[00:00:00] Announcer: Due to the themes of this podcast, listener discretion is advised. Lock your doors. Close the blinds. Change your passwords. This is Secrets and Spies. Secrets and Spies is a podcast that dives into the world of espionage, terrorism, geopolitics, and intrigue. This episode is presented by Matt Fulton and produced by Chris Carr. [00:00:36] Matt Fulton: Hello, everyone, and welcome back to Secrets and Spies. On today's episode, I'm joined by Nicolo Majnoni, the host of a gripping new podcast series called Shadow Kingdom from Crooked Media and Campside Media. The first season, titled God's Banker, dives deep into the life and mysterious death of Roberto Calvi, a man entangled with some of the most powerful and shadowy institutions of the 20th century. Nicolo walks us through the story behind the series, what he uncovered while investigating this case, and what it was like stepping into this world of smugglers, priests, mobsters, and spies. It's a fascinating look, not just at one man's death, but the systems that surrounded it and the silence that followed. Thanks for listening. Thanks for watching. Take care. [00:01:19] Announcer: The opinions expressed by guests on Secrets and Spies do not necessarily represent those of the producers and sponsors of this podcast. [00:01:43] Matt: Nicolo, welcome to Secrets and Spies. It's, it's so great to, to have you on. [00:01:47] Nicolo Majnoni: Great to be here, Matt. It's awesome, I'm excited. [00:01:48] Matt: Yeah, um, so just to start us off, um, tell us a bit about yourself. I understand you left your day job to research this podcast. [00:01:56] Nicolo: Yeah, it's true. I was a lawyer, I guess I am a lawyer, but I was sort of more full-time for almost a decade and, uh, I lived in, I practiced in London and then I practiced mostly in New York. And, um, and that, that was my, that was my training and is my training, and I got introduced to the story that we're gonna talk about and I started researching it slowly but steadily, slowly but steadily, until it was just more and more and more and more until the opportunity came, misguided or not, to kind of transition to that full-time. Uh, so basically, long story short, I don't know what to put on my, like LinkedIn now. Like, I don't know what I am. I, I am a lawyer, but I guess I, I work for this, some podcasting companies. It's very confusing in terms of, you know, professional development. [00:02:42] Matt: In my experience, it makes Thanksgiving conversations very interesting. [00:02:46] Nicolo: That's right. If nothing else, if nothing else, I'm like a slightly more interesting person than the average one when you ask. Yeah, you know, so what are you doing? [00:02:56] Matt: It's a bit hard to, yeah. [00:02:57] Nicolo: Now I'm like, well, do you have 35 minutes? Because I got, I'm gonna give you a whole thing. [00:03:00] Matt: Yes, totally. [00:03:01] Nicolo: And then they walk away. [00:03:02] Matt: Totally. Um, so this is a story about, uh, Roberto Calvi and, you know, the God's Banker, and his, um, murder back in London in the, in the '80s. Um, it's a story that's been covered many times over the, over almost, what, 40, 40 years? Over 40 years now? Um, what was the moment that made you say, I need to tell this story? [00:03:26] Nicolo: The moment that made me want to tell this story, um, was exactly seeing all that coverage for 40 years -- all the people that have been talked to, all the rabbit holes that have been gone, all, all gone down -- um, and realizing that there was this sort of ecosystem below the surface of, of various people that had not been spoken to, just because they're maybe harder to reach or because a lot of the productions had been sort of Anglo-American, um, and it's, it's, it's harder to reach people that are a little bit more offline. Um, and, so I thought there was this opportunity to tell a hidden, like 30% -- if 70% of the story had been told, there's kind of a hidden 30% that hasn't been told just by virtue of the fact that the people are hard to get to. And I thought, what if I get those people, uh, and get them to tell this sort of like the, the, the, the photo negative side of, of, of the story? Um, and also on a more kind of a generational, uh, side of it is I, I kept talking to people in their 20s and in Italy and here, and nobody had any idea who Calvi was. They, everybody thought the name God's Banker was very cool. They were like, Oh wow. What's, I guess there's something there, but no, I have no idea. Um, and so those two things kind of together were very, um, very attractive to me. I thought there was something here, you could do kind of a public service, not only would this be an interesting story, a history, a, a fun tale, but you could also maybe capture people who aren't gonna be around for that long, and so in on the great kind of historical record of the Calvi tale, I, I, I'm proud, I think to, to add this little sort of audio cassette on the shelf. [00:05:08] Matt: Yeah. [00:05:08] Nicolo: Um, if that makes sense. [00:05:10] Matt: No, no. Yeah, it does. Kind of preserving it for a new generation a new... preserving bits of this history before they're lost to the ages, and also packaging it in a way that's presentable for a generation that sort of missed it the first time around, I guess you could say. [00:05:23] Nicolo: Yeah, yeah. I think that's right. That's exactly right. [00:05:27] Matt: Okay. All right. [00:05:27] Nicolo: That was the intention, at least at first. [00:05:29] Matt: Mm-hmm. [00:05:29] Nicolo: And then as always happens, as you know, and I know that then you end up, the whole