Country cousins: Europeanness, sexuality and locality in contemporary Italian television

Abstract

This article examines the consequences of the concurrence of a recent surge of interest in LGBT lives in the Italian media with the perceived transformation of Spain. Long considered Italy's close – though inferior – cultural cousin, Spain has been seen to be forging its own path with the reforms of the Zapatero administration, gay marriage especially. The article focuses on Il padre delle spose (RAI1, 2006), which generated intense discussion across the political spectrum precisely during the period in which the issue of recognising domestic partnerships between same-sex couples was being contested in Italy. The drama and surrounding media debates are analysed in order to articulate both the anxieties and the sense of opportunity brought about by Spain's ‘sorpasso’ of Italy. The drama is also informative for the way it reverses the standard ‘metropolitan’ trajectory of LGBT narrative. By relocating its lesbian protagonists to rural Puglia, the drama indicates how local traditions might be better able to respond to hetero-patriarchal oppression than imported ideals of ‘coming out’. Further, the drama's emphasis on local forms of solidarity suggests an alternative vision of LGBT existence to the one increasingly dominant across Europe and the West which privileges economically productive subjects.

Keywords:

• same-sex marriage
• television
• Europeanness
• Zapatero
• Puglia
• coming out

Notes

Notes

1. For other responses, see for example: Volpe (2006); Patruno (2006); Costanzo (2006); Carugati (2006).

2. The debate escalated between 2006 and 2008 as the Prodi government struggled and ultimately failed to pass any kind of legislation on same-sex partnerships due to internal divisions within its centre-left majority and in the face of outright hostility from the centre-right opposition parties. For a detailed account of this debate, and of the heated responses that the topic of same-sex unions ignited during this period, see the documentary Improvvisamente l’inverno scorso (dir. Ragazzi and Hofer 2008).

3. Un difetto di famiglia and Mio figlio, both focusing on gay male characters, had been previously broadcast by RAI in 2002 and 2005 respectively. Luca Malici (2011) asserts that, in the 1990s, the representation of LGBT people – actually mainly gay men – on Italian television was largely limited to films and shows imported from the US, though these were often subject to censorship. Since the mid 2000s, imported shows such as The L-word (La7, 2005) and Queer eye for the straight guy (I fantastici 5, La7, 2004) have been broadcast uncut, though not without attracting criticism from conservative quarters. We would contend that numerous other television texts from earlier periods have provided Italian LGBT people with useful resources. More attention might be paid, for instance, to the strikingly queer content of imported animated series such as Lady Oscar (Italia 1, 1982) and C’era una volta … Pollon (Italia 1, 1984).

4. Other reforms include legislation passed in 2004 to speed up divorce proceedings, the Gender Equality Act of 2006, and the ending of compulsory teaching of Catholicism in public schools in 2007.

5. A similar point is also made by Claudia Cucchiarato: ‘Spagna e Italia, è risaputo, sono paesi simili. Con i “cugini” spagnoli abbiamo molte cose in comune…. Gli spagnoli, tuttavia, sono sempre stati guardati dagli italici come un popolo tutto sommato inferiore’ (2010, 26).

6. According to The global gender gap report 2010, Spain has been competing since 2006 with Scandinavian countries for the top rankings and currently scores 11th in the world, whilst Italy's position, in the same period, has fluctuated between 67th and the 84th (Hausman, Tyson, and Zahidi 2010, 8). Celia Valiente (2008) offers a more measured assessment of gender equality in Spain since the Zapatero reforms. For instance, the Spanish state has failed to properly implement the Gender Violence Act of 2004, and there has been opposition to the Gender Equality Act of 2006 from employers’ organisations.

7. A significant number of articles on Zapatero and his progressive reforms have appeared in Italian magazines and newspapers asking what these social reforms mean for Italy. See for example: Vignolo (2004); Oppes (2004); Merlo (2005).

8. According to the Dizionario Treccani dei neologismi, the first recorded uses of these terms occurred in 2004.

9. Notably, in response to the lack of financial support from the newly elected regional government of Piedmont (led by Lega Nord), the director of the 2010 Turin gay and lesbian film festival Giovanni Minerba threatened to move this prestigious event to Puglia (Caroli 2010, 1).

10. Another key supporter of the drama was the Apulian actor and national television star Lino Banfi, who plays Riccardo, and who is father to the actress playing Aurora, Rosanna Banfi. Lino Banfi's involvement parallels Puglia's recent transformations. A rather conservative public figure, Banfi vigorously defended this project against its critics. The involvement of Banfi was surprising especially for those who were critical of RAI's decision to broadcast the drama. Luca Borgomeo, president of the Association of Catholic TV viewers (AIART), declared: ‘davvero strano che il ruolo del padre sia stato affidato a Lino Banfi, che finora ha vestito i panni dell’amorevole e rassicurante nonno, quasi un garante della famiglia italiana’ (aiart.org).

11. In the film Mater natura (dir. Andrei, 2005), for example, a group of transsexuals and femminielli, disappointed with life in the city, leave Naples and set up a queer rural community on Mount Vesuvius. In a similar vein, Ferzan Ozpetek's most recent film, Le mine vaganti (2010), which is entirely set in the small provincial town of Lecce, shows two gay brothers establishing affective relationships and envisaging the possibility of living as queers away from the metropolis.