Quartet Records, in collaboration with Beat Records and Liuto Edizioni Musicali, presents world premiere release of the catchy, infectious score by Piero Umiliani for the successful Spanish-Italian comedy Due Ragazzi da Marciapiede, directed by Ramón Fernández in 1969, and starring Alfredo Landa, Jean Sorel and Ira von Fürstenberg.
The film is about Dr. Andréu, who runs a gynecological practice in a provincial town without any success because he’s too handsome for the husbands of his patients. Meanwhile, his neighbor Antón, a dressmaker who pretends to be gay, succeeds because the parents and husbands of his customers do not object to him seeing them in their underwear. The doctor goes to Madrid to attend a conference, and his colleagues take him to a cabaret. There he is amazed to see how Antón displays his hidden Celtiberian masculinity. The dressmaker confesses: he pretends to be what he is not in order to outwit the backwards society in which they live. In this environment, the two men’s friendship is misinterpreted as a sexual relationship, creating a confusing situation for which the doctor’s girlfriend and the dressmaker’s wife appear to find a solution.
Piero Umiliani provided a memorable comedy score, with a theme typical of the composer (Oh che bella festa!) subjected to several variations, flirting with bossa nova, beat, swing, soft jazz and samba. Both the climate of extreme sensuality and the conflicts generated by the various misunderstandings of the film found a good ally in Umiliani’s score.
Four cues were released on an EP in 1970 by Umiliani’s own label, Omicron. The complete score has been made possible thanks to the cooperation of the Umiliani family who found the original tapes—mislabeled with the wrong title—with the complete score in mint condition and beautiful stereo. Mastered by Chris Malone and supervised by Claudio Fuiano, the package included a 12-page booklet with liner notes by Spanish cinema specialist and documentarist Juan Sánchez.
