A “Little Flower” at San Remo

The show of the Sicilian entertainer raised the audience of a Festival that ‘till this moment was rather dull

Fiorello: Good evening my friends, how are you doing? Could you move the camera for a second please, ‘cause I don’t see anybody? Good evening my friends at home, good evening to you! I can’t believe it. They didn’t even present me. Hello Lombardo, how are you? Mamma mia guys. And what do I say now? And what do I do now? And Raffaella said go go, of course. But what do I say now, what do I do?! Let me touch these famous flowers. And then they say that there aren’t any real flowers on the stage of S. Remo. Here I am! But in the meanwhile, listen to me, ‘cause I wanna say something: I want to present you the real people of the S. Remo Festival. I’ve seen this Festival for two nights and the persons that have been showed the most. What Papi? What Ceccherini? What Carrà? It is these two! You don’t see it from here, but from home you see Carrà standing here, and these two who are standing behind her.

Mister Fiorello, this has been a good year for you. I aim at the affirmation that, in my opinion, has been completely deserved. I am not of that branch, but in your opinion, do you have extraordinary qualities to be an actor? Would you like to insist?
Biagi, you will not be of that branch, but I trust you, so I will insist.

From last night, because of your intervention at Sanremo, you are considered, like Enrico Toti, Pietro Micca and so on, a Savior of the country. How do you feel about that?
I don’t feel like a Savior of the country. I feel like a guest of S. Remo who is amused and who is now going back home.

What does it mean to participate at the Festival?
As a guest you feel good because you don’t have the stress of the game. As a singer I’ve felt it in ’95. It is very different. It’s a huge stress, which almost stops you from wanting to sing, to appear in those hard 3 minutes of the song. Terrible.

Who did you like? And who didn’t you like?
Well, well, Carrà and Chiambretti. I didn’t like Megan Gale at all, because she is so ugly, little, thickset, ugly.

I am Eminem!
You are Eminemma!
Let’s do this Emminemation!
Let’s use some cuss words, come on!
Raffaella, come on! You are bastard! My butt! My butt!

Raffaella Carrà: Hey! Do you want me to get kicked off!
 
The success of these songs used to be celebrated when, the next morning, the deliverymen of the bakers would whistle a part of the song. Why doesn’t this happen anymore today?
Because there aren’t any bakers anymore who whistle outside I guess.

Who do you owe thanks to for your career, except from your own merit of course?
Well, let’s say Claudio Cecchetto is the person who discovered me.
In the second part of my career, let’s call it the “second part”, Ballandi and his staff of authors, who took me aside and said: ‘Fiore’, come on and try to work good, study, apply and give everything you can’.

Have there been certain moments in which you thought to abandon the scenes?
A thousand times. I’ve always thought that, every time that something went wrong ‘enough, I can’t handle it anymore!’. But, I have to say sincerely, if the program ‘Stasera pago io’, the one that always ended so late, Mister Biagi, you even got angry and I officially apology now. If that program would have gone wrong, I really would have quit doing television. Then maybe I would have done theatre.

From Japino, ‘Baffuto’, ‘Orendo’, Chi sa se va, sings Raffaella Pelloni.

(Carrà sings)

All men have a table of the things that have value. What’s yours?
Certainly the family, absolutely the family. Then work.

What did you bring with your from the Festival, other then maybe flowers for your lady? If you didn’t remember that, take care of it immediately.
If I have to be sincere, I didn’t bring any flowers. I will take care of it immediately. But the thing that I carry with me, believe me, is that beautiful applause. When I came down from the stairs there was this huge applause which I didn’t expect, I said: ‘What a beautiful applause. I will carry it with me in my heart’. An applause of the public of S. Remo.

You have been at the Ariston Theatre as a singer and as a guest. Is it a target to come back as a presenter?
As a singer I was a disaster in ’95 which I still remember. As a presenter I have to say that I would like that a lot.

We would also like it.