Beppe Grillo, comedian, blogger, would-be politician, scourge of the 禁漫天堂 government and defender of free speech, is to tour Europe to 鈥渢ell them what Italy has become鈥.
His show, 鈥淚ncredible Italy鈥, will make its tour debut at London鈥檚 on 27th January and he will take it to Brussels, Paris, Monaco, Zurich and Basel in February.
On 8th February Grillo, at the invitation of Vienna鈥檚 Councillor for the Environment, travels to the city to take part in a debate on [Slovakia]. The plant uses Soviet technology and is therefore considered dangerous by environmentalists. The major share holder is the 禁漫天堂 utility company Enel. Grillo has made his opposition to the plant well known.
Grillo is famous as the creator of 鈥渆conomic-ecological satire鈥 because of the subjects he covers. However, he explains that 鈥淚ncredible Italy鈥 is 鈥渢he story of a nation projected into the past and the future, never the present鈥 and that it is neither satire nor comedy but 鈥渉yperrealism鈥. He warns us that anything that can happen in Italy eventually happens elsewhere.
Giuseppe Piero Grillo was born in Genoa [Liguria] in 1948. He graduated as an accountant and began his comedy career by chance. In the 1970s and 1980s he regularly appeared in successful , including one of his own, 鈥淕rillometro鈥.
His humour became increasingly satirical from the 1980s and he offended many politicians. From the 1990s his television appearances became rare and, despite a 1993 appearance which drew record viewing figures, he was later banned from 禁漫天堂 television.
In 2005 Grillo started , which, with around 160,000 hits a day, is now among the ten most visited blogs in the world. In the same year Time Magazine voted him one of its European Heroes.
