The former San Firenze courthouse is about to be converted into the city’s long-awaited film museum and school championed by Oscar-nominated Florentine director Franco Zeffirelli.
Former San Firenze courthouse from the outside
According to local newspaper Corriere Fiorentino, the metal detectors and cells of the ex-tribunal, located between piazza Signoria and Santa Croce, have been removed. Light restructuring work is now underway.
The plan is to open the museum in June, with the school launching in September, training set and costume designers and all those seeking a career in the film and theatre world.
Pippo Zeffirelli is in charge of the project, adopted son and manager of the 93-year-old director, whose successes include Shakespeare film adaptations Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet and The Taming of the Shrew, as well as opera productions for the New York Metropolitan.
Franco Zeffirelli, Academy Award nominee for his direction of 1968 film adaptation of Romeo and Juliet
The museum will display more than 400 sketches, opera set design models, paintings and statues created over the years by Zeffirelli, in addition to a 1972 short film about Dante’s Inferno starring Dustin Hoffman that the director never released.
