Paolo Giussani
Paolo Giussani | |
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| Born | 3 March 1930 Sassari, Cacertian Empire |
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| Spouse(s) | Rauna Næsve |
| Children | 2 |
Paolo Giussani (Gylic transcription: Paolo Ďusani; born 3 March 1930) is a Cacertian–Gylian director and screenwriter. He is best known for his creative partnership with his wife Rauna Næsve, which yielded comedies considered classics of Gylian cinema and made Rauna one of Gylias' biggest sex symbols.
Early life
Paolo was born on 3 March 1930 in Sassari.
During his childhood, he was interested in the arts. He went to the cinema with his parents regularly, and one of his main hobbies was drawing. He particularly enjoyed cartoons and his ambition was to become an animator, but this did not happen due to his poor drawing skills.
He received a camera as a gift for his 12th birthday. He had good grades in school, but got in disciplinary trouble because he often skipped classes to watch films at the local cinema.
After completing his mandatory military service, he attended university in Vichenza, where he studied filmmaking and art. Resigned to the fact that he lacked the skills necessary to become an animator, he focused on becoming a director instead.
Career
Paolo began his career as an assistant director, working with several well-known Cacertian filmmakers. His first feature film was released in 1954.
His early experience with the Cacertian film industry was frustrating. His cartoonish comedic sensibilities were not shared by most of his contemporaries, and he lamented: "I sacrificed my twenties to try to get a foot in the door of an industry I didn't really fit into." He later disowned the films he directed before his marriage, feeling that they were compromised by too many concessions to producers.
Disillusioned with the state of his career, he agreed to participate in a Cacertian–Gylian co-production in 1960, as an assistant director. This became the turning point of his career.
Partnership with Rauna
While working on the film, Paolo met Rauna Næsve. The two began a romantic relationship and married later that year. Although he had initial reservations about the 10-year age difference, he was won over by Rauna's personality and shared sense of humour.
They became creative partners and established their own production company, Parafilm. A rather poor English speaker, Paolo would amuse his wife by punning her surname "Naesvéy" as "Nice-babe", which inspired her to change her stage name to "Rauna Næsve".
Rauna and Paolo developed a distinctive style with their first films together. When their first film earned moderate commercial success, he remarked to her, "We found our calling." Finally, their 1962 collaboration Big Juicy Ones proved to be their breakthrough, uniting all the elements of their success — light comedy, bawdy humour, and a promotional campaign that jocularly emphasised Rauna's appearance.
From 1962 to 1976, Rauna and Paolo worked at a steady pace, releasing 1–2 films per year. Most of them bore campy double entendre titles — Too Much Woman, A Lot to Bare, A Nice Pair, Too Hot to Handle and Nice and Hard among them. The films generally had low budgets but were carefully produced and extensively rehearsed, adding to their financial viability. They were the most financially successful films in Gylias by admissions, and made Rauna a major film star of the Groovy Gylias era.
Once established, the couple's style developed into a distinctive subgenre. Beneath their buoyant tone and formulaic surface, they synthesised a variety of elements: the abundant innuendo that took orgone films closer to pornography, the fast-paced banter of screwball comedy, and sophisticated physical comedy, tied together with camera work and editing that drew on influences from nouvelle vague to animation.
Paolo and Rauna worked closely together in writing scripts and planning, and maintained complete creative control over their films, overseeing every aspect from production to post-production and promotion. He was usually modest about his contribution, saying: "I had ingredients I enjoyed — screwball films, slapstick, cartoons —, and Rauna helped me make a great meal with them." In contrast to her glamorous public image and unabashed embrace of the trappings of stardom, Paolo preferred to keep a lower profile and focus on filmmaking. This made the public see them as an unusual but very successful celebrity supercouple.
Paolo worked with Rauna exclusively. He was associated with the banda italiana socially but did the least amount of work with them due to said exclusivity. He was happy to have most of the attention go to his wife during their heyday, but his contributions experienced a revaluation in later years. Radix wrote in 1990 that "Paolo and Rauna's masterful fusion of the lustful and the wholesome changed Gylian cinema forever for the better."
Later work
Rauna retired from acting in 1976, and Paolo similarly reduced his work so they could both focus on their family life. They left behind the more extravagant lifestyle of their stardom years, moved into more modest accommodation, and adopted two children.
For many years, Paolo was reluctant to direct another film. He said that "Rauna is such a perfect collaborator that anything else feels lesser in comparison." The two would occasionally collaborate on scripts for comedic shorts or pornographic films, using pseudonyms to disguise their contribution.
He did intermittent work in the Gylian animation industry, helping realise his thwarted dream of becoming an animator. He directed several episodes of The Magnificent Mademoiselles and Good Time Gals, and worked on several nénédie series.
Personal life
Paolo married Rauna on 31 October 1960, the day after her 20th birthday. Surface described them as "one of the best love stories in Gylian entertainment". The couple adopted two children in the late 1970s, after their retirement.
A more timid person in contrast to his vivacious wife, Paolo has generally avoided interviews and preferred to decline involvement in documentaries. He said that the greatest honour he received was when Rauna wrote "I have a great marriage" in her autobiography. He credits Rauna with having "rescued" his career and personal life, remarking that "If I never met Rauna, let alone married her, I would've had a very sad and probably shorter life."
The couple became close friends with Teresa Ganzel after they met during production of The Magnificent Mademoiselles, and occasionally provided her with mentorship and advice. Paolo praised Teresa as "one of the few worthy successors Rauna ever had", and Rauna similarly remarked, "She's found a way to take what I did and combine it with Suzie, which takes alchemical genius."