Steve

LIFE IMITATES ART

They often say that art imitates life, but only occasionally that life imitates art. In act one of this drama, all of the participants of the Italy 2010 internship had traveled to the little town of San Giacomo, a short distance from Spoleto. It was our call to adventure. We were returning to the little bump in the road where we had been a day earlier, in hopes of finding the little girl we had seen playing in the piazza.  She was beautiful and perfect for our yet to be filmed scene.

As was to be witnessed, a casting director or film crew in need of talent, or location, or a dozen other things, is a crew on a mission.

Within minutes of our arrival we had found the little girl, acquired her mothers permission, procured a motorcycle, and the help of a local man who was willing to drive in circles around our camera and had settled in on a filming location. Things were running smoothly, one might even say perfectly.  A screen writer might say, perhaps, “ too perfectly.”

At this moment in our story, an audience might accurately anticipate that misfortune would strike, and  it did. Act II. We were to be challenged by tests, allies and enemies or at least the loss of our rental car keys.

Some might not recognize the seriousness of our dilemma, where in the U.S. a call to the rental car company could  resolve a problem like ours in hours,  if not minutes. But in Italy things work differently, some might even say more slowly or less efficiently.  We began to confront our ordeal. After a call to the rental car company, we learned that they would have to tow the car to a safe location and that someone would have to travel to Rome to pick up a second set of keys. I knew that someone, was going to be me. I didn’t want it to be me!

So I searched everywhere.  I walked back and forth. I covered all my steps  and some I only imagined I had made.  Then everyone covered all my steps. Some twice, all without luck.

Michele made use of her forced car entry skills. SkillsI was afraid to ask where she had perfected.  The flick of a screwdriver and the turn of a hanger and we discovered that the keys had not been left inside.

I solicited support from the local kids to search for my keys with the promise of a 5 Euro note, later increased to 10. 

That is when everyone in the small piazza in San Giacomo stepped into action. Everyone wanted to help find the keys.

Although that garnered support for a short period of time, their interest soon waned. And as the little girl we had meet suggested, “if they were here we would have found them.” For several hours we all searched in vane.

ACT III - At the moment when all hope of ever recovering the keys was lost and the tow truck had been called we had a non-neo-realist  ending to Italian tragedy . A little lady came around the corner, her arm raised in victory, smiling and shouting,  “He found the keys, he found the keys, he found the keys”  It was as if Giuseppe Tornatore had directed the perfect sentimental scene.

With the keys held high above her head the heroes of our story take possession of the famed elixir and begin their return journey home, not in the back of an Italian tow truck, but withe the keys to their journey. Five people cramped into a two door Fiat Punto.

Life imitates Art.

The screen fades to black.

Can I just ask, “how come the cameras weren’t rolling?”

 - Steve