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Desert Island Discs
Presented by Kirsty Young
Choreographer and judge on Strictly Come Dancing, known for his exuberant personality and becoming a household name on both the UK and US versions.
Eight records
Mina was late 60s to the late 70s the biggest star in Italy. An amazing singer. Imagine Streisand combined with Dusty Springfield. Saturday night there is always like strictly this big variety show singing, dancing, and that what got me the first glimpse of a world I wanted to be part of.
My anthem. But not just for me, I think it's an anthem for a lot of people. You know, what she says really is that it's okay to be who you are.
I love these songs because I just used to hit the dance floor and just show off like you wouldn't believe.
He really is a genius. He's a guy that kind of gave hope to all of us. When he came out, especially with Ziggy Stardust, it was like an explosion.
because of Paris, really, because it's through Paris, through La Grande Eugène, that I that was my ticket.
Nessun dormaFavourite
it has to be Nesundama because... it represents exactly what you have to do in life.
The keepsakes
The book
Gabriel García Márquez
You feel like you're jumping into the book.
In conversation
Presenter asks
Backstage, does anybody ever, a contestant, come to you with a little bit of a tear in the eye and say, that hurts?
No, no, we haven't and they do know by now that we have to do our job. I never had anyone ever coming to me saying anything.
Presenter asks
What's the secret? Why is it happening?
Well, I think is one of the few shows that really has universal appeal. People say, you know, I don't watch strictly, but everybody watches it. Admitted, especially men. In London you have the builders working in buildings. Every time I walk across a building site, Bruno, yay! They beat me in the car very, very nicely. They all know about it. They want pictures for the... So it really is something that is cross-generational, is fun. It really is like a Broadway, a West End show, a Broadway show every Saturday night in your living room.
The recording
Timestamps play the recording from that turn
Speaker 1
This is the BBC.
Presenter
Hello, I'm Kirsty Young. Welcome to Desert Island Discs, where every week I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, the book and the luxury item that they'd want to take with them if they were cast away on a desert island.
Presenter
For rights' reasons, the music on these podcast versions is shorter than in the original broadcast. You can find over two thousand more editions to listen to and download on the Desert Island Disc's website.
Presenter
My castaway this Christmas is the choreographer Bruno Tognioli. As a judge on that sequined juggernaut of a show, Strictly Come Dancing, he has become a household name, playing it big, broad, bold, and brassy, shamelessly flirting with contestants and the camera, brimful of heart and good humour. His highly entertaining schtick has made him a T V star on the American version, too. His parents wanted him to be an accountant.
Presenter
You heard me. But in truth, he has always liked putting on a show. In small-town northern Italy, as his beloved Nona cooked up pizzele alla pancetta for the family, little Bruno would dance on the kitchen table. And later as a teenager, when the only disco in town opened its doors, he would square the most glamorous local girls onto the dance floor, causing a stir with his flamboyant get-ups and slinky moves. By the mid-seventies, he was making a living dancing professionally, touring the capitals of Europe with a raunchy stage show. Within a decade, he'd progressed to plying his trade as a choreographer, working with everyone from the Rolling Stones to Steve Coogan. He says, When I jump over desks and shout and faint and fall over myself with excitement, I don't have a self-censorship button. That filter got broken for good a long time ago, probably when I heard my uncle Silvano swearing and bitching like a docker in the Tognioli home. And so you did say that, Bruno. It's true, and I still do it. Welcome, my Christmas castaway. I use the word shtick there, but you know, this thing that you do on television, and I can only imagine.
Bruno Tonioli
Yeah.
Speaker 2
Yeah.
Presenter
That that is indeed something you turn on for the cameras. Yes, yes, you couldn't you couldn't do that all the time.
Bruno Tonioli
Yes, you couldn't.
Bruno Tonioli
Yeah.
Presenter
But
Bruno Tonioli
No, you couldn't, because I I at first you I wouldn't have the energy to sustain that twenty four hours a day. The show is so glitzy, so glamorous, so in a way larger than life. And I think the only way
Presenter
Yeah.
Bruno Tonioli
to approach it is as an entertainment, still put across a message and a point, but in a way that engages, makes people smile and entertains them. You want to pop out of the screen and draw them in.
Presenter
Uh you once described on Strictly Come Dancing the contestant John Sargent as so wooden he was like Pinocchio after a night on Geppetto's whiskey. And you told Dennis Taylor he was a letter box lost in Trafalgar Square. Good lines. Do you have writers for those little Zooms?
