The Rome Film Festival could not forget to pay homage to one of the most loved and regretted sons of the Eternal City, Alberto Sordi. Albertone. The first international docufilm (also in English and Spanish) on his private life written and directed by his cousin Igor Righetti, journalist and Rai radio and television presenter, was presented at the Parco della musica Auditorium in the Spazio Lazio, land of cinema in the Lazio Region. The docufilm, entitled ‘Alberto Sordi Secret. The unpublished story of his private life is a tribute to the eighth king of Rome in which many great names in entertainment and culture take part including the actors Fioretta Mari, Emanuela Aureli, Maurizio Mattioli, Enzo Salvi, Daniela Giordano, Mirko Frezza , Daniele Foresi, Vincenzo Bocciarelli, Fabrizio Raggi, Dado Coletti, Emily Shaqiri, Lorenzo Castelluccio, Daniel Panzironi, Valerio Mammolotti, as well as unpublished interventions by Pupi Avati, Rosanna Vaudetti, Elena de Curtis, Rino Barillari, Patrizia and Giada de Blanck and many others.
Igor Righetti reveals to the viewer, for the first time, the childhood and adolescence of his cousin Alberto Sordi who called him “grandson”. And he does so by drawing on the many memories experienced firsthand or narrated by his father and grandfather Primo Righetti in family life situations together with the national Albertone.
“I told them through film scenes shot in black and white, set between 1920 and the end of 1930, in costume and with vintage cars – says the director and screenwriter Igor Righetti – which, thanks to the exceptional cast, will excite and generate many laughs Furthermore, seeing Alberto as a child so determined and willing to make enormous sacrifices in order to make his dream of becoming the greatest actor come true will make them understand many aspects of his private life – as in my Rai radio and television programs – he continues – in this docufilm I worked on the contamination between different genres and languages to create a multiplatform project: TV, radio, theater and obviously cinema as regards film narration.
The interventions of Alberto’s friends are testimonies, not interviews, and have the fast pace typical of journalistic reports where the narration of the story is central”. After all, who better than a family member like Igor Righetti who frequented Alberto Sordi together with their respective families can he really know facts and background?
It describes his conflictual relationship with his father who didn’t want him to be an actor, his attraction to the nobility, sex experienced as a sin, jealousy towards his possessions, his never revealed loves, the ostentation of culture – which he knew of not having – through the antiques and the collection of books that he had not read, the total dedication to his profession, the choice of having very few friends, the great affection towards animals, his mania for houses and the wonderful villa of Castiglioncello that the public has never seen. And beware of calling him “Albertone”.
The docufilm uses photography by Gianni Mammolotti, while the music is by Maria Sicari and the sets and costumes by Stefano Giovani. ‘Alberto Sordi Secret’ consists of a documentary part with unpublished contributions from the actor’s friends and relatives, family photos, videos from the Istituto Luce and original audio. This part is intertwined with another where the narration becomes a black and white film story with characters who actually lived, in which Alberto Sordi’s childhood and adolescence in the Twenties and Thirties is shown thanks to the performances of beloved actors and actresses from the general public such as Enzo Salvi, Fioretta Mari, Emanuela Aureli, Maurizio Mattioli, Daniela Giordano, Dado Coletti, Mirko Frezza, Daniele Foresi, Lorenzo Castelluccio, Emily Shaqiri, Vincenzo Bocciarelli, Fabrizio Raggi, Valerio Mammolotti, Moira De Rossi and three boys from different ages who impersonate the actor (Marco Camuzzi, Flavio Raggi and Daniel Panzironi).
“In the documentary film there aren’t the usual two or three famous names with their three memories that everyone knows by heart by now – says Igor Righetti – otherwise I wouldn’t have titled the work ‘secret’. In the film part I stopped at seventeen-year-old Alberto, upon his return to Rome from Milan, because the most serious mistake that can be made – and was made by another film which not by chance was a flop – is to imitate him, perhaps by putting prostheses on the actor who plays him to make him look like the national Alberto. His fans would be furious.” ‘
Alberto Sordi Secret’, underlines Igor Righetti, “is proudly and deliberately independent, as it was created without tax credit. The community did not pay even a cent to give life to this international project supported, instead, by private sponsors – he explains – and it is also released in over one hundred independent theaters and those of the two multinational chains Uci Cinemas and The Space Cinema, not only Italian but also in Switzerland and the Republic of San Marino, unlike the 345 out of 459 films supported between 2022 and 2023 with the tax credit”, he underlines polemically. After screenings in cinemas, the work will now participate in festivals around the world and will move to national and international television platforms and networks.