1 January. Last airing of Carosello (Carousel), the advertising program broadcast by RAI every evening since 1957. The final show is a dancing and singing exhibition by Raffaella Carrà, sponsored by Fernet Stock. Despite the popularity of Carosello, its formula (mini-films and cartoons, about two minutes long) is considered obsolete by the advertising agencies, which by now prefer the spots, as they are shorter (thirty seconds) and more effective.[1]
20 January. The socialist Paolo Grassi, former director of Piccolo Teatro and La Scala, is nominated as the new RAI president. Under his leadership, the company enjoys for three years a freedom from political authorities. The experiment would never be repeated.[2]
1 February. RAI begins, after six months of experimentation, the official broadcastings in color. The first shows aired, on RAI 1, are the television filmThe suicide club, of the series Mystery and Imagination, and an ABBA concert. The next day, RAI 2 airs the first film in color, The Arrangement. Followed by the turn of the first TV journal (21 February) and of the first RAI fiction (The fatal eggs, 27 February, see below). However, the complete switch-off of black and white will need two years. In a time of deep economic crisis, the color sets are above the means of many Italian families.[3]
22 April. Fifteen years after the Canzonissima scandal, Dario Fo and Franca Rame come back in RAI with an anthology of their most famous pieces. The first play, Mistero Buffo, arouses the protests of the Vatican and a complaint for contempt of religion. Nonetheless, the cycle goes on regularly and without censures.[4]
3 June. Emilio Rossi, director of TG1, is shot in the legs by the Red Brigades.[2]
Private channels.
In Italy, 256 private channels are registered, but only 80 are really active; they are reunited in two organizations, the National Consortium of Free TV and the catholic FIEL.
17 April. In Abruzzo, Teleadriatica is the first Italian private channel to broadcast live a football match (the regional derby Pescara-Sanbenedettese, shoot from the balcony of a private house). The next week, the Lega Nazionale Professionisti authorizes Teleadriatica to air a synthesis of the Pescara's matches.[5]
2 May. In Milan, Antenna Nord, owned by the right-wing editor Edilio Rusconi, begins to broadcast. Rusconi, proprietary of other TV channels in Rome, Florence and Veneto, is, by now, the most potent tycoon of the Italian private television.[6]
21 October. Tele Torino International airs Let's strip together ("Spogliamoci insieme"), a sexy quiz with strip-teases performed by amateurish housewives; the program gets wide resonance on the press, also outside Italy, and is largely imitated by other local televisions. The Turin channel is known for another trash show, Tomorrow we die, with surgeries executed on air.[7]
Portobello – with Enzo Tortora, who comes back in RAI after eight years of "exile" for contrasts with the company. In Portobello, as in an ideal street market, collectors or sellers, eccentric inventors, lonely hearts, people looking for lost friends, are put in contact with the public at home that intervenes by phone; mascot of the show is a mute parrot, become proverbial. The show, also if often accused of sentimentalism, is for years one of the most loved by the Italian public, till the Tortora's judiciary troubles, and then his death, cause his suspension.[8]
Apriti, sabato (Saturday, open) – talk show on Saturday afternoon, hosted by Paolo Frajese.
Buonasera con... (Good evening with) – show for children, including cartoons and sitcoms; it introduces in Italy the mecha cartoons.
Discoring – musical show, ideated and hosted, in the first editions, by Gianni Boncompagni; it's, till to Eighties, the most popular TV show of it its kind.[9]
Piccolo slam(Little slam) – musical show, aimed to the young public, with Stefania Rotolo and Sammy Bardot; 2 seasons. The program introduces the disco music in the Italian television; among the special guests, there is also a young Jodie Foster in a dancing performance.[10]
Gioco città (City game) – show for children, with Claudio Sorrentino and the Miracles Alley Cats.
Non stop – by Enzo Trapani. The show is innovative for the absence of a presenter, the fast pace and the use of the color; it reveals many young comic actors as Carlo Verdone and groups as The grimace (with a debuting Massimo Troisi), The Miracle Alley cats and The Giancattivi (with Francesco Nuti).[11]
News and educational
Check-up – medicine magazine.
Spazio libero (Free space) – "access programs" broadcast by RAI but autonomously produced by cultural, political or religious associations.
Sereno variabile (Serene Variable) – travel magazine, again on air in 2019; entered in the Guinness World Records because hosted for 42 years by the same person, Osvaldo Bevilacqua.[12]
Serials
In 1977, RAI increases considerably the importation of American serials. Columbo and Happy Days get an immediate success, but the hit of the year is Fury; the "Western horse" becomes the Italian children's favorite, also if his adventures are in black and white and twenty years old.
Foreign and private channels
Montecarlo sera (Montecarlo evening) – news magazine on Telemontecarlo.