Bruno Tonioli
No, oh god, I wish I had. The stress would be so much less. It's just what happens? No, no, I don't I don't have any writers.
Presenter
Really?
Presenter
Backstage, does anybody ever, a contestant, come to you with a little bit of a tear in the eye and say, that hurts.
Bruno Tonioli
No, no, we haven't and they do know by now that we have to do our job. I never had anyone.
Bruno Tonioli
ever coming to me saying anything.
Presenter
Let's uh go to your first choice. Just explain just a little bit about this first choice.
Bruno Tonioli
Mina in Sieme. Mina was late 60s to the late 70s the biggest star in Italy. An amazing singer. Imagine Streisand combined with Dusty Springfield. Saturday night there is always like strictly this big variety show singing, dancing, and that what got me the first glimpse of a world I wanted to be part of. And she is a fantastic singer. And she was huge in Europe, South America, but never in the Anglo-Saxon world. So here it is, Mina in Sieme.
Speaker 1
Listen.
Speaker 1
Iononte Colosco.
Speaker 1
Ionung Saukisai.
Speaker 1
Soque ari cancelato, con dresto miso nie.
Presenter
Yay.
Speaker 1
So no not high, may and shall you die?
Speaker 1
When you see I may
Speaker 1
Don't take the other side
Speaker 1
One conflict.
Presenter
That was Mina and Incemi, and chosen Bruno Tognioli because you said that was the first time as a little kid in Italy that you saw these great big shiny Saturday night entertainment shows. More of that a little later, but for now let's talk about this great big shiny entertainment show that you are such an important part of. Strictly Come Dancing is in its fifteenth series now.
Speaker 1
Any Saturday Night Entertainment
Presenter
And something remarkable has happened for people who follow these things, which is usually.
Presenter
A series' popularity just naturally trails off. It has its moment in in the sun and then that dissipates. This is not the case with Strictly. It is getting record figures well over ten million in each episode in the last series. It is beating the competition on Saturday nights, which is a very hard fought over slot, by at least twice. I think they get half those viewing figures.
Speaker 1
Then
Bruno Tonioli
Yeah.
Presenter
What's the secret? Why is it happening?
Bruno Tonioli
Well, I think is one of the few shows that really has universal appeal.
Bruno Tonioli
People say, you know, I don't watch strictly, but everybody watches it.
Presenter
Do you mean people don't want to admit that?
Bruno Tonioli
Admitted, especially men. In London you have the builders working in buildings. Every time I walk across a building site, Bruno, yay! They beat me in the car very, very nicely. They all know about it. They want pictures for the... So it really is something that is cross-generational, is fun. It really is like a Broadway, a West End show, a Broadway show every Saturday night in your living room.
Presenter
Yeah.
Presenter
You do the equivalent show in America. It's called Dancing with Stars in America. And so obviously you have a pretty tight work schedule. So there is a period of time in every year when you are doing both shows at once. What's your travel pattern in that week?
Bruno Tonioli
That's what it does.
Bruno Tonioli
We do the launch here, then I go to the United States, to Los Angeles, then we start the show there. So the show there is on Monday and Tuesday sometimes. I get on a plane on Wednesday, London and Thursday. I go my Friday to get my schedule for what they want me to do. Do the show on Saturday. Sunday morning I'm in a car, back on a plane, arrive Sunday night, do the show on Monday and Tuesday in Los Angeles, then come back here. And that l is for September till the end of November.
Presenter
Brute
Bruno Tonioli
Life on Mars. Talk about space cadet.
Presenter
Do you feel constantly strung out and jet lacked?
Bruno Tonioli
And you never go out, you don't see anyone, which is a bit hard. And you really have to kind of discipline yourself so that you save your energy for the shows. What happens, you feel like your brain is detached from your body. You never quite know where you are. And you have
Speaker 2
Yeah.
Bruno Tonioli
Fifteen people here, fifteen people there. You have to come up constantly with this.
Bruno Tonioli
One line is oh, because you don't want let people down. They're expecting something from you and you have to deliver. Gotta put on a show. You've gotta put on a show.
Presenter
Let's have some more music, Bruno Toggnoli. Tell me about your second one. What are we going to hear?
