“They took everything from me. I am desperate but still happy to be alive.” Morgan opens up in the podcast One More Time and talks about everything with Luca Casadei, including his father’s suicide, the end of his love with Asia Argento, his experience on X Factor, the summer scandal, and his new project.
The video opens with the backstage. Marco Castoldi, his real name, jokes, plays ping pong, and starts a push-up challenge. He’s a real whirlwind. Then the colors shift to black and white, and the conversation quiets down, delving deeper.
Born an Artist
Morgan flips through his childhood memory album, showing that he’s always been an artist: “My parents would invite friends over. At 5 years old, my sister, a year older, and I would go to bed. At midnight or one, while they were talking and laughing, I would get up and go to the living room. I would put on a show, three or four pieces of Elvis or Bob Marley that I knew how to sing and dance. Then I’d go back to bed.” What drove him to do this since he was a child? “I sought applause, it’s the need to be loved. All artists are histrionic. Performing is putting oneself on stage. Then it becomes a job, an art, a profession, and a wonderful science.”
The Parents
Marco Castoldi’s mom and dad represented the Yin and Yang of his childhood. “My dad was very affectionate but more silent, mom was more rational and dialogued – he recalls – my father was a bit of a ‘mom’. He would hug us and give us the bottle because my mom didn’t breastfeed. My mother was always a bit unaffectionate but very formative. She was an elementary school teacher and so she also took care of other children who came to our house in the afternoon for tutoring.”
The Father’s Suicide
However, his father soon began to show signs of something amiss: “He filled us with love but was a bit moody and a bit depressed, although at the time it wasn’t called that. He would go to the psychologist with my mother but she took the medication.” His taciturn nature made him carry a heavy burden. Morgan recounts: “He had a collapse. He didn’t speak, didn’t vent. In the family, I was the only one who knew his problems because he took me to work.” Here’s what young Marco saw: “He had this business, a carpentry, that was failing. He had fewer and fewer workers until there was only one left who was mute. The phone never rang. He waited all day and smoked 200 cigarettes.” A sweet childhood memory in a very delicate moment: “I asked the worker, who was his 90-year-old cousin, to teach me how to make furniture, and I made some small ones.” As a son, he always tried to protect his father Mario: “I knew he had financial problems. He had borrowed money from loan sharks, who then persecuted him, but he didn’t want to say it. Mom didn’t know anything yet, and I made sure the charade continued. I played piano bars, came home at 5 in the morning, and brought in 4-5 million lire a month, giving it to him. We pretended he earned it, and I supported my family.” But one day, his father could no longer bear the situation: “At 46, he took his life; I was 15. That night he came to give me 100,000 lire to say, ‘At least you won’t think I never gave it back to you.’ I didn’t understand, I went back to sleep. I didn’t realize that would be the last time I would see him. I would have turned on the light and hugged him tight.” He expands the reflection to the theme of life: “What leads to suicide and what leads to murder? These are the most important things in life.”
The Joy of Living
Morgan asserts the happiness of living, even in the face of what he has experienced in recent months: “I am happy even when I am desperate. I am in pain, treated poorly, I really struggle with everyday material things like financial availability or the loyalty and respect of those who write about me in newspapers.” The artist indicates he suffers from public opinion: “My goodness, how mean. How much those things hurt me. They canceled all my work. I haven’t worked since June. People should shoot themselves in my situation, yet I can tell you that I am happy to be alive. I have done like the bear, collecting music as fat to face dark times.”
The Accusations
When accused of stalking and threats by his ex Angelica Schiatti, a domino effect occurred: “The scandal this summer caused me a defamatory catastrophe and a drop in reputation. They canceled my concerts; I was supposed to do a show on Rai, but they didn’t even call me anymore. Total collapse.” However, he specifies that he is innocent: “Everything that has been said is false. I have reported it, but unfortunately, people got scared. But these are crimes I didn’t commit. Talking about revenge porn is very serious. These are defamations.” How did he react to these difficulties? “It’s tough because I have a family to support. The brilliant idea I thought of was to play. I am happy because now I know how to play Ravel. I didn’t leave the house all summer, without a friend or someone asking, ‘How is Morgan?’ My daughter and my partner went on vacation; I stayed to live my hallucinating situation.”
X Factor
“I don’t want to be changed by what I don’t like.” Morgan states, drawing a thread of connection through his successes: “My beauty is spontaneity but also extemporaneity, invention, improvisation. I am not willing to give up.” This is how he faced the X Factor machine as a judge: “Doing live television is an incredibly difficult art. You have to have things to say, respect the timing, and be interesting. You have to get applause. Almost no one is capable of doing this because it’s the hardest thing in the world live in front of 8 million people.” A reflection also on relationships with others: “I trust, I have no reason not to. But when you get burned, what do you do next time? You close up, protect yourself, become colder.”
The Love with Asia Argento
It’s harder when he talks about Asia Argento: “She ruined my life. I gave everything of myself, and she kicked me.” The reason, according to him? “She couldn’t handle the idea of being with someone. She can’t handle relationships in general. Yes, there might be my part, but there are four legs here.” Sweet words for their relationship: “With her, I could share many artistic things, and this created a beautiful all-encompassing bond that was friendship, complicity, artistic collaboration. For me, she was home. I also felt understood, I felt like entertaining her. Looking into her eyes, I saw myself as beautiful. For me, it was forced to leave that dimension because I wasn’t the one who wanted to leave, but she did.” The separation was experienced like a mourning, so much so that he didn’t want to sleep in that bed anymore: “That was the marriage bed. And because it made me sad. What despair. It really made me want to cry.”
The New Project
Morgan announces a project he wants to realize in Milan: “My school will come to fruition. I will do everything physically, teaching how to make songs. In this auditorium on the Navigli, lessons are held every Sunday for a month. There are four subjects: harmony, lyrics, production, arrangement. You go home knowing how to make songs.”
Drugs
Morgan also talks about his relationship with drugs: “It anesthetized me. It helped me not to live the void and not suffer anymore. But the real drug is music. If you take that away from me, I die.”
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