Tiziano International

DB: I don’t really understand what happened last fall. I heard you talk with Linus on the radio about a dark period but I didn’t understand…

TF: I can make it very short. I don’t believe in bad luck, and I don’t talk about bad luck. But I have to say that it’s a year that started in a strange way, in the sense that first my grandfather passed away, and then it went on, for different reasons I had to go to the hospital two or three times, thankfully everything okay…

DB: But take the opportunity to say why, given that they’ll say: “ah who knows what he’s done!” If you can say it, say it!

TF: I would rather, other than the leg, not talk about it because actually, sometimes things happen and your body reacts in a certain way to events… Like some people have written erroneously, and I don’t know how they managed to write it given that I’ve never talked about it… Perhaps the triggering event has also kind of been the warlike period between me and the person who I was with and who’s not there anymore, so two years…

DB: But “not there anymore”, it’s not that he died…

TF: I don’t know anything, I don’t think so.

DB: You left each other.

TF: Let’s put it like that.

DB: He left you? But Tiziano, at this point you have to talk! If we have to talk about it, talk about it! He left you or you left him? First tell me this!

TF: I didn’t leave anyone!

DB: Alright then he left you, okay. Then what happened?

TF: If he called you and told you that…

DB: You don’t hear from each other anymore.

TF: Maybe he called you today.

DB: I don’t even know who he is, I don’t know anything Tiziano, I swear!

TF: Right, exactly.

DB: But tell us, because you’re alluding to a trauma…

TF: The trauma’s because I think it’s a sort of grief in that very moment when you love a person… You know this year they’ve made me talk about nothing but simple love, “love is a simple thing, love is a simple thing.” Well I agree that it’s simple: it simply begins and it simply ends. The problem is that love is also a very egoistical feeling, when it’s shared. So if it goes well for two then you feel good together, if it goes wrong for one then neither of the two feel good. So it’s just one person’s feelings that matter: to be a couple you need to have a common objective, and to break up it only takes one. So it’s like that, whether you like it or not. And then the dynamics are never right and they’re never nice because there’s no way to leave or to be left with little pain. I maintain that in the end there are a bit more dignified methods, but if people need to simply pass from one period to another without a period of dialogue, a cushioning period… perhaps for me that was the trauma, but it’s also the first time that I was in love, so there’s that too.

DB: The first time, really?

TF: Yes.

DB: At thirty years old you were in love for the first time?

TF: Well, I think I was fortunate.

DB: Fortunate to be in love that late! Gosh, well it’s never too early and it’s never too late…

TF: You know, I’m not sure it’s late. I can’t stand when people talk about unrequited love because I think that real love is a feeling that you can’t nourish by yourself. Love for me at its core is the great esteem that you have and that you receive, that you give and that is given to you. So I think that when people talk about an unrequited love, they talk about attraction, of a great infatuation, obsession, or however you want to call it… but I think real love is not just what you feel as an impulse towards someone, it’s an exchange of something. So certainly, having been in a genuine relationship, made of moments from the first day of living together, made of real things, of parents, friends, holidays, quarrels, everyday life, etc. I have to say for me this is love. And if there’s one really beautiful thing among the many things that this story has left me, it’s that I discovered myself the way I wanted to, that I’m a monogamous person. And it’s the thing that I’d most like to explain to people who don’t know what it means, this strange and twisted word that’s often explained as a “sexual choice”, while it’s actually a sentimental dimension. Homosexuality is still love, real love! It’s love that consumes you and that deprives you exactly the way it gives things to you… Love that’s actually always been known, like the heterosexual kind. So… that’s how I see it and that’s why I think it was the first time. And clearly, I also lost my head for the first time!

DB: But why do you think it’s over?

TF: Because I believe that deep down… [A/N: he becomes quite emotional] Hold on, so that I can say it in Italian, eh! Because on one hand maybe certain aspects weren’t accepted, on the other hand I can’t accept them either, so I wasn’t able to give him the confidence necessary to go beyond and fight. Because some of the things that weren’t right for me, I think it’s me who wasn’t right. Really, and perhaps I have to work on it. And the person next to you sometimes loses the will to fight for things that you deep down don’t even want to change, or are not able to change.

DB: But “La differenza tra me e te” (the difference between me and you) speaks of this kind of relationship?

TF: Yeah, yeah.

