Lucio Presta on Amadeus: “From gratitude to resentment: this is why we broke up”

The break with Amedeus? “The sad ending is that Giulio Andreotti was right. Gratitude is the feeling of the eve and the rancorous syndrome of the beneficiary is a syndrome attributable to our times and also to great people”. As Lucio Presta who in a long interview with Newspaper retraces the stages of the relationship with the host. “The first Sanremo Festival done together was a masterpiece of complicity. Amadeus didn’t even know where he could begin to formulate a regulation and what follows from it” and with him and his family “I spent a few days in La Coruna, in Spain, to write the entire regulation which he then brought to Rai as his work”, says Presta, explaining that together they also built “the authorial team, the direction, the set designers, the director of photography, the choreographer, etc.. .”, and made the choice of co-hosts: “Some of them he met for the first time directly during the Saremo photo shoots”. As for the musical part, “from day one we had meetings with the discography together”. In short, a solid relationship of unconditional trust, at least “for four Festivals”.

Shortly after starting work on the fifth Sanremo, says the manager, “I realized that something was wrong: Ama always said no and declined every proposal”. Then “I asked to have a meeting with him and the answer was that she had a lot to do”. Presta says that in June 2023 Amadeus asked, in relation to Arena Suzuki, a program produced by Arcobaleno Tre (the company of which Presta sold the shares but remains manager) “that he be paid by the company for the artistic direction and that he be recognized 100 percent of the ownership rights of the format” and his son partially “gave in to his insistence”: “He recognized 90 thousand euros, in addition to those paid in previous years and also – according to Presta – not owed. Money that Ama has invoiced regularly with the wording ‘artistic direction’, thus contravening the Rai Supervision circular”.

“I honestly believe he was pushed to do it, I don’t recognize him in this gesture”, adds the manager, explaining that Amadeus subsequently “announced his intention to interrupt the relationship after the end of the Festival”. Then, “a few days later” she wrote him a message “saying that he preferred to immediately end our relationship because my presence would have made him uncomfortable at the Festival”. “On that occasion he confirmed to me that he would honor the payment of my dues until the end of the contract (August 2024)”, only to then communicate “that he intended to pay only until December. For this reason, the legal office was given instructions to protect the my interests”.