of Italians. Individuals could pass, yes, but not as a group.
Just as an aside, the spread the Club put out for her wedding was absolutely stupendous. I really like Portuguese food, and thanks to this community we have quite a few really great restaurants. I'm there about once a week, more often than I go to Italian restaurants. That I can make for myself. I particularly like bacalao, and they sometimes have rabbit, which I love. They also have a marvelous way with stews with clams and chorizo. Heaven.