To tell you a bit about who Gian Paolo Ormezzano was, we present this long interview he granted to Nino Materi of Il Giornale, published on June 14, 2022. Not everything is here, but there's a lot of our GPO.

The boxing match between Gian Paolo Ormezzano and Covid, he won it: that 86-year-old journalist recognizable in the ring for his maroon shorts (see football faith) and sitting on the stool in the left corner (see political faith). Ormezzano in "Raging Bull" version, born in Turin (where else?), on September 17, 1935, had a tough time in the most violent match ever fought.

The damn Coronavirus was hitting hard, so much so that under its blows Gian Paolo (known to friends as "Gpo") risked losing his skin. But then the ball reporter (in the sense of football expert) most loved by the Maratona curve pulled out the secret punch that made the opponent die laughing. It was when "Gpo" said to him bluntly: "I am a twice-lucky man. First because I wasn't born a woman in Afghanistan; second because I was born in Turin without ever becoming a Juventus fan". Technical knockout. The only known case where the world champion of contagion went down, crushed by the pandemic force of irony. Humor, an antidote to misfortune that always protected Ormezzano, decreeing his success as a "sports reporter" (a limiting title, like a Sassicaia defined as an "all-meal red wine"). Actually, "Gpo" is the prototype of the globetrotting journalist that all those aspiring to this profession dream of becoming: "The Special Envoy" by Evelyn Waugh. Those were the times when your boss would tell you: "Go, look and write". Over time, "go" was replaced by "call"; "look" by "listen" and "write" by "copy and paste". The only allowed journey is now just from home to the newsroom. And, with smart working, not even that. "Gpo" speaks, giving the desire to listen to him with the same enchantment that captures you reading his pieces: fun, never banal. An English humor varied with Piedmontese hazelnuts, and the fantastic mix tastes like porridge with a Nutella aftertaste. Ormezzano certainly had a blast. While he tells, he grins. And every grin is a dive into a past of front pages; exclusive reportages; mischief; rascality; memories that taste like the refined velvets of the Orient Express. When newspapers would reimburse the most "creative" expense notes; book you a business class seat and a 5-star hotel. Not like now, when they contest your taxi ride even if a moment before you broke your leg falling from a bicycle.
"All credit or blame goes to new technologies," narrates Gpo, "which have transformed the profession into something I can't say is better or worse than before. It's not up to me to judge. I'm nobody to do so." And yet Ormezzano is the Supreme Court of journalism. His latest book "I Was Really There" (Minerva Publisher) is an exceptional Treccani of sports reporting, a model-cheat sheet. Work in a playful version. The best of the best, synthesized in 200 anthology pages. Encounters, jokes, blunders by the Olympics record-holder who followed 25 editions in a career paved with honors, burdens, and jokes. 
Ah, jokes: your great passion.
"For years, there wasn't a day when I, Adriano De Zan, Sandro Ciotti, and Giorgio Martino didn't tell each other one." 
But sometimes, reality can beat the best joke 10 to zero. 
"I agree." 
For example: is it true that after retiring, you directed a magazine specialized in funeral services? 
"True. All thanks to the cyclist Alcide Cerato from the Molteni team. I met him at the Giro d'Italia and nicknamed him the bartender." 
Cerato ran a bar? 
"No. He ran coffins." 
In what sense?
 "He was, and still is today, the owner of the Lombard funeral home San Siro."
 Did he hire you for this macabre editorial adventure? 
"Macabre? Not at all. The magazine was called La Buona Sera (subtitle: Periodical of Life, Death, and Miracles), had an elegantly glossy graphic design, with prestigious collaborators including Enzo Biagi. My salary didn't include money, but free vacations in Costa Smeralda. La Buona Sera was sent for free only to prominent personalities." 
And the VIP recipients - at least those in good health - appreciated the gift? 
"At Christmas, we sent it with an attached greeting card. A mess erupted." 
Was that when you put - let's say - a tombstone on your journalistic relationship with gravestones and niches? 
"Not in the least. I replicated the experience in another newspaper called La Panchina (subtitle: Tactics and Technique for Recognizing Death and Surviving It)." 
A true sector expert. 
"So much so that I earned an invitation as an honored guest to the Festival of Desperation in Andria, Puglia." 
Speaking of "desperation": journalism now has the air of a dear departed with chrysanthemums wrapped in printed paper. 
"My generation was lucky. I was super lucky. I found two great newspapers on my path: Tuttosport and La Stampa." 
You were also the director of Tuttosport. "Director by attrition."
 What do you mean "by attrition"? 
"The publisher, perhaps, had no valid alternatives and chose me. But actually, I didn't care. My vocation was not to command but to go, see, and write like true journalists do."
Category that you divide into three races: "cantaglorie", "erotists", and "pornographers". Can you explain the differences?
