Ivano Marescotti has died. The actor, director and playwright was 77 years old. Marescotti, born in Bagnacavallo in 1946, had been ill for some time and was hospitalized in the Santa Maria delle Croci hospital in Ravenna. Among the last films interpreted, ‘Bar Giuseppe’ directed by Giulio Base. “What a pain: Ivano left too soon. He will be missed dearly”, Base’s tweet.
Marescotti was a versatile interpreter of over 50 films, capable of ranging from comic roles, which gave him popularity, to dramatic ones, which during a film career that began in 1984 worked with directors such as Anthony Minghella, Ridley Scott, Roberto Benigni, Marco Risi, Pupi Avati, Sandro Baldoni, Maurizio Nichetti, Carlo Mazzacurati, Antonello Grimaldi and Klaus Maria Brandauer.
On 10 February 2022, with a post on his Facebook page, Marescotti announced his decision to retire from the stage to devote himself exclusively to the Teatro Accademia Marescotti, his theater school based in Ravenna.
Born in Bagnacavallo (Ravenna) on 4 November 1946, in 1981 Marescotti resigned from his job in the Municipality of Ravenna, and, at the age of 35, he decided to be an actor without ever having acted in his life. He made his debut as the protagonist in a children’s theater show, directed by Patrizio Roversi. Since then he has dedicated himself to the theater working as an actor among others with Leo De Berardinis, Carlo Cecchi, Mario Martone, Marco Martinelli, Thierry Salmon, Armand Gatti, Santagata and Morganti, Giampiero Solari, Giorgio Gallione, Sergio Fantoni, Giorgio Albertazzi. Since the mid-1990s he has also been his own director in the theatre.
Marescotti’s big break at the cinema came in 1989 when Silvio Soldini directed him in the film “L’aria serena dell’Ovest”. Since then films such as “Il muro di Gomma” by Marco Risi, “Jonny Stecchino” (where he plays Dr. Randazzo) and “Il Mostro” (Pascucci) by Roberto Benigni, “Stranestorie” by Sandro Baldoni, “Luna e the other” by Maurizio Nichetti, “The language of the saint”, “Vesna goes fast” and “The right distance” by Carlo Mazzacurati, “Declarations of love” by Pupi Avati, “Pasolini, an Italian crime” by Marco Tullio Giordana, “The sky is always bluer” by Antonello Grimaldi.
Marescotti has also appeared in international films: “Mario and the Magician” by Klaus Maria Brandauer, in Germany, “Le chateau des olivier”, TV-movie by Nicolas Gessner in France, and he worked with the Oscar winners Antony Minghella in “The Talented Mr. Ripley” with Ridley Scott in “Hannibal” and Antoine Fuqua in “King Arthur”.
Marescotti has regained great popularity alongside the comedian Checco Zalone in the films “Cado dalle nubi” (2009), where he plays Mauro Mantegazza, local secretary of the Northern Party who despises the southerners, and “Che bella giorno” (2011), where he plays the role of Colonel Gismondo Mazzini, both directed by Gennaro Nunziante.
Among the most recent films “A casa tutti bene” (2018) by Gabriele Muccino, “Stay friends” (2019) by Antonello Grimaldi and “Bar Giuseppe” (2019) by Giulio Base, up to the last appearance on the big screen in ” Criminals we become” (2021) by Luca Trovellesi Cesana and Alessandro Tarabelli.
Ivano Marescotti also made many television appearances, such as in the series “La neve nel vetro” (1984) by Florestano Vancini in “La Piotra 6 – The last secret” (1992), from “Un medico in famiglia 8” (2013) to “God help us 3” (2014). Also on TV Adriano Celentano wanted him by his side in the show “125 million bullshit” in 2001.
In 1993-94 Marescotti, as he loved to tell with a certain pride, had recovered his Romagna dialect of which he was previously ashamed and had returned to the theater again, with the texts of the great poet Raffaello Baldini with “Zitti Tutti” and “Carta Canta “, to the point of writing and producing his shows such as “Dante!”, inspired by the “Divine Comedy”, and “Bagnacavàl”, a contamination between the low Romagna dialect and Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso. In 2002 he became artistic director of the Teatro Comunale Conselice in Ravenna, where, in addition to managing a national theater bill, he planned and produced his own shows.
Exactly one year ago, on March 26, 2022, the actor had married – after five years of engagement – the 49-year-old Erika Leonelli, his former pupil: the wedding in a civil ceremony had taken place at the Ecomuseum of marsh herbs in Bagnacavallo (Ravenna ). Many of the old marsh grass artifacts woven by hand by Marescotti’s father are kept here. The ceremony had been quite original, celebrated in Romagna dialect and, as per ancient tradition, the president of the museum had given the couple a special gift: a marshy grass ‘bag’ with bread inside, which represented the necessary, salt, which it represented ingenuity, and wine, which represented the ‘more’. From his first marriage Marescotti had had a son named Mattia who died prematurely at the age of 43 from cancer; while from his second union with Ifigenia Kanarà he had a daughter, Iliade, born in 2003.
(by Paolo Martini)