He’s been portrayed as a lascivious lothario, a likable scamp and even a female librarian. But who was the real Casanova? As the world’s most infamous lover returns to the stage, our writer reveals all
‘Once I started the research,” says Kenneth Tindall, “I was shocked at how much Casanova achieved, how brilliant his mind was, how many different roles he played in one lifetime.” The son of two Venetian actors, Casanova was a priest, a violinist, an author, a gambler, a soldier, a diplomat, an occultist and a prisoner. Tindall begins his wonderment afresh: “To translate The Iliad, to speak seven languages, to start the state lottery in France – the list is sort of endless. I came away thinking, as I sat there watching Netflix, ‘I’m really not living enough!’”
But then, everyone thinks they know who Giacomo Casanova was: the famous cad whose name became synonymous with seduction; the breaker of hearts all across Europe. But if that were all there was to the 18th-century libertine, there’s no way he would have become such an enduring cultural figure, inspiring everything from the 1918 novella Casanova’s Homecoming by Arthur Schnitzler to the Pet Shop Boys song Casanova in Hell. Then there are the film stars who brought the unscrupulous lover back to life, from Bela Lugosi to Richard Chamberlain and John Malkovich. More recently, we’ve had a Divine Comedy album, a Horrible Histories song – and a ballet by Tindall, premiered in 2017, now restaged and touring the UK.
