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Entertainment Overview

As the famous Italian film director Federico Fellini showed us over and over again, Roman nightlife has been setting trends since time immemorial -- and being a native son, he would know. Fellini Satyricon focused on those Lucullan all-night banquets (and some more naughty entertainments) of the days of the emperors; La Dolce Vita immortalized the nightclubs and paparazzi of the city's Hollywood-on-the-Tiber era. Many people, however, know that Rome, the city, is entertainment enough. It's piazzas, fountains, and delicately colored palazzi make impressive backdrops for the living theater of the vivacious city, with a fortissimo of motor vehicles. It has learned to make the most of its spectacular cityscape, transforming its most beautiful places into settings for the performing arts, outdoors in summer and in splendid palaces and churches in winter. When performances are held at such locations as Villa Celimontana, Piazza Trinità dei Monti, the Baths of Caracalla, or the church of Sant'Ignazio, the venue often steals the show. Of all the performing arts, music is what Rome does best to entertain people until the wee hours, whether it be opera or jazz or disco. Theater, and especially the cinema, is a big draw, particularly for Italian-language speakers. But the way most Romans (and visitors) spend an enjoyable evening is late-night café-sitting in a trendy or traditional spot, in gorgeous piazzas, watching the colorful crowds parade by -- it's great fun, even if you don't speak the language. Little wonder Fellini made people-watching into an art form in his famous films.

La Dolce Vita notwithstanding, Rome's nightlife is decidedly more lively for locals and "insiders" who know whose palms to grease and when to go where. Still, discos, live-music spots, and late-night bars do exist for denizens and tourists alike. The "in" places, especially the discos, change like the flavor of the month and may fade into oblivion after a brief season of popularity. The best sources for an up-to-date list of late-night spots and of who's playing what at the music clubs are the weekly entertainment guides, roma c'è and Trovaroma. If you'd prefer to see where the night takes you, hubs of after-dark activity are the area between Piazza Navona and the Pantheon, the Campo de' Fiori, Trastevere, and Testaccio. The Spanish Steps are strictly for tourists.

Now that smoking has been banned in all public indoor areas in Italy (that's right, it's actually happened), Roman aversion to clean air has initiated a thinning of crowds in bars and clubs. Still, Romans love to "fare un salotto nella strada" (that is, to turn the street into one's living room), and warmer weather brings hibernating smokers -- and crowds of garrulous Romans in general -- back into the streets, piazzas, and the locales that line them. In summer, many bars and discos close to beat the heat (although some simply relocate to the beach, where many Romans spend their summer nights). The city-sponsored Estate Romana (Roman summer) festival takes over, lighting up hot city nights with concerts, bars, and discos, all in the open air. The summer of 2004 saw the return to the Roman Holiday days of dancing and drinking along the Tiber River, with bars and open-air markets selling everything from sarongs to mojitos, under the stars.