Tra parodia e decostruzione: i ‘duri’ di Fred Buscaglione

Abstract

With his ironic songs about “pistols, puppets and whisky” (Lanotte 2007, 68), whose protagonists – gangsters and tough guys – he literally embodied in his live performances, thus establishing a very specific performance persona (Auslander 2004), the singer and jazz musician Fred Buscaglione was particularly successful in Italy in the second half of the 1950s. The following article wants to point out, in a first step, the gender stereotypes and other elements originating primarily from US popular culture and film noir, which fit together in his performance persona. It will then be shown how these tough guys and gangsters are undermined and deconstructed within the song lyrics, on the level of what Auslander calls the characters, through the intervention of female figures no less tough than the male ones.