Lorenzo becomes the Magnificent
The focus of the second season of the series entitled Medici: The Magnificent is Lorenzo, son of Piero the Gouty. It takes place 20 years later in the second half of the 1400s. A great art lover, Lorenzo was already a prolific patron of talented artists as a young man: a scene set in a room in the Palazzo dei Medici sees him conversing with Botticelli and Poliziano. This was shot in the Sala della Fontana in Villa d’Este, Tivoli (RM). Locations in Florence included the Basilica of San Lorenzo in particular, which the family commissioned from Brunelleschi in 1418. The facade of Palazzo dei Priori in Volterra (PI) stood in for Palazzo Vecchio with its Sala del Maggior Consiglio the location for the meetings of the Consiglio dei Priori, which historically took place in the Sala dei Duecento in the Palazzo Vecchio during Medici rule. In the opening scene of the first episode, Lorenzo and Giuliano leave for Florence on horseback. The villa they depart from is the Palazzina Gonzaghesca in Bosco Fontana (MN). As the Vatican’s bankers, the members of the Medici family are in constant contact with the highest ranks of the clergy. The facade of the Palazzo Apostolico in Rome is actually that of the Palazzo dei Papi in Viterbo, recognisable by its splendid Loggia delle Benedizioni. The interiors of the Vatican are those of the Palazzo Ducale in Mantova. In particular, the Sala del Manto was used as the setting for the papal throne when Francesco della Rovere is crowned Pope Sixtus IV. To save his bank, Lorenzo is forced to make an alliance with Duke Galeazzo Maria Sforza. The Porta Imperiale of Sabbioneta (MN) served as the entrance into Milan, and through a feat of editing, the Castle of St. George in Mantova can be glimpsed in the background disguised as the imagined Sforza Castle of the 1400’s. The castle interiors where the life of the Milanese court takes place, including the wedding of little Caterina Sforza, the Duke’s illegitimate daughter, to 30 year old Girolamo Riario, are those of Palazzo Te in Mantova. Caterina’s wedding banquet takes place in the Sala dei Cavalli while the assassination of Galeazzo Maria Sforza was shot in Mantova at the Rotonda of San Lorenzo, although the historical event actually took place in the Church of St. Stephen in Milan.
