Lady Gaga portrays a fictionalized version of Patrizia Reggiani in the new film ‘House of Gucci.’ But what is the real Reggiani up to now?
TV & Movies Reggiani served her time, but is now living in Milan — and she has plenty of thoughts about her portrayal in the new film. With the release of Ridley Scott’s House of Gucci, Patrizia Reggiani is again at the forefront of the public’s mind. The film centers around Reggiani’s (Lady Gaga) relationship with her onetime husband, Maurizio Gucci — and the true story is just as wild as the movie makes it seem. Reggiani first met Gucci at a debutante party in November 1970, and he would later say it was “love at first sight.” However, others in the family weren’t as taken with Reggiani; as stated in Sara Gay Forden’s 2000 book House of Gucci (on which Scott’s film is based), patriarch Rodolfo Gucci described her as a “social climber who has nothing in mind but money.” Despite the Gucci family’s misgivings, Reggiani and Gucci married in 1972 and had two daughters before divorcing in 1985. Apparently, Gucci simply told Reggiani that he was going on a business trip to Florence, and never returned; the day after he left for his “trip,” he had a friend tell Reggiani the marriage was over. Then, on Mar.27,1995, Gucci was shot outside of his office in Milan. In 1998, Reggiani was convicted of having him murdered, and sentenced to 26 years in prison. However, she maintained her innocence throughout the trial, saying her personal psychic, Giuseppina Auriemma, set her up. (Auriemma was ultimately sentenced to 25 years in prison, as she allegedly hired the hitman to kill Gucci, on Reggiani’s orders. According to a 2016 profile of Reggiani in The Guardian, a reporter once asked her why she hired a hitman instead of killing Gucci herself. Her response? “My eyesight is not so good. I didn’t want to miss.”) Reggiani spent 18 years in San Vittore prison before being released in 2016, and to this day, maintains her innocence.
