Among the many surprises of My family history, successful Italian series by Netflix, One of the most beautiful is Demetrio. A character who, without grand gestures or long speeches, has managed to establish himself as one of the most intense in the series. His strength lies in his ability to listen, to be there, to leave space for others, and it is precisely this apparent simplicity that has won over the audience.
The credit goes to Antonio Gargiulo, a highly sensitive performer who has been pursuing his artistic career away from the spotlight for years. From theater to television, through prestigious collaborations and ongoing exploration of the acting profession, Gargiulo has developed a personal style grounded in essentiality: subtracting rather than adding, suggesting rather than revealing.
In this conversation we retraced the work behind Demetrio, the meaning of kindness, the reflection on the desire for paternity and the comparison with Massimo Troisi, until he gets to his new show My name is Antonio. The result is the portrait of a performer who made scenic truth his artistic and human hallmark.
Silence as presence
«"Demetrio listens despite himself, he's not a psychologist," Antonio explains. "He has a personality that allows him to absorb, and sometimes the one who says nothing is the one who at a certain point says: 'Do you realize what you're doing?'" Demetrio is a revealer, a character who never seeks prominence, but who ends up becoming one of the cornerstones of the series. Through his way of listening and welcoming others, he manages to highlight the fragility, fears, and desires of those around him.
Antonio explains that there are two reasons behind this choice. The first is personal: he based Demetrio on real people he's met in life, men and women capable of authentic listening. The second is technical, developed over years of working with actors of great personality: "The less you do, the better. If two dogs bark together, nothing comes out. If one barks loudly and the other less, you create something dramatic and true."«
The result is a character that makes you laugh, moves you, and stays with you. "If I'd seen it done by anyone else," Antonio confesses, "it would have made me laugh out loud."«
The gentle revolution
In an age where only the loudest voice seems to matter, Demetrio chooses kindness, and the public has rewarded him with unexpected affection. "I feel like people have reached a limit. This bullying, this constant imposing, is no longer manageable. I'm sure we're moving toward another form of self-affirmation: kindness, generosity, loving kindness, gratitude. Things that until recently were mistaken for weakness."«
Antonio calls this change "a gentle revolution" and is happy about it. Even in everyday life, he says, he's learned to take a second longer before reacting. "I'm no Saint Francis," he clarifies with a smile, "but that extra second changes everything."“
“I'm content to be the old man Gargiulo”
Among the comments surrounding the series' success, many viewers have compared Antonio to Massimo Troisi. A huge comparison, especially for a Neapolitan. How do you feel about it?
«At first it scared me. I thought, 'Now people think I want to play Troisi.' I'm Antonio. Then something changed. Now I jokingly reply, 'I'm happy to be the old Gargiulo.' Because this juxtaposition means being part of a river, a story much bigger than me, and I'm part of it too. It means I'm immersed in my own history, my own tradition, and that makes me happy.“
Fatherhood and Demetrius
One of the most original aspects of the series is the way it addresses the theme of fatherhood. Not just that of Gaetano, a cumbersome and absent father, but the silent and profound one of Demetrio, who finds himself caring for children who aren't his own and longing for a child who, ultimately, isn't even biologically his.
In contemporary narratives, the desire for motherhood often finds space, while that for fatherhood remains more in the shadows. My family history instead, he chooses to also tell this need, with delicacy and depth.
«"Giving love to a being who doesn't yet exist, who is just emerging, I think is the greatest act of love. Demetrio isn't simply a man who wants a child. He's someone who has so much love to give and who, for various reasons, hasn't yet fully expressed it."»
The all-round actor
Before Demetrio, Antonio Gargiulo built his career with the perseverance of someone who knows the phone doesn't always ring. Years of theater and training alongside figures such as Toni Servillo, Danio Manfredini, and Serena Sinigaglia, then television with Maurizio Crozza, learning that even a small gesture can say a lot about a character.
This winter Antonio wrote an autobiographical monologue, My name is Anthony, directed together with Alessandro Brucioni, which tells of a period of crisis, the end of a relationship, a trip to Italy, the neighbors in Milan, the memories of Naples. A space shared between him and the audience, without any separation between the stalls and the stage, with improvisation as its driving force.
The monologue will debut in Livorno at the end of September and, who knows, maybe sooner or later it will reach overseas. "You always have to dream. There are no limits to that, and it doesn't cost anything."«
That same idea of theater as a meeting place also emerges from the projects he carries out off-set. Among these is Generation Discomfort, an artistic collective founded to explore the contradictions of contemporary life with irony and intelligence. Antonio describes this experience as a space for research and sharing, where theater becomes a tool for questioning the present and building community, a far cry from the idea of an artist locked in his own world.
Even more than his talent, Antonio Gargiulo impresses with his openness to discussion. He speaks of his profession with gratitude, his successes with moderation, and his sacrifices with rare sincerity. He doesn't chase shortcuts, but continues to build his career one step at a time, with the conviction that every experience has value. Perhaps this is also why Demetrio has struck such a chord with audiences, because behind that character is an actor who truly believes in kindness, listening, and the ability to portray human beings, even before they are protagonists.
And looking at the progress made so far, it's hard not to think that this is only the first chapter of a story yet to be written.
