The actor and singer Gennaro Cannavacciuolo died today in Rome. The news of his death, at the age of 60 just three months ago, was greeted with great amazement by many friends and colleagues who expressed their condolences on social networks. Born in Pozzuoli on February 14, 1962, Cannavacciuolo had been a pupil and then collaborator of Eduardo De Filippo and later also of Pupella Maggio. As an actor, singer and stand-up comedian he has expressed his talent in theater, cinema and television. But it is in the theater that his multifaceted talent has manifested itself over a 40-year career spanning prose, musicals, operettas, recitals and one-man-shows.
In 1981, Eduardo De Filippo published on the agenda of his theater: “I thank Gennaro Cannavacciuolo for his collaboration, but above all for the commitment and seriousness with which he faced two substitutions; and that’s not all…”. Cannavacciuolo was just 20 years old at the time. His training in Eduardo de Filippo’s school lasted six years, during which he met Pupella Maggio, with whom he will become a great friend and with whom he will also share the scene.
After Eduardo’s death and a short period spent with Luca De Filippo, since 1987 he has interpreted roles and participates in important shows, such as ‘Cabaret’, of which he was the first interpreter in Italy, but also ‘Concha Bonita’ with music by Nicola Piovani, ‘The Nights of Cabiria’, ‘The Kiss of the Spider Woman’, to name but a few. For the critics, Cannavacciuolo was synonymous with eclecticism, class, talent and imagination, heir to a great theatrical school, which enabled him to face the comic, the tragic, the cabaret, the magazine. Among her latest shows, the homage to Yves Montand (‘Yves Montand. Un italien à Paris’) and last winter’s one to Milva (‘Milva. Woman of the theater’) in which she proposed quotations from some of the most great musical and theatrical successes of the ‘Pantera di Goro’. He leaves behind his wife Christine and a 9-year-old son.
“You can’t die so suddenly and so young!”. It is almost with an existential protest that Geppy Gleijeses, Neapolitan director and actor, artistic director of the Quirino theater in Rome, expresses his “great pain” in reminding AdnKronos of his colleague, friend and fellow countryman Gennaro Cannavacciuolo. “I know that, after the very recent one on Milva, he was now preparing a show on Toto, he was in top shape”, he relates.
Gleijeses describes Cannavacciuolo as “an extraordinary actor, of great quality and finesse, very subtle in his interpretations and with the ability to act showing an innate class, as well as having a beautiful voice as an authentic and highly refined chansonnier. An actor of professionalism and seriousness. the only one, the first to show up at the theater for rehearsals and the last to go away “. But, he adds, “for me, also a great friend who now suddenly leaves me with a great void: he was an exceptional companion, he spoiled me by preparing splendid sandwiches with sausage and broccoli …”.
Gleijeses recalls: “With me, Gennaro Cannavacciuolo practically made his debut in the theater, in 1980 at the Valle di Roma with ‘Il voto’ by Salvatore Di Giacomo, directed by Virginio Puecher, starring Pupella Maggio, in which I was a lead actor and producer. And then we shared the success of ‘Jennifer’s Five Roses’ directed by me in 2001, an award-winning show; and again with my direction she then interpreted in the theater ‘Lonely girls with some experience’ from 2003 and ‘Always say yes’ by Eduardo De Filippo until 2010. He moved perfectly at ease in the theater, it was his world “.
“An actor of great skill, a true professional. And above all a man of exquisite kindness”. With these words, the screenwriter and director Enrico Vanzina reminds AdnKronos of the figure of Gennaro Cannavacciuolo.
Cannavacciuolo participated in two films written and scripted by Enrico Vanzina and directed by his brother Carlo Vanzina: ‘A summer at the sea’ in 2008 and ‘Life is a wonderful thing’ in 2010, his latest film in a career spent mainly on theater. “I remember that with him a take or at most two was enough and everything was already perfect – continues Enrico Vanzina – After all, having been a pupil of Eduardo De Filippo is more than a business card: it is a guarantee …”.
(by Enzo Bonaiuto)
