[Protagonisti] ritoriale, un porto franco della sessualità e del divertimento, un luogo capace di offrire esperienze esclusive e irripetibili altrove. Oggi quell’odore di zolfo si è disciolto con l’arrivo della modernità». Qual è la forza di Capri. Cosa la rende unica? «Sicuramente la sua bellezza, che è fuori discussione. Del resto non l’abbiamo scoperta noi e non è un caso che già Tiberio l’avesse scelta come un luogo paradisiaco. L’isola è ricca da sempre di ambientazioni straordinarie, che poi nel tempo hanno appassionato esteti e gay». Esiste una sorta di sacralità dell’isola, quella che si rinnova ogni anno nel presenzialismo e nella ritualità dell’esserci ad ogni costo? «Per quanto riguarda la mondanità, i riti del presenzialismo che si ripetono tutte le estati, Capri rappresenta il “cafonal dei cafonal”. Diverso da quello romano perché non conquista solo i vip capitolini, ma tutti coloro che approdano sull’isola. Dalle feste in casa di Dino Trappetti alle serate trascorse cantando sui tavoli di Anema e Core, ogni individuo viene traviato dallo stile dell’isola. Anche i milanesi, in molte altre occasioni compassati e discreti, si lasciano vincere dallo spirito “cafonal”, come dimostra la storica foto di Afef che canta nella taverna di Guido Lembo, mentre Paolo Mieli e Marco Tronchetti Provera suonano i tamburelli. Un’immagine che vive e si consuma solo dentro i confini di quest’isola». Faraglioni. My rediscovery of Capri coincided with Arbore and De Crescenzo’s playning around there, back when they were doing “Quelli della notte” on television. We’d go to dinner at Da Paolino and have a hilarious time, like the overgrown students we were. And that’s when my love affair with Capri started, split between the Quisisana and Anema e Core. Do you have an anecdote to share with us that sums up those days? A lot of what went on definitely can’t be repeated in polite conversation, but there was one episode that captured the spirit of the times perfectly, and it involved De Crescenzo, one of Italy’s most notorious tightwads. We were all in the same motor launch anchored in a pretty little cove, and he was the only one who hadn’t jumped in the water. So as we were all diving in to cool off, De Crescenzo called out, “How’s the water?” We all replied practically in unison, “It’s free!” That silliness more or less defined the mood on Capri back then. To find another example we’d have to go back to 1987 when I presented my book Libidine, published by Mondadori in inflatable plastic, no less. The event was followed by a party where virtually everything was made of plastic, from the balloons to the condoms. What is left today of that image of Capri as an island of sinful pleasures, the legacy of a certain kind of literature and a wealth of racy anecdotes that lent Capri an aura of perverse fascination? Capri is no longer the den of iniquity the great novelists made it out to be. While it once drew the entire gay literary colony, today vice is about as commonplace as the change you leave the barman as a tip for your coffee. Once Capri had a sort of extraterritorial status; it was a free port for sex and entertainment, a place that guaranteed you exclusive adventures not to be had anywhere else. But with the arrival of modernity, that devilish whiff of sulphur dissipated. What exactly is Capri’s appeal? What makes it unique? Its amazing beauty, certainly, which is undeniable. We were hardly the first to discover that, after all; Tiberius’s choice of Capri to be his island paradise was no accident of history. In fact, the island’s breathtaking scenery has always attracted aesthetes and gays. Would you say the island has its own set of sacred rites that are played out every year in the celebrities’ impelling desire to be there, be seen, and go through the motions at any cost? As far as the glitterati are concerned, and their rites of passage we can observe every summer, Capri represents that levelling of popular tastes to the lowest common - very common - denominator. Unlike the Roman variation on the theme, which targets only the capital’s VIP’s, in this case everyone who sets foot on Capri gets infected. From the parties Dino Trappetti throws at his house to the evening choruses at the tables of Anema e Core, every single person gets ‘corrupted’ by the island’s style. Even the ones from Milan, people who are normally quite collected and discreet, happily “go lowbrow”, as the history-making photo of Afef singing Iustily in the taverna run by Guido Lembo shows, while Paolo Mieli and Marco Tronchetti Provera play the tambourines. A sight to behold, I assure you, and a scene that couldn’t play out anywhere else but on Capri. G. DEMMA - SIE 16
I misteri di via Krupp [Luoghi] È stata riaperta dopo 32 anni la suggestiva strada che dai Giardini di Augusto porta a Marina Piccola di Bruno Manfellotto
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