G: Here we are again live in the newsroom of Diregiovani. Sorry for the little technical problem. Should we thank Marco Zuccheroso?
R: Thank you Marco Zuccheroso, I know you won’t disappoint us again.
G: Let’s start over, even if you don’t need to be introduced: he’s Rocco Fasano, the star of Skam Italia, the web series most loved by teenagers and Diregiovani. I thank you for having accepted our invitation.
R: Thank you.
G: In this live, you have to feel free to do whatever you like.
R: Amazing!
G: Good. So, I wanted to tell you something: yesterday, when we announced your presence here, people wrote to us from China. So we say hi to the fans from China, ni hao.
R: We thank the Chinese fan, thank you!
G: She invites you over in China.
R: Very good.
G: And she sent us two questions for you.
R: Ok.
G: The first one is, how did you manage to play so well - she highlighted “so well” - Niccolò Fares?
R: Well, first of all thank you so much for your compliments, and nothing. As I was saying earlier, when I got the call that confirmed me the role of Niccolò I was very happy, clearly, but at the same time there was a bit of worry in approaching a role that had been already played by Henrik Holm specifically, who did an amazing job. So surely there was a bit of fear. So I watched half of the season of Isak and Even, the Norwegian one, but then I stopped, because also with Ludovico Bessegato we decided to do a personal job on the script. Which is a personal case, indeed, detached from the Norwegian one to some extent, and I relied completely on his very wise supervision and I’m very happy to have done so. And I thank him.
G: And then she wrote to us, how’s it been- What has working in Skam meant to you?
R: It meant a radical change, in a lot of ways. First of all practically, because everything that Skam brought wasn’t predicted. I simply did my job in the most honest possible way I could. Then everything that came after surprised us all, because Skam Italia got really famous even in other parts of the world. But not only this; it changed me on a level of perception of other people: I mean, the famous phrase of Skam, which is “Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind. Always” is a thing that Skam makes you live throughout the seasons. And it’s something, when you think about it, that is not taken for granted. It seems taken for granted, but how often and how easily we judge, before getting to know someone? Or also, we use prejudices of any kind before approaching someone? And Skam, maybe, spying on the lives of teenagers, proves how hurtful it can be, right? And indeed Skam taught me this, to be aware of other people’s pain and to use less easily, you know, prejudices and preconceptions.
G: Right, and this thing can be seen even in the number of fans that the series has. The third season is airing right now on TimVision.
R: The third one, yeah.
G: And while we wait for the live questions from the fans, I wanted to ask you: has acting always been one of your dreams?
R: Yes. I have to say, acting has alway been part of my vision for my professional future somehow, because I’ve always had the feeling that reality was something a bit limiting and too narrow in which to live so I always looked, since I was little, for ways out that could have been like fantasy novels or tv series but not even those were enough. I really wanted to be part of that mechanism that actually creates other realities and this is something wonderful.
G: And how did the meeting with Skam happen?
R: It happened with a banal phone call from my manager who told me there was this casting. I did this audition, - two of them I think, two or three, I don’t remember - some of them were also very fun because in one of those I had to prepare a fake joint and it was a bit of a mess because I was embarrassed and I spilled all the tobacco on the floor. It was very fun but also very intense. And then Ludovico took his decision and told me and from that you know basically everything.
G: You’re the main protagonist of season 2 together with Federico Cesàri.
R: Cèsari, Federico Cèsari, yes.
G: Cèsari, sorry for the accent.
R: Whom I say hi to and whom I love a lot.
G: Hi, Marti.
R: Hi, Marti.
G: And it dealt with the topic of homophobia and coming to terms with one’s sexuality. How did you approach this topic and how did you manage to combine it with the BPD of Niccolò without coming off as pathetic, quite the opposite?
R: Well, first of all, as you well know, both the groups - the LGBT community and the people who suffer from some sort of mental illness - are very delicate minorities. So it’s normal, in approaching such a complex and kind of rare situation, to try and take it with responsibility and awareness as much as I could. I was, again, helped and supported a lot by Ludovico Bessegato and Federico; because without the beautiful relationship that he also allowed me to create, I couldn’t even have felt free to move in specific ways acting-wise. So I was definitely frightened, but, especially in retrospect, I am very honoured. The fact that like a lot of messages that we receive daily from people who have difficulties maybe because they don’t know how to come out to their parents or their best friends, or maybe they suffer from depression or BPD and they find comfort, but even more than that they find representation. Because Skam, in the way it’s been represented, I’d humbly feel free to say that it’s been done with honesty, both intellectual and ethical. So the teenagers, that are also a very complex audience because it’s not one that keeps what it thinks to itself, it’s an audience that speaks very boldly. I lost my train of thought.