mission starts to change in real time, and you, you go where you didn't think you were gonna go, but that, I think that's the underlying kind of mission statement. That's the manifesto for me for now. [00:05:42] Matt: Cool, cool. So, for listeners new to this case, how do you describe the story of, uh, Roberto Calvi? What do, what do, what do people need to know? [00:05:51] Nicolo: Basically that in 1982, in the summer of 1982, above the Thames River in London, on a bridge above the river, a man was found hanging, who had committed suicide. And he had a fake ID, bricks in his pockets, and two wristwatches, two underwear. Very strange. When the London police figured out who he was, they figured out it was Robert Calvi, who was Italy's most famous private banker. He was the banker for the Vatican, and it really turned out slowly but steadily that he had not killed himself at all, um, uh, according to many. But he had been killed, um, because of what he knew. And the story is basically asking what did he know? What did he know? And every episode is a little bit of an, an extra kind of, kind of chunk of, well, he knew this and he knew this and he knew this. And the, and then, then at the end we hope to say, well, which one of these pieces do you think was the one that kind of broke the camel's back? [00:06:50] Matt: So, post-war Italy of the late '70s and early '80s, kind of, you know, like, the fair Verona of this story, I guess you could say. [00:07:00] Nicolo: Mm-hmm, yes. [00:07:00] Matt: Um, it was a very volatile place. Uh, terrorism, secret societies, massive corruption scandals. For listeners less familiar with that context, what do they need to understand about the country Calvi was operating in, at the time he was in it? [00:07:13] Nicolo: Yeah, and, and listeners all over the world, because even Italians that I, that I've talked to, uh, through no fault of their own, had have no idea. Italy in the 1970s and '80s, it was a place that it -- you know, the '70s and '80s are the, the end of the Cold War -- and so, um, Italy is a weird front of the Cold War that people, a lot of people ignore because it is so close to Yugoslavia. It's so, it's so close to countries of the -- it touches countries in the Soviet block and it has an extraordinarily powerful communist party, keeps getting 10% of vote, 15%, 20%, 30%, 31, 32% of the vote. It keeps edging forward and forward and forward. Um, it it, it's a country that has a very strong, far right, a very strong, far left, and different sides on different parts of the Atlantic hate one or the other. Nobody wants Italy to become a fully communist country. So this, this, this kind of fair Verona is, is these kind of Montagues and Capulets right and left are battling it out and the result is very scary terrorism on the right. Very scary, you know, little mini 9/11s, you know, all over the place. Um, and it's a country that has a very strong intellectual tradition of extremist movement. So the left, you know, fancies itself, this, this wonderful kind of Marxist tradition on the left, and it's very appealing to young kids. On the right, you have the shadow of Mussolini who was around, you know, 20 to 30 years before, a lot of the parents still remember him at the time, and there is an echo of, Boy, you know, it was horrible, fascism is terrible, but you know, things really worked. And so you have the, the shadow of these two intellectual traditions that are both appealing to militants but also to intellectuals. So if you go to a dinner party, it wouldn't be uncommon to hear somebody you know wax poetic about Marx, or, on the other side. And in this great cauldron of extremism is an economy that had been destroyed in World War II, decimated, then had experienced this enormous boom. If you think of, of the Dolce Vita and the Vespas and, and I, I talk about this in the podcast, a lot of the Italy in the American popular imagination is from this period. It's from the '60s. It's the cinema, Rome, the Trevi Fountain, Fiat. And then all of a sudden this great boom had gone away. There's been like a, like, like New York City experienced in the '70s. It was just, you know, a terrible moment. And, and so this is a long-winded way of saying this is where Calvi is operating. The, the, a Cold War focal point, right and left wing going crazy at each other, an economy tumbling down, and in the center you have the Vatican Bank, an offshore center in an offshore bank in the center of Rome, um, operating in this little -- I, I think it's really wonderful, the Vatican Bank is housed in a tower in the Vatican, a medieval tower, and I always picture it as the world is, is going, you know, ballistic around it, and at the center is this fortified tower. It's called the Nicholas V Tower. Um, and in it, in this circular office, is the Vatican Bank, the IO, it's called the IOR. Um, and in a war zone -- I'm being, I'm, I'm being a little extreme, but there, there, there's a case to be made that Italy was a bit of a war zone in the, in the late '70s, early '80s-- [00:10:38] Matt: Yeah. [00:10:38] Nicolo: Stands the Vatican Bank, a bank that is protected from the chaos of Italy because it is not in Italy, it's own, it's in its own state. And Calvi is the primary reference point of, of, of, uh, financial advisors to this bank. So that's, that's where we are, that's the scene. Um-- [00:10:58] Matt: So that's, that's a good segue there, how you kind of end with the, with the Vatican Bank. So, the Vatican isn't just a backdrop to this podcast, the story that you're telling here. It's a financial player. It's a political actor. Um, and in some