The director and the Oscar for «Mediterraneo»: «I have kept it in the bathroom for a long time, now I use it as a book holder. Even now I don’t understand how it is possible that I have won ». And on Abatantuono: “he has an enormous talent that he doesn’t cultivate”
“When Sylvester Stallone he announced the winning film he said “Italy” but I understood “Ilary”. I immediately thought that in the five there was a sixth film that I had never heard of ». Gabriele Salvatores he grew up with his cinema made of friendship and irony, of travels and illusions, of escape and melancholy, of dreams and deceptions, a generation that has recognized itself in its imagination; the meeting of many solitudes who have found themselves united in a collective hope, because after all we are not so different, each with its own weaknesses and expectations. L’Oscar per Mediterranean as the highest point, that statuette that makes you turn in the perception “not of yourself, but of others”.
At the Oscars, his was perhaps the shortest speech of the short speeches: 27 seconds.
“There were two problems. The first is that I don’t know English; the second that I didn’t think I was going to win. The favorite was Red Lanterns by Zhang Yimou, and I too was convinced that they would reward him. It’s a beautiful film, even now I don’t understand how it is possible that I won ».
What do you remember of that evening?
“Several moments, like Warren Beatty’s face in the front row staring at me and meeting Zhang Yimou in the bathroom. I am with the Oscar in hand because they give it to you without even a box, he is crying softly; a dialogue was born where I almost apologized and he didn’t understand; then he looked at the Oscar and told me something that luckily I didn’t understand ».
Backstage there was also the hug with Abatantuono …
“I was already engaged to his ex-wife, Rita. I join him in a room with an Oscar when we see a door that opens and a woman running chased by the security; she is Rita and Diego and I scream together: no, no, let it pass, she is my wife, she is our wife … ».
To get to Hollywood he left Naples. What did his hometown leave you?
«Naples taught me its great truth, knowing how to laugh at misfortunes, the ability to combine tragedy and comedy that has fueled my way of being and my cinema. Another lesson is that very Greek, ancient sense of waiting for luck, of relying on what happens: what will be, will be ».
When she was six you moved to Milan, were you greeted by a “southerner”?
«My father moved to Milan before Rocco and his brothers, it was Milan with the words “We do not rent to the south”, but it is a city that welcomed me and allowed me to be who I am, even “football”. I obviously supported Napoli, but by dint of blows – real, physical – my classmates forced me to choose one of the two Milan teams. I decided to cheer for Inter because the Napoli blue was in the shirt ».
What did your dad teach you?
«My father – Neapolitan lawyer, Crociano, super classical and democratic training – wanted me to do law. When I told him I wanted to devote myself to the theater he was silent for a day, then in the evening he said to me: life is yours, if you want to be a plumber do it, but he tries to be the best plumber in the neighborhood. Winning the Oscar was like getting a degree; the first phone call I made to my parents. He never forced me to do anything, when something was wrong he applied an ironic dissent. It seems incredible to see me now but as a boy I had shoulder-length hair, he would warn me: when we walk together on the street please go to the other sidewalk ».
Her mom?
«He was underground and I constantly cheer for my choices. In my early years at the theater he typed our scripts, sewed costumes, invited Silvio Orlando to the house, who at the time didn’t have a penny and ate often with us. She was a housewife with three children, she did a fundamental job that is unpaid, she kept the family together, she was the glue. ”
Twenty-year-old left in Milan in the 70s, subversive ideas were seductive for many at the time. How did you avoid that temptation?
«To understand the climate, this anecdote I was telling the other day to Mario Capanna is enough. I loved music – I really wanted to be a musician – and I had seen a wonderful electric guitar in a shop in Piazza Diaz, when I finally managed to buy it, that same afternoon I went to a meeting at the State University which declared the electric guitar and Bob Dylan tools of American capitalism. That day I decided that perhaps it was not the case to follow their approach too much … Art was an excellent antidote because that type of siren sounded for many, even among the technicians of the Teatro dell’Elfo where it all began. I understood that it was possible to do theater in a political way instead of doing politics in the theater ».
Is it always left-wing?
«The militancy of the left – then the left existed, today it no longer exists – has always remained both at work and on a personal level. I grew up with a strongly collective mentality of work, I hate to say “my film”, “my cinema”. For me, the actors are also authors, they are fundamental, they are not the instruments of a symphony, they are “the” symphony, they are as important as the text. For this reason, with the actors I worked with I tried to create if not a family, a kind of tribe ».
His is a close intertwining between cinema and friendship.
