There is a widespread idea that people who make others laugh live constantly immersed in comedy, as if humor were a permanent lens through which they see the world. But what happens when the stage lights go out? In this interview, Lillo – one half of the famous duo Lillo and Greg – talks about himself beyond the laughter, through personal passions, reflections on comic intelligence, and a clear-eyed view of how (and how much) Italians laugh today.
Lillo Petrolo is one of the most versatile personalities in Italian entertainment: an author, actor, comedian, singer, musician, voice actor, radio host, and cartoonist. A multi-talented artist and beloved public figure, in 2021 he won over a new generation of viewers by taking part in LOL – Last One Laughing, where he achieved great success. Alongside his television and theatre career, he has also written the comic books Normalman and Posaman & Friends, further confirming his creative talent across many different forms of expression.
How do you really spend your free time, when you do not have to make anyone laugh?
Look, that is a question nobody ever asks me, and yet I would love it if they did. In my free time, I paint miniatures.
And then the second question usually comes right away: “But what are miniatures?”
And I light up, because finally I can talk about something I truly enjoy. They are small figures, models that you paint by hand with almost obsessive precision. It is a slow, quiet activity, completely different from being on stage.
And that is exactly the beauty of it: it is a passion that almost nobody knows about. When I talk about it, I am not trying to be funny, I am simply sharing something I genuinely love.
If it is true that comedy comes from a particularly sharp form of intelligence, what advantages has being such an intelligent person brought you in life?
Let us start from one point: it is not at all certain that comedy comes from superior intelligence.
I, for example, do not consider myself especially intelligent in general. I definitely have a strong sense of irony, that yes, it is instinctive. I have the intelligence to understand what is funny and what is not, to feel comic timing, to sense situations.
But in many other things I am completely useless.
So rather than “superior intelligence,” I would say I have selective intelligence: it works very well for humor and much less for everything else.
If there is one advantage, it is that I can see the absurd side of things. Even when I do not fully understand everything… at least I can laugh about it.
Do young people today laugh at the same things? And above all, do they understand them?
Good question. Some things inevitably change: references, language, timing.
But the kind of humor I do is quite universal, because it is what I personally enjoy: situational humor. A scene makes me laugh more than a punchline.
A joke, once you know it, stops working. A situation does not.
Someone slipping on a banana peel will always be funny, no matter the age or the historical period.
So yes, maybe they do not laugh at everything in the same way… but when faced with certain human dynamics, certain absurd situations, I think we still all laugh in the same way. And that is where I try to be.
Over the years, how has the perception of comedy changed in Italy? In a few words: do people still laugh?
In my opinion, people laugh less than they used to, especially in everyday life.
Today people are more stressed, more overwhelmed by problems and worries, and that inevitably affects their willingness to laugh.
As for professional humor – theatre, cinema, television, or the internet – I do not think it has changed that much: people still laugh at what is funny, period.
What seems to be missing is laughter between people. The spontaneous teasing, that lightness in daily relationships which, for example in Rome, was almost a way of life.
Today all of this is fading a little. Probably because, as time goes on, difficulties and pressures of every kind increase, and that makes us less inclined toward lightness and shared laughter.
Between miniatures painted in silence and stages filled with laughter, Lillo’s story offers a less predictable image of comedy: not an ever-present talent, but a precise, almost surgical tool, living alongside fragility, private passions, and a disenchanted view of the present. Perhaps we still laugh – but we do so differently. And understanding how, today, is already part of the joke.
By Lelio Deganutti and Igor W. Schiaroli supervision
Web Reporter iscritto al Registro WREP EU