Ileana Ghione 3rd December 2005. Joan Booth 3rd December 2017
“She passed away the same day as my wife (12 years previously) in the light of the Super Moon and I like to think that Ileana opened her arms to light the way for my dearest friend.”
In Praise of Joan
It was just a year since Ileana had died and I decided to dedicate a mass to her in the Cathedral of her home town of Asti.She felt her roots very deeply and we wouid often come to Asti to see her mothers sister and grand children who we were glad to have helped when their father died and they were still teenagers.
Massimo Scaglione,her lifelong friend and distinguished television and stage director, would often invite Ileana to performances in Asti -The photo is from an evening he dedicated to Ileana a few years before.
I came back now a year later which was just enough time to be abandoned by ‘our’ family who we had shared everything with so generously over our thirty years together with esteem and love and much else besides.
Parassitic greed meant that I now arrived in ‘our’ city alone with terrible rumours spread by Ileanas brother and sister of my evil machinations and intentions
Milena Vukotic and Renzo Rosso two such warm faithful friends spurred me on to commemorate my adored wife who had left me alone too soon.
The cathedral was full to the rafters and I decided ,spurred on by Milena to talk about Ileana and our love story of thirty years.
No sign of our ‘cousins ‘ or close family was very hurtful but there are so many things that are revealed when a close family member dies.
The next morning in the hotel in the main square that we had always stayed in together I was having breakfast feeling very alone when the waiter asked if he could talk to me.A friendly respectful voice ‘Of course’……’I just wanted to tell you how moved we all were when you spoke about your love for Ileana ….we come to church so often and hear about people in distress or disasters but we never could have imagined a love that you described to us last night ‘.
The next year Eugenio Guglielminetti the great set designer and artist ,also from Asti ,designed a garden in the centre of the city to be dedicated to their illustrious citizen Ileana .
Eugenio who had advised and designed Ileanas homes,theatre and stage sets died before the opening ceremony but we went ahead dedicating the garden to them both.
Ileanas brother and sister ,cousins and family members were nowhere to be seen and after their evil machinations have joined Ileana in the family tomb that I care for.There are the lemons that I went to our home to collect in Sabaudia to make the tomb more beautiful . Ileanas mother had built it much to our amusement at the time .It now needed to be cared for and a beautiful garden created to house our beloved Ileana who after all had also paid for it and given the world so much of herself.
Eighteen years on the Foundation that we both wanted to create has been abandoned .
It was created immediately after her death so our thirty years dedication of bringing culture to the Eternal City could continue and flourish long after we were no longer on this earth and above all give a much needed platform to aspiring young actors and musicians .
This ,after years of wrangling with a legal system that is so slow and unjust,has not been possible.A system where you are guilty and have to prove your innocence becomes fodder for professionals with enormous fees .Guilty or innocent depending on which way the wind blows over a fifteen year period as fees reach sky high proportions without any guarantee of success.The vultures were all around waiting to zoom in for the kill knowing how to take advantage of a legal system that does not protect the innocent or the accused .
But thanks to my adopted family of Roberta Blasi Ercole Palmieri Luca Palmieri ,Matteo Palmieri Francesca Langella and Ilaria Gregori the Teatro Ghione is going from strength to strength and hopefully our wishes will be respected despite such unexpectedly despicable opposition from within.
I can now begin to mourn in peace knowing that I have completed our mission the best I could!
Today I lay a wreath on the grave of Joan in Ewelme deep in the heart of Oxfordshire ……..Ileana knew and loved Vlado and Joan and their idyllic love nest in Ewelme that we visited so often.
They will both be looking on today with a knowing smile as I await to join them
Life is indeed a mystery as the waiter asked me what dessert I would like and then coming back again he said we have banana split today .
Little could he have known the significance of the very first thing that united Ileana and I 45 years ago .
It came the day after Ileana’s birthday .
We were travelling down to Siena together Ileana driving the young repetiteur flown in from London to help his old teachers wife Lydia Stix Agosti with her inexplicably named course for actors :From Schoenberg to today’.
Driving her own car and singing operatic arias on the way we stopped for a snack and she had a banana split that she said was her favourite desert.
In the Campo later that evening we were having a welcome drink with the class and I ordered a banana split for Ileana . She was so moved that I had remembered that this was the first seed of a love that was to last almost thirty years.
Ileana had suffered as only those that have had a loved one commit suicide can understand .Her beloved husband Ezio Gagliardo had suffered from depression and had decided to take this drastic step leaving Ileana shocked distraught and mistrusting.The idea that someone could have remembered something so trivial as a love for banana split was the first step in eventually being reborn and able to live and to love life again.
The waiter today could never have known why a banana split should have brought tears to my eyes !
Unforgettable try through recital on Perlemuter`s piano with the amazing 104 year old companion for so many years of Vlado .
And the astonishing Mark Viner .
Wonderful,sounds.Wonderful music.Wonderful company.Thank you to all .February 2017
Achille Millo,
pseudonimo di Achille Scognamillo (Napoli, 25 novembre 1921 – Roma, 18 ottobre 2006)
Image of Ileana Ghione and Achille Millo in Dress the Unknown
ChristopherAxworthy-MusicCommentary 
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