Staff Profiles

• Visiting lecturer, MFA Writing for TV, Stephens College residency programme at Jim Henson Studio, Hollywood (2017, 2019)
• Visiting lecturer, MA in Digital Media Practice, University of Rome 3 (2017)
• Visiting lecturer, MA in Film Aesthetics, University of Oxord (2012)
• Invited lecturer, Oxford University Day School, University of Oxford (2012-2016)
• Visiting lecturer, PG Seminar Programme, University of Reading (2007)
• University of Oxford, Pembroke College, AHRC Joint Postgraduate Programme (2006, 2007)
• University of Dayton, International Programme in Rome (2006)
• University of Rome 3, PG programme in Film Studies (2006)
• University of Rome La Sapienza, MA in Film Development (sponsored by Cinecittà Studios, Warner Bros, 20th Century Fox, Rai Cinema, Istituto Luce, Venice Film Festival) (2006)

Modules taught

• Story Development (MA)
• Screenwriting for Film and Television (UG)
• Screenwriting: Craft and Practice (UG)
• Film History (UG)
• Dissertation (UG, supervision)

Modules taught in previous years include: Film Project, Film Production Management and Practice, Film Form and Technical Skills, Film Genres, Cinema and technology, European New Waves, Realism in Film, Documentary filmmaking.

Supervision

I welcome proposals for PhD supervision in the following areas of inquiry: screenwriting studies, screenplay writing (research by practice), film theory, history and criticism, film analysis, narrative, serial TV (especially drama), archival research, industry and laws about cinema, body and technology in film (including posthumanism, cyberpunk, AI), film philosophy, migration in film and TV

Research group membership

At Oxford Brookes:

• Creative Industries Research Network
• Migration and Refugees Research Network

International:

• Screenwriting Research Network
• Crisis of the European Dream project (funded by
• Destination Italy project (funded by The Leverhulme Trust)

Books

• Russo P, Ed., Nero su Bianco. Sceneggiatura e sceneggiatori in Italia, Quaderni del CSCI (2014)
  ISBN: 1885-1975
  
• Russo P, Storia del cinema italiano, Lindau (2008)
  ISBN: 9788871806921
  Abstract Ampliato rispetto alla precedente edizione e aggiornato al 2007, questo saggio propone un panorama ampio e documentato di oltre un secolo di cinema italiano, facendo luce sui molteplici, concomitanti fattori - di diversa natura, dal contesto politico al dato economico, ad esempio - che hanno contribuito al suo sviluppo e alla sua diffusione. I diversi capitoli approfondiscono temi e protagonisti di tutti i momenti significativi, dagli esordi nel 1896 ai divi del muto, dalla rinascita degli anni '30 al neorealismo, dai nuovi autori degli anni '60 alla crisi degli '80, fino alla proclamata ripresa degli ultimi anni. A conclusione di ogni capitolo, una cronologia evidenzia i principali fatti della vita politica, sociale, artistica e culturale del paese, mentre la bibliografia, aggiornata ai contributi più recenti, segnala anche titoli che hanno avuto un ruolo pionieristico nella pubblicistica sul cinema fin dagli anni '30.

