Big Brother, from the late-night appendix to the first cast members to the (still missing) commentator: all the latest news. Behind the scenes

Pippo Baudo, who loved it dearly, invented the DopoFestival (After Festival), to enormously extend his Sanremo Festival, even beyond the confines and times of the Ariston Theatre. Then other hosts decided to focus all their resources on the Festival itself. This was the case until Amadeus, who eventually handed over the duties to his friend Fiorello.

Well, Simona Ventura , who has seized the great television opportunity that's about to come her way—hosting Big Brother—has reportedly also decided to follow in Pippo Baudo's footsteps, probably without having the same shoe size as the great host who passed away last August. The idea was to organize a sort of " After Big Brother " program, discussing the recently concluded episode, which would air late into the night, with a regular commentator, a TV blogger.

However, it seems that this idea was quickly scrapped, perhaps for purely economic reasons, and that ultimately, Simona Ventura's Big Brother will remain more or less on the same time schedule as its predecessors. Big Brother, as we've informed you, will have a panel of commentators in the studio made up of former contestants of the famous reality show, namely Cristina Plevani, Floriana Secondi, and Ascanio Pacelli. Perhaps with some additional guests.

As for the commentator, Sonia Bruganelli and Selvaggia Lucarelli have vanished in the last few hours. There's even talk of no commentator at all, though that seems unlikely. As for the cast, Ventura announced the first contestant: Matteo Azzali: 47, from Parma. Profession: professional boxer. Former rugby player. He's not exactly an unknown, having a massive following on social media and having already appeared on TV, albeit only as a relative of a contestant on "Isola dei Famosi," Giacobbe Fragomeni. Well, what can I say? With social media, no one is unknown these days, and unknowns are perhaps only found in nurseries. So, naturally, it's likely that unknown rare birds will be hard to find in the cast of this "new" Big Brother.