A carnival of camp!

 I’ve had a surprising amount of interest in comments on my last post, on Facebook and elsewhere, on the camp funfest that is the annual Sanremo Music Festival, so I thought I’d expand on that. 

Here Storm Pulcinella is bucketing down as I write but that doesn't stop the loony tunes festival. I'm not prepared to watch all 5-6 hours of TV every night just to report back, but it's proving quite fun, even if Sanremo town centre is virtually off limits to ordinary mortals. 

The main venue is the Ariston theatre, that for much of the year operates as a four-screen cinema:

(c) Fotogramma : adnkronos

2024 sees a fabulous stage, an outstanding presenter, varied music, lovely flowers (all grown locally through the mild winter), and lots of peripheral events... I'm not sure that John Travolta's rendition of the birdie song accompanied by fluffy dancing ducks was the high point of his career, but hey!

 

(c) Il Gezzettino.it

 

Big Mama, twerking in tomato-red tights with trans symbols on, dedicates her song to the queer community (thank you). Alessandro de Santis, one half of Santi Francesi, performs in a rather lovely glittery floor-length black evening dress. Ghali has sparkly bracelets and earrings that look very feminine. Marco Mengoni wears leather culottes by Fendi that look like a skirt. And is that a skirt that one of the boys of BNKR44 is wearing? Or some kind of Tarzanesque loincloth? Who cares, it’s not boring trousers, so that’s good.

Of course, being a giant national event, it attracts politics, such as Ercolina 2, a cow protesting against the EU Common Agricultural Policy (successor to the original Ercolina who was famously granted an audience with the Pope in 1997 whilst protesting about milk quotas). Ercolina 2 appreciated the Sanremo Green Carpet to the extent of eating some of it! Well, it is organic!  

The carpet tastes lousy, but the flowers are good! Ercolina 2 at Sanremo 2024. (c) Liguria Notizie

The event is heavily mediatized, though, and only about one third of seats in the Ariston theatre are available to music fans; the other two thirds are for radio and TV people, music industry execs and the like. Ditto the vast cruise ship with DJ and outsize LED screen flashing messages to shore all night.

The first festival was held in 1951 in the theatre at the casino, and the huge Ariston theatre was then built to house it from 1977. The event spawned the Eurovision song contest and if Sanremo council had remembered to renew an old contract with the government, Sanremo would have hosted Eurovision in 2022. The winner of the song contest gets a trophy, a guaranteed music career, and, better still, a municipal drain cover with their name and song on it!

(c) Tonino Bonomo: Sanremonews.it

No complaints so far from the local homophobic bishop this year that it's too camp. In fact, a very conservative Catholic organisation, Opus Dei, has just put out a list of pop songs that its faithful may enjoy without guilt. 

Besides, any more anti-queer abuse from the bishop and Big Mama might well crush his head like a walnut between her gigantic thighs! (Only kidding, bishop; though she might not be!)

It's a commercial pop show, so of course it's camp and a bit gender-bending. This is the creative world for you. And that's why everyone loves it.

The winner will be announced at the end of Saturday night's TV marathon.

 

Weight loss

Only half a pound off this week; I've lost focus a bit. And maybe that glass of wine to celebrate January is at fault! It'll be better next week.

Sue x