Journal articles

• Russo P, 'Storylining engagement with repulsive antiheroes: Towards a cognitive poetics of TV serial drama narrative: The case of "Gomorrah : The Series"'
  Journal of Screenwriting 8 (1) (2017) pp.5-21
  ISSN: 1759-7137 eISSN: 1759-7145
  Abstract The unprecedented success of Italian crime drama serial Gomorrah – The Series has spurred much interest in the industry as well as a lively critical debate. Little attention, however, has thus far been paid to the creative process behind the series. This article contributes to filling this gap by investigating the branding strategies and the writing strategies that have informed the development process. Particular emphasis is given to the analysis of the storylining techniques employed in the development of the arcs of Season 1 with a view to unpacking how, in turn, these determine mechanisms of the viewers’ engagement with characters. As typical of much contemporary serial dramas, these are predominantly antiheroes and therefore our allegiance to them is questioned when problematic issues are raised, as in the case of violent actions and dubious moral choices. The investigation combines three interplaying methodologies – i.e. a genetic approach, close textual (quantitative and qualitative) analysis and a cognitive theoretical framework – to offer a general poetic model for analysing serial narrative. While the article deals with one particular case study, the more general aim is to contribute to developments in the field of cognitive studies of serial drama, with a specific focus on creative development and writing practices.Website 
• Russo P, Steenberg L, 'Imagining the Post-forensic Landscape: The Crime Drama on Transnational Television'
  New Review of Film and Television Studies 14 (3) (2016) pp.299-303
  ISSN: 1740-0309
  Abstract EditorialWebsite 
• Russo P, 'Gian Luigi Rondi: Vita, Cinema, Passione'
  Journal of Italian Cinema and Media Studies 4 (2) (2016) pp.307-322
  ISSN: 2047-7368
  Abstract Gian Luigi Rondi: Vita, Cinema, Passione, Giorgio Treves (2014) Rome: Iterfilm/Luce/Lazio Film Commission
   
  A Portrait of a Nation and the Future of its Cinema: 50 Anni di David 1956–2006, La storia per immagini (Project headed by Massimo Mascolo. Released by Ente David di Donatello – Accademia del Cinema Italiano, AGIS, ANICA, thanks to Rai Cinema and Istituto Luce, 76 min., DVD – Rome, Italy, 2007)
   
  The literary substance of The Great Beauty (2013)
  Website 
• Russo P, 'Il dolore nella mente, il corpo nella narrazione: puzzle scripting in 'Inception''
  Imago : Studi di cinema e media 12 (2016)
  ISSN: 2038-5536
  
• Russo P, 'Beyond Perverse Allegiance: The Problem of Viewers’ Engagement in Pier Paolo Pasolini’s "Salò or The 120 Days of Sodom"'
  Senses of Cinema 2015 (77) (2015)
  ISSN: 1443-4059
  Website 
• Russo P, 'The 'De Santis case': Screenwriting, political boycott and archival research'
  Journal of Screenwriting 5 (1) (2014) pp.101-123
  ISSN: 1759-7137
  Abstract In the late 1940s and throughout the 1950s writer-director Giuseppe De Santis was the most successful Italian film-maker worldwide, thanks to box-office hits like the Oscar-nominated Riso amaro/Bitter Rice (1949). However, endless rows with producers, distributors and censorship soon forced him into professional exile until his creative voice was completely silenced. Over the years De Santis denounced a systematic boycott against him because of his social and political commitment. All scripts needed the central government film office approval; this system enforced a form of pre-emptive censorship by controlling the writing and packaging process. This article unveils the findings of comprehensive research conducted at the De Santis Fund in Rome. While De Santis’s official filmography lists only one title in the last 33 years of his life, his archive contains dozens of treatments and full scripts (and the film-maker’s correspondence) adding up to a total of almost 50 projects that were never made. The materials analysed here not only allow a thorough re-write of De Santis’s career, but also shed light on the intricate relations between politics and the Italian film industry in the post-war years.Website 
• Russo P, 'La politica come sistema produttivo'
  Rivista di Politica 2014 (1) (2014)
  ISSN: 2037-495X
  
• Russo P, 'De Santis. 'I fatti di Andria' e tanti altri'
  Quaderni del CSCI: rivista annuale di cinema italiano 10 (2014) pp.158-162
  ISSN: 1885-1975
  Website 
• Russo P, '"Does political scare you?" And other ideological questions'
  The Italianist (2013)
  ISSN: 0261-4340 eISSN: 1748-619X
  Abstract

  This article offers a short metacritical overview of the discourse on ideology and political cinema as it has evolved and has been received by critics, with particular reference to Italian cinema. An update of the debate over ideology is pertinent in terms of its currency. Firstly, because of the recent trend of films that treat the political as their subject matter: ACAB – All Cops Are Bastards (Stefano Sollima, 2012), Diaz – Non pulire questo sangue (Daniele Vicari, 2012), Cosimo e Nicole (Fransceco Amato, 2012), Viva l’Italia (Massimiliano Bruno, 2012), L’ultima ruota del carro (Giovanni Veronesi, currently in production), to cite just a few among the most recent titles. Secondly, because the debate itself faces the historical contingencies of a now global world dominated by the pervasive ideology of neo-liberalism and inscribed in an intermedial technoscape
  that, while exhibiting similar drivers for change, is profoundly different from the context of the post-1968 season that functioned as the accelerator of a theoretical and critical overhaul.
  

