[Editor’s note: The following review contains spoilers for the Season 2 finale of “My Brilliant Friend,” titled “The Blue Fairy.”]
“The Blue Fairy” is a low-key, gentle yet mostly joyous final hour of the second season of “My Brilliant Friend,” which wrapped Monday night. The eighth and last episode is loyal to the ending of the second book in Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan series, “The Story of a New Name,” so much so that, without a Season 3 to immediately dive into, you might find yourself headed to your bookshelf to revisit the third book, “Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay.”
Buoyed no doubt by the show’s strong international fan base — that includes you, loyal readers, who’ve been following along with me all season — HBO renewed Saverio Costanzo’s jewel of a series for a Season 3. But with production among many things in Italy obviously halted, how long will it be until we get to see it? Either way, at least we know it’s coming,...
“The Blue Fairy” is a low-key, gentle yet mostly joyous final hour of the second season of “My Brilliant Friend,” which wrapped Monday night. The eighth and last episode is loyal to the ending of the second book in Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan series, “The Story of a New Name,” so much so that, without a Season 3 to immediately dive into, you might find yourself headed to your bookshelf to revisit the third book, “Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay.”
Buoyed no doubt by the show’s strong international fan base — that includes you, loyal readers, who’ve been following along with me all season — HBO renewed Saverio Costanzo’s jewel of a series for a Season 3. But with production among many things in Italy obviously halted, how long will it be until we get to see it? Either way, at least we know it’s coming,...
- 5/5/2020
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Indiewire
In a Gold Derby exclusive, we have learned the category placements of the key Emmy Awards contenders for Fremantle. For this season, the company has such scripted series as “The New Pope,” “My Brilliant Friend” and “Dublin Murders.” Unscripted programs as part of their 2020 campaign include “American Idol,” “America’s Got Talent,” “Celebrity Family Feud,” “Match Game” and more.
Below, their list of submissions for all scripted and unscripted programs. More names might be added by the company on the final Emmy ballot. Also note that performers not included on this list may well be submitted by their personal reps.
SEEJude Law movies: 15 greatest films ranked from worst to best
Scripted —
Dublin Murders
Limited Series
Movie/Limited Actor – Killian Scott
Movie/Limited Actress – Sarah Green
My Brilliant Friend – The Story Of A New Name
Drama Series
Drama Actress – Margherita Mazzucco
Drama Supporting Actor – Giovanni Amura, Francesco Serpico
Drama Supporting Actress – Annarita Vitolo...
Below, their list of submissions for all scripted and unscripted programs. More names might be added by the company on the final Emmy ballot. Also note that performers not included on this list may well be submitted by their personal reps.
SEEJude Law movies: 15 greatest films ranked from worst to best
Scripted —
Dublin Murders
Limited Series
Movie/Limited Actor – Killian Scott
Movie/Limited Actress – Sarah Green
My Brilliant Friend – The Story Of A New Name
Drama Series
Drama Actress – Margherita Mazzucco
Drama Supporting Actor – Giovanni Amura, Francesco Serpico
Drama Supporting Actress – Annarita Vitolo...
- 4/28/2020
- by Chris Beachum
- Gold Derby
[Editor’s Note: The following review contains spoilers for “My Brilliant Friend” Season 2, Episode 7, “Ghosts.”]
“Ghosts” ends with a haunted Lenu (Margherita Mazzucco) recalling how her whole life is a series of “almosts” as she tosses a box containing Lila’s (Gaia Girace) innermost personal effects and writings over a bridge. The “ghosts” of this episode stalk every frame, and they’re the ghosts of dreams killed, hopes collapsed, and old friends and lovers who’ve drifted apart. As Lenu betrays her promise to Lila never to read the letters entrusted to her, director and series creator Saverio Costanzo makes an experimental choice, which is to shoot Lila’s epistolary reverie in 16mm. The rest of the series has, up to this point, been shot digitally, despite lacking the varnish of other contemporary series in favor of a loose, gritty, ’60s arthouse style.
