Italian cuisine as told by Stanley Tucci has only one flaw: it's too perfect

Stanley Tucci is back in Italy. But it’s no longer (just) the land of grandmothers kneading dough and villages made for scrolling through on Instagram. This is the Italy of vertical farms, major entrepreneurs, and contemporary restaurateurs who choose work-life balance over relentless business. In this new series — well shot, well paced, aesthetically flawless — food becomes a lever to tell the story of a nation that innovates. Yet, the narrative still clings to a different kind of cliché.
The Tucci 2.0 is no longer content with homemade pasta. He looks for the stories behind the products, the supply chains, the visionary gestures. He visits workshops, slaughterhouses, mines, dairies. He talks about industry, environmental impact, integration, even civil rights. And yet, even here, everything often remains wrapped in a soft glow. The spaces are always beautiful, the people always kind, the dishes always successful. The “everyday heroes” are chosen with the same eye used to select a film set. Truly popular, uncomfortable, or contradictory places — those where Italy’s complexity explodes — almost never make it on screen. There’s no mess, no surprise.

Italian cuisine according to Tucci: always perfect

Stanley Tucci in Sicily during production of National Geographic’s “Tucci in Italy” series. (National Geographic/Matt Holyoak)

And then there’s him, Stanley. Tasting every dish with the wonder of the first bite. Whispering “unbelievable” even in front of a salad. Finding something “incredible” in a risotto at an Autogrill. It’s his way — polite, enthusiastic, always grateful — and it’s part of his charm. But has there ever been a dish that didn’t convince him? A story that left him with questions? Has he ever wondered if behind the Italy he celebrates, there’s also the one of sold-out historic centres, tourist trap restaurants, and chefs cooking without knowing for whom anymore? We can’t know.
Over time, though, this seamless enthusiasm ends up ironing out any ambiguity in the story. There’s no room for error, or for the lukewarm. Only excellence, only certainty. And an Italy where everything is delicious, everything is moving, everything is “amazing”… simply doesn’t exist. Tucci in Italy aims higher than the first series, but still stays firmly within the boundaries of the narrative everyone loves. A narrative that prefers to move only among excellence, vision, stories to celebrate. More than an investigation into the Italy of food, it feels like a collection of case studies for a Made in Italy conference. For those in search of a real, imperfect, even contradictory Italy, the journey lies elsewhere.