G: Train? Train?
R: Oh, here it is. When they thank you because you managed to do some good or to make them feel represented, because they somehow can identify themselves with the character they see on the screen, thanks to the honesty in which you’re represented, then this is maybe a big step forward and especially it’s a big beautiful reason to do this job. Besides all the good things that come with it, besides giving life to aesthetically pleasing contents, I think this is the most productive way of using this audiovisual media, right? To make people feel less alone. To make them feel represented.
G: You know, I really liked how Martino’s friends reacted when he introduced you to them. I really liked that.
R: Yes, yes. Well, they’re really cool, they’re amazing - Ludovico Tersigni, Nicholas Zerbini, Francesco Centorame - they’re wonderful actors to work with and they played out a very spontaneous way of accepting the fact that their best friend had a boyfriend and it’s been really touching to watch.
G: Yes. The second season of Skam received a lot of awards. The audience award at the first edition of Series Con, at the Diversity Media Awards 2019. This means not only a big satisfaction for the series, in my opinion, but also a slap in the face of homophobia.
R: Absolutely.
G: Would you like to say something about it, to all the people who are watching us?
R: First of all I’m very very grateful because without you and your support there would be no awards, nothing of all this. So thank you from the bottom of my heart, thank you to the producers of the series, thank you to Ludovico who directed us. It’s basically everyone’s merit if we reached these goals. Because they’re awards very- I mean, the Diversity Media Award is a very important award and I’m very grateful and very honoured.
G: So, a lot of live questions are coming through. I’ll read you one from Valeria. What do you think has been your biggest success so far or the thing that gave you most satisfaction in life?
R: Well, professionally speaking I can absolutely say Skam and Niccolò Fares. And I say this with a lot of gratitude and also pride.
G: Thank you Valeria for texting us and thank you all. Sara asks you for some anecdotes from the audition.
R: There’s this one that everyone knows of the tobacco spilled everywhere in the room. Other fun anecdotes from the auditions… I don’t know. I remember that I was sitting on the couch of the waiting room before doing the audition, and with me there was also Pietro Turano. And we were both unaware that we would be chosen in the series.
G: Hi, Pietro.
R: Hi, Pietro. And so I remember the thrill of that moment and it was really terrible. It was always a moment of great anxiety before doing an audition. I remember the gazes between us, the embarrassment, and then at one point arrived Ludovico and Federico Cesari, whom I didn’t know yet, and then nothing. We met inside and we did one of the auditions that I definitely won’t ever forget in my life.
G: And did you also go to school with Pietro? Because I found out that Ludovica and Pietro went to school together.
R: No, no, no. Nothing. We don’t have this is common.
G: Did he ask you something straight away? Because Pietro asked Ludovica for a ride to get to the set.
R: No, no.
G: He behaved, then.
R: I offered him a coffee, though, on my own free will.
G: Luisa asks us: in your opinion, what school path will Niccolò follow? I hope they’ll allow at least him to stay in Rome.
R: This we don’t know about, for now, and so I’m afraid we will skip this question.
G: Well, maybe in the fourth season…
R: I have no idea, I’m tight-lipped.
G: I think we’ll find out, but we won’t tell Rocco. Angelica asked you, what has been your first impression about the cast of Skam? Did you hit it off from the beginning?
R: Absolutely, Angelica, let’s say that the first impression has been of great acceptance. I have to be completely honest, from the first to the last person in the crew and the cast made me feel really at home. And it’s not something obvious, also because it was a show that had already had its first season so I was entering a family who was already assembled. But they made me feel warmly at home from the beginning. Which is fundamental to let an actor do his job.
G: A lot of us are asking live, Rocco give us the pic of the dinner.
