Nothing against Russian culture and people, but against its regime: the premiere of La Scala with Boris Godunov, a masterpiece by the very Russian Modest Musorgsky, was an opportunity to reaffirm the political position of Italy and Europe after the attack on Vladimir Putin's Ukraine.
And to confirm, if needed, the country's appreciation of the Head of State, greeted this year with a standing ovation and more than five minutes of applause as he entered the central stage, in a replica of what happened last year when the public clamored for an 'encore' at the Quirinale.
The Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni also applauded him, who then also sang the words of the anthem.
And the presence of both is already an exceptional fact, but even more so if we consider that in the box with them was also the second office of state, the president of the Senate Ignazio La Russa, and above all the president of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen.
And it was she who used the harshest words upon her arrival at a theatre: "I think Russian composers like Musorgsky or Tchaikovsky are fantastic as well as Tolstoy or Dostoevsky. We shouldn't allow Putin to destroy this fantastic country. That's why I don't see time to see this opera".
A work which, incidentally, speaks of a tsar who dies consumed by remorse for his crimes.
"A Wish"
"We are not angry with the Russian people, with Russian history, we are angry with the choices of those who have politically decided to invade a sovereign nation. It is a different thing, in my opinion it is right to keep the two dimensions" he said echoed Meloni, who applauded Mattarella from the stage together with the over two thousand spectators in the hall, answering a question about the controversy over the choice to open the season with a Russian opera.
Same opinion of the Minister of Culture Gennaro Sangiuliano, present with that of Made in Italy Adolfo Urso, of the Reforms Maria Elisabetta Casellati, of the Anna Maria Bernini University.
Criticisms against which Mattarella also expressed himself in his conversation today with the president of the Commission.
"These are positions that I do not share both on a cultural and political level.
Great Russian culture is an integral part of European culture.
It is an element that cannot be deleted.
While the responsibility for the war - he stressed - must be attributed to the government of that country, certainly not to the Russian people or their culture".
Far away the echo of the few Ukrainians who took to the streets today to protest, where there were also social centers, Cub and Cobas.
Once all traces of the paint smearing on the facade of the Last Generation environmentalists were erased, only Morgan's invitation to Meloni to listen to them and a few slight controversies remained.
Like the one for the words of the undersecretary Vittorio Sgarbi towards the superintendent Dominique Meyer branded as a "foreigner".
"For the first time I heard this harsh word, 'foreigner', it hurt me" commented Meyer, who, however, was most keen to talk about the show that "will remain in my memory for a long time".
The tribute to Mattarella will certainly remain.
"Even if we kind of expected it,
