Festa di San Donato – Day Four – Sex Sells

Wow, I said to Jack,  this Miss Mondo competition must be a big deal – look how many people are here already. Look how many of them are young men. As we walked down Viale Europa to Piazza Roma I noticed that the bancarelle were a wee bit different – more food less tchokas. Whoa, crepes filled with Nutella!  What is this – lots of lemons surrounding a pigs head?   I found out the next day it was boiled parts of the pig served spritzed with lemon and is very good. The porchetta roasta stand was packed with people.  Well, I could go on but I need to fast today.  As we continued to walk, I thought what a juxtaposition of ideals – size 0 young women on parade for Miss Mondo surrounded by the most fattening types of food you could imagine. Yummmmmm.

Rats, don’t the organizers know how to dress a stage?  Night three’s up stage blacks are gone and the backdrop for Ms Mondo is the stone of buildings surrounding a screen.  I don’t remember anything projected on the screen – but I left early.  It looks like less lighting instruments are hung than the previous night too.   At least they set up chairs – the opening night red chairs too.

Our party hardy pals, Carmella and Mario had a table on the upper terrace at Bar Mixed Fantasy so we had a great view and I was able to leap into the tangle of testosterone to take pictures and head back for a drink.  The beauty pageant was scheduled to start at 10:00PM – which here could mean anytime.  So I was shocked when the lights came up at 9:51 and the MC, who is apparently a quite well known Neapolitan entertainer – but whose name I will not use because – well, because all publicity can be good publicity.  He did the same pre-show warm up he did the two previous nights and at 10:07 the competition began.

Shut him up! That is what I took away from Ms Mondo. The host/MC, needed to be told that the show was not about him but the contestants. The folks I was sitting with, when I wasn’t running up to take photos, all said sta ‘zitto, he made the night much longer than it had to be.  Yo, get the hook.

The young women’s first appearance was in the highest of heels and it looked like what ever they wanted to wear – mostly short, tight and low cut stuff.  They were called out one at a time, walked down stage, down a set of steps to the piazza and through the center of the audience.  Spike heels on cobblestone, nice.  No one reached out to put a euro in their pants, but thats what it felt like.  It was a long walk too, which meant the first woman out was standing on the stage for a long time.  After they all had strut their stuff and were in a line up stage, the MC called them to the down stage edge of the audience.  Then they were told to stand with their backs to the audience, close together for a photo – kneel, bend, stick out your ass. The entire group of women assed out the audience. Who directed this???

The women exited – to change for the next round- and the MC blabbed on and on. A singer came out and sang to fill the void. Then Mr. Talk A-Lot blabbed more and more – he didn’t have to because I could see the women all cued up in wedding dresses waiting to go on. They waited and paced and waiting.

The dress designer and creative coordinator were introduced. The coordinator introduced each woman and talked about the dress – fashion show style. In gowns the women repeated the long walk down stage and through the audience taking care not to trip down the steps.  NOW if I were directing, there would have been two cute men in tuxedos posed on the steps holding out a hand to guide the brides down the steps. Instead, all the girls had to hoist up their dress, look down and probably pray not to go splat.

The women who decided which girl would wear what wedding dress obviously had favorites because one dress made a cute girl look frumpy.  Isn’t this about helping young women gain poise and public performance skills?

Listen to me, I sound BITTER or ANGRY or something not nice. I felt sorry for these young women. They were all good looking, all supported by friends and family in the audience and probably all bright. With good direction and planning this could have been a classy night. INSTEAD –

Sexy dress modeling was next and during this portion the MC really shined.  I couldn’t understand him but I could see him and what I saw horrified me.  A young educated women that I respect said  that next day that Mr. Creepy M/C was saying was incredibly vulgar – her word.   As each girl came out and did the long walk in the sexy dress he talked about them and then each one had to undergo his playing with them.  For example he brought a guy up on stage from the audience to do sexy Latin dancing with one girl – obviously unrehearsed and embarrassing for both.  The WORST thing he did was insist that a girl ride him like a horse. Who the hell directed this?????

Shortly thereafter we left, I couldn’t take another minute. I hope that whoever won got a great scholarship or something.