  I will first outline what I consider a few blind spots concerning critical approaches, definitions and ungrounded common places that are still widespread in commentaries on Italian cinema; I then suggest a few points for further discussion with particular regard to modes of reality and genres.
  

  Website 
• Russo P, 'La regia nei film sull'immigrazione'
  Quaderni del CSCI (2012)
  ISSN: 1885-1975
  Abstract

  Questo saggio si propone di analizzare la regia in un campione di 22 film sull’immigrazione dell’ultimo decennio circa. Il campione ha rilevanza quantitativa poiché rappresenta quasi il 20% dei titoli che, più o meno direttamente, hanno affrontato questo tema;1 ma è significativo anche da un punto di vista qualitativo in quanto i criteri prescelti per la selezione di tali titoli sono dettati da una serie di indicatori atti a fornire una panoramica il più possibile ampia e comprensiva del tema. Il campione include, infatti, commedie e drammi; storie ispirate a vicende realmente accadute o che affrontano problematiche correnti col piglio dell’impegno civile, e altre che invece prediligono la leggerezza e il disimpegno; cineasti affermati e nomi emergenti; opere titoli che hanno goduto di una degna distribuzione a livello nazionale e internazionale e altri che hanno infoltito la schiera degli “invisibili”; programmatiche dichiarazioni di autorialità e semplici operazioni commerciali; fautori del realismo e affabulazioni fortemente codificate nei generi.
  

• Russo P, 'Nord-Sud. Cinema italiano e migrazione interna'
  Quaderni del CSCI: rivista annuale di cinema italiano 7 (2011) pp.120-124
  ISSN: 1885-1975
  

Book chapters

• Russo P, '“Rome! By all means, Rome!” Mitopoiesi della “grande bellezza” di Roma attraverso il cinema americano' in Zagarrio V (ed.), Mirroring Myths: Miti allo specchio tra cinema americano ed europeo, Edizioni RomaTre Press (2019)
  ISBN: 9788832136371
  Website 
• Russo P, '“History Doesn’t Repeat Itself, but It Does Rhyme”: Fictionalizing History in Boardwalk Empire' in Renga D (ed.), Mafia Movies: A Reader, De Gruyter (2019)
  ISBN: 9781487510466
  Website 
• Russo P, 'Separazione/Iniziazione/Ritorno: il potere del mito nelle strutture narrative del cinema americano postclassico' in V Pravadelli (ed.), Forme del mito e cinema americano, Edizioni RomaTre Press (2019)
  ISBN: 9788832136319
  Website 
• Russo P, '(The Facts Before) The Fiction Before the Facts: Suburra from Novel (to Trial) to Feature to TV Serial' in Thornley D (ed.), True Event Adaptation, Palgrave Macmillan (2018)
  ISBN: 9783319973210 eISBN: 9783319973227
  Abstract

  Hailed as the Italian brutal response to the likes of Sicario (2015) and HBO’s True Detective (2014), Suburra—both the 2015 feature and the 2017 Netflix 10-part series—pries open the proverbial can of worms on the biggest national scandal in decades, renamed “Mafia Capital” and involving an intricate web of connections between politics, criminality and the Vatican. This chapter analyses and compares select reports from the still-ongoing inquiry and related trials that inspired the original 2013 novel (written by reporter Carlo Bonini and magistrate-turned-crime writer Giancarlo De Cataldo) to the approach of both screen adaptations. All push mythical archetypes and popular genre over-codification to extreme levels as if, as one reviewer put it, “genre was the only way to get to the facts.”
  

