Aridosio by Lorenzino de Medici

English version by Carlo Ardito

Directed by John Tydeman

BBC Radio 3 1977 



A Florentine Comedy written and first performed in 1536.



Lorenzino de Medici was born in Florence, Italy, the son of Pierfrancesco II de' Medici and Maria Soderini. He was educated at Camerino together with Cosimo and Alessandro de' Medici. He and the latter were later involved in several public scandals involving their escapades. In 1526 Lorenzino was brought with Cosimo to Venice to escape the Landsknechts falling on Florence, and was also saved
from the expulsion of the Medici from that city following the Sack of Rome which crushed the power of the most powerful member of the family, Pope Clement VII. After a period in Veneto, Bologna and Rome (where he gained the nickname Lorenzaccio, "Bad Lorenzo", for his habit of decapitating statues), he returned to his native city in 1530, after the end of the Imperial siege which installed Alessandro as duke.

Probably prompted by Filippo Strozzi, Lorenzino and the killer Scoronconcolo murdered duke Alessandro on January 5, 1537. Lorenzino entrapped Alessandro through the ruse of a promised arranged sexual encounter with Lorenzino's sister Laudomia, a beautiful widow. After this, he fled to Bologna, and from there to Turkey, France, and then Venice. He wrote a public defense of his actions (the Apologia), claiming that, as an ideal heir of Marcus Junius Brutus, dedication to human liberty had forced him to kill Alessandro. Cosimo I de' Medici became Duke of Florence, and condemned Lorenzino to death. An assassin in Cosimo's pay killed Lorenzino in 1548 in front of his lover's house at Campo San Polo, Venice. 

As a writer, Lorenzino also authored the play Aridosio, which gained him notable critics.



The Cast:

Prologue................Michael Tudor Barnes

Aridosio................Stephen Murray
Lucido..................John Moffat
Mark Antonio............Peter Bull
Ermilio.................Martin Jarvis
Rufo....................Ronnie Stevens
Livia...................Rosalind Shanks
Tiberio.................John Rye
Caesari.................Geoffrey Collins
Lucrezia................Mary Wimbush
Mona Pasqua.............Kathleen Helm
Giacomo.................Jack May
Alfonso.................Alan Dudley
Riga....................Alaric Cotter

Directed by John Tydeman.


source: tape recording of broadcast material.


Type                : mpeg 1 layer III
Bitrate             : 128
Mode                : joint stereo
Frequency           : 44100 Hz
Frames              : 197279
Length              : 01:25:53
Encoder             : Gogo (before 3.0)