It was October 2002. Silvio Berlusconi was the Italian Prime Minister for the second time. The first, in 1994, lasted only a few months. This time, instead, he governed for five years. In Sofia, Bulgaria, during a press conference, Berlusconi accused two journalists, Michele Santoro and Enzo Biagi, and the satirist Daniele Luttazzi, from the public service broadcasting station RAI. His precise words were: "the use of television, paid with money from tax-payers, that Biagi… -What is the name of the other?- Santoro… -But the other?- Luttazzi have done is a criminal use. And I believe that it is a precise duty of the new management not to allow that to happen anymore". And that is what really happened. The three were fired. The episode remains in the Italian memory as the 'Bulgarian diktat'.
One year after, it was the turn of another comedian, Sabina Guzzanti. Guzzanti's family is publicly known in Italy. Paolo Guzzanti, Sabina's father, is a journalist who went into politics and became a senator for Berlusconi's party till 2008. Sabina's brother, Corrado, and sister, Caterina, are also actors and satirists. They used to work together in comedy shows critic with Italian politics on the public broadcasting service. The first was in 1989. Guzzanti siblings have parodied many politicians and celebrities with success in terms of audience and sharpness ever since. In November 2003, Sabina Guzzanti made her debut on RAI 3 with a new programme. After the launch press conference, the director of the channel communicated the stop of the show. Only the first episode was broadcasted. So Sabina Guzzanti organised a big mediatised event from the Rome Auditorium to broadcast the second on local and satellite television channels, on the Internet and in some theatres. The event gathered together people everywhere in Italy, especially along the network of ARCI's social and political clubs.
Both cases mark a sad chapter about freedom of expression in Italy, and the recent events confirm this has not ended yet. In fact, eight years after the 'Bulgarian diktat' and a temporary two-year government theoretically opposed to Berlusconi's coalition, satire in television is less and less present in the Italy of Silvio Berlusconi. Among the purged RAI professionals in 2002, only Michele Santoro went back to work in RAI in 2006. This month, he has been at the centre of another attempt of silencing critic points of view on the government and especially on the Prime Minister. This time, Berlusconi exercised direct pressures on the Authority of Communications and on the management of the public broadcasting service to stop Santoro's programme because it often talked about his trials and involvement in crimes. The calls were tapped and now allegations of power abuse are pending for Berlusconi and favouritism for a member of the Authority.
Santoro's programme has also been stopped with the excuse of regional elections and measures of fair treatment on political communication, known as 'par condicio'. This year, for the first time, 'par condicio' has been interpreted as the elimination of talk shows from television programming and their substitution with electoral tribunes in the month preceding the elections. Talk shows should start again from the 29th of March 2010, if April Fools' day does not reserve new surprises.
On the 25th of March, Michele Santoro replied to the limitations in the programming of the public broadcasting service with a mediatised event, similar in principle to the one mentioned above, called Raiperunanotte. It was a special edition of his programme, Annozero, from the stadium of Bologna and broadcasted on satellite, digital television and the Internet, reaching an extraordinary audience of more than 3 million people.
Viva Zapatero! tells half of this story of breaches in freedom of expression on Italian television. It questions the Italian public broadcasting service system and its tight relationship with politics. The documentary looks at the rest of Europe, at what is considered and allowed as satire abroad, at Zapatero in Spain and his public broadcasting service reforms. The images of the film go from some of Sabina's comic sketches to interviews with politicians, important public figures on the Italian cultural landscape, as Nobel Prize Dario Fo, or popular foreign satirists in France, the UK and the Netherlands.
Sabina Guzzanti shot Viva Zapatero! in 2005 as another reply to her experience of being censored. Viva Zapatero! also suggests the renewal of the Italian public broadcasting service based on the model Zapatero used in Spain. A little book with a specific proposal for a law to reform the public broadcasting service on popular initiative also came together with the DVD.
.jpg)
No comments:
Post a Comment