  Website 
• Russo P, 'Forms of Cyborgism in Gabriele Salvatores’ Nirvana' in Brodesco A, Giordano F (ed.), Body Images in the Post-cinematic Scenario: The Digitization of Bodie, Mimesis International (2017)
  ISBN: 9788869771095
  Website 
• Russo P, '"If you have to do it, you can do it": Mildred Pierce come modello di self-made woman nell'America della Grande Depressione' in Giorcelli C, Morbiducci M (ed.), M/Other. Scansioni di alterità, Guida editori (2015)
  ISBN: 978-88-6866-138-0
  
• Russo P, 'Suso Cecchi d'Amico' in Nelmes J, Selbo J (ed.), Women Screenwriters: an International Guide, Palgrave Macmillan (2015)
  
• Russo P, 'Migration Told Through Noir Conventions in 'La sconosciuta' and 'Gomorra'' in Bond E, Bonsaver G, Faloppa F (ed.), Destination Italy. Representing Migration in Contemporary Media and Narrative, Peter Lang (2015)
  ISBN: 978-3-0343-0961-5 eISBN: 978-3-0353-0657-6
  Abstract In Part 3: CinemaWebsite 
• Russo P, '"Sorvegliato speciale". Il dibattito su terrorismo e rieducazione tra politica e società civile attraverso i progetti televisivi di Giuseppe De Santis' in Jansen M, Urban MB (ed.), Televisionismo. Narrazioni televisive della storia italiana negli anni della Seconda Repubblica, Edizioni Ca' Foscari (2015)
  ISBN: 978-88-6969-044-0 eISBN: 978-88-6969-046-4
  
• Russo P, 'Gimme (Tax) Shelter: The Politics of the Production System' in Lombardi G, Uva C (ed.), Italian Political Cinema. Public Life, Imaginary, and Identity in Contemporary Italian Film, Peter Lang (2015)
  ISBN: 9783035395419
  Website 
• Russo P, 'Puzzle narrative in inception and shutter island' in Hollywood puzzle films, Routledge (2014)
  ISBN: 9780415622455
  
• Russo P, 'Struttura e modelli narrativi nell'ultimo Moretti' in Nanni Moretti: Lo sguardo morale, Marsilio (2012)
  ISBN: 9788831712583
  
• Russo P, 'Paranoid androids. Per una teoria del film italiano de genere' in Istantanee sul cinema italiano, Rubbettino (2012)
  ISBN: 9788849834642
  
• Russo P, ''Verso Sud': la poetica del displacement nel cinema italiano' in Urban MB, de Rooy R, Vedder I, Scorretti M (ed.), Le frontiere del Sud. Culture e lingue a confronto, CUEC (2011)
  ISBN: 978-88-8467-723-5
  
• Russo P, 'Body vs technology? myths and identity in gabriele salvatores's nirvana' in Italy on screen: national identity and italian imaginary, Verlag Peter Lang (2010)
  ISBN: 9783039114160
  
• Russo P, 'Corpi d'argento. Sadismo e masochismo nella trilogia delle madri' in Zagarrio V (ed.), Argento vivo. Il cinema di Dario Argento tra genere e autorialità, Marsilio (2008)
  ISBN: 88-317-9506
  

Books

• Russo P, Davies R, Tieber C. (eds), The Palgrave Handbook of Screenwriting Studies, Palgrave Macmillan (forthcoming 2022)
• Russo P, In the Writers' Words: Great British TV Drama Creators (forthcoming 2021)
• Russo P, Echart P (eds.), El sueño europeo: narrativas fílmicas, televisivas y fotográficas de una crisis, special issue of Fotocinema (2020)

