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ABSTRACT
This article aims to contribute to the debate about critical race studies in the Italian context – and especially in the 1960s and the 1970s – by focusing on the construction and negotiation of race in the career of the prominent Italian meticcia singer, television host and producer Silvana Areggasc Savorelli, also known as Tanya from 1960 to 1966 and Lara Saint Paul from 1967 onwards. Through an examination of Savorelli’s career as a singer, television host and Italian diva, this article shows how the meanings of Savorelli’s meticcio body have been constantly adapting to the shifting perceptions of blackness in Italy and other Western societies. Lara Saint Paul’s media representations illustrate a change in the social construction of Italianness in terms of race from the early 1960s to the early 2000s.
Notes
1 J. Hobson, Venus in the Dark: Blackness and Beauty in Popular Culture (New York; London: Routledge, 2005), p. 148.
2 S. A. Tate, Black Beauty: Aesthetics, Stylization, Politics (New York; London: Routledge, 2016), p. 53.
3 L. De Franceschi, ed., L’Africa in Italia. Per una controstoria postcoloniale del cinema italiano (Rome: Aracne, 2013); S. Greene, Equivocal Subjects: Between Italy and Africa – Constructions of Racial and National Identity in the Italian cinema (London; New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2014).
4 G. Giuliani, ed., Il colore della nazione (Florence; Milan: Le Monnier – Mondadori Education, 2015); and G. Giuliani and C. Lombardi-Diop, Bianco e nero. Storia dell’identità razziale degli italiani (Florence; Milan: Le Monnier – Mondadori Education, 2013).
5 S. Ponzanesi, Paradoxes of Postcolonial Culture: Contemporary Women Writers of the Indian and Afro-Italian Diaspora (Albany: SUNY Press, 2004); J. Andall and D. Duncan, eds, Italian Colonialism: Legacy and Memory (Oxford: Lang, 2005); J. Andall and D. Duncan, eds, National Belongings: Hybridity in Italian Colonial and Postcolonial Cultures (Oxford: Lang, 2010); and C. Lombardi-Diop and C. Romeo, eds, Postcolonial Italy: Challenging National Homogeneity (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012).
6 Blaxspoitalian. 100 Anni di Afrostorie nel cinema italiano, dir. by Fred Kudjo Kuwornu (Blue Rose Film, 2016).
7 J. Guglielmo and S. Salerno, Are Italians White?: How Race is Made in America (New York; London: Routledge, 2003).
8 See N. J. Moe, The View from Vesuvius: Italian Culture and the Southern Question (Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2002).
9 G. Giuliani and C. Lombardi-Diop, Bianco e Nero, pp. 12–13.
10 V. Deplano, ‘Senza distinzione di razza? Razzismo in controluce nel discorso pubblico italiano tra anni Cinquanta e anni Settanta’, From the European South, 1 (2016), 95–102 (p. 96).
11 L. De Carlini, ‘L’inchiesta della settimana. E tu, sposeresti un negro?’, Ciao Big, 15 December 1967, 98–100 (p. 98).
12 P. P. Pasolini, Pasolini su Pasolini: conversazioni con Jon Halliday (Parma: Guanda, 1992), p. 66.
13 Quelli della Domenica (RAI, 1968; RAI Teche Archives); La domenica è un’altra cosa (RAI, 1969).
14 Canzonissima (RAI, 1970–71; RAI Teche Archives).
15 XII Festival della Canzone Italiana – Sanremo (RAI, 1962; RAI Teche Archives); XVIII Festival della Canzone Italiana – Sanremo (RAI, 1968; RAI Teche Archives); XXII Festival della Canzone Italiana – Sanremo (RAI, 1972; RAI Teche Archives); and XXIII Festival della Canzone Italiana – Sanremo (RAI, 1973; RAI Teche Archives).
16 R. Dyer, Heavenly Bodies: Film, Stars and Society, 2nd edn (London; New York: Routledge, 2004), p. 12.
17 N. Fleetwood, Troubling Vision: Performance Visuality and Blackness (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2011), p. 6.
