Enzo Biagi - author and journalist

Much respected presenter taken off air by Berlusconi

Enzo Biagi, pictured in 2006

Enzo Biagi, the distinguished print and television journalist and author of more than 80 books, died in Milan on this day in 2007, at the age of 87.  

A staunch defender of the freedom of the press, Biagi himself was the victim of censorship from the highest level of the Italian government in 2002 when prime minister Silvio Berlusconi effectively sacked him from the public broadcaster RAI for what he called "criminal use" of the network.

In what became known as il Editto bulgaro - the Bulgarian Edict - because he made the pronouncement during a state visit to Sofia, Berlusconi named another journalist, Michele Santoro, and the satirical comedian, Daniele Luttazzi, as guilty of similar conduct and said it was his duty to "not to allow this to happen".

It meant that the last years of Biagi's life were marred somewhat by an absence from the screen that lasted five years.  He made an emotional comeback in April 2007, seven months before his death, when Romani Prodi had begun his second stint as PM and saw to it that he was reinstated.

Berlusconi's disapproval of Biagi was thought to have related to two interviews he conducted during the run-up to the 2001 elections.

In the first, he appeared to be sympathetic to Berlusconi's opponent, Francesco Rutelli. The second - just two days before polling - was with Roberto Benigni, the actor-director and comedian, who poked fun at what he saw as a conflict between Berlusconi's political ambitions and his business interests.

Silvio Berlusconi banished Biagi from
Italian state TV network RAI

Biagi had interviewed Berlusconi himself before he first stood for prime minister, grilling him over his relationship with Bettino Craxi at the time the former prime minister was convicted of corruption and illegal funding of the Italian Socialist Party.

Born in 1920 in Lizzano in Belvedere, an Apennine village in Emilia-Romagna, the son of a warehouse guard, he began working for the Bologna newspaper Il Resto del Carlino at the age of 18. An opponent of Fascism, he joined the Italian partisans in 1943 and was a member of an anti-Fascist political movement at the time but during his journalistic career he never adhered to any political party.

After the Second World War, he moved to Milan and between 1952 and 1960 was editor of the magazine Epoca. He started working regularly for RAI in the 1960s, while continuing to write for leading newspapers.

He hosted many magazine programmes for the station, interviewing leading political leaders from Margaret Thatcher to Muammar Gadaffi, as well as key figures from his other great love, the cinema.

Biagi published more than 80 books, many about history and current affairs, as well as a biography of his friend, the actor Marcello Mastroianni.  His 1987 book, Il boss è solo, based on interviews with the Mafia pentito (state witness) Tommaso Buscetta, won the Premio Bancarella literary prize.

The snow capped Corno alle Scale mountain is close
to Biagi's home village of Lizzano in Belvedere

Travel tip:

Lizzano in Belvedere, in a mountainous area on the border between the provinces of Modena and Pistoia, offers all-year-round attractions, from skiing on the nearby Corno alle Scale peak in winter to trekking and mountain biking in the spring and summer, with the village centre well stocked with restaurants specialising in local dishes.  The ancient round church, known as 'Rotonda' or 'Delubro', is an interesting feature.


Travel tip:

Bologna is the historic capital of Emilia-Romagna, at the centre of which is the spacious Piazza Maggiore, the social hub of the city, surrounded with arched colonnades, many attractive cafes and fine medieval and Renaissance buildings, including the Palazzo Comunale, the Fountain of Neptune and the imposing Basilica di San Petronio, which dominates the square.

More reading:

How journalist Bruno Vespa opened door to late-night political debate

Maurizio Costanzo - journalist host of Italy's longest running TV show

Roberto Benigni - Oscar-winning star and director of Life is Beautiful

Also on this day:

Raise a glass to Vino Novello - Italy's autumn treat

(Picture credits: Enzo Biagi by Stefano Vesco; Berlusconi by paz.ca; Corno alle Scale by Adriano Petrachi - all via Wikimedia Commons)

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Maurizio Costanzo - talk show host

Journalist whose show is the longest running on Italian TV

Maurizio Costanza pictured early in his broadcasting
career, as host of a 1972 radio show, Buon Pomeriggio

Veteran talk show host and writer Maurizio Costanzo celebrates his 78th birthday today.

