Silvio Berlusconi, his friend Roberto Benigni, and the terrible news

Monday, December 17, 2012. Roberto Benigni, Academy Award winner actor, comedian director and screenwriter, appears in state-owned TV Rai1 to host a programme about the Italian Constitution, grabs the occasion and mocks his favourite target, Silvio Berlusconi.

Roberto Benigni, wary about Silvio Berlusconi's comeback

Over 12.6 million viewers – a share of 43.9 per cent – watched Roberto Benigni's “La più bella del mondo” (“The most beautiful in the world”), a public television programme about the Italian Constitution, but – as usual – Italian Academy Award winning comedian had something to say about Silvio Berlusconi's comeback into Italian politics (the video very beginning of the show is on our YouTube channel).

The director of the Oscar-winning tragicomedy "Life is Beautiful" on the Holocaust is not new to such cultural happenings, he recited Dante's Divine Comedy on TV on the past and sang (and explained) Italy's anthem to viewers last year, on a programme celebrating 150 years of Italian Nation, last year.

But he can't help being a comedian, and Silvio Berlusconi has always been his favourite target.

"I wanted to talk about beautiful things, but this December there were two awful, catastrophic, news" quips Benigni. "One you know it all, December 21 there is the end of the world, but that's not the ugliest. You know, the end of the world, you can just get over it.”

Silvio Berlusconi at Canale5's Domenica Live

“Another, really terrible, news has really smashed everyone, in a period when so many Italians wish to retire and cannot do it. The only Italian who could really go and retire whenever he wanted if he just wanted it, is not doing it.” continued Roberto Benigni “Silvio is standing again, Lord pity us all”.

"He's got nothing to lose” added Benigni gesticulating wildly as he was painting a well known picture of a scandalous Silvio Berlusconi, “he's done it all now: orgies, lawyers, minors. He already had a crazy time!".

During the show Benigni also invited Mario Monti, the current Italian prime minister (though he said we will soon resign, since Berlusconi's Peopleof Liberty party withdraw its support to Monti's government) to join the TV programme and make a fake announcement that he will run in elections just to stop Berlusconi.

Berlusconi was also in TV recently, most possibly in an attempt to please housewives and romantic women watching TV shows on Sunday afternoon, Silvio Berlusconi declared he was engaged to 49 years younger Francesca Pascale on Canale5's Domeni Live show, but most probably Benigni's show was recorded previously, so he did not mentioned nor commented the good news (we are sure he would have liked to), so he focused on bad news. [Added on Dec. 19: Benigni show was live, and he did comment the good news! See Chiara's comment for further details. Sorry for that, folks.]

We knew already that almost everybody is against Silvio's comeback, and it was just obvious that Robert Benigni would be the staunchest opponent to it.

Why nobody likes Silvio Berlusconi?

Thursday, December 13, 2012. French President François Hollande joins droves of politicians eager to state their disapproval over Silvio Berlusconi. Whatever he does or will do, nobody likes it.

Mr Holland, while speaking publicly in Brussels (see photo), declared he saw “very low chance“ for the “chevalier” (Berlusconi is a Labour's Knight, having been awarded the Order of Merit for Labour) of winning a term and replacing Mario Monti as head of Italian government.

"Now, look at you" seems to say François Hollande

"I don't take his words saying he abandoned his candidature seriously. What he says one day is not necessarily true the day after," Hollande added, clearly stating his stance towards the Italian media magnate “re-entering the field”. In this stance Hollande does not show any improvement in the relationship with Berlusconi, compared to Nicolas Sarkozy's days (watch the video on our YouTube's Berluschannel).

Silvio Berlusconi and the Barbarous Act of Left-wing Journalists

Thursday, June 21, 2007. Silvio Berlusconi receives a phone call from Agostino Saccà, a national TV broadcaster RAI director. An example of how an Italian-way exchange of favours happens.

The reason of the call is simple: Agostino Saccà needs political help from the head of the the opposition (actually Mr Urbani, a man of the PdL - People of Liberty party - is “acting like an ass-hole”) and Silvio Berlusconi – as usual, since he's “torn by the requests” – needs to fix a couple of acquaintances up with a television role.

Video from our YouTube Channel: Berluschannel

The acquaintances are two nice looking and young women (how strange!), the Neapolitan actress Elena Russo and Evelina Manna, a would-be actress and alleged Silvio Berlusconi's girlfriend.

Evelina Manna, (would-be) actress

Elena Russo's case would get a little boost later on, as Berlusconi will become the Prime Minister. Elena in fact became the protagonist of a TV spot boasting about how the right-wing government solved the problem of waste in Naples.

Here's the script:

Narrator: “Naples had a problem, let's not talk about that again. We know what was that. Than the Government intervened. And when the Government, the State, does something it's just like all the Italian did it.

But now we need the commitment of everybody, who lives there and comes to visit. Let's keep it clean. It's more beautiful”.

Elena Russo: “Thank you. Naples. Beautiful yesterday, beautiful today, beautiful tomorrow”.

Elena Russo, in a role on Italian TV

The transcripts of the interceptions leaked in December 2007 (most of the media published it on 20 December) and led to a corruption investigation, dismissed by Mr Berlusconi's fans as another barbarous act of left-wing journalism by Mr Berlusconi's fans.