Saverio Costanzo, an Italian screenwriter and director, has wrapped production on his next film. Finalemente L’Alba, starring newcomer Rebecca Antonaci alongside international cast Lily James, Joe Keery, Willem Dafoe and Rachel Sennott.
Set in the golden age of Rome’s historic Cinecittà in the 1950s, the feature follows teenage ingenue Mimosa (Antonaci) over the course of one night after she is hired as an extra.
An unsettling shadow hangs over her personal trip in the mysterious passing of Wilma Montesi. This was a real-life young lady from Rome who had aspirations to act. Her semi-naked corpse was discovered on a beach near Lazio in 1953.
A cause célèbre at the time, amid theories she had been caught up in a high society prostitution and drugs ring, Federico Fellini conjured up her spirit in the final scene of his 1960 classic La Dolce Vita, in the figure of the blond-haired girl who calls out to Marcello Mastroianni’s character on the beach.
Mimosa, who is working with an international cast on an Ancient Egypt-set sandals and swords production, is plunged into the chaotic, glamorous and unpredictable world of film over the course of one evening. She will also encounter the darker side.
Lily plays the neurotic Hollywood starlet Josephine. Keery, a rising actor, is taking on bit parts. Dafoe, an American artist gallerist, is an old friend of Josephine. Sennott, an Egyptian princess, is Sennott.
Mario Gianani and Lorenzo Gangarossa at Rome-based Fremantle company Wildside produce with Rai Cinema.
Finalmente L’Alba marks Costanzo’s first directorial credit since hit HBO drama My Brilliant Friend, adapted from Elena Ferrante’s best-selling literary quartet The Neapolitan NovelsThe story of two teenage girls growing up in sexist 1950s Naples culture.
The production also marks Constanzo’s first feature since psychological thriller Hungry HeartsThe movie, which was first shown in Venice in 2014 by Alba Rohrwacher, won the Volpi Cup for best actress and actor respectively.
Finalmente L’Alba wrapped on October 15 after an eight-week shoot mainly in Cinecittà, where Fremantle has a five-year lease on six of its studios, where the production also built exterior sets [pictured below].
There were also location shoots on Rome’s famed Piazza di Spagna, the ruins of the Roman villa of Quintili as well as other locations across the city.
Award-winning Thai cinematographer Sayombhu Mukdeeprom, whose credits include Luca Guadagnino’s Call me by your namee Suspiria and Apichatpong Weerasethakul’sUncle Boonmee, Who Can Recall His Past LivesThe attached production shot on 35mm is by,
Deadline visited the Cinecittà set on the tri-ultimate day of filming, sitting down with Costanzo to discuss the genesis of the project and its production.
Deadline: After the long hours of work, you will be glad to take a break with this film ‘My Brilliant Friend’?
Saverio Costanzo:This is my first original work. My films are always based on a book or a private story that I have adapted. This is my dawn. It’s a new beginning. It is a personal inspiration that I draw from something that happened to myself.
Italy is very misogynist to me. After the experience of Ferrante, of being in a woman’s shoes for such a long time, six years, I had a lot to say about that but in my own way, which wasn’t that of Ferrante. I believe every film comes from something you’ve done before. It’s like a circle. You become something and then you express what you’ve become.
Deadline: You don’t know where to start. ‘Finalemente L’Alba’?
Costanzo:Wilma Montsi. It’s a cold case. This investigative stuff is what I enjoy. That was the beginning of my story. Writing is a mysterious process. You never know exactly what you’re really doing. I enjoyed playing with different genres and cinema. This was my response to being a director and showrunner for so many years on a TV series. I needed to get out of my own way.
On My Brilliant FriendI was writing, directing and showrunning. I was very sincere with myself, but at the same time Ferrante was always above me, not because she was imposing something – I was free to do anything – but because I was trying to bring to the screen, her characters, her drama, her narrative and to give it back to the readers. I had to let go of that narrative box. I let go of the narrative and allowed myself to enjoy the adventure with this young lady.