The camerawork helps create a claustrophobic, gossamer atmosphere for the most intimate hour of “My Brilliant Friend” so far.
“Ghosts” ends with a haunted Lenu (Margherita Mazzucco) recalling how her whole life is a series of “almosts” as she tosses a box containing Lila’s (Gaia Girace) innermost personal effects and writings over a bridge. The “ghosts” of this episode stalk every frame, and they’re the ghosts of dreams killed, hopes collapsed, and old friends and lovers who’ve drifted apart. As Lenu betrays her promise to Lila never to read the letters entrusted to her, director and series creator Saverio Costanzo makes an experimental choice, which is to shoot Lila’s epistolary reverie in 16mm. The rest of the series has, up to this point, been shot digitally, despite lacking the varnish of other contemporary series in favor of a loose, gritty, ’60s arthouse style.
The camerawork helps create a claustrophobic, gossamer atmosphere for the most intimate hour of “My Brilliant Friend” so far.
- 4/28/2020
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Indiewire
In “Rage,” the sun has set on the short but potent romance of Nino Sarratore (Francesco Serpico) and Lila Caracci (Gaia Girace). Director Saverio Costanzo is back after handing the camera to Alice Rohrwacher for the past two weeks spent in Ischia, but the transition is seamless. Costanzo appropriately sets the last moments of happiness for Nino and Lila all a swoon in the rain, set to the sad swell of Gino Paoli’s love song “Vivere Ancora.” It’s an achingly romantic sequence, especially a time where those of us single in quarantine assume we’ll never touch another human being or be touched again or experience love’s sweet, elusive kiss! But their life on the lam in a hovel somewhere in Naples hits a dead end once Nino grows resentful of Lila’s intellect. Nino is a Sarratore, through and through, so he was never not going...
- 4/21/2020
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Indiewire
[Editor’s Note: The following review contains spoilers for “My Brilliant Friend,” Season 2, Episode 5, “The Betrayal.”]
Nearly every moment of “The Betrayal,” from the unstable Dutch angles of the cinematography to Max Richter’s chilling score, is building up to the episode’s final third like a horror movie. “My Brilliant Friend” has been operating on this track all season, with morbid flourishes in the visuals and sound design mounting toward an awful inevitability. Directed by Alice Rohrwacher, this episode is the season’s darkest and strongest hour yet.
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This week, that came on the shoulders of a cast-aside Lenu (Margherita Mazzucco), now an enabling third wheel in the ongoing illicit affair between Nino and Lila, surrendering her virginity to Nino’s father, the shady railroad worker Donato Sarratore (Emanuele Valenti). Don fancies...
Nearly every moment of “The Betrayal,” from the unstable Dutch angles of the cinematography to Max Richter’s chilling score, is building up to the episode’s final third like a horror movie. “My Brilliant Friend” has been operating on this track all season, with morbid flourishes in the visuals and sound design mounting toward an awful inevitability. Directed by Alice Rohrwacher, this episode is the season’s darkest and strongest hour yet.
More from IndieWire'The Midnight Gospel' Review: 'Adventure Time' Creator's Astonishing New Netflix Show'Better Call Saul' Review: Masterful 'Bad Choice Road' Sets Up a Season-Capping Standoff
This week, that came on the shoulders of a cast-aside Lenu (Margherita Mazzucco), now an enabling third wheel in the ongoing illicit affair between Nino and Lila, surrendering her virginity to Nino’s father, the shady railroad worker Donato Sarratore (Emanuele Valenti). Don fancies...
- 4/14/2020
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Indiewire
Trigger alert: To those for whom the exquisite pain of first unrequited love still scalds, Episode 4 of this season of “My Brilliant Friend,” titled “The Kiss,” could freshen those wounds. It’s an effective juxtaposition to experience Lenu’s (Margherita Mazzucco) internal torment — over learning that the broodingly handsome and cocksure Nino Sarratore (Francesco Serpico) prefers her best friend Lila (Gaia Girace) to her — against the beautiful backdrop of Ischia, a volcanic island at the edge of the gulf of Naples. The emotions are volcanic, too, with Lenu devastated at the episode’s end by this awful revelation.