Book chapters

• ‘Almost Noir. Approccio teorico al film italiano di genere dell’ultimo decennio’. In Franco Montini (ed.) Immagini di parole. Cinema e letteratura nell’Italia di oggi. Rome: FAC-Agis 2007. [Noir and other genres. A theoretical approach to genres in recent Italian films]
• ‘La distruzione del piacere in Eyes Wide Shut’. In Vito Zagarrio (ed.) Nuovi sguardi su Kubrick. Rome: Audino 2006. [A Lacanian reading of Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut]
• ‘Mettere in scena l’angoscia. Dario Argento e l’horror’. In Vito Zagarrio (ed.) Storia del cinema italiano – Vol. XIII 1977-1985. Venice: Marsilio/Edizioni di Bianco & Nero 2005. [Staging the anguish: Argento and the horror genre in the 1980s]
• ‘Non ci resta che ridere. La commedia tra passato e presente’. In Vito Zagarrio (ed.) Storia del cinema italiano – Vol. XIII 1977-1985. Venice: Marsilio/Edizioni di Bianco & Nero 2005. [Comedy in the films of the 1970s and 1980s]
• ‘La Repubblica nel cinema’. In Maurizio Ridolfi (ed.) Almanacco per la Repubblica. Istituzioni, simboli e linguaggio del patriottismo repubblicano nella storia dell’Italia contemporanea. Milan: Paravia/Bruno Mondadori Editore 2003. [Representations of the Republic in film]
• ‘Brutto, sporco e cattivo (gusto): l’ideologia del kitsch’. In Vito Zagarrio (ed.) Trevico-Cinecittà. L’avventuroso viaggio di Ettore Scola. Venice: Marsilio 2002. [The ideology of kitch in Scola’s Dirty, Mean and Nasty]
• ‘Letteratura e cinema nei Novanta’. In Vito Zagarrio (ed.) Il cinema della transizione. Scenari italiani degli anni Novanta. Venice: Marsilio 2000. [Cinema and literature in the 1990s]

Journal articles

• ‘Look/Fuck: il Fallo non è il pene. Identificazione e annullamento del Soggetto in Eyes Wide Shut’. Cinema Sessanta, 252, 2000. [Identification and abasement of Subjectivity in Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut]
• ‘Aspetti postmoderni nell’opera di Tom Stoppard. Negazione, relativismo e iperrealismo nel rapporto teatro-letteratura-cinema’. Cinema Sessanta, 244, 1999. (from BA thesis) [Postmodern aspects in the films written by Tom Stoppard]
• ‘Tre letture di Shakespeare in love’. Cinema Sessanta, 244, 1999. [Three readings of Shakespeare in Love]

Reference works

• Gianni Canova (ed.) Garzantina Cinema. Garzanti: Milan 2002.                                                                                        92 filmmakers and actors entries (Abbot & Costello, Alberini, Aldo, Asner, Attenborough, Asquith, Balasz, Balcon, Bara, Barbaro, Bergman, Bettetini, Bitzer, Bolt, Borzage, Brakhage, Brooks, Browning, Calcina, Canudo, Chiarini, Clarke, Comencini, Contini, Curtiz, Delluc, Del Giudice, De Mille, Deren, Duvivier, Ermey, Friese-Greene, Gandolfini, Guglielmi, Hampton, Hare, Hepworth, Herschell Lewis, Ivory, Jacobini, Johnston, Kassovitz, Kaurismaki, Kennedy, King, Korda, Kubrick, Kuleshov, Kureishi, Kusturica, Laemmle, Lattuada, Leoni, Lewton, Loach, H. Mankiewicz, Mari, Maselli, McEwan, Mekas, Menke, Meszaros, Miller, Montaldo, Morgan, Niepce, Omegna, Orfini, Osborne, Pacchioni, Pasolini, Patrick, Petri, Pinter, Rattigan, Reisz, Rhames, Richardson, Rickman, Rock, Rosi, Roth, Salvatores, Scarpelli, Schrader, Shepard, Silvestri, Singleton, Skarsgard, Sobieski, Stallone, Stoppard) + 96  technical entries.
• Tamara Alessi et al., Dizionario dei termini tecnici e finanziari in uso nel cinema e nel settore audiovisivo: Italiano/Inglese, Inglese/Italiano. Tecniche Nuove: Milan 1999. 750 entries. [Italian/English Dictionary of technical and financial terms used in film and audiovisual practices]

