Last Friday, when I got off the tram on this sun-drenched morning, I saw them right away. Two large posters on a billboard across the street showing a photo of a charismatic, broadly smiling elderly man with beautiful shiny white hair. Beneath his photo there were only two words that unfortunately still said so much: Ci mancherai, we are going to miss you. It was Gigi Proietti, an icon in Rome who passed away quite suddenly on November the second. It was on the day of his eightieth birthday and in Italy il giorno dei morti, the day of the dead. Social media were immediately flooded with expressions of grief and messages about how Rome would never be the same again. Our mayor delivered an emotional and personal message too. To my great regret, however, I had to confess that I had not known who he was.
How different would your life be if you had no idea who the local icons in your city or region were, if you didn’t know the stories that make part of the collective memory, or if you didn’t understand all the subtle, not literal jokes at the local grocery store because you have no idea what they refer to?
When you move abroad, you suddenly find yourself in a world that is still completely unknown to you. The exciting start of a great path of discovery on which you will marvel and learn new things every day. You suck up all the impressions like a sponge, but also forget a lot of details because you can’t put it into a bigger picture yet. It’s still too early for your brain to connect everything that happens and to see through how every paving stone, every playing child, every church and every passer-by are connected to each other. Occasionally this can overwhelm you, or you can feel lonely. Uprooted even. Think about yourself. How different would your life be if you had no idea who the local icons in your city or region were, if you didn’t know the stories that make part of the collective memory, or if you didn’t understand all the subtle, not literal jokes at the local grocery store because you have no idea what they refer to?
Suddenly I was the outsider again, la straniera, who did not share in the collective grief of the Italians
That’s how I felt again when I read the news about Luigi “Gigi” Proietti. I realised that it had been a long time since I had had this feeling. Even my Italian friends were starting to joke with me lately about the fact that I knew more about the local events (and drama) than they did. Suddenly I was the outsider again, la straniera, who did not share in the collective grief of the Italians.
After the coffin had been carried into the wooden theatre, a deafening round of applause followed that lasted for minutes and minutes because basically every applause would have been too short to truly honour him. If it’s possible for an entire country to have goose bumps at the same time, it was definitely at that moment
On Thursday morning, the farewell service for Signor Proietti was broadcasted live throughout the whole of Italy. And as crazy as this may sound, it was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen on Italian television, and perhaps on television at all. After the coffin had been carried into the wooden theatre, a deafening round of applause followed that lasted for minutes and minutes because basically every applause would have been too short to truly honour him. If it’s possible for an entire country to have goose bumps at the same time, it was definitely at that moment. The coffin covered in red roses was placed in the middle of the stage. Everyone was dressed in black, one of the most beautiful and respectful expressions of mourning. A gesture so simple, but so meaningful. One speech after another was recited by his friends and colleagues, almost all of them artists from the theatre profession. Each speech was therefore a work of art in itself about a harsh reality with which they had been confronted only a few days earlier. The grandeur and feeling with which the speeches were recited was almost unreal. Occasionally it felt like I was watching a film in which I was completely carried away. The moment when one of his best friends, whom had considered Gigi Proietti his mentor since the 1980s, pulled off his face mask out of sheer frustration after only speaking the first three words, I won’t easily forget.
Isn’t it sad how you sometimes only get to know someone when they are no longer amongst us?
Thanks to those passionate speeches – of which I failed to understand some parts that were told in the Roman dialect, showing you how essential it is to also understand the local dialect in order to really integrate somewhere – I got to know Signor Proietti. Isn’t it sad how you sometimes only get to know someone when they are no longer amongst us? Gigi Proietti was a great theatre man. Although he also played in films and was the Italian voice actor of many Hollywood stars, theatre was the profession in which really no one could come close to him. Footage of theatre plays he did were demonstrated, showing how he, with his specific humour and great facial expressions, played the audience in a grandiose way.
Because the influence of theatre reaches so much further than the red velvet chairs, or in this case the wooden benches. At times, there is a scene from a play, a sentence from a song, a movement from a dance, or something as small but subtle as a facial expression that touches you so much that you take it home with you as something you won’t forget for the rest of your life
Things were also said about his personal life. About his Swedish wife and two daughters, Susanna and Carlotta, who were praised for how they dealt with the fact that they never completely had their husband and father for themselves. How they had to share him with the general public. Because a man like Gigi Proietti was a bit of everyone. There was also talk of his enthusiasm to continue sharing the art of theatre and especially the classics. Back in 2003 it was his idea to build in the Villa Borghese – Rome’s most beautiful park – the wooden, Elizabethan theatre The Globe, which was a reconstruction of the famous London theatre from 1559. Gigi Proietti chose to perform the classics of Shakespeare here, entirely in the spirit of the theatre. The audience is free to choose where they want to sit: on the floor or in the wooden stands, which almost look like stable boxes. From the very beginning, the theatre and the plays performed there have been very popular with the younger generation, and with this Signor Proietti had made a masterstroke. Because the influence of theatre reaches so much further than the red velvet chairs, or in this case the wooden benches. At times, there is a scene from a play, a sentence from a song, a movement from a dance, or something as small but subtle as a facial expression that touches you so much that you take it home with you as something you won’t forget for the rest of your life. Inside the theatre, there’s no distinction. And Signor Proietti knew that better than anyone.
That wooden tribune with three floors, that stage, it all looked very familiar to me. And that’s when I knew it again
And while I sat on the couch, deeply stirred and unable to tear my eyes away from that coffin covered with red roses on the screen, it suddenly hit me. The camera swung towards the grieving public again where a colleague artist who had just delivered his speech gave Gigi Proietti’s daughter a warm hug. That wooden tribune with three floors, that stage, it all looked very familiar to me. And that’s when I knew it again. Immediately I grabbed my phone to look for an old video. And there it was. On seven October 2015, less than a month after I had arrived in Rome for the first time, I had been there to watch a Shakespeare performance: ‘Sogno di una notte di mezza estate’, the world-famous ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’. At the time I had no idea where I actually was and I could hardly understand a word of what was being said in the play, but that did not make me love it any less. Not in the slightest. Because after that night I knew one thing for sure: I wanted more of this.
Only now, five years later, I connected the dots and discovered that Gigi Proietti, the man I thought I did not know, actually had made an impact on my life
It would take another five years before I would find out whom I owed that magical experience to. Only now, five years later, I connected the dots and discovered that Gigi Proietti, the man I thought I did not know, actually had made an impact on my life. And his influence goes beyond that. It was thanks to looking back at that video from 2015 that I realised how much better I have gotten to know Rome, as a small player in the grand décor that Rome is where everything and everyone is connected to each other. I can no longer imagine what it is like to not understand the language. To not be able to get the jokes between the two baristas in my coffee bar this morning. Gigi Proietti was a true connector, and after watching his funeral, I realised that now, even after his death, he had managed to deepen the connection between me and Rome. The city, or rather the whole country, has lost a great man, but his legacy will remain with us forever. Grazie Gigi.