I Love Italian Everything

If you love the movie Pane e Tulipani like I do – it’s my absolute favorite – you’ll be happy to hear what I’ve discovered about the actor who played Rosalba’s youngest son Nic. Good news – he’s all grown up, and that adorable teenager Nic is now extremely good looking Tiziano Cucchiarelli. Bad news – He’s not acting anymore! More good news, he’s happily married to a beautiful woman named Rahel and they have a darling little five-year-old daughter.

I found TIziano on Facebook, and well, you know how I complain that there aren’t enough super good Italian movie stars? Tiziano should definitely return to acting. He’s obviously a naturally talented actor, having had no real training but shining like a superstar in Pane e Tulipani, and he is, as I keep saying, extremely good looking. (He’s almost exactly my daughter’s age so it’s probably extremely inappropriate to keep saying that.)

I asked Tiziano to share some of the things he remembers about making the movie and he was kind enough to tell me some things about life on the set. He says that even if it was a “brief adventure”, it was one of the most exciting experiences of his life, and that director Silvio Soldini, Licia Maglietta, and everybody on the set from makeup artists to the camera crew were very supportive and helpful. He says that he found acting a very natural thing, but that some of the more intense scenes were challenging.

Everyone got along well and laughed a lot on the set, particularly when Tiziano and Matteo Febo (the young actor who played Salvo, Rosalba’s older son) became dialect coaches for the rest of the cast. Both from Abbruzzi they had to teach all the other actors how to speak like the natives; Antonio Catania (he’s siciliano), who played Mimmo, Rosalba’s husband, didn’t find it easy!

Tiziano says that he misses acting and would love to try it again, so if any of you are interested in forming a Tiziano fan club, let me know! Maybe we can coax him out of retirement and get him back on the screen. I could picture him opposite Cristiana Capotondi in a romantic comedy; couldn’t you?

Interested in joining the Tiziano Cucchiarelli Fan Club? Sign up here!