«I am deeply attached to all the actors I have worked with. Silvio Orlando, Antonio Catania, Gigio Alberti, Elio De Capitani, Paolo Rossi, Claudio Bisio: it is a bond that has remained strong despite the passing years ».
“Marrakech Express” got his career off the ground.
«He was born under a lucky star, intercepting the emotions, desires and dreams of many. A funny film but which also has melancholy, reflective and poetic sides ».
The set wasn’t just work …
«One evening Bayern Munich – Inter of the Uefa Cup was played, the one of Berti’s famous goal that is scored across the pitch. Diego was the only one who had a radio and kept saying that we were zero to zero ».
Then there was the turning point of «Mediterranean».
“He had to be called Forget us, playing on a double meaning: in the sense of getting lost and in the sense of leaving us alone. Although it is set during the Second World War, it also told the Italy of the time, that disillusionment of those who thought they could change society. Those were the years of Berlusconi, of private TV, of that lowering of taste – even visual – which was ruinous. It is the end of collective sentiment and the victory of individualism, of the hedonism of Milan to drink, an isolation that was then amplified with social media, which in reality are places of false sharing “.
That film (the other was «Turné») concluded its «escape trilogy» …
“Speaking of escape, Diego used to say that to enter the history of cinema forever one had to change a vowel … Escape was intended not as an escape, as a holiday, otherwise I would have called it Méditerranée … Escape is not the rejection of responsibility but the search for freedom and a new place ».
What is cinema for you?
«Cinema is not only the desire to tell a story but also the need to come to terms with oneself. Being a director was my real therapy, the certainty of being able to control what you can’t in life. As a director you feel like you can govern what surrounds you, but in life there is no script ».
He has had many recognitions from the public. And the criticism?
“Brecht said that an artist must always stand at least one step in front of his audience. Not ten, however, without losing sight of it. Here is the problem: if you prepare a dinner for your friends, you cook what you like, without thinking about their tastes, but then you are happy if they come to eat it and they appreciate it. I’ve always tried to experiment with new forms of storytelling, but I don’t like to think that I have to teach anyone something, that I have to prove that I am smarter than the audience. In addition to the great Masters I admire, I also love directors who are not always considered “Masters”: Sam Peckinpah, Germi, Cassavetes, Brian De Palma, Bob Rafelson, Bogdanovich, Altman … Maybe that’s my being a bit in the middle of research and the desire to communicate. I have always considered cinema a popular art ».
Where do you keep the Oscar?
“I had a strange relationship with that statuette. The Oscar is not a microchip that you put on your head and get better; when you win it you are exactly the same as before, but both spectators and insiders expect something special from you. But I didn’t want to compete with myself, so for some time I kept it in the bathroom, then in the office, now I’ve made my peace and it acts as a book holder for a series of books on cinema ».
Physically different, she is thin and Zen-like, he is overflowing and carnal. Abatantuono has practically made all the films of her, what binds you?
«Abatantuono is more than a friend, he is a relative. This memory summarizes our relationship more than any other. Once, we were in Lucca, and I was taking Marta to school – her daughter, whose ex-wife became my partner by Rita – who was in first grade. We were going down the hairpin bends, she was absorbed. After a couple of curves she says to me: “Gabriele, what do you mean fagot?”. No, look, then, I’ll explain: fagot is a dirty word, it’s an insult. You can say gay, homosexual … These are men who like other men, is love and is respectable. Three more hairpin bends and Marta: “Gabriele, do you like your mum?”. And of course I like her, I like her very much, I am with her. “Then why does Dad say that you are a fagot?” ».
What actor is Abatantuono?
“If you put him in the midst of ten people, everyone will instinctively look at him. He has a huge talent that he doesn’t cultivate. A little because of his natural laziness, a little because he was branded as the terrunciello of the films. He has presence, charisma, he would be a wonderful King Lear. He is a melancholy who feels loneliness, he never wants to be the last to go away ».
Who else in your opinion has not fully exploited his talent?
«I am thinking of Paolo Rossi. A great sympathy immediately arose between us, an immediate harmony thanks to Comediansthe text by Trevor Griffiths, a Trotskyist author who still writes to me “Dear comrade” …. But without digressing, Paolo Rossi if he did not have that self-destructive demon that haunts him would have become like Gaber, like Jannacci, he has a special fabric , as an actor and poet ».
He is 71 years old, the age advancing …
«… makes your balls spin. The poet Mario De Andrade described life as a package of candy given to a child. At first you eat them greedily, when they are about to finish you see that the bag of candies is getting smaller and you become more reflective: I want to taste the candies that remain ».
June 25, 2022 (change June 25, 2022 | 10:33 am)
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