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| Nicola Maccanico with Anne-Katrin Titze on current Cinecittà productions: “Joe Wright (Mussolini series M. Son of the Century, starring Luca Marinelli of Pietro Marcello’s Martin Eden), Roland Emmerich (Those About To Die, starring Anthony Hopkins) and Luca Guadagnino (Queer, based on William S. Burroughs’ novel, starring Daniel Craig and Jason Schwartzman).” Photo: Sally Fischer |
I met with Nicola Maccanico to discuss the significant expansion of Cinecittà Studios under his leadership on the morning of the Open Roads: New Italian Cinema luncheon at The Leopard at des Artistes, attended by The Hummingbird (Il Colibrì) director Francesca Archibugi, Tommaso Ragno (star of Paolo Virzì’s Dry, Siccità), Margherita Mazzucco (star of Susanna Nicchiarelli's Chiara and Saverio Costanzo’s My Brilliant Friend), directors Michele Vannucci (Delta), Niccolo Falsetti (Margins), Monica Dugo (star and director of Like Turtles, Come le Tartarughe), and Fireworks (Stranizza d’Amuri)) director Giuseppe Fiorello with his stars Gabriele Pizzurro and Samuele Segreto.
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| Nicola Maccanico on Luca Guadagnino: “Bones and All! His last movie, I think is a masterpiece.” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze |
Inside Film at Lincoln Center’s Walter Reade Theater, Nicola joined me for a conversation on the robust state of Italian cinema and the current international productions going on at Cinecittà, which include Roland Emmerich’s Those About To Die (starring Anthony Hopkins), Joe Wright’s Mussolini series (M. Son Of The Century, starring Luca Marinelli of Pietro Marcello’s Martin Eden), and Luca Guadagnino’s Queer (based on William S Burroughs’ novel, starring Daniel Craig and Jason Schwartzman).
Anne-Katrin Titze: Hi! Did you just arrive in New York for Open Roads?
Nicola Maccanico: Yes, you never live in the exact time zone in which you are! I wake up 4 in the morning so everything is substantially a bit confused. This morning I went out around 6, walking in the Park which was amazing. Now the heat went through the roof, but I love it. I just came from London where it’s chilly, like 10 Celsius, it’s like winter. So here it’s paradise.
AKT: And it’s only June. Yesterday [on June 1], the forecast said thunderstorms, but nothing so far.
NM: The weather phenomena are moving so fast now, that weather forecast is not an easy job anymore.
AKT: During Covid they explained that there were fewer planes and so they had less information. That explanation for inaccuracy doesn’t work anymore now. Anyway, I love to talk about the weather …
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| The Hummingbird director Francesca Archibugi with interpreter extraordinaire Michael Moore helping with the translating Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze |
NM: … but let’s get to movie business!
AKT: Yes! Cinecittà is doing very well! It’s thriving!
NM: Yeah, we are thrilled about that because we strongly believe that Cinecittà could be a real industrial asset in this moment in time in which productions are booming everywhere. Last year we had a very positive year; we had a positive balance sheet, we increased our revenues more than 120% and now we are running the site with full speed, with great productions.
And what is even more important is the fact that Cinecittà is back with the big international productions. So in Cinecittà what is happening now is what used to be happening in the Sixties and now we are back. What was the great past of Italy can be also an opportunity for the future. This is the message that I hope Cinecittà is sending everywhere.
AKT: You are also enlarging to have more studios?
NM: We are working on enlarging Cinecittà. We are structuring facilities and we’re building five new studios. At the end of the journey we will have 24 studios, now we have 19 studios. And the production capacity will grow 60%. We’ll move from 18,000 square feet to 30,000. Now we can do it with even more strength. We need more space, it’s not just a project.
AKT: What’s the importance of Open Roads for you?
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| Nicola Maccanico and Francesca Archibugi at the Open Roads: New Italian Cinema press conference Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze |
NM: Open Roads is a fundamental bridge between Italy and the United States. Cinecittà is a public company so our responsibility is also to promote contemporary cinema around the world. In this case Open Roads is fundamental because our new contemporary cinema is very competitive, it’s very powerful with great talent and great productions and Open Roads is a bridge, useful to demonstrate what we are doing.
AKT: People, filmmakers, can see, ah, this film was made there! I want that production design for my film!
NM: Yeah, but also, I want to see that movie! What we need to work on is to make Italian movies to be seen by a public around the world. In this era with the streamers all the audiences are used to seeing content coming from around the world. I think that Italy has a great opportunity to increase the number of audiences around the world for our movies. And I think that even if platforms are easy to use, to increase the value of our cinema around the world we need theatres. We need to show our movies in theatres and open roads.
AKT: I don’t want to ask you to pick favourites among your babies, that is, among the films and filmmakers who are here now, but are there things you want to say about this year’s programme?
NM: I can’t pick, but I can say we have a lot of variety. We have young talents like Michele Vannucci, Niccolò Falsetti, we have great directors like Francesca Archibugi, a real icon of our entertainment world.
