“Ms. Boccia's method is almost perfect. Like her social communication, her approach to the interview, her answers, her smile, her posture are perfect. She definitely has a very advanced idea of communication, not casual. It will be spontaneous, it will belong to his DNA, however, it is sincerely striking.” Words by Repubblica editor Maurizio Molinari spoken Friday, Sept. 6, on La7 on the sidelines of Luca Telese and Marianna Aprile's interview with Maria Rosaria Boccia, the woman who in two weeks has thrown the government's nervous system into crisis and forced the resignation of Culture Minister Gennaro Sangiuliano.
Not forgetting Vittorio Feltri, who on Tuesday, September 10, before being removed from the studios of “L'aria che tira,” let go of his inhibitions. “How did the minister introduce her to you?” asked David Parenzo to the founder of Libero. “As a friend of hers. How did you want him to introduce her to me, as his bitch?” Forty-one years old, a failed marriage, a wealthy family behind her that operates in the clothing industry, Maria Rosaria Boccia has become within 12 days one of the most well-known women in Italy. So much so that she put the first female-led executive in serious trouble. Days elapsed from the post in which Boccia announced her appointment as adviser to the minister for major events to the moment Sangiuliano handed the premier the letter announcing her irrevocable resignation. Stating that the top priority was to be near his wife. In between a series of twists and turns, pirouettes, tears, threats and somersaults that not even the genius of Carlo Goldoni would have been able to come up with in the most fertile period of commedia dell'arte. And we are talking about today, not 300 years ago.
So much more than Harlequin, Punchinello, Balanzone and Columbine! Minister Jenny Delon and the Poppea of Pompeii, as apostrophized by Dagospia, have staged a piece of sublime theater that has made the media's fortune. Suffice it to say that Luca Telese and Marianna Aprile announced on Sept. 7 that their interview with Boccia had garnered a 10 percent share (“a bingo for La7,” points out a seasoned TV writer), that Gennaro Sangiuliano's cry on Rai 1 was seen by more than 3 million viewers and that Boccia has gained almost 100 thousand followers on Instagram so much so that, if he decided to be an influencer - Dagospia points out -, each of his sponsored posts would be worth no less than 2 thousand euros and he could get to earn no less than 20 thousand euros a month.
But what exactly happened? Let's try to be concise.
Monday, Aug. 26, kicks off the first week: unknown Maria Rosaria Boccia posts on Instagram the announcement of the beginning of her collaboration with the Mic: “Thank you to Minister of Culture Gennaro Sangiuliano for the appointment as Advisor to the Minister for Major Events.” No one takes any notice except that from the ministry staff comes an indecipherable denial: “Maria Rosaria Boccia has had no appointment as adviser.” And the omelet is made. Because in the newsrooms there are those who raise their antennae and begin to wonder who this lady is. Dagospia gets in front of everyone and publishes the first report. Complete with photos of her and the minister. Photos that multiply and, over the course of the week, begin to flood the net. Including those showing Sangiuliano without a wedding ring when he is in the company of Maria Rosaria Boccia. Riot. Oppositions call for his resignation.
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Monday, Sept. 2, start of the second week: Giorgia Meloni summons the minister, he reassures her, and she goes on Rete4 to Del Debbio announcing that Sangiuliano remains in his post because he “assured her that ‘this person’ did not have access to any confidential documents related to the G7 and above all not a single euro of the Italians was spent on ”this person.”
Boccia's response is immediate. He publishes on the network new documents: official emails, travel tickets, photos during an inspection in Pompeii ahead of the G7 of culture, videos shot in institutional buildings with a pair of Rayban smartglasses and even a recording of a phone call with the ministry. On Wednesday evening, Tg1 director Gian Marco Chiocci interviews the minister, and after the news, the flagship network airs the full document. Seventeen minutes in which Sangiuliano confesses that he had a romantic relationship with Boccia, but swears, complete with supporting pieces, that he did not spend public money on her. “I paid everything out of my own pocket,” he declares. Before getting a lump in his throat when he speaks in a broken voice about his betrayed wife. Without being able to hold back tears. Seventeen minutes in prime time. An extraordinary piece of theater that oppositions, evidently insensitive to the artistic side, brand as squatting on public service.
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Maria Rosaria Boccia retorts by giving her side of the story in an interview with La Stampa that comes out Friday morning. She reiterates that she is a businesswoman, that she met Sangiuliano in August 2023, that she was appointed councilor and that she took part in the Pompeii inspection. She also reveals, while not confirming the romantic relationship, that she attended Coldplay and Il Volo concerts together with the minister with whom she had numerous public meetings. She also explains the reason that prompted her to record the phone call, “The minister said a sentence to me that struck me very much. I am the minister, I am a man, I represent the institution, and in the future no one will believe what you say.” A few hours passed and, before La7 aired the interview with Maria Rosaria Boccia, Sangiuliano irrevocably resigned. Meloni accepts and appoints Alessandro Giuli in place of “O ministro nnamurato” as La Verità directed by Maurizio Belpietro calls him. “Dead a king, long live the king. A minister has resigned, good job to the new minister,” the premier will say a few days later.
In the meantime, it turns out that Sangiuliano has been in a hermitage of Franciscan friars to regain understanding with his wife, that the Corte dei Conti has opened an investigation for fiscal damage, that the Rome Public Prosecutor's Office has launched an investigation, and that Sangiuliano's lawyer has announced that he is suing Maria Rosaria Boccia for attempted extortion.
At this point the question arises: what better could the Italians ask for? At the level of entertainment, of culture, no? Mica we are talking about administration.
Illustration by Gloria Dozio - Acrimònia Studios
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