R: Oh God, the pic of the dinner, right! But I promised, I didn’t forget. I didn’t. It’s in my archive, I had promised it to Antonia which is actually a fan from my same native city, Potenza. So I’ll send it to her, I’ll send it on Instagram.
G: We want to see it as well, though, so you’re gonna post it as well.
R: I already did, but they want me to send it to them and I think it’s in the archive or in the previous pics… But anyway, I’m gonna find it and send it to you.
G: I vouch for him, he’s gonna send it. You’re sending it to us as well, at this point.
R: Exactly.
G: Ok. Alessia tells us, do you see yourself in any aspect of the character of Niccolò or of other characters?
R: Yes, I have a lot in common with Niccolò. Even if he’s a character somehow different from me since he suffers from BPD and has his own sexual identity, I have a lot of things in common with Niccolò. In particular his fragility, his extreme fragility and vulnerability. And the process of opening he’s had with Martino has been a very beautiful thing for me to interpret; because especially in that period, during the shooting, I had a lot inside in common with the character and this helped me a lot in the more dramatic-ish scenes.
G: Dramatic-ish, I like it.
R: Dramatic-ish, neologism.
G: Accademia della Crusca, please, “dramatic-ish”. Like with petal and “petaloso”, we can also add “dramatic-ish”.
R: Exactly.
G: So, I wanted to ask you a question. Asking permission to the fans, because I care. I’ve read that you’re studying medicine and you’d like to specialise in psychiatry.
R: Yes.
G: Is this passion of yours somehow connected with acting?
R: In my opinion it is. Right now I’m taking exams of the fourth year, so I’m a bit behind. We can say that Federico Cesari is a student more brilliant than I am, surely, with more discipline.
G: How much did he pay you to say this?
R: Zero, zero euros. On my own free initiative.
G: A dinner, a dinner for Rocco.
R: A dinner. Federico you owe me a dinner.
G: Federico you owe him a dinner.
R: No but, apart from this, I chose medicine primarily because the only aspect which I’m really interested in is psychiatry. Truly because I think there are a lot of common things with the profession of an actor. Because eventually it’s about the same subject, both the professions approach the same subject; at least if taken honestly and seriously, the job of an actor has to do with this, with some psychological architectures and clothes you have to wear and make tridimensional throughout time and space. Maybe the actor does that physically, while the psychiatrist has to analyse some misperceptions of reality. So in my opinion they have a lot in common. And then both cinema that, if we think about it, a mental pathology, they both offer a perception selected and sometimes distorted of reality. So there’s really a lot in common between these two worlds and that’s exactly what I’d like to look for.
G: I don’t know why, but something tells me that someone there would like to have you as general practitioner.
R: As general practitioner?
G: Yes. I’m sure.
R: It could happen, who knows.
G: Which icon from cinema or theatre or history, literature, music would you like to play?
R: To play?
G: Yes.
R: If I had to let dreams and imagination roam free, I’ve always dreamed of playing a character from mythology or at least some ancient folklore. For example, I’ve always loved the Arthurian saga very deeply. So my little dream was to play Mordred, because I really loved this character when I was little, I would read the books in my super nerd phase which has never ended. So, yeah, probably this. The myth, in particular, is a world that I would like to associate with my job, if it’ll ever happen.
G: Now I have other questions. Arianna tells us, if you could have a season about Niccolò, which topics would you like to deal with?
R: Well, I surely don’t have the power to choose or at least it’s not my role to decide these things, but if I had to, from my heart, I’d tackle very in detail the topic of his BPD which would really be an apocalyptic challenge. Because it’s really not easy to go in detail like Skam Italia did very often. If there ever will be one, yes, I suppose I’d like to analyse this.
G: Speaking of anecdotes, since a girl asked you earlier, when you had to shoot the scene in Milano, naked, cold… I don’t know.
R: No, actually it was hot. I was very good because actually in that moment, despite it being December in the series, it was July, we were in Milano and I was there with a bathrobe and this nude-coloured stuff that covered me. And Ludovico was basically on the terrace of the apartment with a walkie-talkie and when the action started I had to take off the bathrobe and start running. And all was fine, in the absurdity of everything, you do it. But at one point, Ludovico talked with the person who was beside me through the walkie-talkie and was like “Look, Ludovico said that when they start shooting you have to run and scream at the top of your lungs Tabasco!”. And I said “Seriously?” “Seriously, yes” so I accepted. So I did it with all the possible commitment and eventually, at the end of the scene I went back to the starting point and through the walkie-talkie you could only hear buzz and a thunderous laugh basically from the room up there, they were splitting their sides laughing because of this and of course the Tarzan-like scream was cut out of the actual scene because evidently there wasn’t need.
