Stanley Tucci in Calabria

Where will Tucci go next? His Searching for Italy has managed to create a buzz with the mystery, revealed just prior to the new season. Although it’s a country with a richness that could take a lifetime to explore, I wasn’t surprised that this fall the show would kick off with Stanley Tucci in Calabria.

HAVE YOUR PEOPLE CALL MY PEOPLE

Over a year and a half ago now, I got an email from one of his producers. We exchanged several messages and then she requested a video conference. She was pleasant enough but had zero knowledge of Calabria – she was from Rome. I spent quite a bit of time responding to her written questions as well as consulting with her on an extended video call.

I’ve always liked Tucci as an actor, and of course thought, how cool it would be to meet Stanley Tucci in Calabria and contribute to the program. The producer was going to take my ideas to the table but told me that lots of “important” people had contacted them, wanting to participate in the show. “You contacted me,” I reminded her. 

I never heard back…

BEHIND THE SCENES

Fast forward to this past June, enjoying a fabulous meal in a little trattoria with my group on the Traditions and Food of Calabria Tour. Guess who had been there with a film crew a couple weeks earlier? The chef-owner had made the connection that I was the connection.

Apparently, the new producer had the notes of the producer with whom I had spoken. I was happy for chef Giuseppe Trimboli. He really deserved it. I wasn’t whistling Dixie when I wrote my blogpost about Ristorante-Trattoria La Collinetta.

I also knew Tucci had been in Reggio Calabria at the time, because a friend happened to be at the archeological museum the day of his visit. The hall of the famous Riace Bronzes was on hold for the actor, best known in Italy for Il diavolo veste Prada. Afterwards, he whisked out of the building at a speed I fear the spectacular ancient Greek statues would be left on the cutting room floor…

What else would be left out and what would be put in?

TUCCI – ROOTS IN CALABRIA

Stanley Tucci’s grandparents were Calabrian, on his father’s side, from Marzi a village in the Province of Cosenza and on his mother’s, from Cittanova a good-sized town by Italian standards in the Province of Reggio Calabria. Interestingly, despite his acknowledged influences of calabrese food and family with the extraordinary cooking of his mother and his grandparents, he had only been to Calabria once as a child and before Searching for Italy, had shown no interest in returning.

But with Season 2, episode 5 of Searching for Italy, we find Stanley Tucci in Calabria… with his parents. Apparently, an expensive proposition as CNN just announced pulling back on the series. Lots of hay was made of his family’s surnames, which he observed all over his ancestral hometowns. A very large proportion of Tuccis counted amongst Marzi’s fewer than 1,000 souls and his mother’s maiden name in its original form, Tropeano, was well represented on Cittanova’s war memorial.

Tucci had that bonding experience with the Tropeano family of Cittanova with images from a home kitchen and of a long familial table enjoying a quintessential al fresco Italian meal. They dined on stocco, air-dried cod. Cittanova is particularly well known in Calabria for its stocco, attributed to the quality of the town’s water. (You can read all about stocco or pescestocco in my book Calabria: The Other Italy in the chapter about Mammola, the other hill town noted for stockfish.) Tucci also reminisced about eating goatmeat when he visited as a boy.

TROPEA, SCILLA AND THE ASPROMONTE

With only 42 minutes to play with, Searching for Italy hit the two biggest tourist highlights of Calabria: Tropea and Scilla. Thus, Tucci bit into a Tropean onion like an apple in the middle of an onion patch and dined on swordfish caught in the Strait of Messina at a restaurant situated over said waters. I don’t have a photo of myself eating a raw onion, but to give you an idea of Scilla, here’s a pasta dish made with swordfish I enjoyed at the same restaurant on one of my tours.

The Aspromonte are mountains in southern Calabria. For this portion of the program, a Michelin-star chef with a penchant for foraging prepared a dessert using charcoal from an area forest fire. Tucci smacked his lips. Personally, I would rather have had him mention Calabria’s excellent natural licorice if black food was to be the focus. Or better yet, a delicacy made with the bergamot, grown only in the Province of Reggio Calabria.

The program finished with an organic farmer, who told of the difficulties she has had with the ‘ndrangheta, the region’s criminal organization, and a succulent meal of lamb cooked in clay at the above-mentioned trattoria.

CONTROVERSY OVER STANLEY TUCCI IN CALABRIA

When the show aired in October, Calabrians were in an uproar, in large part due to Tucci’s interview with Christiane Amanpour, which I imagine was designed to promote the series. However, instead of talking about Calabria’s culinary prowess – after all the show is about food and Calabria is celebrated for its outstanding food, even by Italian standards, he focused on the ‘ndrangheta, and it was like, here we go again.

Calabrian news outlets and social media described Tucci’s judgements of the region as “crudele” (cruel). As he was off script, the interview showed he was rather misinformed with regard to Southern Italy, reinforcing regional stereotypes with erroneous remarks about EU funds and stating, for example, that Puglia was known as “the shame of Italy.” In addition, Calabrians pointed out his seeming lack of awareness as to Italy’s great biodiversity.

What did I think? Honestly, based on the interview, I didn’t have high hopes, but the show was basically well done, and it made me think that perhaps the actor had waited too long to return to Calabria. In the episode, he mentioned his family’s “strange and magical bond with food.” Had he been searching for that bond in Rome, Tuscany and Milan?

NOT MEETING STANLEY TUCCI IN CALABRIA

Would I have done it differently? Absolutely. An example? In the narrative, Tucci remarked how green Calabria was, something that surprised him as he hadn’t remembered it from his childhood visit. I would have liked seeing some of that greenness in the episode, perhaps a sweeping over the three national parks with their lush forests, the Pollino to the north, the Sila in the center and the southern Aspromonte.

Or when he mentioned Greater Greece, to have at least shown a glimpse of the culture, because without a visual, all the viewing public saw were a bit of Tropea, Scilla and his ancestral villages, which brought to mind his interview pronouncement, “The only people who really go to Calabria are people who have roots in Calabria.”

And while time was very limited, I think that it would have been important to at least hint at the agricultural vastness in a region with incredible geographical diversity. But perhaps that would have been too complicated for a general viewing public, who may persist in asking, “Is there anything to see in Calabria?“

So I suppose, I must continue writing about Calabria as there is so much more to be said and keep taking people to the region, not just to Tropea and Scilla, as spectacular as they are, for a view here and a meal there, but to explore all of the deserving places and immerse in a myriad of experiences impossible to fit into one brief television segment, no matter who the presenter.

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Join me on one of my comprehensive, small group tours of Calabria. You may not run into Stanley Tucci in Calabria, but you will surely taste the region’s incredible food, immerse yourself in its beauty and soak up the culture first hand! See the detailed itineraries on the Calabria Tour page.

Read all about the fascinating Calabrian region in my book Calabria: The Other Italy, described by Publisher’s Weekly as “an intoxicating blend of humor, joy, and reverence for this area in Italy’s deep south,” and explore Calabria’s northern neighbor in my book Basilicata: Authentic Italy, “recommended to readers who appreciate all things Italian” by the Library Journal.

Follow me on social media: Basilicata Facebook page, Calabria: The Other Italy’s Facebook page, Karen’s Instagram and Karen’s Twitter for beautiful pictures and information.
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CALABRIA: The Other Italy and BASILICATA: Authentic Italy make great gifts!