DB: It’s very nice though, actually it ends well.

TF: Of course, but I can’t wait to fall in love again, Daria! Perhaps you didn’t understand! I firmly believe in it. What I told you is that if there’s one thing that this experience left me, it’s how beautiful it is and how wonderful it is what happened to me and that it really makes love a simple thing, even when it simply goes away, through its mechanisms.

DB: But when there are problems in a couple - I was wondering this when I was listening to “L’amore è una cosa semplice” - isn’t there a need to work on it, to be patient, to fight even if you feel sick of it? Or if things aren’t working out does it mean that it’s not love?

TF: I’ve often talked with my mother… not very often because I’m a bit ashamed of it… not of talking with my mother, but I’m ashamed of talking about myself… so here I am in primetime on LA7!! [laughing] As they say in English, “makes sense”. But anyway, if there’s one thing my mother said it’s “you know, in a couple with children and with a strong connection, even if trivially sealed by a contract, sometimes the will to fight comes to you in honor of these things. As superficial as they may seem - children aren’t, but even marriage could be - you find the will in them. What frightens me more about this situation you could find yourself in, in this case you, my son, is that when faced with the first difficulty you don’t have this incentive - on one hand incentive on one hand torture - that I’ve had for thirty years and that makes me stay with your father and be happy.” And they certainly weren’t thirty easy years, they’ll never be for anyone, no couple that lives together for thirty years. So the truth is that I think it’s necessary to fight. For couples like the one I was part of, I often also talk of the idea that the only real thing that binds you to the other is love. So if it’s not there, there are essentially no other ties that hold you together, and well then I have to say that makes it very weak.

DB: But Tiziano, there are many homosexual couples that get married, that have children. It’s your choice…

TF: I’ve been hibernating until now?

DB: Well, not in Italy, but abroad you can get married.

TF: Daria, I’ll tell you one thing, the reason I don’t want to live abroad anymore, no matter how much I love traveling. I don’t want to isolate myself anymore and be afraid of feeling bad, but I also don’t want to be afraid of feeling good. I’m not going to go to Spain to get married. Either it can be done here, or I don’t get married, and I could even be fine with that. But I respect those who get married, it’s right to do it when there’s the need, when you’ve been together for a long time you should do it if you want to. But I am a dreamer and if there’s one reason we exist, we who write songs, it’s to motivate, to stay here and give ourselves up and become those through whom others can find the courage to dream… through our songs and also through our choices in life. And it’s the reason why I wrote the book, while everyone asked me “why haven’t you kept silent about your path if it took so much out of you?” For this reason as well, because perhaps it’s the only real duty that I feel I have towards those who follow me. I think that it’s important to stay strong and remain here and show that we love one another here, we can’t get married, and sometimes we break down in front of all these limitations.

DB: But would you like it if you could?

TF: I wouldn’t do it right now because I’m not… I’m not… But above all the possibility should be left, the choice should be left to the individual, like in any civilized society, period. Then, whether right or wrong…

DB: No, but I’m asking you…

TF: I would like to live in a world where there’s at least the choice, the possibility to choose. Up until now I have never imagined, not even in the happiest moment with the person I love— did I say “love”? Fuck… Commercial break!

DB: It’s not time yet… Tiziano, now I don’t want to be a cheap psychologist, but you still love this guy!

TF: Oh come on, Daria, I beg you, come on!

DB: Alright, I’m sorry, but it’s clear! I don’t know, if you don’t want to talk about it, but you still seem madly in love! I don’t have to tell you?

TF: I don’t know, it’s all difficult.

DB: Are you sure that the story’s finished?

TF: Look… I don’t think that feelings can follow the course of the faucet at home so that when there’s too much warm water we switch to the cold and when we don’t want anymore water we simply turn it off. I believe in stages, in moments, I believe in patience when you need it, I believe in the fight. I’ve already told you. So deep down I’ve already given you my answer.

DB: Still it’s obvious, but okay, let’s not get too much into it.

TF: Okay, but it takes two, eh!

DB: But do you think he’s watching you right now?

TF: I don’t think so.

DB: But someone will tell him what you said tonight.

TF: Ah tomorrow, yes.

DB: And what would you like for them to tell him?

TF: No, come on!! It’s a game of massacre.

DB: Yes, yes, you’re right, you’re right.