STEFANO BOSCUTTI - “FELLINIESQUE” (SHORT STORY)

A documentary crew chases the elusive Federico Fellini through the labyrinth of Cinecittà Studios.

Chaos ensues as the maestro flees, leaving a trail of clowns, cowboys and a tilted Christ statue in his wake.

“Felliniesque” is a cinematic short story that bends reality and fantasy.

Will Fellini spill his secrets?

Or hold them tight?

1,000 words / 4 minutes of vibrant reading pleasure

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‘Imagination is everything.’ Albert Einstein

STEFANO BOSCUTTI

FELLINIESQUE

Copyright 2024 Stefano Boscutti
All Rights Reserved

It’s nineteen seventy-four and they’re shooting a documentary on the life and times of famed Italian film director Federico Fellini.

Armed with handheld, sixteen millimetre Bolex cameras and a single sound man hoisting a boom microphone, a desperate film crew has cornered the filmmaker in his offices at the top of Stage Five at Cinecittà Studios.

Fellini is shooing them away. Black fedora crushed on his head and long thin crimson scarf double-wrapped around his neck. His favourite composer Nino Rota is with him, smirking.

Fellini is warming up a small copper saucepan of risotto on an old gas camping stove sitting on a desk littered with black and white headshots of what looks like every actor and every extra in Rome.

‘Risotto always tastes better the next day,’ he says, splashing in a dash of mineral water that spits and sizzles. Blue flame hisses.

‘That’s the secret. Everyone puts in more butter but that makes it too dense, too thick, too rich. A little carbonated mineral water gives it a lift.’

Rota leans over and whispers in his ear. Fellini looks shocked.

‘What! Are you crazy? You can never use plain mineral water. Too flat, too blah. You need some sparkle in life, si?’

Fellini stirs the risotto with an old wooden spoon his mother had given him. That’s another secret. Never use a metal spoon. It gives the risotto a bitter edge.

He scoops a little from the side, brings it to his lips and blows to cool it down. Holds it out to the camera lens.

‘Mange, mange!!’

Rota turns and flees. Fellini tosses the spoon back in the saucepan and runs after him, laughing. Film crew gives chase, trailing electrical leads and assistants yielding clipboards, schedules, contracts. Crashing into each other in their mad rush, sending sparks flying.

Outside the soundstage on the largest film studio in Europe, a battalion of odd-sized clowns in full bright makeup saunter towards the immense cafeteria, past a two-hundred-and-sixty foot replica of World War II submarine, past some cowboys and astronauts in full costume complaining about parking.

A fibreglass statue of Christ, arms outstretched, leans oddly against a brick wall, the eyes gazing to the roof of Stage Five.

Black smoke wisps and tumbles out from under the corrugated metal roof. Rolls towards the camera lens until everything is black. Sounds of car horns blaring in a traffic jam.

Sketchbook pages flip past. They’re filled with quick drawings of people’s faces, black and white cartoons expressing joy and hate and love and confusion and mirth and anger and one emotion after the other. All crammed between the pages, all dancing and jittering to life.

Snatches of pop tunes and dance music ripples over the animated faces and into the next scene.

Cameramen are rushing down the hallways and extended outdoor balconies of a modern hotel cascading down towards the seashore, down towards the pebbled beach.

Guests are arching back into their rooms, scurrying away from the hungry cameramen. Someone is crying out for Fellini but he is nowhere to be seen.

Outside a cafe on the sinuous Via Veneto in Rome, two film critics are discussing Fellini’s latest opus.

‘It’s a concoction, nothing more.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous. It’s his best work. Pass the sugar.’

‘It’s nothing but a huge serving of gelato, covered with marshmallow topping, chocolate sprinkles, butterscotch sauce, and great spirals of aerated whipped cream. After two-and-a-quarter hours, I had a stomach ache.’

‘Troppo dolce? You’re berating Fellini for being too Fellini, too Felliniesque? Are you insane?’

‘Birthday-cake decors, appetising costumes, technicolor spectra. One emerges from the cinema debauched, glutted and bleary eyed, yet with a curiously empty feeling and a flat taste in the mouth.’

‘You Marxists are all the same. You deprive oneself of pleasure.’

‘Fellini has become a caricature of himself. A sad parody.’

‘You’re being ridiculous.’

‘I don’t even want to mention his moral ambiguity.’

‘Because now you’re a great moralist?’

The critic shrugs his shoulders and orders a pastry.

Carl Jung appears in a vision, applying a lit match to a pipe clenched between his teeth, puffing as tobacco smoke envelops him.

‘He has fallen into his dreams and lost himself in psychological manifestation. Lost himself between the frames of his desires.’

It begins to rain, a light drizzle that splinters the sunlight. People huddle under Rome’s twisted umbrella pine trees.

Fellini is ambling along Via del Babuino, alone. Scarf around his neck. Lost in his thoughts and dreams. Thinking how he always directs the same film, how he can’t distinguish one from another. He is carrying a cardboard pastry tray wrapped in waxed paper from his favourite pasticceria.

Fellini admires the languorous locals, leaning back and taking life in. Apartments and small cafes side by side. Ocher stucco and vining ivy, timber shutters and window boxes. A sheen across the worn cobblestones.

Every film is a film about you, he thinks. How can it be otherwise? To pretend to be someone you’re not is a travesty, a tragedy. There is nothing funnier than agreeing with an idiot while laughing on the inside.

They call him a fool, a liar, a trickster, a manipulator. Fellini takes these insults with a pinch of salt and a smile. It’s the truth of him.

Everything is made up. Everything is a confabulation. Flamboyant, surreal, fantastical. Is this not the best way to live?

The light drizzle fades away, evaporates as golden sunlight gleams through the streets.

Fellini turns right on Via Albert and left on Via Margutta towards the ground floor courtyard door to his apartment. Then turns to see the film crew galloping towards him, cameras rolling.

He fumbles for his key as one cameraman slips and tumbles. Assistants check the camera and lens before helping him up. The cameraman shakes himself down.

Fellini shakes his head as he slides the key into the lock and twists the door open and slips inside. Locks the door behind him and laughs.

Life is a circus.

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Copyright 2024 Stefano Boscutti

All Rights Reserved

The moral rights of the author are asserted.

No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, digital, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or copying and pasting, recording or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing.

Stefano Boscutti acknowledges the trademark owners of various products referenced in this work. The publication or use of these trademarks is not authorised or sponsored by the trademark owner.

This is a work of fiction. While many of the characters portrayed here have counterparts in the life and times of Federico Fellini and others, the characterisations and incidents presented are totally the products of the author’s slippery imagination. This work is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. It should not be resold or given away. Thank you for your support. (Couldn’t do it without you.)

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