by Marco Bellocchio
Verdi’s Rigoletto was the third opera chosen by producer Andrea Andermann for his Live Film project, after Tosca and Traviata. The opera was recorded live, and broadcast live around the world, on September 4 and 5, 2010. It was filmed over two days, so that the action could take place in the exact spaces at the correct time of the day. The setting, of course, is given by Mantua’s splendid Renaissance venues: the Ducal Palace, the Palazzo Te and the so called Fortezza Sparafucile. The orchestra plays in the Teatro Scientifico Bibbiena and the singers keep in touch with it through monitors and advanced auditory devices. It is an opera production more realistic than anyone could possibly fancy, therefore all the more spectacular. It won the Rai Grand Prix 2011.
Rai Prix Italia, under the Patronage of the President of the Italian Republic, is awarded every year to the best programs produced for radio, Tv and the web, in categories as drama, documentaries, music and performing arts. Online at prixitalia.rai.it
IN COLLABORATION WITH
Italy 2010, 129 min.
directed by Marco Bellocchio
Film in Italian with Italian subtitles
producer: Andrea Andermann
cinematography: Vittorio Storaro
music: Giuseppe Verdi
conductor: Zubin Metha,
Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI
TRAILER (via Youtube)
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Synopsis of Rigoletto
Hunchback court jester Rigoletto makes himself hated by everyone at the court of the Duke of Mantua, thanks to his insolence and his readiness to support every depravity the Duke might indulge in. He does not miss any occasion to take advantage of his position to abuse the other courtiers as much as he can. Nobody knows he has a daughter, beautiful Gilda, whom he keeps safely hidden from the world. No matter how much he tries, however, she is spotted by the Duke himself, a notorious womanizer, who easily seduces her, spoiling Rigoletto of his only treasure. Scorned by the courtiers, who relish in his humiliation, the jester plots a deadly vengeance against the Duke, but eventually the actual victim will not be the frivolous ruler, but the innocent Gilda.
Marco Bellocchio, Director
Born in Bobbio, near Piacenza, Marco Bellocchio had a strict Catholic upbringing – his father was a lawyer, his mother a schoolteacher. He began studying philosophy in Milan but then decided to enter a film school, making his first film, Fists in the Pocket, (Pugni in tasca), funded by family members and shot on family property, in 1965. He made a big impact on radical Italian cinema in the mid-sixties. In 1968 he joined the Communist Party, and began to make politically militant cinema. More recently however, in a 2002 interview, he remarked: “I can talk about my personal ideas but Marxism has little to do with it now. Today politics means administration. No party is now proposing a radical change of anything, and radical change is no longer very interesting to me as an artist.” His films include China is Near (1967), Sbatti il mostro in prima pagina (Slap the Monster on the Front Page) (1972), Nel Nome del Padre (In the name of the Father) (1972), La Marcia Trionfale (Victory March) (1976), Salto nel Vuoto (1980), Henry IV (1984), Il diavolo in corpo (Devil in the Flesh (1986), L’ora di religione (My Mother’s Smile) (2002), La Condanna (The Conviction) (1991), Sogni infranti (Broken Dreams) (1995), Buongiorno, notte (Good Morning, Night) (2003), The Wedding Director (2006), Vincere (2009), and he recently finished Sorelle Mai.
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