Born on this day in 1938 in Rome, Costanzo has spent 40 years in television.  His eponymous programme, the Maurizio Costanzo Show, has broken all records for longevity in Italian television.

Launched on September 18, 1982, the current affairs programme continued for 27 years, alternating between Rete 4 and Canale 5, two of Italy's commercial television networks, part of the Mediaset group owned by former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi. 

Its run came to an end in 2009 but was relaunched on the satellite channel Mediaset Extra in 2014 and returned to terrestrial television in 2015, again on Rete 4.

Costanzo began his media career in print journalism with the Rome newspaper Paese Sera at just 18 years old and by the time he was 22 he was in charge of the Rome office of the mass circulation magazine Grazia.

After branching into radio, he switched to television in 1976, hosting the RAI programme Bontà loro, which is considered to be Italy's first TV talk show.  Others followed before the launch of the Maurizio Costanzo Show, which involved prominent politicians and others in the public eye, discussing major issues of the day.

Costanzo returned to print in 1978, while continuing his broadcasting career in parallel, when he was appointed editor of La Domenica del Corriere, the Sunday edition of the Milan newspaper, Corriere della Sera, a move that saw Costanzo caught up in scandal.

Maurizio Costanza as TV audiences know him today

Corriere della Sera had in 1977 secretly fallen into the control of Propaganda Due, a clandestine network that evolved from a masonic lodge into an alliance of industrialists, members of parliament, military leaders, journalists and other influential figures who aimed to create a "state within a state" to control the direction of Italy's social and political future.

In 1980, Costanzo conducted a controversial interview with Licio Gelli, a former Fascist blackshirt who was head of Propaganda Due - already under scrutiny because of apparent links with the disgraced former banker, Michele Sindona - in which Gelli denied P2 had any malevolent agenda but spoke about his support for a rewriting of the Italian constitution along the lines of the Gaullist presidential system of France.

Less than a year later, police investigating Sindona raided Gelli's villa outside Arezzo in Tuscany and discovered a list of supposed subscribers to P2 that ran to almost 1,000 names.  As well as Berlusconi, 44 MPs, the heads of all four of Italy's secret services and 195 officers of the armed forces, the names included Costanzo himself.

Although at first he denied being a member, Costanzo later admitted his involvement but stressed his deep regret, insisting he was naive and acted only in the interests of safeguarding his career. He publicly distanced himself from the organisation and Gelli, who was subsequently jailed.

Costanzo rebuilt his reputation in the eyes of the public after shifting his political stance more towards the left and risking his own safety to campaign against the Mafia through his broadcasting. It is suspected that a car bomb that exploded in Rome in 1993 outside the Teatro Parioli, which was regularly used for the Maurizio Costanzo Show, was intended either to do him harm or at least frighten him.

A man of immense professional energy, Costanzo had a parallel career as a screenwriter both for television and the cinema, with a long list of credits from the 1960s until as recently as 2007.

He has been married four times and has two children by his second wife, journalist Flaminia Morando, of whom, Saverio, is a film director. He married his current wife, television host and producer Maria de Filippi, on his 57th birthday in 1995.

UPDATE: Maurizio Costanzo sadly passed away in Rome on February 24, 2023, at the age of 84. His funeral took place at the Church of Santa Maria in Montesanto, known as the Church of the Artists, in Piazza del Popolo, on Monday, February 27, 2023. His remains were buried at the Campo Verano cemetery.

Travel tip:

The Teatro Parioli - full name Teatro Parioli Peppino De Filippo - is situated in the Parioli district of Rome, about 20 minutes north of the city's historic centre. Opened in 1938 in the Via Giosuè Borsi, it takes its name from the Italian artist Peppino De Filippo.  Costanzo became artistic director in 1988 and remained in the position until 2011.

April in Rome: a view over St Peter's Square along
Via della Conciliazione towards the Tiber

Travel tip:

Seasoned visitors to Rome consider the Eternal City to be at its best between October and April, when there are fewer tourists and hotel prices are generally cheaper than in the high season.  The early part of October can still feel like summer with temperatures in the low to mid-20s, although there is an increasing chance of rain.  April tends to be a little cooler but is often dry and with plenty of sunshine.

(Photo of Maurizio Costanzo today by Birillo253 CC BY-SA 4.0)
(Photo of St Peter's Square by Diliff CC BY-SA 3.0)

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