While crowds soaked up sunshine and then dodged raindrops at Summerfest on Sunday afternoon, I spent the day driving around Milwaukee with a quartet of folks from MTV Italia.
The group included two producers, including Niko Mazzei, who called OnMilwaukee.com last month to set the whole thing up, and Pif (aka Pierfrancesco Diliberto) -- known to MTV Italia viewers as the host of the show "Il Testimone" -- and his American-Italian sidekick.
They were here while traveling around the States filming sites featured on classic TV shows. Since few in Italy know "Laverne & Shirley" -- although some of a certain age remember it -- you can guess the show for which they visited.
Since the Bronze Fonz isn't yet mounted, we stopped at Leon's and the former Pig ‘n' Whistle, which are among the places most cited as inspiration for Arnold's. Later, they lunched at A&W so they could experience first-hand what car-hop service is like.
We drove along the lakefront but there were apparently no submarine races scheduled. I took them to the East Side and Shorewood to see the neighborhoods where the Cunninghams supposedly lived. But, even the house whose facade appeared as the scene-setting shot for interior scenes in casa Cunningham is located in Wilshire, Calif.
Wowed by the sight of rummage sales -- rare in Italy, and distinctively American -- we stopped to film one but the man of the house demurred. Luckily, further down the street we found success.
As on the show "Il Testimone," Pif shoots all the footage himself on a handheld camera and seeing him working on the streets of Shorewood, he looked almost like a well-dressed, hip gunman or speed trap cop.
The program will air sometime in October or November and viewers can watch the show (in Italian only, sorry) on the MTV Italia Web site. I'll let you know when it's up and will provide a link.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
