Loretta Goggi: yesterday, Goggi and tomorrow

This article was published on October 16, 2019, in issue 41 of Vanity Fair and we propose it again today to retrace the changes of which Vanity has been the protagonist in the last 20. Here are all the articles we are republishing.

«Meanwhile, tell me: did you have a good trip?».

In short. Slowdowns on the network. I hope to return.
«At worst he stops here tonight. It’s not much of a punishment, come on. It’s great in Rome this season.”

Are you talking about the climate?
«It is a city that cannot be judged with two words. She’s beautiful, but ruined. We Romans are a bit like that, that anything goes. OK’ here, OK’ over there… and no, not OK’!».

Before I even have time to mix the coffee, at the Parioli bar where we meet, an all-too-easy intuition enlightens me. The secret of Loretta Goggi’s success lies in her ability to sit at a table and chat generously. Without being asked. Just like it was on TV.

Do you know it’s difficult to interview her?
“And why?”.

He’s done a lot.
“I?! And what have I done?”.

Of interviews, I say. They’ll bore her by now.
«No, it would be as if I were bored by always singing the same songs: every time, who listens to me changes».

Singer, presenter, actress, imitator, voice actress… what did her identity card indicate under “profession”?
“Artist. “Soubrette”, even for its time, was a bit old».

He can do everything. Or not?
«There are many things I don’t know how to do. For example, dancing: it’s something I do with elegance (laughs) but I didn’t start at the age of 8 with Russian teachers. I had to do it Great song instead of Raffaella Carrà, but Barrie Chase, the prima ballerina, stood up. Rai said: there’s no problem, Goggi does everything. First lesson at 22, under the Amalfi sun, in wool tights, to shed a few kilos.”

But he always had an incredible physique.
«Write it down! Actually before I was 25 I was chiattulella».

Chubby? We recently saw her playing golf with Raffaella, her eternal “rival”.
«Yes, at the Argentario. We often met there, but never really met. This was the first time I went back without my husband Gianni: he took me – what do you say in Milan? − one sciupun! We had fun, we talked about everything. She has seen further than me, she has conquered foreign countries; I was more nationalistic. I was wrong, but mine was a life choice. I wanted to be close to the sweethearts of the time.”

After Carrà and Goggi, Cuccarini and Parisi arrived. Rags fly between the two today.
«Lorella is a very calm, strong-willed and also courageous person. With Heather I did Fantastic: on a ballet level it is an excellence.”

Who does he throw off the tower?
«I’ll throw myself in, since I’m not good at dancing».

Compared to Carrà, she defined herself as “an eternal second”.
«Being an icon is one thing: she, Mike, Baudo, Corrado are. Not me: I’ve done so many different things that defining myself was impossible. How can you identify with someone who changes under your nose 200 times?”.

A choice, yours?
«I am in eternal movement, even internally: I look for myself, I scrutinize myself, I love myself, I love myself less, I discover myself… The public has struggled to keep up with me, they have not always understood my choices».

For example?
«When I came second in Sanremo my record companies said: “Enough TV, now you just sing”. I thought about it: records, concerts, promotion, often for free… No, I took my profession back and continued to do what I wanted.”

She was the first woman to present the Festival.
«Then only men could lead; we were considered incapable of managing the unexpected events of the live broadcast. It was so offensive that I decided to leave Rai for Fininvest. In Hello Goggi I was already the protagonist in the title.”

This is why she had such a bad experience with Miss Italia with Mike Bongiorno, when she left the show because she was introduced after half an hour of broadcast.
“It offended me as a woman, even before as an artist.”

Do you love each other in this period or not?
«I’m rediscovering the Loretta who still lived with her parents and who suddenly became popular. Dad accompanied me everywhere, until I was 27. But a Fantastic I went there alone. And indeed – tac! – I fell in love immediately.”

Freedom!
«That’s not how I experienced my first evening in Milan. I went shopping at the supermarket: my emancipation.”

Why do you see yourself in that Loretta?
«I find myself in the enthusiasm of when I opened up to life. I passed from my father to my husband, a man with a strong personality, and I put myself completely at the service of our love story, just as I was of my family before. Now, alone again, I go back to finding out whether I want to get up or not, to go to the cinema… or not.”

Wasn’t that the case with your husband?
«In a couple, one of the two must smooth out their edges».

You were very close: home and work, always together.
«I totally entrusted myself to him, even for my career».

Isn’t the secret of married life finding your own space?
«Look, I found Gianni at 29 years old and I said: “this is mine and I won’t let it slip away”. I became indispensable – that’s the right word – to him, as he was to me. He was a free spirit, he taught me to fly: I called him Jonathan Livingston. He believed he couldn’t count on an artist like me for the practical management of his life. I made him change his mind.”

The famous opposites that attract.
«Opposites for sure: we argued a lot, but never about work. It was a question of character.”

What was Gianni’s character?
«He was an Istrian refugee. He grew up without a family: he lost his father at 3 and his mother at 14. His granite attitudes hid a great sweetness. He thought I had grown up in cotton wool, he always told me: “Never wear mismatched socks!”. He didn’t see my potential for madness. But believe me: I’m a little crazy.”

Your relationship was clandestine at first.
«More: top secret for two years. We couldn’t decide on the spot that this wasn’t temporary. I felt a strong responsibility: I was a successful woman; not only was he 13 years older than me, but he was married with children. When I returned from India, I asked him: who says it’s not a trip?”.