18 S. A. Tate, Black Beauty, p. 150.
19 Presidenza del Consiglio dei Ministri, ‘Assegno Straordinario Vitalizio a favore di cittadini illustri – Scheda personale di Areggasc Savorelli Silvana (in arte Lara Saint Paul)’ http://presidenza.governo.it/GovernoInforma/documenti/bacchielli/Silvana_Areggasc_Savorelli.pdf [accessed 16 May 2017].
20 R. D’Intino et al., ‘Il festival confidenziale’, Sorrisi e Canzoni TV, 18 February 1962, 10–14 (p. 14).
21 G. Tomasello, L’Africa tra mito e realtà: storia della letteratura coloniale italiana (Palermo: Sellerio, 2004), pp. 211–13.
22 Two artists sang the same song at Sanremo festivals in the 1960s, because the competition gave an award for the best song rather than the singers’ performance.
23 R. D’Intino, ‘Le strane reclute del Festival’, Sorrisi e Canzoni TV, 4 February 1962, 14–17 (p. 17).
24 G. Ruffo, ‘Colbacchi e sombreros per le vie di Sanremo’, Sorrisi e Canzoni TV, 18 February 1962, 15–17 (p. 16).
25 P. Novelli, ‘Le domande cattive ai personaggi del Festival’, Sorrisi e Canzoni TV, 18 February 1962, p. 20.
26 E. Lamberti, ‘Il tema di Lara’, Ciao Duemilauno, 3 September 1969, 34–37 (p. 35).
27 Due Mattacchioni al Moulin Rouge, dir. by Giuseppe Vari (Telefilm Industria, 1964).
28 D. M. Caporoso Konzett, Hollywood’s Hawaii: Race, Nation and War (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press: 2017), pp. 135–94.
29 The RAI (the Italian national television and radio service) multimedia catalogue does not specify when each episode was aired.
30 Studio Uno (RAI, 1961–1965; RAI Teche Archives).
31 R. Haworth, ‘Making a Star on the Small Screen: The case of Mina and RAI’, Journal of Italian Cinema & Media Studies, 3.1–2 (2015), 27–41 (p. 32).
32 The RAI multimedia catalogue, which includes these videos, is not freely available online. It can be accessed from RAI libraries and regional offices, and from selected libraries in Rome and Milan.
33 J. L. Collier, Louis Armstrong: An American Genius (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985), p. 304.
34 A. Buratti, ‘Pronti all’attacco dei Big Stranieri’, Sorrisi e Canzoni TV, 4 February 1968, pp. 24–27.
35 Anon., ‘La faccia nera del festival’, Sorrisi e Canzoni TV, 14 January 1968, pp. 18–19.
36 E. Baldi et al., ‘Rosso e nero’, Sorrisi e Canzoni T, 11 February 1968, p. 21.
37 L. Saint Paul, ‘A casa di Armstrong un incontro indimenticabile’, Sorrisi e Canzoni TV, 29 December 1968, pp. 22–25.
38 See, for example, the opening credits of the film Stasera mi butto, dir. by Ettore Maria Fizzarotti (Titanus, 1967).
39 Sabato Sera (RAI, 1967; RAI Teche Archives).
40 G. Vesigna, ‘I segreti di Lara’, Sorrisi e Canzoni TV, 1 June 1969, pp. 22–24. Lara also appears in the magazine cover of this issue.
41 G. Guazzaloca, Una e divisibile: la Rai e i partiti negli anni del monopolio pubblico (Florence: Le Monnier, 2011), p. 137.
42 Anon., ‘Lara Saint Paul: mi va di gridare che sono felice!’, Giovani, 4 March 1968, 78–79 (p. 78); and L. Saint Paul, ‘Tutti al sole con Lara! Saint! Paul!’, Playboy, July 1978, p. 36.
