100 years of Mike Bongiorno, Rai celebrates him with a miniseries
Having died in 2009, the legend of Italian television would have turned 100 on May 26th. Claudio Gioè will interpret him
ROME – “Friends listeners, Cheer”. It’s impossible not to remember one of the most famous greetings addressed to viewers. And it was with this that Mike Bongiorno began the management. Considered one of the founding fathers of television, he is remembered as ‘SuperMike’ or ‘The king of quizzes’ for having made memorable the game shows that marked an era such as ‘Quit or double’, ‘Rischiatutto’ (“Ouch ahi ahi , Mrs. Longari fell on my dick” or “Which envelope do you want? One, two or three?”, two of the many expressions of the program that have entered the hearts of Italians) and ‘The wheel of fortune’.
MIKE BONGIORNO, THE MEMORY OF THE CHILDREN
Born in 1924 in New York, in 2009 Mike Bongiorno – born Michael Nicholas Salvatore Bongiorno – suffered a heart attack at the age of 85 while he was in a suite at the Metropole hotel in Monte Carlo for a short holiday with his wife Daniela Zuccoli. Tomorrow, May 26, he would have turned 100. From the marriage between Bongiorno and Zuccoli were born: Michele, Niccolò and Leonardo (whom the host called ‘Leolino’).
Mike rhymed with legend but for his three children “he was a normal father. Of course, our schoolmates who talked about it, the people who stopped him on the street, could make us feel different, but for us he was the father. Seeing him on TV was normal: dad is at work. On the contrary, it was a pleasure to see the affection he received he is still alive”, his children declared to La Repubblica. “The Bongiorno Foundation continues to receive letters, messages. People who look for him on TV because a life memory is linked to his figure, to one of his programmes. The other day they wrote to us: ‘ I look for anything about Mike on the Internet, to see him, deluding myself that he is still alive’. In another hundred years – the children continue – he will still be talked about as a man who represented many things for the country a politician, but he was a father of the country“.
MIKE BONGIORNO, CLAUDIO GIOÈ INTERPRETS HIM IN THE RAI MINISERIES
In the week of the 100th anniversary of Mike Bongiorno’s birth, filming is underway on ‘Mike’, a two-part miniseries directed by Giuseppe Bonito (‘L’ arminuta’, ‘Sons’) and written by Salvatore De Mola (‘Màkari’, ‘Imma Tataranni-Substitute Prosecutor’) with Claudio Gioè (‘Màkari’, ‘The mafia kills only in summer’ ) in the role of Mike Bongiorno and Valentina Romani (‘Mare Fuori’; ‘Il sol dell’avvenire’) in the role of his wife Daniela Zuccoli, and Elia Nuzzolo who will play the iconic presenter as a young man. Also in the cast are Clotilde Sabatino, Paolo Pierobon and Tomas Arana. Mike’s filming took place for nine weeks between Sofia (Bulgaria), where the New York of those years was reconstructed, and Turin.
MIKE BONGIORNO, WHEN THE MINI-SERIES COMES OUT
A Rai Fiction – Viola Film co-production, ‘Mike’ will arrive in autumn in prime time on Rai1, enriching the celebrations for 70 years of television and 100 years of radio.
MIKE BONGIORNO, WHAT THE MINISERIE TELLS
When you say “Cheer up!” to a person, the first thought they will have is Mike Bongiorno, the father of Italian television and the king of quizzes. For decades he entered the homes of Italians, becoming the son, the brother, the uncle, and finally the grandfather of everyone, from the 1950s onwards.
But who was Mike Bongiorno really, who was the man behind the screen? The miniseries will be an opportunity to tell his most intimate and secret face, largely hidden by the success of the host, always at ease among people and in front of the cameras, but reserved and introverted in his private life, marked by harsh experiences of war, of imprisonment, of concentration camps. Born in New York in 1924, Mike had a life full of events, unique in its kind, lived between America and Italy. Its history is continuously intertwined with that of our country. He eventually chose Italy, the land of his grandparents, becoming the undisputed protagonist of the small screen. S
It was he who, on 3 January 1954, inaugurated the television broadcasts of the newly formed Rai with Arrivals and Departures, which was followed by many other programs which had a great influence on the customs of those years. The miniseries represents the opportunity to tell the world of our protagonist, both professional and human, from the most difficult period to the proclamation of the unparalleled success of Rischiatutto. To also tell the story of the realization of Mike’s most secret dream: to create with Daniela, the woman of his life, that united and happy family he so desired.