Bruno Tonioli
Oh, my lovely Lady Gaga, born this way. My anthem. But not just for me, I think it's an anthem for a lot of people. You know, what she says really is that it's okay to be who you are. And, you know, don't be afraid of being who you are in spite of what people are saying to you, which they've always told me since I was a kid. You can't do that. You will never come to this. But you have to go for it. Be yourself. You're born this way. Be it. Embrace it. Incredible singer.
Bruno Tonioli
Incredible musician.
Bruno Tonioli
Great off.
Presenter
That was Lady Gaga and born this way. Growing up, just paint me a little picture of home life.
Bruno Tonioli
Wh when I was very, very little, I mean, that we all used to leave my father, his brother.
Bruno Tonioli
and uh lived in my grandmother's and my grandfather's house. They were all living together. And everybody was working and the grandma used to cook for everyone because everybody left in the morning, came back for lunch, They go back to work and they come back home for social. I was always in the kitchen and I loved my grandmother so much. She was a saint, that woman. My parents worked all the time. They both had two jobs, didn't they? Your parents? They worked. My mom used to be trained as a seamstress, but one of our uncles used to kind of renovate cars, second-hand cars. And she learned how to re-stitch upholstery. Oh, right, very skilled. So she was doing all of that. And then she at night she was doing like sewing her own clothes or mine. Everybody was working constantly. My dad used to be a mechanic in a way, but he learned how to paint cars. Then he had a job for the bus company in in the day and then in the evening he used to go to the garage to repair.
Speaker 2
Yeah. Push.
Bruno Tonioli
Cars. So I hi I really actually hardly sew them except at the weekend and I spend all my time with my grandma.
Presenter
In photographs that I've seen in in your biography, you look almost identical to your father. I mean, it is uncanny. You have the same physical frame, the same shape of face, the same
Bruno Tonioli
Shape of face.
Presenter
Skin colour. Were you similar in any other ways?
Bruno Tonioli
Uh I wasn't really close to my dad because I hardly ever saw him. And the only thing we had in common, it was the love for dance. My father used to go out every Saturday night, all his life, Timmy my mother died ballroom dancing, every Saturday night. His pride was his elegance. And he g based himself on Fred Astaire. And we used to go, I still remember I was very, very little, they used seven or eight.
Speaker 2
Right.
Speaker 1
Yeah.
Bruno Tonioli
There used to be cinemas in Italy at the time when they used to show old movies. You s for like fifty P you get a double bill of Fred Estelle, Ginger Rogers, Gene Kelly. So you had all afternoon, basically, for five hours in these little cinemas.
Presenter
He practiced at home.
Bruno Tonioli
What's your mother?
Presenter
So would you watch them die?
Bruno Tonioli
No, but sometimes on the Sundays, because in at the time there used to be Saturday night, obviously it was too little, but they used to do Sunday dances as well.
Presenter
Another five.
Presenter
Oh yes.
Bruno Tonioli
So they used to take me with them. I used to do the walls on my mother's feet. You know, and then I used to do the jive with my mum and she said, You're too rough. Because you're too rough. You're too rough. Calm down.
Presenter
Yeah.
Bruno Tonioli
Tho those kind of things get ingrained within you.
Presenter
Well, that's an incredible condition, isn't it?
Bruno Tonioli
But who could have imagined that?
Bruno Tonioli
Years later,
Bruno Tonioli
This would happen to me.
Presenter
Let's have the next piece of music. It's time for your third, Bruno.
Bruno Tonioli
I love these songs because I just used to hit the dance floor and just show off like you wouldn't believe. And then all the beautiful girls in town
Bruno Tonioli
Wanted to dance with me. So because of my relationship with all the stars, you know, the hot girls.
Bruno Tonioli
All the boys wanted to be friends with me because of all the my girlfriends were the most fun and beautiful girls in town and just because I could clear the dance floor. And thank you to the Rolling Stones and sympathy for the Devil.
Speaker 1
Let me please introduce myself. I'm a man of wealth and taste.
Speaker 1
I lay traps for troubadours
Speaker 1
Who gets killed before they reach Bombay?
Speaker 1
Pleased to meet you. Hope you get my day. Oh yeah.
Speaker 1
Blackwatch person you is a nature of a
Presenter
That was the Rolling Stones and sympathy for the devil chosen, Bruno, because you said that was the beginning of you starting to feel your power and it was a kind of power, a social power through dance.
Bruno Tonioli
And it's a
Bruno Tonioli
Yeah, I didn't realize until I let myself oh, something's happening. I I got something that people like.
Presenter
I is it true that you had been a sort of little bit of a kind of tubby kid with a I don't know if you had a squint, but you have a lazy eye.
