2.🔊 “Horrible” and “ugly” appear among published family comments about the casting of the movie scheduled for release in November by Metro Goldwyn Mayer. The film follows the story of Patrizia Reggiani, who was tried and convicted of orchestrating the assassination of Maurizio Gucci, her ex-husband and former head of the Gucci fashion house and the grandson of fashion designer and company founder Guccio Gucci.

3.🔊 Among its other stars, “House of Gucci,” a biographical crime film based in the book House of Gucci: A Sensational Story of Murder, Madness, Glamour, and Greed, features Jared Leto, Jack Huston, Reeve Carney, Jeremy Irons and Salma Hayek.

Short, fat, ugly

4.🔊 The main complaint by the family has to do with appearances, which in the world of fashion is what matters most. “We are truly disappointed,” Patrizia Gucci, second cousin of the late Maurizio Gucci, told The Associated Press. “I speak on behalf of the family. They are stealing the identity of our family to make a profit, to increase the income of the Hollywood system.”

Lady Gaga and Adam Driver on Piazza Duomo in central Milan on the set of the movie.

5.🔊 The Guccis’ shock after seeing photos of the set is particularly directed at the casting of Al Pacino as Aldo Gucci, who was a key figure in the global growth of the fashion label, and of Jared Leto as Paolo Gucci, who among other creative contributions designed the company’s internationally-recognizable double G logo.

6.🔊 Patricia Gucci, who wrote her own book about the family, Gucci, The True Story of a Successful Dynasty, published in 2015, told AP that the family’s concerns “stem from the casting of top actors to play family members whose stories intersect little with Maurizio Gucci’s murder, the lack of contact with Scott’s production company and the inaccuracies in the book on which the film is based.”

7.🔊 “My grandfather was a very handsome man, like all the Guccis, and very tall, with blue eyes and very elegant,”Patrizia said. “He is being played by Al Pacino, who is not very tall already, and this photo shows him as fat, short, with sideburns, really ugly. Shameful, because he doesn’t resemble him at all.” Jared Letto appearing with a bald head was “horrible, horrible. I still feel offended,” she added.

Killing and glamour

8.🔊 ‘House of Gucci ‘ tells the story of the 1995 killing of 46-year-old Mauricio Gucci, as he arrived at his Milan office, by a hitman hired by his former wife, Patrizia Reggiani, whom he had left for another woman. She was convicted and sentenced to 29 years in prison after a very public trial that captivated Italy in the late 90s.

Lady Gaga during the filming of “House of Gucci” on April 7, 2021 in Rome, Italy

9.🔊 Reggiani, called the “Black Widow” by the Italian media, was released from prison after 17 years in 2016. “It was sensational fin de siècle stuff,” The Guardian reported in an interview with Reggiani when she was freed. “This was elegant Milan, not mob-riddled Naples, and execution-style killings of the city’s glamorous elite were unknown.”

10.🔊 “Reggiani, dubbed the ‘Liz Taylor of luxury labels’ in the 1970s and 80s, was an immediate suspect. She had openly threatened to kill Gucci after their split. Without evidence, the crime went unsolved for nearly two years. A tip-off led to her arrest in 1997, along with four others, including the hitman.”

Discussion

1.🔊 Do you think this movie will be a huge hit?

2.🔊 Have you ever bought or would you ever buy what you thought was a “luxury” good? Why/why not?

3.🔊 In a period of economic crisis, do you think that luxury brands suffer the same drop in sales as brands in general?

 

Listening Quiz

Phonetic Chart