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| Nicola Maccanico: “Joe Wright is doing the Sky series on Antonio Scurati’s book on Mussolini.” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze |
AKT: Her name is everywhere as a screenwriter as well.
NM: Yes, she’s so good. There’s another first film by Giuseppe Fiorello. He’s a great actor who has been in so many movies.
AKT: The Talented Mr. Ripley, I think I saw?
NM: No this was his brother. He’s the brother of Rosario Fiorello, one of the most important Italian entertainers, but he’s not an actor, but acted in The Talented Mr. Ripley. Giuseppe is the brother, talented as well, and this is his first movie as a director.
AKT: Fireworks is great!
NM: Exactly, it’s incredibly gentle; it’s a tough story, taking place in Sicily in the Eighties, connected to boys that love each other and that was not accepted at the time in that part of Italy.
AKT: The film asks important questions about masculinity in the Eighties, and now.
NM: What is great is that it’s a movie made poetic, not with violence. You see violence but see that it makes no sense because you see the quality of this love and how much this love was genuine and innocent. That is to say, we have movies for different tastes. It not only shows how good is the environment for Italian movies today, but also how much prospective we have. I’m very happy about the selection made by Dan Sullivan, who is our curator here at Film at Lincoln Center.
AKT: I saw that Joe Wright is doing a Mussolini series in Cinecittà!
NM: Now we have in Cinecittà Joe Wright, Roland Emmerich and Luca Guadagnino.
AKT: Not bad!
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| Open Roads: New Italian Cinema press conference Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze |
NM: Joe Wright is doing the Sky series on Antonio Scurati’s book on Mussolini. So a Sky Studio series, and then we have Netflix doing The Decameron there. Then we have Roland Emmerich working on Those About To Die, it’s a big TV series on gladiators.
AKT: Okay, wow.
NM: And then we have Luca Guadagnino doing his movie Queer in which the main character is played by Daniel Craig. That gives a sense of how important is the movie.
AKT: I’m very curious about that. How far along is he?
NM: Almost all of the movie is shot in Cinecittà. Luca has some road in front of him, but so far he’s happy and for sure I can tell you, it’s unbelievable to see this level of talent.
AKT: You can just walk around and say hello to all the different talent!
NM: What’s incredible in the studios is that productions are like bubbles, you know. You live together, you are in a bubble all together straight to the target, that is to make the movie or make the series. Studio facilities put together these bubbles, because you are not alone. You have your movie, your cast, your crew, but you also have another movie not far from you.
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| Nicola Maccanico: “Cinecittà is back with the big international productions.” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze |
And this can create interaction and give a sense of how creativity can be increased if you can speak with other people. And this is at the end of the day the soul of Cinecittà. And seeing this soul back is a big emotion, I have to say. We heard a lot of stories about when Fellini, Visconti were there.
AKT: Oh yes.
NM: And now we have the big directors of today being there, like it was in the past!
AKT: The nostalgia that is present can be very helpful for the future, I think.
NM: Nostalgia is helpful because now we are competitive. A few years ago nostalgia was not good because it felt like a museum, it’s just the past. Now that we are able to be competitive we are hosting important productions and we are now a studio that is competing structurally in the market of studio facilities today, that brand, that nostalgia may make all the difference in the world.
I can tell you already many times it happened to me that I went to say thank you to a director, because he comes to Cinecittà. And when I say “Thank you for being here”, they say “No, thanks to all of you here, because I’m so happy that I can work here.” And this is probably a gift of the past that we are trying to valorise as much as possible today.
AKT: You couldn’t pick a favourite film from Open Roads, for good reason, but do you have a favourite by Luca Guadagnino?
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| Open Roads: New Italian Cinema poster with Margherita Mazzucco Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze |
NM: Bones And All! His last movie, I think is a masterpiece. And only a talented director like Luca Guadagnino …
AKT: … can get away with cannibalism!
NM: Exactly! When you forget while watching the movie that we are speaking about cannibals, you are in the love story.
AKT: I saw it right here in the Walter Reade Theater where we are sitting now, during the New York Film Festival press screening.
NM: I understand that it can be not for everybody, but if you get into the movie, as I did, it’s like a miracle. I saw the premiere in Venice and it was an incredible emotion.
AKT: I loved it too. How were people reacting in Venice?
NM: It blew people away. It was on the big screen in the Sala Grande in Venice [seating 2,300 spectators]. A real hymn to love.
AKT: Thank you for this conversation!
NM: Thank you so much for your attention. Thank you so much for your time that you are spending with our guests. It’s important for us to give the opportunity to these movies, to be known and hopefully also to be appreciated.
AKT: You said you’ve seen my past coverage, so you know I try to go into depth in the conversations with filmmakers.
NM: Yes! I think in the end that’s much more interesting, otherwise you stay always on the surface and it’s just a title, not a concept. So thank you so much!
Open Roads: New Italian Cinema in New York ran from June 1 through June 8 at the Walter Reade Theater, Film at Lincoln Center.
