by Gaia Piccardi
The former tennis champion: «This sport has given me everything except money. Pietrangeli keeps telling me we could have had a story”
No numbers (27 Italian singles, doubles and mixed titles), what banalities. Lea Pericoli has always been a matter of style. “I haven’t won much in tennis. But I was stubborn. And certain things that no one else had the courage to do. Especially to wear them: ostrich feathers, glitter, taffeta and lace at Wimbledon, the temple of tradition, flashes of blonde light when white was the dominant color, and Nicola Pietrangeli the alpha male. Christmas in Milan eighty and a few cents years ago (delivered with infinite class and told with a still fluted timbre), childhood in Addis Ababa where his father Filippo Pericoli, an entrepreneur, moved his family to Ethiopia after the war, youth in Kenya. Lea sighs loudly: “You’ll never get over the Africa disease…”. Well, let’s start here.
Above all, a memory.
“Just one? Impossible. I kept them all in my heart. It was a different Africa, the second half of the 1930s, nothing with safaris and tour buses. I was two years old. Papa was the first civilian to live in Addis Ababa arrived: he opened an import company, we got rich, but the war broke out, the British came and captured him, it was supposed to end up in India, but by the time of the Graziani massacres it had saved many people, including the emperor’s personal servant . And the Negus forgave him.”
How did tennis get into this story?
«Loreto Monastery in Nairobi: the greatest fortune of my life. Ten evil Irish nuns keeping 300 wild girls at bay. Swear to me you’ll never get caught in the middle of the current, mama has to promise me that when we go. The first night I find myself in a dormitory with four windows wide open, raging wind. I think: Tonight I die. But I can ride well, I can get along with the tennis I learned in Ethiopia. It was a completely different sport, it didn’t earn a dime! On the contrary: taking money with you was actually forbidden. In fact, tennis has given me everything except money. But I see that I’ve stuck in the minds of many, and my clothes are on display at the Victoria & Albert Museum».
Ted Tinling’s Muse.
«The most fashionable tailor of the time who made very daring things (intelligently) for me! Dad, who was a brave, but very strict man, got angry: Lea, rude, now get to work! First year at Wimbledon, it was ’55, they all came in procession to see my lace panties. The Italian federation threatened to disqualify me!”.
Anything but a trivial life, dear Lea.
«I love life absurdly, I’m madly in love with it, it’s a pity that one day I have to go: if I die I will be very unhappy. I missed out on everything negative that happened to me.”
Including cancer.
«I have cancer, I was ill, I was sad, why remain silent? I see you pale, they said to me when they met me. And I: Of course, I have a tumor. And this amazed, with open mouth! Talking about it at the time was a shock. For Professor Veronesi, a luminary, it didn’t seem true: we plastered Italy with prevention posters. After all, cancer is like a tennis match: in order to beat it, you prefer to be cheered on by the entire audience».
What courage.
“It wasn’t courage, believe me. It was more of a call for help, an outlet. If you keep everything to yourself, if you spend time feeling sorry for yourself, it’s even worse. And you feel fear».
Let’s change the subject: are we talking about love?
“Oh no, I don’t like digging up ready-made loves. I had a lot of nice stories, I even got married, let’s say, I was good at not letting people badmouth me, including my ex-boyfriends.
Forgive the tenderness: Wasn’t having children a choice?
“I didn’t make it in time, I was too busy. Or maybe I’ve never really thought about it.
How did he manage, 60 years before the generation of Pennetta and Schiavone, to get women’s tennis out of the shadow of men’s tennis?
“It was a different world indeed: women were very, very subjects of men. But I’ve never really valued feminists, the ones who fight men head-on. Men don’t go to war: they want to be stronger, feel cooler, just make them believe it. I never wanted to be equal to men, I wanted to be protected.”
You know each other with Nicola Pietrangeli as children: It is hard to believe that nothing ever happened between you.
«He’s right, sometimes we ask ourselves: It’s not that we haven’t thought about it, eh… But I always had someone else by my side, he at least two! On the other hand, an infinite friendship was born that lasted an entire existence. We often cried on each other’s shoulders. Nicola still racks his brains today that he’s ninety: Lea, why me and you never?”.
Was panatta the best?
‘No. The most fascinating was Umberto Bitti Bergamo, first a tennis player and then an entrepreneur. I had an important story with Bitti. Unfortunately, he passed away far too early.’
Indro Montanelli wanted it at the “Giornale”, a trademark of fashion and tennis.
«He was so tender to me … He suffered from great depression, the secretary called me: Lea, come quickly, the director is in a crisis. I took him out to lunch and we chatted. Indro, I would like to write about fashion. And what do you know, Leah? you test me It started like this. For television, however, I have the voice and the English to thank: nobody spoke it then».
Do you have any regrets?
‘Nicola says only fools don’t have them. He’s right, but what can I tell you? i will be stupid Perhaps I was a very happy woman, except for the pains that were not lacking. Life can be bad, especially when it comes to illness. But I always see the glass half full, I have filled my soul with positivity. It’s an attitude that I carry with me as a child.”
Africa was a teacher in that too.
“It will be that when you have survived the savannah and the fanaticism of the Irish Catholic nuns of Nairobi, you will fear nothing”.
January 13, 2023 (change January 13, 2023 | 08:04)
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