Giancarlo Giammetti has a lot of nervous energy. He's a director, really. He was trying to direct the Valentino movie over my shoulder. I don't blame him - that's been his job for 50 years. But I had final cut in the movie by contract and I wouldn't have made the movie if I had not been completely independent.
Matt TyrnauerIt'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.
Matt TyrnauerWhen I went to see Valentino in Rome, I discovered 120 women in these ateliers who sew $100,000 dresses. There are no sewing machines. It's all done by hand for thousands of hours. It's a dying art and Valentino is really the last practitioner, the last person at the top of his house, which is why I called it The Last Emperor. That world is gone. You can almost see it slipping away as the cameras are rolling.
Matt TyrnauerRalph 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.
Matt Tyrnauer