Calm and controlled, Vito Del Tonto blows little circles of smoke into the clear evening sky of Catrallo. Whilst the on-screen part of television might be glitter, glamour and showgirls with feathers up their behind, this place is what will stay with him when he’s sitting in an old folk’s home. Three blind walls and an overflowing thrash can which serves as the ashtray for the whole production studio. Over time, the most avid and bored smokers made a point of carving their name in the bricks as well, giving the place at the same time a welcoming face and the resemblance of an open-air prison cell. Slowly, Vito’s eyes roll over the tags, mouthing the many with whom he has worked over the years. A soft click of the only door leaning into the space opening.
“Mister Del Tonto?”
A small second of ignoring.
“Mister De-“
“What?”Del Tonto has no inner intention to bark to the production assistant, apart from maintaining his façade as the grumpy, elderly statesman of the network. It’s not that hard, after all.
“The producer would like to start in a minute.”
“He’ll wait,” Del Tonto replies before turning his back and lighting another cigarette. Slowly, he count the seconds before the assistant gives up and returns to the studio, quite probably to complain about his diva behavior. Thirty-eight. Patient type, he could last her for a few years. A few more puffs. The doctor says it will kill home, but his raspy voice is one of the trademarks with which Vito earns his notoriety in this business, so… After a minute of three, Vito quenches his smoke on the name of a less admired colleague before strolling back.
“Let’s get started, ready in five?” he remarks casually to Evita, his producer, before walking towards the door of the actual studio. He knows she won’t have enough time to film his entrance in full. She knows he will be a pain in the ass to reshoot the scene. And he knows she knows he knows this is just to put a little extra nerves into the candidates, making it clear that this will not be a walk in the park. It’s all a great show and not just when the cameras roll – even if it drives Evita raving mad.
“Take three,” she sighs a minute or four later as Vito wanders into the studio, waving to the people who sit in a U-shape around him. The camera up high now has that nice aerial shot of his arrival, surrounded by a hundred nervous, anxious even, faces while his voice boasts over the intro music.
“Benvenuti and welcome to another episode of
Il Primo tra Cento, the Sunday evening quiz of TeleUno! Last week we saw how Gianni was the best amongst our hundred candidates – he awed us with his knowledge of Rushmori birds and nearly went home with over three million lira but failed to recognize the octarine-tongued petrel from Graintfjall. Will we see a winner who takes home a big bag of lira tonight? Let’s find out!”
A repetition of the intro music as Vito seats himself in what can only be described as a throne amongst the audience. He looks around, slowly but surely. Many people believe that he does that only for the theatrical effect, but it offers him a first chance to scan the audience for interesting characters, people with a ‘television face’. He’s rarely off target.
“Your knowledge of birds will not help you here – as we will play with one hundred sports fan tonight! Different questions but the same principle. Question by question, we will try to eliminate the field to have one person remaining… With each question, we add one million lire, split by the amount of remaining contestants, to the virtual bank account. If you remain as the last man or woman standing… You will take this final amount home! Even more, you might spice your wallet even more if you can answer the ‘Double or Nothing’ question… But to get that opportunity, you must eliminate all your ninety-nine opponents and show that you are truly…
Il Primo tra Cento!
Applause from slightly moist hands erupts around him, which he quickly silences with a short hand gesture.
“And as our Spada have just been eliminated from the Cup of Harmony, all questions will be related to the ongoing World Cup campaign, the debut of San Ortelio on the international scene!”
Far more fluent than one would expect from a man with a retreating hairline and a full, pepper-and salt going into white, beard, Vito rises and skips to the steps on his left. The contestants are lined up in four rows in this half-round set, giving the whole the atmosphere of an ancient amphitheater. With this exception that the lions aren’t in the ring, but seated next to one another in the stands. One of them looks agonizingly nervous. There is sweat under his armpits, the two top buttons of his shirt are opened and Vito believes that he saw an eye twitch. The perfect opening target.
“Tell me, young man, what is your name?”
“Vittorio, ehm, Vittorio Lelli,” the other one stutters.
“In the microphone, please, Vittorio,” Vito replies while flashing his dentist-approved smile, “and you are a major sports fan?”
“Vittorio Lelli,” the poor lad repeats before realizing the question, “oh, ehm, yes.”
“In that case, our opening question will be no problem for you! The World Cup of Football has been around for ages already, with various sides triumphing. But which number does the current, ongoing edition carry? Evita! The clock!”
