Cantini Parrini, candidate for the statuettes for the film «Cyrano»: «I owe my art to my grandmother a seamstress. I have a collection of 4,500 dresses, they are my children “
After «Pinocchio»the musical on «Cyrano». It is the second consecutive nomination, at the Oscars, for the Florentine costume designer Massimo Cantini Parrini.
What changes on the eve, compared to last year?
“Emotionally it changes a lot. The first time was a shock, if I ever expected it. Now more, for consecutivity. It is my first great American film ».
It has been since the time of Fellini’s “Casanova” that …
«That an entirely Italian film does not win for costumes. It was 1971. Then there was Gabriella Pescucci, my teacher, with “The age of innocence” and the four Oscars taken by Milena Canonero. But they were foreign productions. If I won it with “Pinocchio” we would have dispelled this curse ».
Piero Tosi only had the Lifetime Achievement Oscar.
“Absurd, Visconti’s costume designer. A bit like what happened to Ennio Morricone before he won the second with Tarantino. Tosi was my teacher at the Experimental Center, they were not costume lessons but stories of lived experiences. At the oral I displaced him, he overturned a box of buttons and I guessed all the eras. He wanted me to document myself as much as possible, I objected to my need to overturn and he told me I understand, he was very open “.
When did it turn upside down?
“Well, for “Miss Marx” by Susanna Nicchiarelli, another costume film, the ones I prefer, I gave the protagonist a wide sweater of my mother from the 70s. And for “Cyrano” I used a Balenciaga hood ».
The work for «Cyrano»?
«Joe Wright moved the action from the mid 1600s to the mid 1700s. Every director wants to leave their mark on him. Here the diversity is not the big nose but the physicality. The protagonist is a dwarf, a very ugly derogatory term but we don’t have another one. I found this choice brilliant. Then when you have in front of Peter Dinklage, the protagonist, you are struck only by the penetrating gaze and you forget anything about his physicality. There is talk of current issues such as bullying. It is strange that in the 17th century, with people without teeth and mutilated by smallpox, the size of the nose was thought of as a deformity ».
Who were you inspired by?
«To certain 18th century watercolors: lightness and transparency to see inside the soul of the four classes of the film, nobles, middle-class, military and nuns. I used light fabrics, in a musical with dance scenes everything has to float. I worked in subtraction to get to the essence: neither embroidery, nor flowers, nor prints. I didn’t wear a single jewel ».
You are a collector.
“I have about 4,500 dresses, from 1630. Markets, donations. In Italy there is great attention to vintage at exorbitant prices and there is little. I keep some at home, it’s like entering Tutankhamun’s tomb. The fabrics I prefer, linen, cotton, silk, the natural ones. The clothes are my children. How do I take care of them? Every six months I open the boxes, change the tissue papers, air them, put on the new mothproof. It’s like having a nursery at home ».
Does the dress make the monk?
«And the nun. Actors are difficult to dress in costume films; for those in today’s clothes they are more insecure, they come out of the dressing room and ask for no reason: why are they looking at me badly? ».
Who do you feel is your biggest rival at the Oscars?
«I’m not afraid of anyone, not because who knows who hears me. I really like the freedom with which Jenny Beavan works in the running for “Cruelty”. I am happy to compete with such good colleagues. It is already a victory to be in the five. “
Is it a job for women?
«Numerically yes, now they are equivalent professions, a bit like in the kitchen where the most famous are men».
How did it start …
«My grandmother worked in the Mattolini tailor’s shop in Florence, mother of the theater director. Family run, women talking, laughing, screaming, I got lost in the colors and rolled up fabrics. The apprenticeship at the Tirelli tailor’s shop. Today we dress without the passage of time. There is no difference between 2000 and 2020. Technology has taken over, the status symbol is given by the latest mobile phone, not the last coat ».
How do you dress?
“I’m a black hole in space, blue and black, so I’m not mistaken with washing machines.”
February 18, 2022 (change February 19, 2022 | 07:27)
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