Quelli della girandola (The Catherine wheel people) – tutorial show on RSI
Superclassifica show (Super hit parade show) – musical show on Telemilano, care of the magazine TV Sorrisi e canzoni and hosted by Maurizio Seymandi; migrated on Canale 5, it becomes one of the most popular show of the Fininvest network and goes on till 2001.[13]
Jesus of Nazareth – by Franco Zeffirelli, with Robert Powell in the title role and a stellar cast, in five episodes. On Italy, it's the event of the year and the first great success of the TV in colors, getting also 28 million viewers for episode. It's acclaimed by the Church and by the general public while the critics generally consider it a spectacular but stereotyped work, without any deep spirituality.[15]
Il passatore (The smuggler), by Pietro Nelli, with Luigi Diberti in the title role, script by Tonino Guerra, in three episodes; the true story of a brigand in the nineteenth-century Romagna.
Un anno di scuola (A school year) – by Franco Giraldi, from a Giani Stuparich's tale; two episodes. In Trieste, at the eve of the First World War, the story of a non-conformist girl, the only female student of her class.
Una donna (A woman) – by Gianni Bongioanni, with Giuliana De Sio (in her first starring role), from the Sibilla Aleramo's autobiographic novel, in six episodes; at the beginning of the century, a woman fights for freedom by an oppressive marriage. It's the first RAI fiction with an explicitly feministic message.[16]
Non ho tempo (I don’t have time) –by Ansanio Giannarelli, with Fabio Gamba as Evariste Galois; the director applies to the TV biopic the Brecht’s technique of the distancing effect.[19]
Il nero muove (Black moves) – by Gianni Serra, in two episodes; about the right-wing terrorism.
Gli occhi del drago (The dragon's eyes) – by Piero Schivazappa, in two episodes; a Japanese motorcycle leads its owners to madness.
Traffico d'armi nel golfo (Arms traffic in the Gulf) – by Leonardo Cortese, with Giancarlo Zanetti and Lorenza Guerrieri, from Francis Durbridge's The World of Tim Frazer; it ends the long row of Italian adaptations from the English mystery writer.[20]
Saturnino Farandola – by Raffaele Meloni, with Mariano Rigillo, in thirteen episodes, from Albert Robida's Saturnin Farandoul, parody of the Jules Verne's novels.
L'amico della notte (The friend of the night) – musical show with Gigliola Cinquetti.
Auditorio A (Auditorium A) – musical show; it reveals to the wide public the singers of the "New Naples sound", as Pino Daniele.[21]
Bambole, non c'è una lira (Dolls, there is not a lira) – by Antonello Falqui, with Pippo Franco, Christian De Sica and Isabella Biagini; the story of Italy from 1935 to 1960, through the performances of a down-at-heel avanspettacolo company.[22]
Noi no (We not) – by Romolo Siena, with Raimondo Vianello and Sandra Mondaini; the Sandra's show (a traditional variety, in color) is constantly alternated to the Raimondo's one (a parody of the intellectualistic cabaret, in black and white).[23]
Quantunque io (Notwithstanding I) – satiric show by Romolo Siena, with Enrico Montesano; the Roman comedian, beyond to perform some irreverent impersonation of politicians, creates here his most famous character, the "romantic Englishwoman", naively enthusiast of Italy. It's the first RAI variety aired in colors.[24]
Rita ed io (Rita and me) – by Eros Macchi, with Rita Pavone.
Scuola serale per aspiranti italiani (Evening school for aspirant Italians) – satire of custom by Enzo Trapani.
La forza della democrazia (The power of democracy) – enquiry in three episodes, by Corrado Stajano and Marco Fini, about the Piazza Fontana bombing and the strategy of tension.[26]
Si dice donna (You say woman) – enquiry by Tilde Capomazza about female condition in Italy.[27]
Il petrolio e la vita nuova (Petrolium and the new life) – in four episodes, by Alberto Moravia and Goffredo Parise, reportage about the Persian Gulf states.
La Scala e i suoi protagonisti (La Scala and its protagonists) - in six episodes, by Dora Ossenska.[28]
Match, domande incrociate (Match, crossed questions) – talk-show hosted by Alberto Arbasino, with two adversaries, working in the same field (journalists, directors, writers) but by opposite ideas or divided by a generation gap; the debates are sometimes friendly, other times on the verge of the brawl.[30]
Proibito (Forbidden) – by Enzo Biagi, who questions his guests about by then thorny matters, as the tax evasion and the eroticism.[31]
Viaggio in seconda classe (Travel in economic class) – by Nanni Loy. Fourteen years after Specchio segreto, the director goes back to the candid camera, but now with a more accentuated sociologic purpose (to study the Italians as appear in the popular trains.)[32]
