«I tell late love with irony and lightness» – Corriere.it

Gianni Di Gregorio led to the Rome Festival Astolfo, one of the most popular films (from 20th in theaters for Lucky Red). The story of a pensioner evicted from Rome who has to take refuge in his family home in Artena, a small town in Lazio. And there he finds love in Stefania Sandrelli. The beginning of a new life. The senior singer smells of laundry but is now “less melancholy, more cheerful and carefree”.

Di Gregorio, is it possible to love at 360 degrees as an elderly person?

“I was terribly afraid, but you’re crazy, I told myself. My daughter laughed, that you got it on your head. I thought about the pandemic that generated an uncontrolled reaction. I did not know Stefania Sandrelli, a crazy surprise, on the set she was a girl, full of strength, of irony. He is a myth. She told me: if in a scene we have to kiss, we can give each other a little kiss. It is a sympathy … Yes, you can fall in love at any age. Artena protected us, pampered us, in the evening we drank the wine of the town ».

“Fiercely. It happens in life. My friends’ children, who ran to the notary, who said but what is Dad doing? Let him do it, he is good with you I said. The children are keen to mark the territory, the selfishness, the fear of inheritance, but these are not so bad ».

In the film, the priest cares about a piece of the house.

«It happens in absence, when you return to your property after so many years. I have lived it. I had an old house in Abruzzo that after the earthquake was not accessible, neighbors were priests who did not want to make the gutter, we will do it they said, in the meantime they changed between them. They had taken a room that they thought was pending. I told him, you don’t have the title deed. They kicked me out badly. I had a garden that has become public green ».

The mayor in the film steals his oak grove.

«The power, if you go away, disappears or is a scam. When I did the work at home, the Fine Arts came out, I don’t know where from: you have to redo everything as it was. But 30 meters from me it was all reinforced concrete, I objected. Yes, but you are in the historic center. Excuse me, I have the neighboring eco-monster at 30 meters and I have to put the tiles of the ‘700? ».

Friends enter her house and never leave.

«I lived it, eh, whoever says your shopping will do it for you and cooked, whoever played cards, the barber had nothing to do and came to my house, it looked like a tavern. And I said enough ».

«I was inspired by my cousin, he is eternally in love. He then went to work in Switzerland and has a nice pension. Back in the village, the head of an 18 year old also returned. He despairs, he pines, he tells me. It’s a beautiful thing, I’d spend hours listening to him, he’s not a playboy, he’s in love with love, maybe he’s right. “

“In Italy little is said, much more abroad. It is a delicate issue, there is the modesty of the body. I tell it with irony, if I had taken it seriously I don’t know how I would have finished it ».

And the elderly who get together with young foreigners?

«I see a happy, elegant person at the bar, I don’t know him well, hindsight I would ask him everything. But thank goodness, I said to myself alive, it’s a good story. I know that he had to settle everything financially with his daughter to be able to go out with the Romanian ».

But what does your daughter Teresa say about your house in Abruzzo that is a bit run down?

«He studied art, he says it dates back to 1200 … Even to sell it, who buys it … Could he give up the inheritance? It is an idea. Meanwhile, desperate, we drank a bottle ».