Zelensky case in Sanremo 2023, but how much politics at the Festival. Whistles, eggs, appeals (with Gorbachev on stage and Salvini in the audience) – Corriere.it

From comedians booed for an “too political” impersonation to eggs promised against satire and then punctually thrown (but on the TV screen). From stage leaders to audience leaders. In short, it is not the first time that politics has erupted in Sanremo, pace of the chorus of no that has risen against the intervention at the 73rd Festival of the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky. From names that have made world history such as the leader of Perestroika Mikhail Gorbachev to entr’actes that, more modestly, have made the history of a TV event that also – and above all – thrives on controversy.

1980 – Benigni and the “Wojtylaccio” ended up in Parliament

The eighties didn’t even have time to begin when the Ariston was already “burning”. The 30th Festival (managed by Claudio Cecchetto) has a young and «demon-possessed» Roberto Benigni on stage. A very long French kiss on stage and live with the actress Olimpia Carlisi cannot be enough for a comedian of his caliber. This is how it will end up in Parliament – with questions and discussions – for having respectively addressed Pope John Paul II and the Prime Minister, Francesco Cossiga with the “cripples” Wojtylaccio and Kossigaccio.

1984 – The protest of the Italsider metalworkers

The crisis of the large industrial settlements, as all current affairs has punctually done in the 74-year history of the Festival, takes the stage. In 1984 he did so in the guise of some metalworkers of Italsider in Genoa: while their colleagues protested on pickets outside the Ariston theater, the blue overalls claimed their battle against the closure of the plant in the Ligurian capital alongside Pippo Baudo in Eurovision.

1995 – The attempted suicide of the unemployed

The tragedy of work will return to Sanremo on other occasions: in 1995, Baudo himself saved a man who threatened to commit suicide from the gallery balustrade because he was unemployed. A record moment of listening (and for this very reason, according to some, part of a “fake” orchestrated by the national Goofy).

1999 – History on stage: Gorbachev and Signora da Fazio

Lovers of Italy, of song, but above all living witnesses of the greatest turning point of the twentieth century. The yes of Mikhail Gorbachev and his wife Raissa to Fabio Fazio in 1999 – to talk about geopolitics in the temple of pop songs – launch the concept of the superhost of Sanremo into the stratosphere. Other than Madonna and Take That…

2000 – Jovanotti: «Cancel the debt»

It is one of the most political Jovanotti who goes to the second evening of Sanremo. He raps – alongside South American percussionist Carlinos Brown – and calls on governments to “cancel the debt” of Third World countries. At least the request for dialogue will not remain a dead letter: a few days later Prime Minister Massimo D’Alema will receive Lorenzo Cherubini with the lead singer of U2, Bono Vox.

2002 – Ferrara and Benigni’s eggs (from the living room)

Baudo returns and – after 19 years – Benigni returns to Ariston. Open up heaven. The Berlusconi II government is in full force and the premier is one of the “core business” of Benigni’s comic activity. The director of Il Foglio, Giuliano Ferrara lashes out at the guest announced for the final evening, promising: «We’ll be in the audience and we’ll throw eggs at him». He will partially keep his word after a tam tam of days: the launch will take place against the TV that broadcasts the comedian’s monologue.

2014 – Grillo: rally outside the Ariston, spectator inside

In his sights he has the then prime minister, Matteo Renzi, someone who has always – and he will prove it again once he leaves the government – has a passion for television. The founder of the 5 Star Movement, Beppe Grillo, presents himself in Sanremo. He holds a rally outside the Ariston and then enters the theater, to applause, with the regularly purchased ticket. He sits in the seventeenth row and enjoys the evening. The raid that alarmed the police and Rai security for days is all here.

2016 – The sprint to the Cirinnà law

If in May 2016 the first true Italian law on de facto couples becomes a reality, perhaps it is partly due to them. The artists who – even with a simple rainbow ribbon on the microphone – launched a pro Cirinnà message from the most important stage in Italy. From Enrico Ruggeri to Noemi to Arisa there are many who bring a piece of civil rights to the second edition conducted by Carlo Conti.

2018 – Salvini (honorable boyfriend) in the audience

He’s the first gentleman and he doesn’t mind. Matteo Salvini, at the time leader of the League in opposition to a center-left government, is at Ariston as a companion to one of the leading faces of the Rai flagship network. The fiancée Elisa Isoardi (they will break up a few months later after 4 years together), in fact, is the protagonist of the bitter relay with Antonella Clerici at the helm of the The cook’s test.