“The Kiss” is the first episode of the season to be directed by Alice Rohrwacher, whose sister, the actress Alba Rohrwacher, provides the narration for the series (and will presumably play the next phase of grown-up Lenu next season). The director of last year’s surreal Netflix movie “Happy as Lazzaro,” Rohrwacher...
“The Kiss” is the first episode of the season to be directed by Alice Rohrwacher, whose sister, the actress Alba Rohrwacher, provides the narration for the series (and will presumably play the next phase of grown-up Lenu next season). The director of last year’s surreal Netflix movie “Happy as Lazzaro,” Rohrwacher...
- 4/7/2020
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Indiewire
Get married. Have a baby. Raise the children. Please the husband. Die. This is the cycle of life as laid out to the women in the world of the 1950s as depicted by “My Brilliant Friend,” and the dreary cadence against which the newly married Lila (Gaia Girace) is now rebelling. In this season, that rebellion culminates in the cunning Lila’s most visceral act of vengeance yet: the violent defamation of her wedding portrait.
Jumping back a bit, Lila has made it clear to Lenu (Margherita Mazzucco) she wants nothing to do with the industrial-marriage complex to which she’s wedded herself. “The idea of getting pregnant disgusts me!” she spews at Lenu, who’s asked by Lila’s cruel, shallow husband Stefano (Giovanni Amura) to carry the message that he wants a child. “She has an evil force inside her,” Stefano tells Lenu of his wife, whose dark...
Jumping back a bit, Lila has made it clear to Lenu (Margherita Mazzucco) she wants nothing to do with the industrial-marriage complex to which she’s wedded herself. “The idea of getting pregnant disgusts me!” she spews at Lenu, who’s asked by Lila’s cruel, shallow husband Stefano (Giovanni Amura) to carry the message that he wants a child. “She has an evil force inside her,” Stefano tells Lenu of his wife, whose dark...
- 3/24/2020
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Indiewire
Anyone who ever thought that secretive Italian author Elena Ferrante is actually a man hiding behind a female nom de plume is surely dreaming. The deeply realized dynamic between childhood best friends turned frenemies Elena Greco and Lila Cerullo could hardly be conjured from a male gaze. Their riveting, decades-long push-pull is explored across the four novels in Ferrante’s Neapolitan series, which have been adapted into an equally riveting series for HBO. The Italian production now begins a gorgeously wrought second season that vividly recreates 1950s postwar Naples, and the complex relationships among its denizens, all of whom are looking for something more among the ruins.
Director Saverio Costanzo returns to helm the first episode of the new season, lifting from the sequel to “My Brilliant Friend,” “The Story of a New Name.” However, this season he hands over directing duties on two episodes to fellow Italian filmmaker Alice Rohrwacher,...
Director Saverio Costanzo returns to helm the first episode of the new season, lifting from the sequel to “My Brilliant Friend,” “The Story of a New Name.” However, this season he hands over directing duties on two episodes to fellow Italian filmmaker Alice Rohrwacher,...
- 3/16/2020
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Indiewire
The first season of My Brilliant Friend, the excellent HBO adaptation of Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels, introduced viewers to Lila and Lenu, two bright little girls in 1950s Naples whose paths diverge when Lenu’s family allows her to enter middle school and Lila’s does not. In the second season, which premieres March 16th, the girls — now young women — discover that in order to wiggle out of the narrow constraints of poor women’s lives in postwar Italy, they’re going to have to get creative. Decades later,...
