The actress, grandson of Gino Cervi, starring with Anna Bonaiuto in the play Addio ghosts, based on the novel of the same name by Nadia Terranova
Daughter of an actor-director, Tonino Cervi, of the producer Marina Gefter and grandson of the great Gino Cervi. Valentina Cervi theater and cinema have it in their DNA. These days starring with Anna Bonaiuto of Goodbye ghostsbased on the novel of the same name by Nadia Terranova.
The ghosts of the title – explains the actress – are the ones that Ida, my character, carries with her since she was a child, when her father, suffering from depression, at a certain point disappears. The confrontation with the mother, personified by the great Bonaiuto, and with whom he has not seen for years, conflicting: he tells his daughter “forget”, but the daughter does not want to forget, but to understand the reason for that disappearance to deal with the trauma immediately. It will never be discovered what happened to the father and the two women, like two stray dogs, will try to reunite in their unbridgeable diversity. A story that, curiously, has a little to do with my family history.
That is to say?
My father died when I was 25, but he was never very present in my life, even in my professional career. Apart from the fact that, when he passed away, I was still in a very immature moment from an artistic point of view, while today I would have confronted him in a more productive way. And then my father did not intend much to certify with his consent my career choice which, in the first years, I experienced as my secret.
And his mother?
She was very critical and we had a conflicted relationship. She said: you are not beautiful enough to be an actress, you are not good, but if you really want to, do it. She feared I would suffer. So at the beginning I did a journey that was not shared with the family: my parents did not interfere and I was happy.
Then, thanks to his producer mother, he made important meetings.
She lived in Paris and at her house I met the star system: Brian De Palma, Antonio Banderas, Francis Ford Coppola … I didn’t see them as Hollywood myths, but as friends of my mother, for me the person came first, then the great talent , while listening to these characters, to understand what they are made of.
And from the talent Coppola was directed.
He hired me for a commercial for a well-known coffee brand. An extraordinary experience, lived with simplicity. I remember him as a likeable glutton, a great director who doesn’t make you weigh his greatness, puts you at ease.
Then it was directed by Jane Campion, Spike Lee, Peter Greenaway … she shared the sets with Nicole Kidman, John John Malkovich, John Turturro …
The truth that I have breathed this air since I was a child, I have always felt on the set, my family, unwittingly, passed the baton to me.
Starting with grandfather Gino?
I passed away two years before my birth, but I have known him since I was a child through the memories of the people, who stopped me on the street to tell me about his greatness: from the devoted spectators to the seamstress who sewed his stage clothes. Then at home I saw his photos and I saw all his films … When I decided to do this job I “met” him as an actor, I observed him carefully, I felt enlightened by his talent and, if the Dna has its own truth, I tried to understand if it transmitted something to me.
Which films do you like most?
Among the many, 4 steps in the clouds, The iron crown, Cardinal Lambertininaturally Don Camillo and Peppone and Commissioner Maigret. I feel its volcanicity similar to my nature. Also, his voice fascinated me.
And to think that his grandfather started very young …
In small roles and his father, my great-grandfather, Antonio Cervi, an important theater critic, seeing him on stage said to him: Gino, you are a dog! Then he was hired by Luigi Pirandello as a young actor for Six characters in search of an author, next to Marta Abba, Lamberto Picasso, Ruggero Ruggeri! I can’t believe it, his predestination: wahoo! A giant with an innate charisma, which was such even when he interpreted the carousel for the Vecchia Romagna black label, the brandy that creates an atmosphere … There were today actors of that caliber, capable of advertising with his class, its elegance.
July 20, 2022 (change July 20, 2022 | 07:32)
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