Italy: Leonardo series debuts on Amazon Prime as producers confirm second season
Italy: Leonardo series debuts on Amazon Prime as producers confirm second season
Milan: Already airing in Italy, the Leonardo series starring Aidan Turner premieres on Amazon Prime Video in the UK and Ireland.
Leonardo, the historical drama which has divided art critics, will premiere on Amazon Prime Video in the UK and Ireland on 16 April, after airing on Italian television station Rai1 over the last few weeks.
Set in 15th-century Italy, the fictional series based on Renaissance master Leonardo da Vinci has proved a major hit with the Italian public however historians accuse it of playing hard and fast with the truth.
The show sees Leonardo, played by Irish actor Aidan Turner, embroiled in a fictitious murder scandal in Milan, with the great artist, engineer and inventor becoming the main suspect.
Weaving the tale of the mysterious Leonardo through a blend of fact and fiction, each episode features the artist creating one of his masterpieces, from The Baptism of Christ to The Last Supper.
The series also tackles the artist’s sexual attraction to and relationships with men. Luca Bernabei, the producer of Leonardo, confirmed to Italian radio show RTL 102.5 that the show will have a second season, with Turner continuing in the lead role.
Bernabei gave a glimpse into what lies in store in Season 2: viewers will see Leonardo during his time in Rome, in competition with other giants of the day such as Raphael and Michelangelo.
The producer also revealed there is talk of making a series dedicated to Michelangelo, with a particular focus on the period around the creation of the Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel. However for now it remains a concept.
Turner stars alongside Freddie Highmore as Stefano Giraldi, the detective investigating the murder; Italian actress Matilda De Angelis as Caterina da Cremona, the model who appears in Leda and the Swan and who, on screen, becomes Leonardo’s muse; and Oscar-nominated actor Giancarlo Giannini as the artist Andrea del Verrocchio.
Best known from his roles in the BBC series Poldark and the The Hobbit films, Turner prepped for the Leonardo series by reading numerous biographies, visiting the Louvre blockbuster and learning to paint using his left hand.
Turner told the Financial Times that the goal was to give a fuller picture to the artist whose personal life remains something of mystery: “We know some of his famous works, his inventions, his philosophies, but we’re trying to get to the core of what was driving him emotionally.”
The 37-year-old Irish star is quoted by ArtNews as saying: “You’ve got to play this huge, almost mythical figure, and you panic. But you’re not playing the genius, you’re playing the person and I had to keep reminding myself.”
Critics of the series have labelled it “pop” – a tag that the producer Bernabei is keen to shrug off.
“I don’t agree with the term “pop” history” – he told The Times – “We have been really careful in our research, but this is not a documentary, we are not historians and this is not a university history lecture. We covered the empty space where Leonardo’s biographers didn’t know the story, otherwise it was impossible to recount this complex character.”
The creator of the series, Frank Spotnitz, said the intention “is not just to say that Leonardo was a genius, but to really show why he was a genius and have the audience understand what it was that made him so brilliant and radical and centuries ahead of this time.”
The US release date for the eight-part series on Amazon Prime Video is yet to be confirmed.
