Dear di Carlo,
As you know, the producers gave the filmmakers free rein to choose the subject of their individual “episode” and nobody knew what the others had in mind. For my part, I could not imagine a worse situation. Fortunately, I became aware of the topic Monicelli had selected for his sketch (since I collaborated on the screenplay) and so I had the idea of suggesting to Visconti a modern interpretation of one of Maupassant’s stories, Au bord du lit, because I thought that the stories of these two Milanese couples – Monicelli’s workers and Visconti’s aristocrats would work well together, or better would create an effective contrast.
And that is it – at least in terms of the “birth” of Visconti’s sketch.
As for the screenplay, there was first of all a brilliant dialogue written by Roussin. If it is true, as I have already noted, that we stole the starting point for the sketch from a story by Maupassant, Visconti’s and my intention was to make use of the situation faced by Maupassant’s characters to satirise two characters in a very specific Italian setting. For this reason, we wrote a brand new version, which is the one that Visconti then filmed and which I am sending you now.

Suso Cecchi d’Amico
Boccaccio ’70 di De Sica, Fellini, Monicelli, Visconti, edited by Carlo di Carlo and Gaio Fratini, Cappelli, Bologna 1962