"The cantaglorie are the pens aspiring to literature; the erotists are quality signatures who write for the people without disdaining life's pleasures; the pornographers are those who tend to mess everything up".
Were you a "cantaglorie"?
"Yes, but then I pleasantly shifted to being an erotist".
Indeed, you never "disdained" the "pleasures of life". Like that time in Berlin...
"In a night club, two disguised leeches drained my wallet".
Who saved you from bankruptcy?
"Gino Palumbo. The director whom, together with Antonio Ghirelli, I loved the most. Gino told me: Don't worry, write what you want, I'll pay you well. And so I recovered my finances".
You've spent a life in newspapers, became popular on TV. Was any of your pieces ever censored?
"No. I always worked in complete freedom because my bosses knew I had an easy 'vaffa' and therefore put themselves in a position not to be sent away. Even if...".
Even if?
"Many years ago, I proposed a reportage to a famous magazine titled 'Me, Sitting on Gianni Minà's Toilet'. But nothing came of it".
What's so special about "Gianni Minà's toilet"?
"You should know that right in front of Gianni's toilet bowl, there's a large wall with photographs of many of his famous interviewees from 60 years of career. And I assure you that being watched in your most intimate moments by characters like Fidel Castro, Maradona, Mohammed Ali, Robert De Niro etc. is an emotional experience".
An "emotional experience" you often experienced?
"Very often. Gianni is more than a friend to me, a brother. I frequent his house a lot and, being of a certain age, I go to the bathroom quite often".
You were also very close to many other legendary characters. Who do you put on the podium?
"Enzo Ferrari, who had only one flaw: he trusted me. With Enzo Bearzot, there was a special connection. I continue to drive Livio Berruti today, now 82 years old and moving with crutches, just as I used to drive him around in a 500 when he was world champion of 200 meters".
Another mythical friendship: the one with Giampiero Boniperti. A relationship even more inexplicable in light of the theoretical "incompatibility" between a Torino and a Juventus fan.
"Great Giampiero. He died precisely during the days when I was hospitalized for Covid. For him, I directed, incognito, the periodical Hurràà Juventus".
An icon of the "Toro heart" directing the Juventus magazine? The Torino fans must have reproached you.
"Never. Thank God, my intellectual honesty as a man and journalist is above suspicion. Same for my loyalty to Torino. Granite. Or rather, granata".
Toro-journalism, a derby between two great "Ormezzanian" passions, always ending in a draw.
"Thanks to them, I won the lottery, but I had bought many tickets. Among my former loud-mouthed colleagues, there are those who claimed to win without having bought even one".
Speaking of colleagues, I wonder how many pranks...
"Two of the best were played on me by Vittorio Feltri".
Tell me.
"I was working at La Stampa, with Gaetano Scardocchia as director. Vittorio invented that Scardocchia had organized a party. But that evening I had a romantic encounter and therefore declined the party. The next day, Feltri told me that Scardocchia was extremely offended with me and that there would be serious consequences. Trembling, I called the director to apologize for not attending the party. And Scardocchia: 'Ormezzano, what are you talking about? There was no party'".
The other prank?
"I was in Bergamo to follow Atalanta's match. At one point, I see a guy not far away who starts raging against me: 'Ormezzanooo, you're a Torino piece of s... Go back home!'. At first, I pretend not to notice. But the guy continues relentlessly insulting. At halftime, I gather courage and decide to confront him. I approach and discover it was my friend Feltri. Who advises me to change my glasses".
"Io c'ero davvero" is a book that resembles a psychoanalytic session. The story of two viruses: one malignant, Covid, the other benign, journalism. Which crossed paths in the painful hospital corridors where humiliation and death reigned supreme.
"The world had no need for this book, while I needed to write it. I managed, overturning certain scientific-jinxing forecasts. Five different hospitalizations in one terrible month. I witnessed degrading scenes but also heroic solidarity. Good and evil between self-denial and destruction of human dignity".
Your reportage from the world of suffering should be read by those who say Covid is a hoax.
"My lungs were invaded by the virus. My bed neighbors were motionless with helmets and nasal cannulas. Breaths like rattles. Then, suddenly, they would disappear into thin air. Like ghosts. I counted dozens. Then I preferred to stop".
Did you end up in intensive care?
"Yes. But the mints I've always preferred to cigarettes saved me. The fact of not being a smoker turned out to be a fundamental help".
You've told, with extreme cruelty, the agony of infected people who died every day without even a last caress from their loved ones.
"It was a painful testimony. From a survivor of the hell of pain. And it made me appreciate my previous life which, in comparison, might seem like a long trip to toyland".
You have three children (and eight grandchildren). Timothy Ormezzano is also a journalist. Dedicate a phrase to him.
"It's the same one I say to everyone who respects me and, perhaps, loves me a little".
Which is?
"Long live us!".

Nino Materi, Il Giornale, June 14, 2022