By Alberto Macchione
The Palace Cinemas Italian Film Festival has welcomed one Italy’s greatest contemporary actors, Edoardo Leo.
Leo is in Australia as a guest of the Cinema group to promote his latest projects, including the highly anticipated features ‘With You’ (Per Te) and ‘Separate Beds’ (2 Cuori e 2 Capanne). For the latter, Leo opened the film at Palace Norton along with the always glamorous Festival Director and powerhouse executive, Elysia Zeccola.
Despite a long journey to the Southern Hemisphere, Leo, who has spent 32 years in show business, arrived with an infectious energy and an eager curiosity to experience Australia firsthand.
“To discover a city, you have to walk,” Leo shared, dismissing the idea of taking taxis or bikes. “No taxi, no bike—walk. And so I walk a lot.” Arriving early in the morning, he immediately took himself and his partner to the tranquility of the Royal Botanic Garden which he described as.”wonderful” before making his way to the iconic Opera House and the newly re-imagined Sydney Fish Markets.
‘For You’ playing at the film festival now, centres on a father with early onset Alzheimer’s. The part is based on a real family and Edoardo reflects on the difficulty that such a film poses to an actor.
It was so challenging, but comedy it’s always challenging. But with this movie, we really tried to do something special, because we had a, you know, a story of a very bad disease, Alzheimer, it’s something so awful.
And when we discovered this true story, we decided not to make a melodrama, not to make something only sad. We would love to do our job, and our job is to make comedy.
So it was very challenging, because that man is still alive, that family is still alive, and we had to write a movie, and shoot a comedy, respecting the pain of that family, respecting the pain of that man that is almost my age. And so it was very challenging, but I think that at my age in this moment of my career, I don’t want to stay in my comfort zone. I want to take some risks. And that’s the reason why I decided not only to act in this movie, but to co-produce this movie.”
The wife of the real family praised Edoardo’s performance prompting him to say that sometimes this job is not only a job. Sometimes it’s something that goes inside your soul, inside your heart, and in a way changes you as a man, not only as an actor.”
Posing the question as why cinema was still important Edoardo was quick to respond; “Oh, it’s something magical. It’s still something magical.
I think that going inside a totally black room, and being projected into a new world, you know, cinema and theater is now a very rare space where you can lose yourself.
And we are always in control of our life. We always control our photos, our friendships, our everything. And sometimes we have to lose [ourselves], and I think that cinema is a good place for losing yourself. And I say that not only as an actor, but as a viewer.”
Edoardo Leo appeared at a Prosecco reception of the Sydney premier of Separate Beds, attended by a full cinema of fans and notable attendees from the Italian community, including MP Francesco Giacobbe. Asked about the blockbuster sensation, he says, I read the script, I have Massimiliano Bruno as director, as one of my greatest friends, and I made maybe seven or eight movies with him. And Claudia Pandolfi, I know that I know her very well as an actor and she’s great in comedy. So looking at these four points I was quite sure it could be a blockbuster. And I was happy because sometimes blockbusters are very superficial, but I thought that we could have a blockbuster talking about something very serious, and that’s my goal.”
Asked what the take away is for the audience, Edoardo suggested “That you have to listen to each other. You can start from different points, in terms of, you know, political point, cultural, and civil, and whatever. But if you don’t really listen to another person that is at the opposite of you, you couldn’t leave.
You couldn’t change idea. Tell me the last time you heard a man or a woman saying, “Oh, I changed my mind. I changed idea.” It’s very hard. Now it’s impossible because you are, you know, inside your Instagram profile, or Facebook profile, or Twitter. And you have to listen. If you listen to each other, you can change it.
You can improve yourself but you have to start from something you have in common. Because I can face first what divides us, or I can look at what we have in common. So let’s start from what we have in common, and in the case of Separate Bets, they have in common something very rare, that it’s their sense of humor. They are the opposite in every part of life, but they make jokes of the other in a very good way.
The sense of humor, irony. It’s something that could save the world. And if you maintain your irony, even when you are in a different position, I think that it’s a link, And so let’s focus on what we have in common.”