The dilemma between respect for the Law and the desire for revenge is the driving force behind the story of Libera Orlando, judge of the court of Trieste, the 4-episode series with Lunetta Savino broadcast from 19 November on Rai 1
THE PLOT
What happens when the Law, the highest value in the life of a woman magistrate, clashes with the desire to take justice into their own hands? Against the backdrop of a Trieste full of mysteries, a judge considered upright joins up with a low-life criminal to carry out a secret and daring investigation: she will lead a double life so as not to arouse suspicion from colleagues, relatives and her beloved niece. It all begins when the woman manages to track down the man she believes is guilty of the death of her daughter Bianca, which occurred fifteen years earlier.
Libera is also an affectionate grandmother: she has a fourteen-year-old granddaughter, Clarato whom she has acted as a mother since the little girl was orphaned. Clara is all that Libera has left of her daughter Bianca; she is carefree and has never missed her mother because she was too young when she lost her. Her grandmother’s protection was enough for her to become a happy, dynamic and future-oriented teenager. The bond between Libera and Clara is made of light-heartedness, complicity, small squabbles and a lot of love. It is also out of love for Clara that Libera wants to unmask her daughter’s killer. Willing to do anything to achieve her goal, she comes into contact with Petera convicted felon who will make unexpected and painful revelations to her.Everything turns upside down. What Pietro tells Libera about his daughter changes the reconstruction that the woman had made about the reasons for her death. Thanks to the new details provided by Pietro, Libera understands that there is a much bigger mystery surrounding Bianca’s death. He must find out and he will do it together with Pietro. The two form an unlikely but effective couple, sanctioned by the pact not to reveal their partnership to Clara until they have discovered the truth. Different both in age and in their ways of being, the two will have to act secretly. Libera will have to lie to many, starting with Daviddeputy commissioner, her ex-husband and Clara’s grandfather, from whom Libera divorced years earlier. In addition to Davide there is Isabella, Libera’s sister, a hardened single woman from whom she hides her investigation until Pietro’s increasingly cumbersome presence in their lives as single women forces her to confess her true identity. Isabella, lively and hyperactive, will decide to help them and not reveal their secret, especially to Clara. Libera will also have to pretend with her colleagues at the Court, especially with Ettore Rizzohandsome and magnetic, who has recently started courting her. In court, Libera continues to do her job as a judge, and then takes off her robe and throws herself into the investigation together with Pietro.
THE CAST
FREE ORLANDO – LUNETTA SAVINO
Libera was born in February 1963, the year in which the law was approved in Italy which also allowed women to enter the judiciary. A destiny, in short, that of Libera who, despite coming from a modest family in the South, managed to graduate in Law with top marks and gain her place in the then chauvinist world of the Italian judiciary. Today she is a judge in the criminal section of the court of Trieste, a city where she moved several years ago and where she is happy to live. In court, Libera is known as an impartial, incorruptible, balanced and feisty judge, but also ready to play down, to recognize the human and ironic side of the cases that they show up in court every day. In private, she tries to maintain cordial relations with her ex-husband Davide, deputy police commissioner, with whom she shares the care of her niece. At the moment, Libera doesn’t want to get involved in romantic relationships. He refuses with casual irony the invitations of the magistrate Ettore Rizzo, a handsome and intelligent man, long-time friend and colleague.
Libera is also an affectionate and protective grandmother, albeit unconventional and unconventional, a character mix that her granddaughter Clara really likes, with whom she has an excellent relationship based on a playful complicity.
PIETRO ZANON – MATTEO MARTARI
Growing up in the outskirts of Trieste, Pietro had a tough childhood marked by the death of his mother when he was still a teenager and by a conflictual relationship, full of anger and lack of communication, with his father who remarried. To make a living he did a thousand jobs and ended up stealing, serving several years in prison.
Behind the tough exterior, however, hides the wounded soul of someone who has suffered many of life’s wrongs.
ETTORE RIZZO – GIOELE DIX
The same age as Libera, he is a fascinating, ironic, brilliant magistrate, passionate about sailing, much loved by women and resistant to long-lasting relationships. Lately, however, she feels the desire to change her lifestyle and sees Libera as an ideal companion. Libera, however, does not want to give in to Ettore’s advances who, in order to show her that his feelings are sincere, will get involved, risking his career. to help her discover the truth about Bianca’s death.
DAVIDE MORESCO – CLAUDIO BIGAGLI
Davide is a serious man, a family man, the opposite of Ettore. He is an excellent grandfather for Clara even if, unlike Libera, he cannot help but see in his granddaughter the mirror of his lost daughter and still has a relationship with her full of painful contradictions. Libera has decided not to share her investigations into Bianca’s death: she knows that Davide would not approve of what she does together with the convicted felon Pietro to discover the truth and, as a man of integrity that he is, he would perhaps even be capable of arresting her.
ALDO FERRERO – ROBERTO CITRAN
Aldo is Libera’s sworn enemy in Court. Also thanks to his position as President of the Criminal Section, he often gets in her way, not only because Libera is a woman, but above all because he is secretly afraid that she will prove to be better than him as a magistrate. He is ambitious, self-centered, manipulative but is an excellent judge, who loves and respects the robe. And then his intelligence leads him to recognize his own mistakes and, sometimes, to change his mind about his deep-rooted beliefs. He loves to quote the Latin mottos of jurisprudence, including his favorite: Pacta sunt servindathe agreements must be respected.
ISABELLA ORLANDO – MONICA DUGO
Clara’s bubbly aunt, fifty-year-old, single, veterinarian, lives in the apartment next to that of her sister Libera and makes daily incursions into the lives of grandmother and granddaughter. Always ready to give the right advice to Clara on how to wear make-up and dress (she also tries with Libera who, however, doesn’t let herself be influenced in the slightest), Isa – as they call her in the family – is a force of nature, in love with the animals she takes care of cares in his clinic and the men to whose charm he gives in more than willingly.
The bond with Libera is sometimes stormy, but she is always ready to lend her a hand, to go out of her way to help and protect her, without giving up speaking her opinion.
THE CURIOSITIES
Director Gianluca Mazzella is keen to underline: “The plot is crime fiction, but there is a mix of genres. I accepted because the story is original, because there is Lunetta as the protagonist, an exceptional actress, and the city of Trieste, elegant, clean , tidy, but with mysteries and gray areas”. Producer Matteo Levi: “This series was born from an ancient relationship of great esteem towards Lunetta: one of his desires was to move away from a series set in the South and make his acting career broader. Trieste was a choice that came After”.
