In 1943, after Italy surrendered to the Allies, his ship was captured by the Japanese, and he was detained as a POW until the Americans freed him in 1945.
[Note 1][2] In 1949 he founded a documentary short film production company Filmeco.
[1] In 1958 he closed Filmeco and founded the Royfilm company, which almost exclusively did dubbing of films into Italian.
[2] A comprehensive biography of de Leonardis was published in 2017 by Nunziante Valoroso in the book Un comandante alla corte di Walt Disney.
La carriera di Roberto de Leonardis leggenda del doppiaggio.