“Le Ragazze”, the Rai Cultura program created by Pesci Combattenti and hosted by Francesca Fialdini, aired yesterday Saturday 4 May in prime time on Rai 3 with the last appointment of this season.
As usual, the episode was opened by the doyen, a girl from the 1940s: Elvia Figliuolo, aka Misselvia, was one of the very first lyricists of Italian music. Born in Potenza in 1924, she moved with her family to Milan during the 1930s. After her master’s studies, she became secretary of Giuseppe Gallazzi, owner of Edizioni Musicali Francis Day, and began to adapt into Italian the lyrics of foreign songs published by the same publishing house, including timeless songs such as “Cantando sotto la rain” and “Guancia e guancia ”. She registered as an author with the SIAE and chose the pseudonym Misselvia, formed from the English word Miss, combined with her name, Elvia. Iva Zanicchi, Bobby Solo, Dalida, Nada, Michele, Natalino Otto, Caterina Valente, Mina, Celentano are just some of the names who have sung her lyrics.
Then it was the turn of two Girls of the 60s.
Leontine Snell was a dancer who made her debut, at just 15 years old, at the Lido in Paris as the first woman in the legendary Bluebell dance troupe. Born in Holland in 1943, she has only one memory of her father: his last wave before boarding a flight that crashed. Her mother is a deeply affectionate woman who, left alone with her two daughters, decides to entrust them to other families. Leontine, who started attending dance school at 4 years old, finishes the Academy and thanks to a scholarship she is called to the Lido in Paris for an audition. This is how she gets a contract with Bluebell. She and them will stop in Italy to participate in the filming of Studio 1. She decides to stay and starts working with Antonello Falqui, Mina and Don Lurio. Two important love stories will change her life: hers with Mario Caldonazzo, a rich building contractor, a violent man who will push her to attempt suicide and the director Dino Risi to whom she will remain tied for almost forty years, despite he was married.
Intertwined with his story is the story of Venere Scaranna, one of the first female traffic policemen in Italy. Born into a family of humble origins, she spent her childhood playing in the rubble left by the Allied bombings. If the precarious economic conditions force her older sister to give up her dream of attending middle school, Venus engages in a real family battle because she wants to continue studying.
For her, education represents emancipation and allows her to join UDI, the Union of Italian Women, the organization that promotes female emancipation. At just 22 years old she married Giorgio, a mechanic from Alfonsine, who supported her in all her battles. In the early ’70s, feminism took on harsher and more maximalist tones: Venus didn’t fit in and she left UDI. The municipality of Ravenna, the first in Italy, announces a competition for police officers open to women. Intrigued, Venus decides to try: she gets the highest score and wears the uniform to the amazement of the people.
Following is the story of two girls from the 2000s. The singer Veronica Lucchesi was born in Pisa in 1987 but grew up in Viareggio and since she was little she has loved wearing many masks, just as per local tradition. Veronica grows up with the American myth, hip hop culture and the dream of living in New York: the attack on the Twin Towers on 11 September 2001 shocks her and opens a period of fears and doubts in her life. At university she chooses law but she is not happy: the meeting with an old friend from high school becomes decisive and will direct her towards the theatre. Between one acting course and another she met Dario Mangiaracina, with whom she began playing and composing music and in 2011 together they created the musical group “La Representative di Lista”. They will arrive on the Sanremo stage with hugely successful songs such as “Amare” and “Ciao Ciao”.
His story is intertwined with that of Marina Cuollo, 42 years old, Neapolitan writer, speaker and activist. Since birth she has been affected by a rare syndrome, Melnick Needles, which causes a serious degenerative disability condition.
Since adolescence Marina has faced obstacles and prejudices. She faces complex surgical interventions, she gives up art high school because she is far from home, but when choosing university she is immovable. She graduated in Biological Sciences and began working as a researcher, but in the end her vocation for writing prevailed. Her first book “A Disabilandia si tromba” was published in 2017, a humorous but also denunciatory essay in which she talks about her life experiences, including sexual ones, and disability. From that moment, writing and communicating become her only path, in 2021 she hosts the Diversity Media Awards with Diego Passoni, and in 2022 she publishes her first novel “Viola”, dedicated to her late mother.
In this episode Francesca Fialdini met the journalist and writer Gianni Riotta.
“Le Ragazze” is a program by Cristiana Mastropietro, Riccardo Mastropietro and Giulio Testa written by Cristiana Mastropietro and produced by Pesci Combattenti for Rai Cultura. Director: Riccardo Mastropietro and Antonio Miorin. The executive producer of Pesci Battente is Marianna Capelli. Rai Delegate: Giulia Lanza.