When did you realize it wasn’t?
«One evening, at dinner. He poured me the wine and I noticed his hand shaking. That big man, so excited, made me tender.”

Does he rule out another “cursed spring”?
“Yes. Oh God, I can’t swear: you know, in a moment of stupor before going to a retirement home, maybe… But then I’m of a certain age.”

Is there an age when you stop falling in love?
“No. But for me yes.”

What was she doing in India?
«I was with friends of my parents, whose children lived there. I discovered a phantasmagorical world. They asked me: “Did you do a foil? If you don’t do drugs here, where do you do drugs?”.

Yes, he seems like the least transgressive person in the world.
«But what do you know, excuse me?».

Confess to me one of your sins.
“I’m not as flat as I look.”

Goggi has her little transgressions.
«Medium, not small».

According to Wikipedia, his debut album would be Lourdes 1858 – The apparitions of the Madonna with Bernadettefrom 1958.
«Perhaps, for the Pauline editions. I made many recordings for them: a lot of fairy tales, the life of Bach… I was at home at the Vatican: I also DJed for Vatican Radio.”

As?
«In ’71: I played records by Patty Pravo and Gianni Morandi».

The voice of the canary Titti is his.
«Since I was 15 I have always dubbed him».

He was a star of the great dramas, the ancestors of TV series.
«I look at them all. In America the most famous film actresses, such as Nicole Kidman, can easily do TV. In Italy, however, there is trouble.”

She is living proof of the opposite.
«Yes, but how long did it take me. And what an effort!

From Fantastic down, she was the Variety. Is the genre dead?
«It’s not so good. She cost a lot: sets, costumes, orchestra… And who can afford them anymore? And then, the public has become accustomed to the worst: on TV you get what’s there. There is no longer any pleasure in analyzing what you see: you change channels in a second. But don’t make me sound like someone tied to the past; nostalgia is useless.”

On Google, people search for: Loretta Goggi… songs.
«Huh».

He hasn’t recorded an album in 30 years.
«And who wants to do the promotion!».

He might as well avoid it.
«And do you think they buy my record like this?».

I do.
«He says it because he’s here. No, I want to sing what I want: I don’t have to sell and meet anyone’s tastes.”

Following, on Google: Loretta Goggi Cursed spring.
«It’s always a song. There is no party where they don’t put it on.”

Can’t take it anymore?
«But not at all! I arrived at Sanremo with the preconception that, as an imitator, I didn’t have a voice of my own. It’s true that singing terrified me: when you act you’re hidden by a mask; when you sing you are alone. I was so distressed that Alice almost scolded me: “Look, I have to sing too, stop it!”».

And the anxiety vanished.
“On the desire to hold each other and then the voice still trembled. But on seee to fall in love again the gallery erupted in applause. At that moment I understood that, inside me, I had already won.”

This year he could return.
«Me, in Sanremo?».

Not in the competition, as co-host.
“I don’t even think about it, I hate the nostalgia effect.”

It disappoints us.
«You see: if they proposed it to me, my “no” would be one of those choices mentioned above».

She has always been defined as “the good one”.
«A limit».

That is to say?
«Skill pigeonholes you. He doesn’t allow you to make mistakes, he doesn’t allow you to head shots. Being “the good one” is cloying.”

She would like them to call her the “good and…” one.
«I would like to be considered a good actress. I will shoot Massimiliano Bruno’s next film. I’m at the cinema with Just a minute: I play a woman far from me, a mother.”

He has no children. Regrets?
«Having not had any, I can’t tell you what I missed. But I’m an aunt, and I understand what it means to have one.”

Meaning what?
“Having the ability to understand even what you don’t agree with: a crazy effort.”

Was not having children a choice?
«We tried, but we were chemically incompatible. I have never done anything to get it at all costs.”

Ever thought about adoption?
“No. I would have forced something that up there… Do you believe?

No.
«I do a lot. My mother used to say: “The Lord sends the cold according to the clothes”. God must have thought I wasn’t good at it.”

Knock on wood. Ninth search key on Google: Loretta Goggi … she is dead.
“No!”.

I swear. How do you imagine that moment?
«Death is scary, I hope I don’t suffer. But as a believer I think that something of us survives earthly life. I’m not a saint: I have some unfinished business.”

No paradise?
“No”.

Purgatory or hell?
«Purgatory has different levels…».

In which group will we see each other again?
“Maybe. I hope I don’t end up in hell.”

You have to make a big deal about that.
«Sometimes we don’t realize the gravity of our actions. Do those who deal know what kills?”.

He just celebrated 69 years old. What did she give herself?
“I would like to take a trip to Jerusalem.”

What do you think you’ll find there?
«How to explain it? Walking where Jesus walked…”.

His cult greeting is: «Happiness!»». What is happiness?
«John Lennon said: “Life is what happens to you while you are busy making other plans”. Happiness is the same: a lightning moment; it would be worth photographing.”

His last moment of happiness?
“I won’t tell him this.”

She called herself “Cucciottella”. I’ve been racking my brains over the lyrics of the song for 40 years, pure delirium. Who is Chubbya bulimic ecologist?
«A little girl who “didn’t want to become a breadstick”, someone who wanted to enjoy life. But what you ate wasn’t the cream puffs, but the energy. I, on the other hand, can’t resist sweets. Do you know that this year I gained 4 kilos?”.

The group of greedy people, therefore. That’s all?