Bruno Tonioli
Uh
Bruno Tonioli
Well, I had a lazy eye. So I had a patch, but I had to wear a patch on one eye to kind of reinforce the other one for a period of time. And then, because again, all the conflict of what I wanted to do and what my parents wanted me to do, which was major. I remember as a kid, I used to paint, I used to do college, I used to sculpture, I used to design clothes, I used to sing, I did singing competitions, plays. I mean, I anything but
Bruno Tonioli
being an accountant, which what is my parents wanted me to be. And I really had a lot of angst and conflict uh because of that.
Presenter
With them or in the middle of the
Bruno Tonioli
With them, and with me, and with them, it's because I didn't see any escape. I mean, how am I going to get out of this? What am I going to do? I always felt like.
Bruno Tonioli
I I was from another planet, totally disconnected at times. It's like I'm not in the right place, I'm not in the right time. It's like I sh I always read a lot, I always had this kind of curiosity about things, and I always felt that that world was very small for me. I didn't know why or how. I think socially, once I kind of
Bruno Tonioli
said, Okay, I'm not gonna let these bullies having the best of me. I very, very quickly once I started to kind of not answer back, but use my brain and my sense of humor to kind of disarm them, I had the strength to do it and turn things around. But it's hard, but then you have to kind of say, Okay, I'm not gonna let this defeat me.
Bruno Tonioli
Because I'm smarter than you kid. And then I started to use my sense of humor and then that's how the dances started in. I say, I'm gonna w make this disadvantage become an advantage. Performing in school plays, you know, I was a great success and bec and everybody wanted to be with me.
Bruno Tonioli
The problems were basically how to make something of my life that I
Bruno Tonioli
you know, close to my dream. And that was really the the problem.
Presenter
The next bit is coming soon before that tell me about this fourth choice. Why is it here?
Bruno Tonioli
Oh, David Bowie-Tarman. Well, I mean, he he really is a genius. He's a guy that kind of gave hope to all of us. When he came out, especially with Ziggy Stardust, it was like an explosion. Oh, there are people that are doing things that are completely out of this world. And
Bruno Tonioli
different, exciting, courageous, breaking the boundary of sexuality, especially in the seventies. It was a big, big thing. Just be you.
Bruno Tonioli
And is fine, is unparalleled, a real genius.
Speaker 1
There's a starman waiting in the sky. He'd like to come and meet us, but he thinks he'd blow our minds. There's a star man waiting in the sky. He's told us not to blow it, cause he knows it's all worthwhile. Let the children
Speaker 1
Yeah.
Speaker 1
Children Bug belong to Children Bougain.
Presenter
That was David Bowie and Starman. So, Bruno Tognioli, when you were eighteen you were, of course, as all Italians at that time were, due to do national service. Tell me how you avoided it.
Bruno Tonioli
Oh, that's a long story. I knew there was a big festival in Positano, arts festival, with all these people from the theater and the movies. So I gotta be there. I don't know why, I just gotta go. The star turn of this festival was um a theater group called Le Grandeurgeme Beste in Paris. There was a huge international hit at the time.
Bruno Tonioli
And as I go to meet this friend, the the guy that was playing one of the major roles in the show had a divas drop.
Bruno Tonioli
And he walked out.
Bruno Tonioli
And it just happened that I was almost the double. And the director looked at me, he's called Franz Salieri, and he said in French, um, Esque tu dance. Oh God. Yes. I've never done anything professional. I was well, you know, I mean, I just I was doing my own thing. Anyway, to cut a long story short, I fitted all the costumes. I fitted everything except the shoes that were too small. And they taught me a number every day.
Bruno Tonioli
So I've opened in Milan. September 1974, it was a huge hit.
Bruno Tonioli
Tour Italy went to Paris.
Bruno Tonioli
And then we came with that show came to London. Now to go back to the question. The question, I was touring and I said at the time, you know, if you were gay, you were exempt from serving in the military. So but obviously everybody by nineteen seventy five, seventy six, everybody kinda was turning up in full makeup because they to g they would have done anything.
Presenter
Get out of them.
