In My Brilliant Friend, there’s no such thing as leaving. The third season of this graceful, sumptuously shot HBO drama, subtitled “Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay” after the wildly popular Elena Ferrante novel, takes place mostly in 1970s Florence. It’s where Lenù lives with her husband, Pietro, and two daughters, having finally broken free from the cloistered Naples neighbourhood where she grew up. In her mind, she hasn’t just escaped the prying eyes of her family; she’s rejected their old-fashioned Catholic mores. How else can a season that starts with the promise of a wedding end with the diffused misery of a double affair?
In last week’s finale, Lenù (Margherita Mazzucco) leaves Pietro for Nino (Francesco Serpico), her floppy-haired childhood friend from Naples. She does it definitively, theatrically, even symbolically. The lovers board a plane to France with small, thrilled smiles – excited, if not by the ending of their respective marriages, then at least by how powerful it feels to find themselves on the other side of a colossal decision. A sense of momentum carries them to their seats. Now it’s the plane’s job to finish what they have begun – to put physical space between the couple and their old, pale lives.
