TO a year and a half after his death, the documentary Luigi Proietti known as Gigi – directed by Edoardo Leo and in cinemas from today – try to make the necessary artistic recovery through archive images and memories of friends and family. To prove what we lost on November 2, 2020.
That is, a great talent, a great performer, a unique actor, a giant – wanting to make the originals in the definitions.
Luigi Proietti known as Gigi: the genesis
Everything comes from a film idea that focuses solely on My eyes, pleaselegendary theatrical performance by Gigi Proietti of 1977 which created an earthquake in the theater scene, changing it forever.
From 2018 Leo starts to follow You project into the endless reruns of the show, interview him and search to investigate the nature of a resounding success.
But it happens that Gigi dies, forcing Edoardo to stop working. He resumes work a few months later, with the support of the Proietti family; the moment when the project changes from simple documentary to homage (admittedly incomplete).
Three documentaries in one
How to summarize the chameleonic personality of Gigi? Not an easy task, which Edoardo Leo solves with a division into three distinct parts but in dialogue.
In the first it is given ample space for archival materials – which summarize the most important stages of his career; from movies like Horse fever to the theatrical success of Hallelujah good people di Garinei and Giovannini together with Renato Rascel up to the RAI variety with Ornella Vanoni Facts and deeds.
Gigi Proietti and Ornella Vanoni in “Fatti e fattacci” of 1975.
Then it’s the turn of the Project private, with interviews with friends and family: Renzo Arbore, Loretta Goggi, Paola CortellesiAlessandro Gassmann, Marco Giallini, then his sister Anna Maria e the two beloved daughters Susanna and Carlotta. A section that brings out even more a multifaceted personality.
The rejection of the divo label and the generosity of the space given to stage colleagues.
Finally, in the last part the original idea of the documentary returns in partial form: with the director who follows Proietti behind the scenes. First with an interview in his Globe Theater and then as a reminder of Leo when, not yet thirty, he was directed to the theater by Gigi in the show Drama of jealousy.
The result is a tribute certainly felt, but where the presence of Leo is an excessive thread. As indeed the use of voice-off which, used to underline the close relationship with Proietti, is too insistent in some moments. To the detriment of the visceral bond between Proietti and his Rome, partial and little explored.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dix7kyojepw
In defense, it must be said that it is impossible to catalyze everything that was Proietti in 100 minutes. Or maybe his figure is still so present in our imagination newspaper that it is difficult to “accept” his death. And one of the merits of Leo’s film is this: give us the illusion that Gigi is still with us.
The words of Edoardo Leo
Contrary to what the doc might suggest, Leo’s bond with Gigi it was not the most intimate. “Until the last few days – said the director – I have never managed to have a friendly relationship with him, I had rather a reverential relationship. Generally with actors after a while you feel like colleagues. With Proietti no, you always felt like a spectator“.
Edoardo Leo on the set of the film. (Andrea Miconi)
On the film instead he expressed the desire to one day create an extended versionsince «in the vastness of material I had I unfortunately had to give up many things. We had to find, for example, another way to talk about the dubbing of Rocky and I had to remove some of Gigi’s operas for reasons of time ».
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