Areas of expertise

Screenwriting, story development and formats, serial TV (drama and comedy), film theory, history and criticism, film analysis, migration in film and TV, complex system theory applied to screen narratives

Membership of professional bodies

Screenwriting Research Network (Chairperson)

Editorial Boards:

• Journal of Italian Cinema & Media Studies (since 2012)
• L'Avventura - International Journal of Film and Media Landscapes (since 2015)
• Journal of Screenwriting (2016-17)
• New Review of Film and Television Studies (2009-17)

 

Conferences

• 12^th Screenwriting Research Network International Conference, Catholic University of Portugal, Porto, September 2019 – Paper: 'The Maze and the Door: “hosted” serial (posthuman) narratives as Turing tests in Westworld'
• 11^th Screenwriting Research Network International Conference, Catholic University of Milan, September 2018 – Paper: 'Suburra from novel (to trial) to feature to TV serial'
• 9^th Screenwriting Research Network International Conference, University of Leeds, September 2016 – Paper: 'HBO’s Boardwalk Empire. Constraining history into the serial drama format'
• 'Cinema & History. Time, Memory, Identity in the Images of the New Millennium' International Conference, University of Rome 3, November 2017 – Paper: 'Fictionalizing history in Boardwalk Empire'
• 8^th Screenwriting Research Network International Conference, IGRS – University College London, September 2015 – Paper: 'Towards A Cognitive Poetics of TV Serial Drama Narrative'
• Invited speaker: Conference 'The Legacy of Pier Paolo Pasolini', Yale University, March 2015 – Paper: 'Between Affective Incongruency and Perverse Allegiance: The Problem of Viewers' Engagement in Salo'
• Invited speaker: 13^th MAGIS International Film Studies Spring School, University of Gorizia, March 2015. Paper: 'Puzzling cyborgism in Nirvana'
• 7^th Screenwriting Research Network International Conference, Hochschule für Film und Fernsehen Konrad Wolf, Potsdam-Babelsberg, October 2014 – Paper: 'From Romanzo Criminale to Gomorra. Exporting the Italian Writers’ Room Model'
• 2^nd CRISA International Conference: 'Contemporary myths and culture between Europe and America' University of Rome 3, May 2014 – Paper: 'Rome! By all means, Rome. Mitopoiesi della “grande bellezza” di Roma attraverso il cinema americano e italiano'
• Invited keynote speaker: CRISA International Seminar, University of Rome 3, May 2014 – Key note: 'Separazione/Iniziazione/Ritorno: la forza del mito nelle strutture narrative del cinema americano postclassico'
• 6^th Screenwriting Research Network International Conference, University of Wisconsin, Madison, September 2013 – Paper/Research workshop: ‘Encyclopedia of Screenwriting project’
• ASMI Conference, IGRS - University College London, November 2012 – Paper: ‘Giuseppe De Santis’s cinema of protest’
• ‘Words & Images: Screenwriting Research’, 5^th Screenwriting Research Network International Conference, Macquarie University-University of Technology Sydney, September 2012 – Paper: ‘Politics, censorship and screenwriting: rewriting film history through archival research’
• ‘The Other inside and out: Italy and the Mediterranean’, Conference of Mediterranean Studies, California State University in Rome, June 2012 – Paper: ‘Migration in mainstream and independent Italian films’
• International conference of Leverhulme Trust Research Hub on Migration in Italy, University of Oxford, April 2012 – Paper: ‘A procedural epistemology of narrative and narration in migration films’
• ‘Contemporary Representations of Organised Crime in Italy and Beyond’ conference, University of Kent, Canterbury, June 2011 – Paper: ‘Complex narrative, genre and mise-en-scene in Gomorrah’
• Cine-Excess V ‘Subverting the Senses: The Politics and Aesthetics of Excess’ conference, London, May 2011 – Paper: ‘Masochism and pornography in The 120 Days of Sodom’
