Mario Magnotta

Mario Magnotta
Born	October 14, 1942 Pieve di Teco
Died	January 4, 2009(2009-01-04) (aged 66) L'Aquila
Nationality	Italian
Occupation	School janitor
Known for	Internet celebrity

Mario Magnotta (October 14, 1942 – January 4, 2009) was an Italian janitor of a commercial school in L'Aquila.

He became an idol in Italy after several prank calls by some former students of the institute were circulated on the Internet.

Biography

Born in Pieve di Teco, the son of Giovanni Magnotta and Romilda Siconolfi, his family moved to L'Aquila from the province of Imperia because of work in 1945.

Prank calls

Some years after the pranks took place (in 1986-1987), the pranksters digitized them and shared them on the internet. In time Mario Magnotta's fame spread all over Italy. The success on the website was principally due to the rage and the use of blasphemies by Mr. Magnotta, and to his "Aquilano dialect", the most important variant of Sabino dialect, considered the standard form of it which sounds very amusing to internauts. The phone jokes were on 3 topics:

• Two calls from Telefono Azzurro ^[1] regarding his daughter and his (invented) homosexual relationship with one of his coworkers.
• Some calls from a Mr. Bruno, pretending to be the new partner of his former wife, asking him money to maintain her.
• The most famous prank was about a washing machine Mario Magnotta really bought in 1981. A fake accountant, Mr. Bontempi, asked him, 6 years after the sale, to pay an installment of ITL 480,000. This and other calls from other subjects (one impersonating a manager of the San Giorgio Company^[2] of Milan) gave him the sensation of being framed in a fraud to the company made by Mr. Bontempi. In the last of his calls, Magnotta, in a burst of rage, said to Bontempi his most well-known (and unintentionally funny) quote: «Me iscrivo ai terroristi! ^[3]»

The fame

After the fame on web (with the url www.magnotta.it), he was twice invited in some talk-shows on Italian television RAI, and suddenly invited in some local events dedicated to him. During a concert of Antonello Venditti in L'Aquila, Magnotta was invited by the singer on the scene, curious to know him. The Italian singer Simone Cristicchi ^[4] dedicated to him a verse of his song "L'Italia di Piero" (The Italy of Piero): <<Piero non rinuncerebbe mai alla lotta, e si iscrive ai terroristi come fa il Magnotta ^[5][6] >>

He died in January 2009 in L'Aquila of a Pulmonary embolism.

See also

• List of Internet phenomena

References

1. ^ An italian association for protection of children
2. ^ An italian electric appliances manufacturer washing machines
3. ^ Translation from Sabino/Aquilano: I'm gonna subscribe to the terrorists!
4. ^ Winner of 2007 edition of Festival di Sanremo
5. ^ Translation from italian: Piero will never leave the struggle, and he "joins the terrorists" like Magnotta did
6. ^ Text of "L'Italia di Piero"

External links

• (IT) Official site of Mario Magnotta (with audios of jokes) (IT)
• (IT) An interview to Mario Magnotta
• (IT) Article about the death of Mario Magnotta on La Repubblica

Persondata
Name	Magnotta, Mario
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	October 14, 1942
Place of birth	Pieve di Teco
Date of death	January 4, 2009
Place of death	L'Aquila