G: How international of you, the “commitment”. So, other questions. Giorgia needs to know; Rocco, is Niccolò in the same class as Edoardo?
R: Boh. I don’t think so. I don’t think he’s in the same class as Edoardo, no. Niccolò was in… 5B? I have no idea, we should ask to who has the details of the script. But I’d say no.
G: Now I have some curiosities. What’s in your wishlist?
R: In my wishlist?
G: I did this, I didn’t do this…
R: Look, I have to be honest, I’m a person who’s pretty happy right now. It hasn’t been an easy road, because there have been a lot of personal, emotive and professional obstacles in the past but in the present I feel very lucky because I’ve lived a lot of experiences that when I was little I could only dream of. I was able to live them, especially thanks to Skam, and in my wishlist there is nothing but to keep doing this job in the most honest and of course professional possible way. And to meet Eva Green. Yeah, I’m so in love with Eva Green, it’s like something that you can’t cure. But since I was little. I’ve watched everything, from the most commercial things to the least ones, interviews… I really adore her, I think she’s a phenomenal actress. If I ever got to meet her personally, I think I’d pass out, something like this surely. Afrasia. Only Tim Burton came here. By the way, Federico was at the premiere and I called him and was like “Is there Eva Green? Is there Eva Green?” because if she had been there I would have found a way to go, slithering, I would have found some way.
G: I’m launching the hashtag #SeCeStavaEvaGreen (”if Eva Green was there”).
R: Se ce stava Eva Green.
G: But she wasn’t, only Tim Burton.
R: The wonderful Eva Green.
G: Exactly. I have other questions for you. Elisa asks us, the scene that you liked shooting the most during season two?
R: Maybe a bit “self-harmingly” the first scene of episode 10. That’s to say the one in which Niccolò has his lowest moment after running naked with 4° and everything. And he’s there and he’s about to tell Martino that, as you see in the scene, that he thinks it can’t work because of his problem. That scene has been really my favourite because I felt a strong connection to the character that hadn’t happened in any other set before. A beautiful perception of the work. That one, even if it’s been painful because really it’s been hard but yes, that one.
G: I wanted to tell Elisa, “se ce stava Eva Green”.
R: Se ce stava Eva Green, yes.
G: The last question, from Agnese: you said often that the key word to describe Niccolò is “vulnerable”. In this season it’s beautiful to see him officially part of the group, thanks to Giò for passing him the Roman accent; how do you think Niccolò has changed in this season and how did he deal with the storyline of the homophobia against Martino? Bye Rocchino, a hug and a kiss.
R: Well, certainly the vulnerability is an important word, in my opinion, to understand the character of Niccolò. This is true especially in the second season, clearly, where it happens what happens, but it’s always part of him because anyway he’s a particularly fragile character due to all the problems and his condition. Clearly his beautiful fragility has been combined to the love for Martino and the love he receives from Martino and so I think this is his big anchor. I really think I can suppose that. And in this season, of course our storyline has been more secondary and that’s fair because we focus on the story of Edoardo and Eleonora, but yeah, a Niccolò maybe a bit stronger thanks to Martino.
G: I thank everyone for the questions you’ve sent us and for watching.
R: Thank you.
G: If you think I’ve forgotten about the chicken dance…
R: The chicken dance!
G: Think again!
R: Come on, let’s do the chicken dance, but you do it as well.
G: I’m doing it as well. Very beautiful.
R: Always the #SeCeStavaEvaGreen.
G: I launch it, so write it to us and bother him with it in the comments. And if Eva Green was there?
R: If Eva Green was there I wouldn’t have been able to speak, I probably would have been laying somewhere.
G: The commitment.
R: The commitment, in adoration.
G: Thanks to Rocco for being with us.
R: Thank you.
G: I hope you had fun. For money and stuff ask them, I don’t-
R: Yeah, yeah, I’ll ask for the bank transfer.
