ROME: Cinecitta on fire

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Cinecitta, Rome

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On the night of august thursday 9, a fire destroyed part of Cinecitta's cinema studios near Rome, Italy. The backlot décors of the TV drama « Rome », produced by BBC, RAI and HBO, have partially burned. The heat melted down some of the cardboard and plastic temples; the houses painted on canvas set ablaze didn't last long. A third of the Suburra district (area of tavern and bordello), shown in season one, no longer exist. Neron would have loved to watch the flammes destroying again his imperial city. A trompe-l'oeil city made of very inflammatable materials.
After five hours, the firemen controlled the fire, probably started by a short-circuit, and no one was killed.
Watch video on: http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQaV_HPRRfI
http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=f1TDK7HqDSg&mode=related&search=

The 22 lots, far away from the fire, are intact, and the mythic studio 5 where Fellini shot most of his films ( Le notti di Cabiria 1957, La dolce vita 1960, Otto e mezzo 1963, Amacord 1973, Casanova 1976, Et la nave va 1983) is not damaged.

Founded in 1937 by Mussolini, Cinecitta, la citta del cinema, welcomed many famous films from the sixties to the seventies. Many peplum like Ben Hur (Wyler 1958) Cleopatra (Mankiewickz 1963), Quo Vadis ( Mervyn Le Roy 1949) where realized there, the american directors enjoying the very qualified technicians, their small salaries and the italian « art de vivre ».


In the seventies, the golden age of the « Hollywwod on Tibre » was over. Tv overshadowed cinéma and for more than twenty years Cinecitta was not very busy.
In 2002,  Martin Scorsese directed "Gangs of New-York" there. In 2006, HBO stopped "Rome" after two seasons. The cost was too high and the ratings too low.

The BBC planned to film an episod of Doctor Who (season 4) in 2008 in the mythic Cinecitta. The antic Rome lot was perfect to shoot the meeting of Dr Who and Caesar. As the set burnt partially, the shooting is uncertain.

 See Rome digital reconstruction on http://www.romereborn.virginia.edu/