Inspiration. ‘The Great Pirandello’
Address: Roberto Ando
artists: Toni Servillo, Salvatore Ficarra, Valentino Picone
Year: 2022
Premiere: March 3, 2023
★★
In this drama, the Sicilian town becomes a stage for a quiet rebellion against conventional storytelling. The central figure returns home to Sicily and learns that his former wet nurse has recently passed away. Rather than offering a simple procession of grief, he orchestrates a funeral that doubles as a theatrical event. He hires two curious gravediggers who are deeply devoted to amateur theatre and ready to blur the line between life and performance. The opening scenes unfold during a chaotic rehearsal for one of the author’s works, signaling that the film will probe the distance between an author and the worlds he creates. It is a meditation that turns on the relationship between the creator known for bestselling pieces like Six Characters in Search of an Author and the people who inhabit and distort the worlds he imagines. The gravediggers become mirrors or foils, revealing indulgence, excess, and the moral ambiguities that arise when art, life, and death collide. The film refuses a simple, tidy arc, choosing instead to illuminate how stories are born from interplay, improvisation, and the sometimes messy collaboration between writers and performers. The director Roberto Ando, however, leans toward a more traditional, lighthearted approach in parts, suggesting a desire to reach a broader audience rather than offering a singular, austere critique of literary or theatrical creation.
In this study of Pirandello, Toni Servillo embodies the role with a blend of brilliance and shadow. Servillo, a renowned figure in contemporary Italian cinema, has made his mark with performances that carry an unmistakable stamp while remaining unmistakably his own. He has inhabited a wide spectrum of personas, from doomed antiheroes to magnetic, almost vampiric figures who linger in memory long after the screen fades. In this project, his portrayal of Pirandello navigates the space between celebrity and creator, between the myth of the author and the human flaws that fuel the writing room. The performance invites audiences to consider how real people, and real reputations, shape the reception of a writer’s work. Characters who once seemed distant become intimate, revealing how fame, influence, and the weight of a famous name can ripple through a story’s reception. Servillo’s delivery is at once precise and expressive, a testament to his capacity to render intellectual complexity with accessible, pulsing energy. His collaborations or references to public figures in other works—such as his portrayals of historic personalities—lend a layered texture to this Pirandello interpretation, making the film feel like a living conversation with Italy’s literary and theatrical past. The ensemble’s chemistry underscores the central idea: that creation is a social act, built from dialogue, conflict, and shared performances rather than a solitary act carried out in isolation. The film’s tone oscillates between affectionate homage and cutting observation, preserving the warmth of a small-town theater while probing larger questions about the responsibilities of storytellers to their audiences and to the people who populate their fictions.