Checco Zalone: Popular Performance, Italian Masculinity, and Transmedia Promotion

Over the past 15 years, Checco Zalone, born Luca Medici, has been the most striking national box-office success and ignited widespread interest among journalists and thinkers. His celebrity has been discussed as a mirror to the many pitfalls and few virtues of the national character. Film scholar Gianni Canova describes him as “the most powerful comedy’s mask in contemporary Italy. He represents this latter as much as Fantozzi did with Italy in the 1970s and Totò in the 1950s” (Canova 2016, 22). Otherwise, Zalone has been described as an alternative to come- dians’ Leftist political engagement: a champion of a commercial, tasteless mode of addressing the lowest instincts of the audience. TV critic Renato Franco openly condemned the comedian: “Comedy’s new messiah is a prophet of ignorance, a champion of chauvinism, an idol of vulgarity. But believers gather in mass at his service” (Franco 2011, 15). Such controver- sies discuss Zalone as substantiating pre-existing sharp alternatives within Italian society and culture. However, this chapter assumes that the reasons for his success lie elsewhere. Therefore, it will scrutinize Zalone through three lenses: media production, genres, and performers; masculinity; and promotional strategies