43 David, ‘Lara: Ecco chi è la tua vera mamma!’, Settimana extra: attualità, politica, cultura, 20 July 1973, pp. 6–8.
44 Homi Bhabha, The Locations of Culture (London: Routledge, 1994) p. 88.
45 Troppo per vivere poco per morire, dir. by Michele Lupo (Fida Cinematografica, 1967).
46 Rapporto Fuller base Stoccolma, dir. by Sergio Grieco (Fida Cinematografica, 1968).
47 M. Mahon, ‘African American Women and the Dynamics of Gender, Race, and Genre in Rock ‘n’Roll’, in Issues in African American Music: Power, Gender, Race, Representation, ed. by Portia K. Maultsby and Mellonee V. Burnim (New York; London: Routledge 2017), p. 292.
48 K. Mercer, Welcome to the Jungle: New Positions in Black Cultural Studies (London: Routledge 1994), p. 104.
49 Tate, Black Beauty, p. 50.
50 S. B. Kaiser, Fashion and Cultural Studies (London; New York: Bloomsbury, 2012), p. 80.
51 A. D. Byrd and L. L. Tharps, Hair Story: Untangling the Roots of Black Hair in America, 2nd edn (New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 2014), p. 54.
52 For example, white British singer Julie Driscoll also adopted an Afro hairstyle in the late 1960s.
53 Lamberti, ‘Il tema di Lara’, pp. 35–36.
54 M.A., ‘Vuole il giardino per un ghepardo’, Ciao Big, 5 April 1968, 4–5 (p. 5).
55 Ibid.
56 Anon., ‘Melissa vuol diventare più famosa di Lara St. Paul’, Giovani, 21 November 1968, 48–49 (p. 49).
57 ‘Lara Saint Paul: mi va di gridare che sono felice!’, p. 79.
58 Lamberti, ‘Il tema di Lara’, p. 35.
59 Tate, Black Beauty, p. 1.
60 Mahon, ‘African American Women and the Dynamics of Gender, Race, and Genre in Rock ‘n’ Roll’, p. 301.
61 b. hooks, Black Looks: Race and Representation (Boston, MA: South End Press, 1992), p. 67.
62 G. Proglio, ‘L’Italia e il passato coloniale. Riflessioni e considerazioni a margine del dibattito storiografico’, Memoria e ricerca 1 (2018), pp. 113–32.
63 ‘Tutti al sole con Lara! Saint! Paul!’, pp. 36–43; Anon., ‘Lara Saint Paul: Disco Music e un tocco di classe’, Playman, 5 May 1979, pp. 54–60; and Anon., ‘Lara Saint Paul’, Ciné Revue Photos, December 1979, pp. 42–47.
64 ‘Lara Saint Paul: Disco Music e un tocco di classe’, p. 55.
65 R. Giuliani Caponetto, ‘Zeudi Araya, Ines Pellegrini e il cinema italiano di seduzione coloniale’, in L’Africa in Italia, ed. by L. De Franceschi, pp. 109–24.
66 Papaya dei Caraibi, dir. by Joe D’Amato (Mercury Cinematografica, 1978).
67 On this topic see, G. Giuliani, ‘La razza fuoristrada. Veneri nere tra memoria coloniale e orizzonti globali’, in A fior di pelle. Bianchezza, nerezza, visualità, ed. by E. Bordin and S. Bosco (Verona: Ombre corte, 2017), pp. 235–50.
68 S. Ponzanesi, Paradoxes of Postcolonial Culture.
69 Lara was a producer and host for the 1988 Sanremo Music Festival at the Casino di Sanremo, and she also produced a documentary on the Italian tenor Luciano Pavarotti, The Best Is Yet to Come (1995).
70 Discoring (RAI; 1980–1981; RAI Teche Archives).
71 Arrivano Frank, Liza and Sammy (RAI, 1989; RAI Teche Archives).
72 R. Hewitt, White Backlash and the Politics of Multiculturalism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p. 18.
73 Io tra di Voi (Mediaset, 2002).
74 Unomattina (RAI, 2007).
75 Including Domenica In (RAI, 2013) and TGcom 24 (Mediaset, 2017).
76 Fleetwood, Troubling Vision, pp. 5–6.
77 b. hooks, Black Looks, p. 21.