“You’ll get a Kick Outa Us!”, “You will have fun with us!”. It is precisely paraphrasing a song by one of his favorite musicals, “Anything Goes”, which we can describe the enthusiasm with which he welcomes us in his Milanese school. He is Simone Nardini, actor, director, screenwriter, costume designer. Artistic director of MTS-Musical! The School. The first two -year musical school in Italy.
Simone, your career includes crafts, talent and genius. You worked with Gigi Proietti, Johnny Dorelli, Gianluca Guidi and Christian De Sica, just to name a few. You started as the theatrical actor in elementary school to get to be Artistic director.
“In reality I had a strong passion for the circus: I wanted to be a clown. My teacher of manual activities (at the time it was a subject who was taught in primary school), told my parents that I was too shy, and that a acting course would help me. I started as a student of amateur acting in fifth grade, and from there I didn’t stop anymore. At the age of fourteen I shot my first show” And Valentina “, under the direction from the Oscar winner Alfredo Giannetti, broadcast in eighty countries in the world, except in Italy! But the acting was not enough for me: I was missing a different creative part. After the high school I enrolled in scenography and costume at the Brera Academy, but after two years my thirst for creativity did not calm yet. As a big one: the artistic producer as you do abroad, a middle ground between the producer and the artistic director.
When was the school born?
“We can say that this school was born in 1988 by my will, from a pupil, within what was the most famous school of private acting in Milan at the time. I convinced the director to grant an opening to the musical part, albeit, at the beginning, he mainly remained a theater school. In 1999, in collaboration with Manuel Frattini and Paolo Olivieri, unfortunately today both consolidated what is now. He sprouts in 1988, and then blossomed completely in 1999, when MTS was the only school of musicals in Italy. Musical! The schoolto make it clear that everything is studied. A real academy of artistic training.
An academy in full style “hunger – will be famous!” capable of churning out 360 -degree artists, where there are auditions to enter, as in a real show.
“Exactly, the first was last July 28, and the next will be 5, 15 and 25 September.”
What are the subjects you teach in the Academy?
“The classical dance, modern, jazz, musical repertoire, acrobatic and tippot dance. We then offer ad hoc internships on other styles. The singing and everything that revolves around it: vocal technique, theory and musical solfeggio, piano, reading of the score, choral singing and single singing. Acting, starting from the diction, from breathing, reading, interpretative reading and then obviously all the theatrical acting and obvious cinematographic. We also organize meetings with professionals in the sector, where the boys come into contact with worlds apparently left by them, such as, for example, light and sound designer, or costume designers. If you learn to be highlighted, when you arrive on stage, it will be instinctively. “
And of course, talking about international work, teach English phonetic.
“We study English and German phonetics, because by now the largest market in the world for work in the field of the musical is the Teutonic world, therefore Germany, Austria and German Switzerland. Masses together, these three nations create the professional pole that attracts the most workers. More than Broadway and more than London. And they do not have the problem of native speaker, unlike London and New York. Many graduate actors work between Germany, Austria and Switzerland, also enticed by the excellent employment contracts proposed, which offer a minimum of two years with paid holidays, make -up bonus for the skin of the skin, and including physiotherapist! “
Really the German musical attracts so much public?
“Absolutely yes, there are tourists from all over the world that go specifically. The atmosphere is so beautiful that it attracts both local and tourists. The installations are spectacular. For example, the version of Moulin Rouge, of Cologne, while maintaining a consistency on choreography, costumes and direction, is currently the larger setting. And I add, with pride, that in that team, three of our best graduates.
A difficult question: what is your favorite musical?
“There are obviously different ones, at least five or six, but if I have to choose one, I would say “Anything Goes”, of Cole Porter. It is a light and fun, but deep show for anyone who does not want to stop apparently. It is a series of vicissitudes of a group of illegal immigrants traveling on a luxury ship from New York to London in 1936. It is among my favorites because it combines in a masterful lightness, grandeur and pomp of the musical with deep contents, telling the social and economic degradation of American society after the collapse of 1929, where together with Wall Street, the moral values also fell. There is material for everyone and I recommend it. Among other things, we have been on the bill to the Carcano thanks to our transposition of this masterpiece. “
One of the many examples in which the school -end representations have turned into billboard shows in the most important Italian theaters. A real academy of the musical, where the first two years are mandatory and the third optional, at the discretion of the management and teachers, who invite only the best to stop for free to attend it.
And just this year, some new graduates managed to enter, together with veterans professionals, in the cast of Hair The Tribal Love – Rock Musical who will start in national preview at the Manzoni Theater in Monza on 22 November and will land at the Carcano Theater in Milan from 30 December. “
But this is another story, which will be told in its time.