• Leverhulme Trust Research Hub conference on Migration in Italy, CUNY, February 2011 – Paper: ‘Mise-en-scène in genre films about migration’
• ‘The Image’ conference, UCLA, December 2010 – Paper: “The CSI format. Use of CAQDA software for a quantitative/qualitative analysis of narrative in film and TV series: a pilot project’
• Leverhulme Trust Research Hub conference on Migration in Italy, Monash Centre, Prato, September 2010 – Paper: ‘Migration as a social and cultural issue in genre films: The Unknown Woman’
• Film-Philosophy Conference III, University of Warwick, July 2010 – Paper: ‘Puzzle narrative in cyberpunk films’
• Invited speaker, round table on Dario Argento with Dario Argento and Xavier Mendik, University of Rome 3, May 2010
• Invited speaker, round table on Dario Argento with Vito Zagarrio and Xavier Mendik, University of Lecce, May 2010
• ‘Crisis and Rebirth in Contemporary Italian cinema’ conference, University of Warwick, January 2010 – Paper: ‘Masochism and pornography in The 120 Days of Sodom’
• ‘Popular Italian Cinema’ conference, King’s College London, May 2009 – Paper: ‘Stars and sexuality: the boycott of Giuseppe De Santis’s dangerous body politics’
• Leverhulme Trust Research Hub conference on Migration in Italy workshop on Migration in Italy, Said Business School, Oxford, February 2009 – Paper: ‘Proposals for a research project on migration in Italian contemporary cinema’
• Co-organizer of the Society for Italian Studies 2008 Postgraduate Conference, University of Reading
• ‘Le frontiere del Sud’ conference, University of Amsterdam, April 2008 – Paper: ‘Poetics of displacement in contemporary Italian cinema’
• Italian Studies Day workshop, Queen Mary University, London, January 2008 – Paper: ‘The need for a new approach to Italian Film Studies in UK universities’
• ‘Mind/Body’ conference, University of Reading, July 2007 – ‘Cyborgized bodies and digital death’
• Biennial Conference of the Society for Italian Studies, University of Bangor, July 2007 – ‘Ideologized female bodies in the films by Giuseppe De Santis’
• ‘Italy on Screen’ conference, IGRS - University College London, 2007 – ‘Cyberpunk mythic narrative in Nirvana’
• Society for Italian Studies Postgraduate Colloquium, University of Bristol, 2006 – ‘Body and subjectivity in Gabriele Salvatores’s cinema’
• Society for Italian Studies Conference, IGRS - University College London, 2006 – ‘Dialectics of spaces in Dario Argento’s films’
• International Postgraduate Colloquium on the Sociology of Culture, University of Trento, 2006 – ‘Dangerous games: mutations of culture and games in contemporary cinema’
• International conference ‘Dalla pagina allo schermo. Registi e scrittori: la nuova generazione’, University of Tuscia-Viterbo, 2003 – ‘Cinema and literature: past and recent trends’
• Keynote speaker. Caffé Storico Letterario Giubbe Rosse, Florence, 2003 – Keynote: ‘Film Pathé en pochette and the emergence of the visual culture in the early years of cinema’
• International conference Overlooking: Stanley Kubrick oltre lo sguardo, University of Rome 3/Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome, January 1998 – Paper: ‘A-Z of Kubrick’s cinema’
• Postgraduate conference, University of Florence, April 1997. Paper: ‘Cinema and education’

Other experience

Professional screenwriter

Videogame localization

Professional script reader

Press, publicity and reviews

Burns drama series (Co-creator and Head Writer) option announced by CYSA Productions, starring Jack Huston:

• Screen Daily
• Twitter (Berlin Associates)
• CYSA

 

Press clippings for Topo Gigio - The Series (staff writer):

• LM
• La Repubblica
• Ansa
• NoSpoiler
• BookCiack Magazine
• Prima Online

 

 

Further information

• Screenwriting Research Network (SRN)
• SRN 2020-21 Annual Conference
• Facebook @Brookes
• Facebook @SRN
• Twitter
• Academia.edu
• LinkedIn
• Topo Gigio - The Series (website)
• Topo Gigio - The Series (streaming)