Bruno Tonioli
To get out of that, I remember I had a wonderful fur coat at the time, but I was very demure. I said, just wear the fur coat, but I had all the clippings, you know, the press clippings of the show, and played it very, very meek, and just as I am, but just with this lovely fur coat, all my clippings. I went in, I had the appointment with the general, I can't remember, or the top guy. He actually was very, very nice. And he said, well, I do understand you're not actually pretending. A lot of people now do that to get out, and in fact, you know, it's just an act. And this would actually stop your career. And I do understand. It was very, very nice. But what happened, which I never told anybody, somebody got a whiff.
Speaker 1
What happened?
Bruno Tonioli
And they called my parents' house. And I picked up the phone and said, Well, we're gonna tell your parents that you just got out because you say you're a queen. So we'll do.
Bruno Tonioli
Did you?
Bruno Tonioli
No, but just just say, well, do it, who cares?
Presenter
Time for some more music, Druno. Tell me about uh this fifth song, then.
Bruno Tonioli
Edith Piaf. No, I never create a rien. I mean, that is because of Paris, really, because it's through Paris, through La Grande Eugène, that I that was my ticket. That was the way it started my career. And then with them, I came to London, we were a great hit at the Roundhouse. And then, because of them, I got invited to perform with the Lindsay Chem Company. And Paris at the time, in the early in the mid-70s, was such a shock to the system to me, coming from Ferrara. Can you imagine? I mean, it was dazzling.
Presenter
Yeah.
Speaker 1
Oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2
Going on.
Speaker 1
No runaway.
Speaker 1
Nila Bea
Speaker 1
Something yet
Speaker 1
No, join the regulatory.
Presenter
Edith Piaf and noise no regretria. Bruno, you spent a considerable amount of time working as a choreographer. You by the time you'd come to London and also in New York, you'd done training to teach yourself the important parts of what it was to be a dancer.
Speaker 1
Yeah.
Speaker 1
Yeah.
Speaker 1
Yeah.
Presenter
You ended up working in that sort of golden period of music production when videos were everything. I've looked at your C V. You worked with them all, it'd be fair to say. You know, Banana, Rama, Juran, Duran. I mentioned the Rolling Stones.
Speaker 1
It'd be fair to say.
Presenter
Was there a signature sort of Tognioli choreography that they were getting from you?
Bruno Tonioli
But Nanorama was, I mean, I did all the big ones, I say, all the big hits, you know, from almost ten years, and that was very much about having fun, doing something like they were, accessible. Everybody felt they could do it and everybody could join in. Pure pop, pure fun. At other times, you know, it's very much, you know, you were presented with a script and you work with a director depending on what the idea was for the particular project. But with the girls, we just like really having a party.
Presenter
Let's have some more music, Bruno. Uh we're gonna go to your sixth. Tell me about this.
Bruno Tonioli
This is just, you know, again, in the the 80s, this period. I mean, I feel very guilty because I should play 27 songs because I was so lucky to be part of this kind of explosion of MTV and the videos. And I work from, you know, with everybody. And they're all wonderful: Boy George, George Michael, Bananarama, Elton John, the Rolling Stones, Freddie Mercury. Because the girls, I spend so much time with them, and we have such a laugh. I have to play Bananarama, Love in the First Degree, because it represents the era.
Speaker 1
Only you can set me free!
Speaker 1
Cause I'm guilty, guilty, guilty as a girl can be. Come on, baby, can't you see?
Speaker 1
I stand with kills of love in the first degree.
Speaker 1
Do you see it?
Speaker 1
I'm loving the first young day. I believe in
Speaker 1
You will come to my rescue.
Presenter
That was Bananarama and Love in the First Degree. Uh Bruno Tony, your professional life focuses so much on gloss and perfection and glamour.
Presenter
But of course there have been times in your own life behind closed doors when you have had
Presenter
All of the tough realities that everybody has to deal with. There was a period from, what, about the mid-90s for about six years where everybody close to you.
Speaker 2
Yeah.
Bruno Tonioli
Oh, it's there.
Bruno Tonioli
Oh yeah, they all died. Passed away. Yeah, no, it started in in uh with the death of my mother all of a sudden in nineteen ninety four. Very sudden. She was supposed to come to uh London in the summer. I spoke to her and at the phone the week before and she was planning to come. And then it's the classic dreaded I was in the garden, I still remember the garden in my apartment. It was a Saturday afternoon.
Presenter
That's a wonderful thing.
Presenter
Danny Sutton.
Bruno Tonioli
And I got the phone call and and it was like brutal. Oh, your mother's dead. I mean, what? Horrendous. So I I had to rush back to Italy, I mean, in a state of total
Bruno Tonioli
distraught really. I mean and then my father was bewildered. I mean I then discovered that she she had very she never told me she was she said she had high blood pressure, but I never knew to which extent, you know, the medicines I found in the cabinet, how, you know, she had problem with her heart basically.