Deadline: Is Wilma Montesi in the film?
Costanzo:It’s not true. The film was made four days after she discovered her body. Everyone in Rome is talking to it. It’s in the background and feeds into Mimosa’s journey. There’s a Hitchcockian atmosphere, a sense that something dark could also happen to her.
Deadline: The film is therefore a thriller.
Costanzo: There are many “Giallo” elements, but no, it’s a comedy, not a comedy in the vein of Mr BeanIt is a very light film and a fairytale. There is also the dark side. Every coming-of-age story has to pass by a moment when things are very dark otherwise you don’t come back alive.
Deadline: How did Rebecca Antonaci find you?
Costanzo:Barilla was the first company I worked with. I had her in my mind when I began writing the film. I then looked into other options to confirm my thoughts and came back to her. She is reminiscent of Giulietta Massina. She can be a bit familiar, but also have a unique ability to change.
I practiced the key stuff with her and then let her go. She’s one of the best actresses I’ve worked with and then she was surrounded by Willem, Lily and Joe, who are all really professional.
Deadline: How did you get the international cast to accept smaller supporting roles with a newcomer?
Costanzo:They would be happy to answer your questions. In the case of Willem, I know he didn’t want to play a secondary character but in the end, he agreed because his character has a very touching key scene and he wanted to be part of it.
Maybe the reason everyone accepted my offer is that even if they’re not primary characters, every character is respected and everyone is kind of a protagonist and memorable in their own way. You will always remember them all.
Deadline: Do you think the stories of Cinecittà and Rome’s cinematic glory days in the 1950s and 1960s, are based on truth or myth?
Costanzo: I wasn’t there. My cinematographic memories are limited, but I believe that the best cinema created in Italy in the 1950s and 60s was cinematographic.
Making this film made me appreciate the special qualities and virtues of this era. There was no psychology. People were acting very crazy and irrationally. There was so much freedom. It’s after the war and just before the economic boom. People didn’t know where they would end up. Life was an adventure. This work will give me that same energy.
Deadline: Italy is currently enjoying a fresh film and TV production boom and Cinecittà is buzzing. You think there will be a revival of the 50s and 60s style?
Costanzo: It won’t be the same with all the problems we are facing right now, not to be too pessimistic, with the environment, global warming, the war. It’s impossible for it to be the same.
But I’ve been shooting here in Cinecittà since August and there’s a very good atmosphere. This film was shot in Rome by the men who were there to shoot it. The city is more international and cosmopolitan than it was five years ago.
Deadline: How does it feel to direct a film set within your home town of Rome, after all these years of telling stories in Naples?
Costanzo:This is my first film in Rome. As it takes place over the course of just one night, we can’t show much of the city but it’s a deeply Roman film. The old Roman accent, their language, and the faces.
Deadline: Numerous directors, from Federico Fellini and Paolo Sorrentino, have taken inspiration from Rome. What’s special about this city?
Costanzo: It’s one of the most beautiful cities in the world. The film doesn’t portray the grandeur of Rome. However, scenes were shot in Piazza di Spagna. We went there in the early morning to shoot.
I’d never understood it [Piazza di Spagna] as a place before – it’s too touristic – but working there for two hours at dawn each day, I finally understood. As a Roman, I’m used to it, but for Paolo Sorrentino coming from Naples, or Federico Fellini from Rimini, it was an Eldorado.
Deadline: Have you worked with the same crew? ‘My Brilliant Friend’?
Costanzo:No, I changed everyone. It was again set in 1950s, just like the first series. We’d already watched the 1950s together. I was looking to do something completely different. I’ve ended up with a very young crew which I’m very happy about.
Deadline: After working so hard on a drama, was it difficult to adjust to the feature’s 90-minute format?
Before this, I had done four features. Although drama is quite different, my approach was the exact same. You can read more about it here. My Brilliant FriendA half-hour episode is a full film. You can watch the same episode twice. Television is like a happy marriage; cinema is like a passion that burns.