Stanley Tucci & Documentarian David Modigliani Set ‘Pack One Bag’ Podcast With Lemonada, Plot Scripted TV Remake

Peter White
·3-min read

EXCLUSIVE: Pack One Bag is a new podcast documentary series that tells the story of two Italians married on the run escaping Mussolini’s “Racial Laws,” and the story of the family they left behind, fighting to survive the Nazi occupation of Rome.

It comes from documentarian David Modigliani, who was behind HBO’s Running with Beto, who is the grandson of the pair, and Stanley Tucci who lends his voice to the story and exec produces.

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The ten-part series is distributed by Lemonada Media, the company that recently struck a major podcast deal with Meghan Markle, as revealed by Deadline. It premieres on June 5.

Tucci is also developing a scripted television adaptation with Modigliani.

Modigliani’s grandfather, Italian-born economist Franco Modigliani, won the Nobel Prize in 1985. But, behind the love story that made his victory possible – a fairytale escape from Fascist Italy with his soon-to-be-bride Serena and her family –  lies a much darker reality: a brother left behind to face the Nazis and shocking personal connections to Benito Mussolini.

Carrying the love letters of his grandparents, David returns to Italy to discover his family’s war experience through the voices of cousins who survived the Nazi occupation as young children, and to reconcile surprising truths about his grandparents’ story through conversations with those who knew them best, including one of Franco’s students – former Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi. Modigliani draws on his personal memories of his late grandparents and documents from family archives – 19 boxes containing letters, personal diaries and Fascist spy documents – to create a sound-rich narrative that spans two continents and nine decades. Along the way, a present-day love story on the run develops as David seeks an answer to the question: if Fascism takes over your country, do you stay or do you flee?

Developed independently by Modigliani and Eric Spiegelman under Modigliani’s Live Action Projects banner, Pack One Bag is produced in association with Gilded Audio.

The first episode of the podcast launched at the Tribeca Festival in 2023 under its previous working title Shalom, Amore and won the Jury Award for Nonfiction Audio.

David Modigliani said, “From the shocking discoveries we made on the ground in Italy to my own adventure reconnecting a family split apart by war, I knew this story wanted to come alive through the ears. I couldn’t imagine better partners for my first audio project than the great Stanley Tucci, our brilliant producers at Gilded Audio, and our launchpad partners at Lemonada, whose shows resonate so deeply with me – and with audiences around the world.”

“The timing couldn’t be better to be exploring what happens to individuals when fascism rises. Pack One Bag is touching, beautifully produced and driven by a story that weaves a rich history artfully into the moment,” added Lemonada’s CEO Jessica Cordova Kramer. “We are honored to be a small part of bringing it into the world.”

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