The granddaughter of fascist dictator Benito Mussolini has won this year’s edition of Italy’s Celebrity Big Brother.
Former actress, singer, MP and talk-show crusader Alessandra Mussolini, 63, won 56% of the public vote on Tuesday night.
The country appeared to take her ‘bossy, over the top, irresistible, strong-willed and light-hearted’ attitude, as Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera described it, well.
She said that no one in her life encouraged her to take part in the reality TV show: ‘Everyone told me not to do Big Brother. But every time people tell me “don’t do it, don’t do it, don’t do it,” I instantly think: “I’ll do it now.”
‘I was spurred on by all this scepticism.’
Her success on the show is the latest win in a long career that hasn’t been hurt by her surname.
Her grandfather was infamous for allying with Hitler in the so-called Pact of Steel in 1939, banning Jewish people from public life and tearing up democracy in Italy during his terrible reign that only ended after he was lynched in 1945.
Alessandra has publicly aligned herself with his views, once infamously saying she was ‘fascist and proud of it’.
Former actress, singer, MP and talk-show crusader Alessandra Mussolini (pictured, centre) won the show on Tuesday night
She managed to capture 56% of the public vote on Tuesday night
The terrible reign of Benito Mussolini (pictured) only ended after he was lynched in 1945
She entered politics with the neo-fascist Italian Social Movement party, which also launched now-prime minister Giorgia Meloni.
While with the Italian Social Movement, she won a significant portion of the vote in the 1993 race for the mayorship of Naples, though did not win.
In 2020, she took part in the fifteenth season of Italy’s version of Strictly Come Dancing, and later appeared on The Masked Singer.
In 2019, Alessandra attacked comedian Jim Carrey for tweeting a drawing of the dead bodies of Italy’s wartime fascist leader and his mistress.
She branded him a ‘b*****d’ for drawing a sketch of her grandfather and his lover hanging upside down from a rafter.
Carrey’s art is based on the real life deaths of Mussolini and his mistress Petacci who were captured by communist partisan fighters and executed by firing squad on April 28, 1945.
Following their deaths, the bodies of Mussolini, Petacci, and other fascists were hung upside down in front of a gas station in Milan’s Piazzale Loreto as a large crowd vented their anger.
The Canadian-American actor, whose drawings have been harshly critical of Trump, expressed his views on fascism by sharing the drawing with the caption: ‘If you’re wondering what fascism leads to, just ask Benito Mussolini and his mistress Claretta.’
His tweet was slammed by Ms Mussolini who replied to Carrey’s sketch, writing: ‘You are a b*****d.’