Presenter
And you had spoken to her every week, even though you every I always spoke.
Bruno Tonioli
Do you think she was protecting?
Presenter
Protecting you from
Bruno Tonioli
She was, but I would do exactly the same. I'd be would have been worried all the time. I'd be on the phone every you know, every other day have I known.
Bruno Tonioli
that she wasn't that well. Eventually between nineteen ninety four and two thousand, I mean, everybody passed away. Not just my mum, then my grandma, my grandfather, very close friends in London. So it was a relentless period when you just you have a knock after the other. I mean, really, it was seven years
Bruno Tonioli
of nightmare, but I was very lucky, I've had very group of very close friends that supported me.
Presenter
When you went home during those periods, whether it was after your mother's death or after your grandmother's death or to visit your father in his declining years.
Presenter
What was your relationship with home? Because as you describe it earlier, all you ever wanted to do was leave. So when you go back decades later with all of your career and your success and your established relationship at the time and all of that, what was your perspective on home when you
Bruno Tonioli
Yeah.
Bruno Tonioli
And when I actually felt very, very sad when I go back because, yeah, there is a sense of a world gone by. I am the same, but I'm not the same. You know, when you live in these provincial towns, time seems to stand still. People do the same things.
Bruno Tonioli
They may be different generations, but they live by a certain not rules, but it is a cyclical thing that they keep repeating. And unless you fit into that kind of
Bruno Tonioli
world, there's nothing for you to do. Going back is alw is a bit sad, especially because I've lost everyone. You know, it's isn't is there is nothing for me there anymore. You know, you you feel that and there's no point hanging on to it.
Presenter
Let's have some more music, Bruno. We're going to have your uh well, we're on your seventh.
Bruno Tonioli
Uh Rod Stewart in my life. I be I love that the song is is a poem. I mean the lyrics you just read the lyrs say the words is one of the best
Bruno Tonioli
Poems ever written. I love Rod Stewart's version because of his first his voice, and he's such a great performer. This song for me is really dedicated to all these people that passed away. In spite of what has happened in my life, I might have moved away, I might hopefully keep moving, I don't know, wherever it's gonna take me, but
Bruno Tonioli
They're still part of me. They're still um I'm getting emotional.
Presenter
Should we hear the music?
Bruno Tonioli
Yeah.
Presenter
There are places
Speaker 1
I remember
Speaker 1
Oh my life.
Speaker 1
Though some have changed, some forever.
Speaker 1
Not for better.
Speaker 1
Some are gone.
Speaker 1
And so we may
Speaker 1
All these places had their moments.
Speaker 1
With lovers and friends are still
Presenter
That was Rod Stewart and In My Life. Bruno, can you explain?
Presenter
It seems to me a rather curious phenomenon that half way through each
Presenter
Series of strictly come dancing. All these celebrity contestants who seem
Presenter
Perfectly decent people with their heads screwed on.
Presenter
They go a bit bonkers. I wanna win it. Yes, it gets a little bit life and death in
Speaker 1
Yeah.
Bruno Tonioli
Please.
Speaker 1
Uh There it is.
Bruno Tonioli
I want to win it.
Bruno Tonioli
But I thought they think it's all gonna be like uh, you know, all fluff and sequence. But it's actually if you wanna win it, you've gotta work and you've gotta put the hours in and then eventually
Presenter
But
Presenter
See
Bruno Tonioli
It kicks in, actually, this is serious. I can win this. And what happens, the body changes as well. You know, when you keep training at that level, you feel a difference in yourself. You become like a racehorse. And you see the finishing line, and all of a sudden, so hang on, I
Presenter
Get the
Bruno Tonioli
This
Presenter
So the body changing does that explain all of the I mean, we only need to take a cursory flick through the tabloids during any series to read about all the things that are supposed to be happening. I'm sure you'll maintain a dignified silence here. But behind the scenes of, you know, people's marriages breaking down, affairs between dancers and contesses, all is that about people realizing their physical selves?
Bruno Tonioli
You get very close to each other. But it can happen in any other situation when you have a lot of people spending free months together. It's not just the strictly curse, it's because that's what happens in life. Do you worry sometimes about what you see going on with contestants? Do you think they can't? I can only look at the dance because I'm there to just comment on what I see. And I always say, you know, whatever happens in your private life is none of my business anyway.
