Half a century has passed since Totò, the great Italian comedian, left
Although all these years have passed, the presence of Totò is more alive than ever. His memory has neither erased nor faded.
Totò's comedy often offers food for thought
Speaking of himself and his art, Totò used to say: “I am not an artist, but only a seller of chatter. Nobody will remember me after my death ”.
Quisquilie and pinzillacchere, one might say to paraphrase it. Yes, because never was a prophecy less apt. 50 years have passed since his death and not only his memory has not been erased but not faded either. His mask has entered our collective imagination, thanks also to the many films he left us and which are broadcast by television networks with unchanged success.
A sign of how much Prince Antonio De Curtis, aka Totò, is still very much alive in the hearts of the public who continue to love his irresistible comedy that often offers food for thought.
Totò: an unhappy urchin
Totò was born in the heart of Naples, in the Sanità district, on February 15, 1868, in Via Santa Maria Antesaecula in a popular building. A palace that in the past had belonged to an aristocratic Neapolitan family. And for the rest. He too boasted an illustrious birth, as the son of a noble, albeit penniless. His parents were in fact Anna Clemente, a beautiful commoner with long black hair and the Marquis Giuseppe De Curtis, belonging to a family that retained a certain prestige.
And many prejudices, since the father marquis forbade his son to impregnate a woman of the people, but not to continue to have a clandestine relationship with her. So Totò grew up missing his father, of whom we only knew that he was an important gentleman. And arguing with the other urchins who marginalized him for this.
Are we men or corporals? A philosophy of life
But Totò was also an author. Of songs, including the famous one Bad luck. Of poems, the best known of which is the poignant 'At the level. And an autobiography from his early years, Are we men or corporals? Defined by himself as a "semi-serious diary", in which, in addition to recounting his childhood and the beginnings of his career, he expounded his philosophy which led him to divide humanity into two categories: men and corporals. The former, the majority, forced to work all their lives, without the slightest satisfaction, harassed by the corporals who tyrannize them. And its most ferocious corporals perhaps the critics, who only after his death recognized its value.
Today not only critics but also the academic world recognize its merits. The Federico II University of Naples, in fact, has awarded the prince of laughter an honorary degree in memory in Disciplines of Music and Entertainment.
http://www.ilmattino.it/napoli/citta/toto_mattarella_napoli-2383303.html
