Franco Zeffirelli lives in the spotlight, famous for lavish
films, opera, & stage production spectacles. His works brought applause
& accolades, along with certain critical contempt.
Zeffirelli is gay & open about his sexuality in his memoir
& his films have a decidedly gay sensitivity, yet he is an advocate of
Catholic dogma in opposition to gay rights, particularly his backing of Vatican
effort to prevent a Gay Pride parade in Rome. The contradiction is characteristic
of Zeffirelli's career with works with extreme degrees of reverence & revilement.
Religious organizations strongly took exception to
Zeffirelli’s supposedly blasphemous representation of biblical figures, yet he
also earned the derision of gay people for publicly taking the side of the
Roman Catholic Church.
Zeffirelli writes in his memoir that he never liked to
discuss his personal life, & that he considers himself
"homosexual," not "gay," a term he considers less elegant.
Several years ago, Zeffirelli adopted 2 adult sons, men
he has known & worked with for years who now live with him, dote on him
& help manage his affairs.
Zeffirelli was turns 90 years old on this very day,
February 12, in Florence, the son of a rich businessman, from the family line
of Leonardo da Vinci, & his fashion designer mistress. His mother followed
the Florentine tradition of naming a child born out of wedlock with a created
name beginning with the letter "Z." After his mother's death, he was
placed in the care of an English governess, from whom he learned the English
language & its literature.
Zeffirelli studied architecture at the University of
Florence where he began directing student theatrical & opera productions. He
left the university to join the fight against the Nazi occupation of Italy,
working as an interpreter for the British Army.
With influence from his new British friends, Zeffirella
dropped plans to be an architect & became a theatrical set & costume designer.
He found work as an assistant to film director Luciano Visconti. His
first big break was in 1949, designing the set for the first Italian production
of A Streetcar Named Desire, directed by Visconti. Zeffirelli: "There were lots of stories of Visconti & myself & the
relationship that developed, but the quality of my work did not authorize
anybody to doubt my serious professional preparation." He lived with Visconti for 3 years.
Zeffirelli found real success staging plays & operas,
famously noted for his highly naturalistic productions of Shakespeare at
London's Old Vic, &operas at Milan's La Scala, London's Covent Garden,
& NYC’s Metropolitan Opera starring Maria Callas, Joan Sutherland, &
Leontyne Price.
Zeffirelli’s lavish looks brought mainstream interest to
opera, but the Zeffirelli's style, which he compared to Hollywood epics of
Cecil B. De Mille, "but in good taste", met with resistance from the
critics, who found his production values overwrought, drawing attention away
from the actual performance.
In the 1960s, Zeffirelli expanded his audience as a film
director, starting with The Taming Of The
Shrew (1967), starring the high wattage duo- Elizabeth Taylor & Richard
Burton.
Zeffirelli gained my attention as a young teen with Romeo & Juliet (1968). The film was an
introduction to Shakespeare for many young people, with his casting of unknown,
inexperienced & attractive teenaged
actors in the title roles. A generation
later, he would repeat the formula of obsessive teenage romance against
parental prohibition with Endless Love
(1981).
The Husband & I watched Zeffirelli’s Tea With Mussolini for a 3rd
time this weekend. We love this film, with the added attraction of enjoying
Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, Joan Plowright, Lily Tomlin (as a butch lesbian)
& Cher in the same project.
Other films include Brother
Sun, Sister Moon (1973), Jesus Of Nazareth
(1977), Verdi's La Traviata (1982) & Otello (1986), Hamlet (with Mel Gibson & Glenn Close, 1990), Jane Eyre (1996), & Callas Forever (2001).
I too, find it a crazy contradiction that the man is himself gay (however he chooses to describe it), yet panders to the Nazis in the Vatican. That's Italy for you... Jx
ReplyDeleteHe used to be a serious artist, but the productions became gradually more and more over-upholstered, over-ornamented, over-sized and then he began issuing public condemnations of any opera house that retired any production of his (after, say, 30 years of service) for a new one. He apparently feels that all truth resides within him and that whatever he has created and over-dressed must remain the standard forever. Sad.
ReplyDeleteI remember crushing hard on his Romeo, Leonard Whiting. I saw the movie at least a dozen times in the late 70's at the $ cinema.
ReplyDeleteZeffirelli's 'Hamlet', or as I like to call it, 'Hamlet-lite', is one of a handful, really less than a handful, of films featuring Mel Gibson, that I feel like I must banish, even though I like them. Haven't seen, and must see, 'Tea with Mussolini', and watch 'The Taming of the Shrew' again after many years, to reacquaint myself with the good, the bad, and the terrible of Dick and Liz. Do I remember 'ToS' as part of the good?
ReplyDeleteI thought Taming of the Shrew quite good. It's fun, which is really all that one goes to that play for.
ReplyDeleteIt is hugely controversial, and difficult for a director today, because of Kate's final speech. I have seen all kinds of attempts to defang that speech, to make it look as if male dominance and the subjection of women isn't the whole point of the play. Short of cutting or rewriting that speech, one or two productions managed to suggest an equal partnership, quite an accomplishment. As I recall, however, Taylor and Zeffirelli played it pretty straight