Presenter
Now you see, this is a problem for me, because I was about to ask you a personal question. You might tell me now to get stuffed, but you missed one of the judging sessions on a Saturday night show for the first time ever. And there was a lot of speculation uh in the tabloids that it was about your love life. No. No.
Bruno Tonioli
Yeah.
Bruno Tonioli
No. It was part of my country because yeah, I physically it's gonna kill me. This year we start literally I had no gaps. So it was logistics. Logistics. I started America before.
Presenter
Uh
Speaker 2
Thanks.
Speaker 1
What about it?
Speaker 2
Can't be fine.
Speaker 1
Cool.
Speaker 2
All right.
Bruno Tonioli
I started in America the same week this year. They over com it's a total overlap all the way through. And I said you have to give me a week off because my ener I don't have time for my body to kind of re-energize. And it was always it was agreed. I didn't decide, oh, I'm not doing it. I would never do that. I'm a pro. Talking of taking care of yourself, I have. I've read that you are a devotee of yoga. Oh, I used to be Mental. What?
Presenter
Yeah.
Bruno Tonioli
Yeah. 'Cause I can't imagine you quieting your inner voice. I go away on an island on my own for two weeks. I've done it. You're happy on your own? Absolutely. Books. I'm very, very happy on my own. I don't know. Truly on your own. Completely on my own. I've been
Presenter
But to wits
Presenter
Yeah.
Presenter
Truly on your own.
Bruno Tonioli
Well, a couple of years ago I went to the Maldives on my own for two weeks. I only spoke to all the room service. I don't need all of that.
Presenter
You'd sort of be fine on the island for a while. This island, I'm going to continue. Oh, God, oh, yes.
Bruno Tonioli
Oh yes.
Presenter
Oh yeah. Quite look forward to it.
Bruno Tonioli
Oh, I c I could go tomorrow. I could easily. I am I will find so many things to do. It's like I d I I love beautiful islands, watching the sunset. Glass of champagne.
Bruno Tonioli
Listen to Nessundorma. I'm there forever.
Speaker 2
Let's do that right now then.
Speaker 1
Uh
Speaker 1
Father Slan, Levant, Fest.
Speaker 1
Uh
Presenter
Part of Nessen Dorma from Puccini's opera Tour and Dot, sung there by Luciano Pavarotti with the London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Zubin Mehta. We come to the moment now, Bruno, when I offer each castaway the books. You get to take. The Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare, and then a book that you would like to choose. What's it going to be?
Bruno Tonioli
I'm gonna choose uh One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriele Garcia Marchez. I read it first, I remember seventies, early seventies in Italian.
Bruno Tonioli
And is how it got me into books. When you read his works, I mean all of his works you taste it, you smell it, you feel it. His ability to describe a smell, a colour, how the air feels on your skin.
Bruno Tonioli
You feel like you're jumping into the book. Okay.
Presenter
We shall give you that. You are allowed to and you maybe hinted at it just before we heard your final choice there at what your luxury might be.
Bruno Tonioli
Oh, it has to be a lovely glass of chilled champ. Oh, a bottle of champ. Maybe a case. You can have a case of champagne.
Presenter
It's a whole cellar. You can have a whole cellar. A whole cellar. A temperature-controlled cellar.
Bruno Tonioli
Pretty much
Bruno Tonioli
So I'm sitting there watching this beautiful sunset, chilled champagne, playing the suddom. I'd be crying.
Bruno Tonioli
With happiness.
Presenter
Blissful.
Presenter
I always ask my castaways to choose if they had to run to the waves to save their discs if they were going to be washed away, which one disc of the eight that you've chosen to day would be the one that you would save?
Bruno Tonioli
Well, it has to be Nesundama because
Bruno Tonioli
Because it's yeah, I'm Italian, it's Pavarotti, I love opera. You know, you know the story of Turando, but it is beyond that. What he says is, you know, the guy has to survive three riddles to conquer the princess. Everybody failed before him. The penalty is death. But it doesn't stop him. There is another story behind it, which is represents exactly what you have to do in life. It doesn't matter what is presented to you and it doesn't matter what the odds against you are. If you're not going for it, you're not going to win.
Presenter
Bruno Tognioli, that is your disc then. Merry Christmas and thank you very much for letting us hear your disclosure.
Bruno Tonioli
Thank you very much. I'm honored, and thank you.
