What about your parents? “They were happy. They told us ‘if you want to go, go.” They took the train from Treviso, the ferry, and the bus. They are 15 and 17 years old, two girls among the immensity of those stationed in front of the red carpet to see Timothée. The hope? “Even just seeing him would be enough for us.” Too much hoping for a selfie, they are in the fourth row, the stoics of the first, who can aspire to a photo, an autograph, a smile, are there from the previous night. “We arrived at 1 am and slept in the sleeping bag.” They raised the sign with the words “Timothée come and eat pasta with me” from early in the morning, and then they waited, waited, waited.
A group of German girls is recovering under some umbrellas to shelter from the sun. “We came for Timothée. We come from Cologne.” The journey was long, the ticket for Lido worth seeing other stars. Harry Styles will be here soon. Are you curious? “Absolutely not. We don’t care. We only want to see Timothée.” There is no other law on the Lido, no Timothée no party. “Pushing the front row girls to catch a smile? We will not do it. We just want to see him”. The good intentions of the morning disintegrate at seven in the evening, when the red carpet comes alive and the actor, half-dressed in red, breaks every protocol by approaching the barriers to signing autographs, hugging fans, and taking pictures. No mercy. The Divine is a few meters away. The hard law of the autograph imposes the fight. “I saw a hostess, motionless up to a second before, making a hundred meters in record time“, smiles a father, one of the few male elements welcomed in this ageless female gathering where there’s only one faith: the cult of this son of a French father and an American mother. The long wait has been paid off.
At least for a group of jubilant American students, they shot with the analogic camera because only one nightmare accompanied the people of Chalamet for the whole day: low battery, with energy saving as a tutor, more psychological than legal. Only considering a live to share with friends at home was unthinkable. “I’m trying, but there’s not enough range.“
While waiting, some lucky ones are buying a ticket from those who can no longer go to the premiere. Fifty euros, Paypal and the evening with Timothée sitting a few armchairs away is set. A privilege for very few, indeed for one, is a matter of moments and wallet. And when the actor goes into Sala Grande room and the lights on the red carpet fade out, two images give sense to another day of ordinary madness. The German girls sitting on the sidewalk rescued by paramedics, exhausted by the heat and a wait that will force them to fall back on Harry Styles because they lost Timothée. And a question from a girl to her friends: “Does it not seem absurd he is a real person?”.