Whilst the spectators at home see a countdown from seven seconds, the participants are left with only a disturbingly annoying sound effect which is solely intended to drive them crazy whilst bowing over their monitor to inspect the four options.
---< A – 79 >------< C - 1093 >---
---< B – 88 >------< D – 87 >---
“Three… Two… One… Fingers off the buttons! Tell me Vittorio, what was your reply?”
“Ehm… Well… I think I want to… It is the Cup of Harmony 79?”
“So you answered ‘A’, Vittorio?” Vito asks, slightly annoyed that he’s not getting the comedic value hoped for, “that would mean that this has been already a great eliminator! Only seven participants guessed for ‘A’ so… Are you a genius, Vittorio? Or are you the weakest link?”
“Well… I think…”
“That wasn’t a question,” Vito flusters under the sound of the result tune.
In the studio, the spotlight over eleven chairs go red at the loudest note of the obnoxious tune.
“And it’s the latter! That means that we must leave behind Vittorio, but we can play forth with eighty-nine contestants!”
Swiftly, he crosses the set and leans over a chair where a young woman sits notably relaxed, compared to the wrecks around her. The production assistant always instructs in his ear to pick out the female participants early on ‘as they’re fewer’. It is true, quizzing often does not seem to be their point of interest. No surprise to Vito who in a private circle compares games like this with ‘unzipping in a filled bar and slapping your member on the table to measure if its taller than most’. And besides, experience tells him that those who do partake usually last long enough to zoom into in the latter stages of the quiz. Yet, this one intrigues him over her calm outwardness.
“So, Erica,” Vito spies on the little bracelet all competitors receive – of course Vittorio had lost his already, “you’ve easily navigated the first question. How many more do you think you can last?”
“That depends on how many questions are asked,” she replies with a smile so humble that only after a few seconds, Vito realizes the underlying confidence.
“You’re a major football fan?” Vito asks.
“I follow it, yes.”
“So you have seen most of the qualifiers, maybe even all of them?”
“I was in the stadium for most home games and then the other ones on television, yes.”
Erica says it without any hint of arrogance, just a calm statement of the truth.
“In that case, the next question will be easy to navigate as well. The question goes at follows – against which team did San Ortelio draw both legs of the qualifiers? Evita! The clock!”
---< A – Mercedini >------< C – Juvencus >---
---< B – Taeshan >------< D – Treekidistan >---
There’s a cheeriness in the way he utters the last few words. He knows how much Evita despises the catchphrase, but it has grown up and beyond here. When someone needs to know the time on set, they recite the line and on the company New Year’s drink, even the network manager referenced to it.
We can say that now is the time to next step in this synergy. Or as we say, now is, Evita! The Time! It was inexplicably cringe, but still Vito had grinned all the way home.
“Guide us to your answer, Erica.”
“It’s Juvencus. We
always draw Juvencus.”
“So it’s not… Treekidistan? Four people of our panel believed it was th-“
“No, it’s Juvencus,” she cuts him short.
Vito looked annoyed for a split second before realizing that the cameras were rolling – he really hadn’t gotten lucky with his picks so far. They could do retakes, they did every one and a while, but the tension worked best if they kept the show going so he snapped back to being a professional.
“Well, that’s a very confident answer from Erica… Let’s see if it is also correct… Yes, it is!”
Nine more red lights got added. Vito loved how, by the final rounds, the whole set got a peculiar hue which highlighted the tension of the few remaining. In the bottom of the screen, a little counter shot up to 23736 lira. In the opening rounds, this played only a minor role – the big cash was to be earned further on in the race, so Vito ignored it for now and walked on to a next contestant. Third time was the charm indeed, as the man immediately got a perfect answer on the question…
“So Roberto, welcome to the show. Do you know the members of the national team?”
“Well yes, but not in person, of course. But I knew Fabrizio Confalonieri quite well.”
“Aha…” Vito nodded, knowing that this guy only needed a little push into the direction of a good story.
“He grew up in my neighborhood and we, yeah, you know how little punks are.”
“Little hellraisers together, bit of mischief here and there?”