Presenter
I hope you enjoyed this edition of Desert Island Discs. You'll find over 2,000 interviews with artists, musicians, scientists, sports stars, comedians, and more at bbc.co.uk/slash desertisland discs. And I have a favour to ask: if you could rate and review the Desert Island Discs podcast wherever you download your podcasts, it'll really help other people find us. Thanks again for listening.
Speaker 1
This is the BBC.
Presenter asks
Do you feel constantly strung out and jet lacked?
And you never go out, you don't see anyone, which is a bit hard. And you really have to kind of discipline yourself so that you save your energy for the shows. What happens, you feel like your brain is detached from your body. You never quite know where you are. And you have fifteen people here, fifteen people there. You have to come up constantly with this. One line is oh, because you don't want let people down. They're expecting something from you and you have to deliver. Gotta put on a show. You've gotta put on a show.
Presenter asks
Were you similar in any other ways?
Uh I wasn't really close to my dad because I hardly ever saw him. And the only thing we had in common, it was the love for dance. My father used to go out every Saturday night, all his life, Timmy my mother died ballroom dancing, every Saturday night. His pride was his elegance. And he g based himself on Fred Astaire. And we used to go, I still remember I was very, very little, they used seven or eight. There used to be cinemas in Italy at the time when they used to show old movies. You s for like fifty P you get a double bill of Fred Estelle, Ginger Rogers, Gene Kelly. So you had all afternoon, basically, for five hours in these little cinemas.
Presenter asks
Tell me how you avoided it.
Oh, that's a long story. I knew there was a big festival in Positano, arts festival, with all these people from the theater and the movies. So I gotta be there. I don't know why, I just gotta go. The star turn of this festival was um a theater group called Le Grandeurgeme Beste in Paris. There was a huge international hit at the time. And as I go to meet this friend, the the guy that was playing one of the major roles in the show had a divas drop. And he walked out. And it just happened that I was almost the double. And the director looked at me, he's called Franz Salieri, and he said in French, um, Esque tu dance. Oh God. Yes. I've never done anything professional. I was well, you know, I mean, I just I was doing my own thing. Anyway, to cut a long story short, I fitted all the costumes. I fitted everything except the shoes that were too small. And they taught me a number every day. So I've opened in Milan. September 1974, it was a huge hit. Tour Italy went to Paris. And then we came with that show came to London. Now to go back to the question. The question, I was touring and I said at the time, you know, if you were gay, you were exempt from serving in the military. So but obviously everybody by nineteen seventy five, seventy six, everybody kinda was turning up in full makeup because they to g they would have done anything. To get out of that, I remember I had a wonderful fur coat at the time, but I was very demure. I said, just wear the fur coat, but I had all the clippings, you know, the press clippings of the show, and played it very, very meek, and just as I am, but just with this lovely fur coat, all my clippings. I went in, I had the appointment with the general, I can't remember, or the top guy. He actually was very, very nice. And he said, well, I do understand you're not actually pretending. A lot of people now do that to get out, and in fact, you know, it's just an act. And this would actually stop your career. And I do understand. It was very, very nice. But what happened, which I never told anybody, somebody got a whiff. And they called my parents' house. And I picked up the phone and said, Well, we're gonna tell your parents that you just got out because you say you're a queen. So we'll do. No, but just just say, well, do it, who cares?
Presenter asks
When you went home during those periods... what was your relationship with home?
And when I actually felt very, very sad when I go back because, yeah, there is a sense of a world gone by. I am the same, but I'm not the same. You know, when you live in these provincial towns, time seems to stand still. People do the same things. They may be different generations, but they live by a certain not rules, but it is a cyclical thing that they keep repeating. And unless you fit into that kind of world, there's nothing for you to do. Going back is alw is a bit sad, especially because I've lost everyone. You know, it's isn't is there is nothing for me there anymore. You know, you you feel that and there's no point hanging on to it.
“You feel like your brain is detached from your body. You never quite know where you are.”
“I always felt like I was from another planet, totally disconnected at times. It's like I'm not in the right place, I'm not in the right time.”
“I'm gonna w make this disadvantage become an advantage.”
“I could go tomorrow. I could easily. I am I will find so many things to do. It's like I d I I love beautiful islands, watching the sunset. Glass of champagne. Listen to Nessundorma. I'm there forever.”
“It doesn't matter what is presented to you and it doesn't matter what the odds against you are. If you're not going for it, you're not going to win.”