Why don’t we know anything about San Patrignano anymore?

If you go to a bar or on the street or, given the current covid cause restrictions, the experiment is also valid online, and ask what you think about Vincenzo Muccioli?, most of those present will tell you if he was good or bad, and almost always using extreme expressions such as “He was a saint”, “It was Evil.” You will find irreconcilable positions, a benevolent memory in abundant advantage, but those convinced of its wrongdoings will be immovable. The discovery lies in the subsequent questions, when you will be amazed that the same supporters or opponents do not know anything else, many do not even know if Muccioli is still alive or not, if San Patrignano still exists today, what happened, how many died, how the processes, what was the real stakes.

We only remember the supporters we were part of, the motivations have vanished, the stories of men and women have melted, the memory has crystallized into prejudice.

We no longer know anything about San Patrignano, the largest rehabilitation community for drug addicts in Europe, founded by Vincenzo Muccioli at the end of the 1970s, in Coriano, a small town just outside Rimini. And it is a shame because it is a very current, useful story about the power of men, of substances, of faith or the need to have one, of politics, of the family and of ambiguity. A story about our atavistic need for the strong man who solves him without letting us know too much. A story that explains Italy and that has never been told from start to finish, perhaps in the hope that no one would ask too many questions.

The collective memory it is what from cohabitants of the same soil makes us communities, people, Italians. At a time when we are divided over everything in fans who only know how to scream at each other without even knowing what we are fighting about, looking back to find out on our skin how short-sighted and ultimately harmful this attitude is, it seems useful to me.

For two and a half years with Gianluca Neri e Paolo Bernardelli we built and wrote and imagined and rewrote and finally – with the direction of Cosima Spender – realized Sanpa – Lights and darkness of San Patrignano, a 5-episode docuseries available on Netflix.

Now I’m just curious what you all think, because this story is about much more, without fear of complexity and asking for your full involvement. Good vision.

(Carlo G. Gabardini, actor and author, writes and acts for theater, cinema, TV and radio. He wrote the SanPa Luci e Tenebre docuseries of San Patrignano).