Franco Cozzo, the perpetual and everlasting mayor of both Brunsawick and Footascray, is set to have his fairly extraordinary story told thanks to a new feature length documentary that has today received financial backing from Screen Australia.
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Palazzo di Cozzo is among a batch of 11 documentary projects that will share in $1.9 million worth of funding from Screen Australia, thanks to a combination of various screen storytelling initiatives.
The documentary film will track Cozzo’s life, coming to Australia as an immigrant with virtually nothing in his pocket, before forging out an incredibly niche furniture empire in Melbourne, becoming a beloved cultural icon along the way.
The 90-minute documentary will be written and directed by filmmaker Madeleine Martiniello, who will make her feature-length documentary debut with the film.
Cameras are set to roll on the project in 2020, following a lengthy pre-production process. The 83-year-old Cozzo is set to make a likely emotional journey back to his home town of Ramacca, Sicily during filming.
The documentary will focus heavily on Cozzo’s rise to fame in Melbourne, on the back of a hugely beloved on-going series of ads, in which Cozzo spruiks his range of baroque furniture in three different languages, and heavily features the now-ubiquitous shout of “megalo, megalo, megalo.”
Cozzo’s stores in Brunswick and Footscray became suburban landmarks, with the Footscray one being adorned in a giant mural of the man himself a short few years ago.
There’s no timeline for a release of Palazzo di Cozzo at this stage, but expect it to pop up in various film festival lineups sooner rather than later.