“Mischief,” Roberto laughs, happy that he can tell this anecdote to someone else rather than his wife who has to live through it
e-ve-ry Virtus Redoccio game, “that’s maybe a big word. One time, when we were thirteen or something like that, we snagged a stack of… ehm… how do you say this, lewd magazines with Jeruselemite models and then distributed them around the whole block. Including the priest! Many complained about Fab and me, but we’ve never heard whether father Giuseppe was happy with his copy!”
On the signal of the production assistant, there was a coordinated and well-timed laughter from the crowd.
“Haha, marvellous story,” Vito grinned, using the exact right timbre for his remark, “let’s hope you are as close with the other members of the squad for the next question. Renato De Tano selected twenty-three players for the Cup of Harmony. But only one of them has, with the tournament coming to an end, played not a single minute for the national side. Be aware, this includes the friendlies at the start of the campaign! Which of these four has not a single cap yet for the Swordfishes? Evita! The clock!”
---< A – Alberto Sgarbi >------< C – Domenico Cappa >---
---< B – Pasquale Pino >------< D – Denis Spaviero >---
The muffled sounds and late clicks on the buttons indicated that this question would separate some wheat from the chaff – two of them even missed the timings for an answer and were eliminated at once.
“For the reply, we have the man himself…”
The black screen at the head of the half round arena suddenly came to live. It showed the face of a man, but the strong light behind him disallowed you to recognize him. Only slowly, the light moved to his side, uncovering the appearance of…
“Pasquale Pino! Indeed the veteran third goalkeeper has not yet made a minute with the team. Only fifty-two of our contestants knew that, cutting loose quite a few who guessed on Sgarbi or Spaviero. And to ask our next question, here is the man himself!”
Pasquale Pino walked into the studio, waving to the people who applauded his arrival – this time spontaneously. Tall, with a scruffy beard and beady eyes, Pino had grown into a fan favorite across clubs for his honest analysis and his capacity to crack a joke in the often otherwise standardized post-game interviews.
“Pasquale! How wonderful to welcome you here… How are you?”
“Usually you should say ‘a little jetlagged’ after a marvelous trip to a final tournament but as some map geek in the FA discovered that Cassadaigua is just within reach in Rushmore, the answer is – ‘still aching from the bus trip’.”
The tightness of the FA was a common trope and immediately got him a few laughs.
“I can imagine, going to such a final tournament, especially as it was the largest one ever organized… It must make some nerves.” Vito asked.
“Of course… I remember us sitting in the dressing room ahead of the opener,” Pino replied, spontaneous enough not to give the impression that this was all scripted, “It was a madhouse, the blood rushes through your veins.”
“For everyone?” Vito enquired.
“Yes… Well, no, actually,” Pino answered. He’ll make a really good pundit one day, Vito realized, “Minutes before facing the Princesses, everyone tried to keep it together. People were fidgeting, putting their boots on and off, going to the bathroom three times in a row. And then…”
He paused, shortly. A bloody good pundit.
“Well, I can say it after the facts,” Pasquale Pino continued, “Suddenly Romeo Gozzi rises and asks,
’if I just scribble my phone number in the inside of my shirt and then swap it with Aaliyah Dallas, you think she would give it to Akai Hanto?’.”
Another pause for the gasps and grins.
“It was completely bonkers of course, we were all with our head on our tactical duties and Gozzi just thinks about picking up a girl. So we all start laughing and he goes on like
‘I’ve seen this crazy show on the internet here and it’s really f’ed up and intriguing at the same time’. And the more he explains, the more we laugh, of course. He starts about naked shows, which sounds like a bizarre gimmick and we’re just rolling over the floor whilst he keeps a straight face… The tension was gone.”
“Brilliant story,” Vito grins, just in a slightly different, more genuine tone than last time. “However, I must add… It did not do the team well in the opening minutes?”
“Yes and no… We started good, a shot on goal from Carmine early on but then…”
“The penalty… And that leads us to our next question. Pasquale?”
The goalkeeper obliges at once. A really, really good pundit.
“In the seventh minute of the opening duel of the Cup of Harmony, a penalty was caused for Jeruselem. Orlando Castorani slides at the edge of the box and just inside, coming a split second too late. But which opposing player did he send down?” And encouraged by a small nod from Vito, Pasquale continues, “Evita! The clock!”
---< A – Kate Dallas >------< C – Stan Epstein >---
---< B – Rishie Smuggs >------< D – Melania Zanic >---
“And it’s a difficult question, Pasquale, maybe also for you at home… What is the correct answer? We will see it… After the commercials!”