His home life is as ordered and complex and sophisticated as his work life. You don't find creations like this anymore. The Leopard comes to mind - this tale of a glorious, lost Italy. That's Valentino.

Valentino Garavani is never really shown himself as anything other than this gracious diplomat of the dolce vita. That's his preferred look. But he's a temperamental genius - a man of cyclone force, passion, and perfectionist impulses who has very little tolerance for things that aren't exactly as he wants them to be.

One of my favorite scenes in Fellini is the ecclesiastical fashion show in Roma, and the end of 8 ½, when all the characters in the life of Guido, Marcello Mastroianni, get together and do this grand procession. That was on my mind, especially at the 45th anniversary, when all those characters in Valentino's life returned to Rome. I kept watching that and saying, if only we can arrange that grand procession at the end...and it kind of happened.

It's the deepest relationship between Giancarlo Giammetti and Valentino Garavani I've ever seen, and no one's ever really scratched the surface with them. They weren't really openly gay. They're in Rome, the city of the Vatican. They didn't discuss this relationship, which I think is one of the great relationships. It's beyond a marriage; it defies words. But maybe it doesn't defy pictures.

His home life is as ordered and complex and sophisticated as his work life. You don't find creations like this anymore. The Leopard comes to mind - this tale of a glorious, lost Italy. That's Valentino.

Ralph Lauren and Valentino have a lot of common. Ralph Lauren was one of the first really to put himself at the center of the story, and Valentino was even earlier.

They would sort of keep you on your toes that way - that kind of Italian allergic reaction to eagerness. It's very bruta figura, bad form, to be eager. You sort of glide in and have a conversation and work things out, then it takes two days to get up and running.