"Here lies Toni Servillo, Toni at the theater Servillo at the cinema": the ironic joke is by the same actor who thus defines his dualism while celebrating thirty years of cinema in a career, as he defines it, "as a militant theatrical".
Covid has made him work harder in recent years on cinema ("before I only accepted it in the summer, in the winter I was on tour"), three films ready for release, "but next year I will return to the theater. Al Piccolo in Milan and then in Naples ", he told Marateale a few days ago when he was interviewed by the director of the Venice Film Festival Alberto Barbera.
His passion is the stage but at the cinema he has taken many great satisfactions and today Servillo, 63 years old from Afragola (Na), is one of the most charismatic Italian actors, with dozens of awards.
"I started making films quite late - he admits - I believed that my business would end with the theater that I never abandoned: after all, the first film, Death of a Neapolitan mathematician in 1992, which is also the debut film of Mario Martone, was a consequence of our theatrical project, we had founded a company (Teatri Uniti ed) with a strong spirit of authorial and productive independence and with that idea we started cinema, not surprisingly the protagonist was that great man of the theater of Carlo Cecchi ".
Servillo has the
honored with Bellocchio, Garrone but there are two great partnerships: with Mario Martone and Paolo Sorrentino, six films with each.
"Before being a great image maker Paolo is a writer, an extraordinary dialogue writer, the jokes even become proverb like 'Don't disunite yourself!'
said to the protagonist Fabietto in It was the hand of God. Paul - he reveals - practices writing every day, always goes around with the equipment to write wherever he is. Mario, on the other hand, is one who makes places speak eloquently and brilliantly in which he plays the characters, he is an extraordinary 'decorateur', in him the set designer and director are integrated. Let's see Qui Rido io, the film about Eduardo Scarpetta:
Martone mixes theater and life to the point that he does not distinguish the curtain of the stage from the curtains of his house, while in Nostalgia he really knew how to tell Healthcare as if it were a neighborhood in Algiers, in Cairo.
We have been working together with Mario at the theater since we were 18, he is my brother, while Paolo has always considered me his older brother.
In short, they are my brothers and I always know their projects from the initial phase, but I do not have an authorial role because I believe that cinema belongs to directors, actors can illuminate a film but the one who brings the contents into the heart of the viewer is the director, who if he thinks about it, if he turns it, he mounts it unlike the theater where this role is instead of the actor ".
while in Nostalgia he really knew how to tell Healthcare as if it were a neighborhood of Algiers, of Cairo.
We have been working together with Mario at the theater since we were 18, he is my brother, while Paolo has always considered me his older brother.
In short, they are my brothers and I always know their projects from the initial phase, but I do not have an authorial role because I believe that cinema belongs to directors, actors can illuminate a film but the one who brings the contents into the heart of the viewer is the director, who if he thinks about it, if he turns it, he mounts it unlike the theater where this role is instead of the actor ".
while in Nostalgia he really knew how to tell Healthcare as if it were a neighborhood of Algiers, of Cairo.
We have been working together with Mario at the theater since we were 18, he is my brother, while Paolo has always considered me his older brother.
In short, they are my brothers and I always know their projects from the initial phase, but I do not have an authorial role because I believe that cinema belongs to directors, actors can illuminate a film but the one who brings the contents into the heart of the viewer is the director, who if he thinks about it, if he turns it, he mounts it unlike the theater where this role is instead of the actor ".
Toni Servillo is not only an actor for directors-stars, his name is in the cast of many debuts: the first film by Andrea Molaioli, Claudio Cupellini, Francesco Amato, Daniele Ciprì without Maresco and the same Martone and Sorrentino.
"There is something exciting about the debuts, which has to do with the first time, the beginning of something. Now I like it even more because maybe with my name it can take off the film of a young man and then from them you learn a lot, you draw lymph and you learn to age better. It must be said that we have an incredible generation of young actors, like Borghi and Marinelli whom I admire. Italian cinema enjoys great consideration from an artistic point of view, we have internationally renowned directors who since they were 40 years old like Alice Rohrwacher and Matteo Garrone,
in addition to the aforementioned, they collect laurels: there is not only the tradition of Italian cinema of the golden days behind them but also a new lever.
Cinema is certainly one of the most important things that our country has offered to the world in recent years and we must be more proud of it ".
