I realized the other day that it has been just about a year since I was cast in Italian reality TV show, Best Weekend, and I still need to complete my diary about the experience. It’s not in my nature to leave things unfinished and, to my credit, time moves a little too quickly these days and I’ve been working on some exciting projects and trying to keep up with the world.

It’s a good thing that I have the actual show, still streaming online for free here in Italy, to remind me of things I might have forgotten. As if I could forget.

I woke up refreshed and ready for day three after a delicious breakfast of fresh, homemade goodies at Podere Terreno. There were two breakfast setups at each hotel, the one we actually ate and the one that was feeding the cameras. They were fundamentally the same, of course, one just had to remain pristine.

It was time for our first on camera vote, which we recorded outside on Podere Terreno’s property on a glorious spring morning. I would like to provide some context for my readers who might not be familiar with reality TV in general and with the severity of the Italian grading system in particular. I’ll be quick. We Americans are more generous with our grading so when I sat down with the writers during my first confessional to judge Gregorio’s proposed activities, let’s just say my natural inclination as an American, bred on a culture of an A for effort and participation certificates, was to inflate the grades. Suffice it to say that was quickly nipped in the bud.

I was very nervous the entire time and come off as severe during the voting process, but, well, anyone who knows me knows that I’m a real softie. In any event, that rapid morning voting session and the confessional that preceded it were real eye-openers. I was finally becoming accustomed to the presence of cameras on me constantly and getting the gist of what I was there for and the part I was meant to play. It was also on day three that I made all sorts of interesting discoveries.

Running with the…goats!

I knew that there would be farm animals at some point. In one of the many pre-recording phone calls I had with the production team, I was asked all sorts of misleading questions involving various farm animals. I had dressed in sweats and sneakers, prepared for anything, but between breakfast and shooting I had a wardrobe incident that involved anti-frizz hair oil spillage. I had already packed up my stuff, I had to find a new outfit and get dressed as quickly as possible while the crew was setting up for our voting scene. Long story short, I put on clothing and shoes that were not exactly ideal for what we ended up doing, literally running with the goats. I was expecting horses and had mentally prepared myself for weeks in an attempt to overcome my fear of riding one. I was actually relieved when I saw the goats.

Emanuela’s theme was poetic Chianti. She is a very interesting woman who has a family farm near Rieti in the Lazio region. Not only did she grow up on the farm, but she also organizes a host of activities, including animal therapy, and has strong connections with similar realities across Italy which explains her choice of Podere Le Fornaci, an adorable goat farm right near Greve in Chianti.

The premise of the activity was that we would take the goats out to pasture where Emanuela would recite one of her poems to them, something she has done habitually her entire life and which she says animals respond to by staying still and listening. The reading didn’t have the desired effect and suddenly the goats were escaping and our host, Francesco Panella, was egging us on to run after them which we we did. I look ridiculous trying to run with my platform sneakers and little crossbody leather bag flying through the air but, notwithstanding my poor outfit and shoe choices, and the fact that I was the oldest contestant, I managed better than expected. I also laughed a ton, it was wild, the entire experience completely surreal.

Reality TV time is unforgiving so we didn’t get to complete the entire experience which also included cheese tasting. You can even milk the goats if you want. I loved this place and highly recommend it for families visiting the area. We even got to play with the baby goats but sadly those scenes didn’t make the final cut.

Lunch with a view

We left our friends at the goat farm and headed to nearby Montefioralle, one of the most beautiful villages in the Chianti and I would hazard to say in all of Italy. The view at lunch was a film set, spectacular. Imagine the most lush countryside, every shade of green coming to life, it was magnificent. It was not, however, an easy lunch.

The mood up until then had been really light and jovial but everything changed while we ate. First, I was moved to tears by the chef owner’s personal story. Having a partner who is a cook, I am particularly sensitive and attuned to the challenges of working in hospitality. Then suddenly both Emanuela and Gregorio began talking about their personal childhood struggles, really intense stuff. Gregorio proceeded to tell Francesco, with tears in his eyes, that acting saved him and helped transform him from the painfully shy child he was into the delightful, extroverted, and hilariously funny man that he’s become. I cried right along with him. Then, Emanuela told a similarly harrowing story about the fact that she didn’t speak until she was well into elementary school. She recounted how theater also saved her life and finally gave her the ability to talk. Finally, it came out that while both Gregorio and Emanuela do many things, they are also professional actors.

I didn’t realize how much our conversation over lunch had impacted me until I was doing my confessional afterward and broke down sobbing to the writer who was with me. I still don’t know if it was my reaction to my co-contestants’ stories, my sudden realization that I was going to have to wise up and play along, or sheer exhaustion from not being my true self on camera. This was by far the most difficult day for me but it was also a breaking point, it signaled a change of attitude and approach for me. I woke up.

Stargazing

I couldn’t wait to get to our hotel, the historical Torre di Badia, in the bucolic hamlet of Badia a Passignano. The place is stunning, in the shadow of an ancient monastery, and everything there was steeped in history and felt mystical. Both St. Catherine of Siena and Galileo Galilei passed through and slept here, and I personally felt and loved the history there (even though I might have said otherwise on camera).

I remember we were all very tired when we got there but we somehow found the energy to shoot our entrance scene and reactions to our rooms over and over again. As mentioned above, we had already filmed our confessionals back in Montefioralle. I did mine post-weeping, seated on a chair placed in the middle of a steep and narrow street just behind the restaurant.

After we finished shooting for the day, we went out to a pizzeria and ate together at a long table with production, the writers, and crew members. I remember little of the conversations I had but was relieved that I could eat and speak off camera and couldn’t wait to get to bed. I was beginning to feel jittery about the next day, my day.

My room was fit for a queen, and Emanuela told me as much, she had handpicked it for me, I found that sweet. Gregorio had lovingly begun calling me “princess Fosca” in his confessionals and sometimes he slipped up in real life. That was when I finally began to piece everything together, we had all been very carefully cast in precise roles meant to clash with yet complement each other.

On day three something shifted. I thought about it while lying in my canopy bed that night but was too tired to make sense of much of anything. It was clear, however, that the lines between reality and reality TV were blurring and my identity and moral code were beginning to suffer for it.