Amadeus, fresh from moving to Channel Nine of Warner Bros-Discovery, replies with a quote from the Russian writer Fedor Dostoevsky to Lucio Presca, his former agent who in a recent interview had spoken, with unpublished background, about the breakup with the host. “He who lies to himself and listens to his own lies reaches the point of no longer distinguishing the truth, neither in himself nor around him”, is the phrase reported by Amadeus on social media which does not directly quote the manager, but the reference seems obvious. A reply that is evidently not enough to dismantle the case, at least for Maurizio Gasparri who announces that he has filed a question with the competent public service bodies on Presta’s declarations.
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“An interview with Lucio Presta, former manager of Amadeus, was published in the ‘Giornale’ of 28 April, whose statements raise two important issues which need to be clarified – declares the president of the senators of Forza Italia – The interview, in fact , contains allusions that raise doubts regarding the compensation of 90 thousand euros paid, following a meeting in June 2023, by Lucio Presta’s son to the host Amadeus in his capacity as Artistic Director of the ‘Arena Suzuki’ program and for having collaborated in the creation of the same although, as reiterated by Presta in the same interview, this is not true. We read that even in previous years Amadeus would have received undue compensation which he regularly invoiced with the wording ‘artistic direction’, in contravention of the Rai Supervision circular”.
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This is not the only reason why clarifications are needed, Gasparri writes. “The second issue, however, concerns the episode of the advertising of the shoes worn by John Travolta during the Sanremo 2024 festival, already the subject of a question of mine that has remained unanswered to date, minimized by Amadeus himself and on which ridiculous statements have also been made by some Rai managers”, writes the senator in reference to the sensational case which culminated in the “dance of qua qua qua” of the actor of Saturday Night Fever and Pulp Fiction with Amadeus and Fiorello. “The shots of the shoes were an advertisement in all respects which, inserted in the most valuable Rai programme, would have had very high costs – thunders Gasparri – It would be appropriate to preserve the public television service from the interference of some managers and presenters. This is why I presented a question to the competent bodies to find out how they evaluate the interview given by Lucio Presta, whether RAI was aware of Amadeus’ compensation, whether the rules were respected and whether they believe that the revenues generated by the advertising of the shoes worn by John Travolta would have could be collected by RAI, if so, if they believe that the failure to collect constitutes damage to the company”.