- 3/14/2020
- by Lara Zarum
- Rollingstone.com
Three episodes into “My Brilliant Friend: The Story of a New Name” comes a scene as lovely and understated as it is pointed and bruising, a combination in which the show specializes, especially in this second season. Elena (Margherita Mazzucco), nervous about going to a party at her intimidating professor’s house, rifles through the lavish closet of her best friend, Lila (Gaia Girace). As she searches for a suitable outfit, she flicks past all of Lila’s louder dresses as Lila looks on, lip slightly upturned in fond amusement at Elena’s palpable stress. As framed by director Saverio Costanzo, almost the entire scene plays out in the reflection of a bifurcated mirror on Lila’s closet, keeping each woman on either side of a dividing line. When Lila crosses over to help Elena with a dress, she briefly disappears in the fold of the glass as Elena stares into it,...
- 3/13/2020
- by Caroline Framke
- Variety Film + TV
Lila and Lenú’s friendship strains and strengthens in the new trailer for Season Two of My Brilliant Friend, based on the second book of Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels, The Story of a New Name. The show returns to HBO March 16th.
The new trailer opens with a harrowing scene in which Lenú (Margherita Mazzucco) pays her first visit to Lila (Gaia Girace) following the latter’s honeymoon with her new husband Stefano (Giovanni Amura). After answering the door with sunglasses on, Lila removes them to reveal a black eye and tells Lenú,...
The new trailer opens with a harrowing scene in which Lenú (Margherita Mazzucco) pays her first visit to Lila (Gaia Girace) following the latter’s honeymoon with her new husband Stefano (Giovanni Amura). After answering the door with sunglasses on, Lila removes them to reveal a black eye and tells Lenú,...
- 2/20/2020
- by Jon Blistein
- Rollingstone.com
In today’s TV news roundup, Apple TV Plus announces Jen Tullock and Zach Cherry have been cast in upcoming series “Severance” and HBO sets a premiere date for “My Brilliant Friend: The Story of a New Name.”
Castings
Jen Tullock and Zach Cherry will join Patricia Arquette, Adam Scott and Britt Lower in Apple TV Plus’ new workplace thriller, “Severance.” Tullock will star as Devon, sister of Mark (Scott), while Cherry will portray one of Mark’s employees named Dylan. Written and created by Dan Erickson, the series follows Lumen Industries, a company aiming to take work-life balance to the next level and centers on lead character Mark, an employee with a dark past trying to put himself back together. Arquette stars as Mark’s boss at Lumen Industries. Lower plays Helly, a woman who struggles to find peace with the decision she made to do the severance procedure.
Castings
Jen Tullock and Zach Cherry will join Patricia Arquette, Adam Scott and Britt Lower in Apple TV Plus’ new workplace thriller, “Severance.” Tullock will star as Devon, sister of Mark (Scott), while Cherry will portray one of Mark’s employees named Dylan. Written and created by Dan Erickson, the series follows Lumen Industries, a company aiming to take work-life balance to the next level and centers on lead character Mark, an employee with a dark past trying to put himself back together. Arquette stars as Mark’s boss at Lumen Industries. Lower plays Helly, a woman who struggles to find peace with the decision she made to do the severance procedure.
- 2/1/2020
- by BreAnna Bell
- Variety Film + TV
The sprawling tale of Lila and Lenù continues through the fraught years of adolescence in the new trailer for Season Two of My Brilliant Friend, based on the second book in Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels, The Story of a New Name. The show will return March 16th on HBO.
The second season finds Gaia Girace and Margherita Mazzucco reprising their roles as the teenaged Lila and Lenù, respectively. The story picks up with Lila bucking against her new husband, the abusive and overbearing Stefano (Giovanni Amura), while Lenù continues...
The second season finds Gaia Girace and Margherita Mazzucco reprising their roles as the teenaged Lila and Lenù, respectively. The story picks up with Lila bucking against her new husband, the abusive and overbearing Stefano (Giovanni Amura), while Lenù continues...
- 1/31/2020
- by Jon Blistein
- Rollingstone.com
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