ways it's a, it's its own character in this story, flesh and blood character in a way. Um, what did you learn about, uh, how the Vatican operated, uh, behind the scenes in this era? [00:11:21] Nicolo: So, I, you know, I was looking at a, a bunch of things at the time, and I'm, I'm also, I'm looking at my web browser because there is the, the Kennedy, uh, document, uh, declassification, huge, tens of thousands of documents that came out recently. Um, there's a sentence, that has nothing to do with Kennedy, um, that was extracted by the great, uh, people at the National Security Archive. Uh, and they found this sentence in a, in a memorandum in a in, and I'm quoting from a New York Times article from last week, John McCone was the head of the CIA in 1961, and a report was, was written up by, um, an intelligence officer a few years later and he is commenting on how the, the, the CIA operated in the 1960s. So, this is an intelligence officer 10 years later writing a report for the CIA and he says, quote, Finally, and this will reflect my Middle Western Protestant upbringing. McCone, he says -- the director of the CIA -- McComb's dealing with the, dealings with the Vatican, including Pope John XXIII and Pope Paul VI, would and could raise eyebrows in certain quarters. Um, I've always, I love that. It just came out, meaning the, the CIA and the Vatican were in extraordinarily close collaboration and communication. Uh, all this to say that the Vatican was a really important ally, uh, to the United States in the Cold War because the Vatican was completely anti-communist. Communism is antithetical to the Catholic understanding. Um, and it in, first and foremost, it doesn't, it doesn't allow for the belief in God. You, you cannot be a, a good communist and believe in God because religion is the opium of the masses, it's nonsense. [00:13:05] Matt: Yeah. [00:13:06] Nicolo: It's made, it's, it's there, the doctrine goes, to kind of enslave you and have you, um, be exploited. Uh, so for whatever, a variety of reasons, the United States and the Vatican are close allies in the fight against communism. So, you have this unprecedented collaboration between, you know, these men in robes, clerical figures, and, you know, high-level people in the, in the government, in the United States, because there's this, this communion of interest for these key years, and I thought that was really fascinating. Um, what does a collaboration look like between a religious, you know, state run by celibate clerics in Rome and, you know, these functionaries, these people running around Langley and the Pentagon? I, I just think that's deeply interesting. What, what do their meetings look like? What do they tell each other? [00:13:55] Matt: Yeah. [00:13:56] Nicolo: Who's the intelligence operative at, at the Vatican? Is there a certain, I mean, these are bishops, these are men who, you know, they have to pray the office for an hour every mor-- Like, that's deeply interesting to me. Um, and so, um, the, the truth is they collaborated quite a bit, and, and an episode that actually drops, uh, today when we record, um, is all about that. It's about how the Vatican, um, ran money behind the Iron Curtain, uh, to, to, to help its, its interest in the United States' interests. Um, so anyway, the, a long-winded way of saying they were active and they had, uh, similar interest to the United States. [00:14:37] Matt: Yeah, I mean, the Vatican's in many ways, one of the first intelligence agencies. [00:14:44] Nicolo: Very good point. [00:14:44] Matt: Historically, you know? [00:14:46] Nicolo: Yeah. [00:14:46] Matt: Like this-- [00:14:46] Nicolo: Of course. [00:14:47] Matt: With this web of, of interests and personnel, uh, deployed globally that is operating in third countries, but yet kind of has its own, its own identity, its own agenda, um, in a way that can use that identity and agenda to garner support and trust with the local population and use that to gather information and send it back, send it back home. And to me, that's nothing if not an intelligence agency. [00:15:16] Nicolo: Yeah, no, you're right. It's an incredible intelligence agency, which has its own diplomatic posts in every little town. Uh, you know, say for, for example, behind the, the Iron Curtain, in, in the few places that's still allowed or, uh, you know, uh, churches. Or think about it in Germany, uh, in, in the, the, the late 1930s. All of a sudden, you have these diplomatic pouches running from every little province in, in a key, key, key area back to the Vatican. Um, and, and that's, that's really kind of wonderful and strange. And, and, and, and as a, you know, lawyer turned historian, podcaster, uh, or whatever I am, I thought that was fascinating. I mean, for no, and for no political reason. Like I, I don't really, I'm not picking a side, I'm not saying it's good or bad. I think it's, it's profoundly interesting. [00:16:07] Matt: Mm-hmm. [00:16:09] Nicolo: And, uh, you know, I'd love to look into that more. Maybe that'll be the, the next season. [00:16:13] Matt: Yeah, yeah. Well, I'm gonna, I'm, I'm gonna ask you a bit about the next and future seasons in a, in a bit, so we'll put a pin in that one. [00:16:19] Nicolo: We'll put a pin in that. [00:16:20] Matt: Um, yeah, so there is a, a lot going on in this story. We've talked about the Church. There's also, uh, La Cosa Nostra, neofascist Italian Freemasons, um, secret letters to the Pope, some Cold War domino theory, uh, anxieties. Um, how did you navigate the line between credible investigation and let's say, tinfoil hat-type stuff? Because you make it clear in some of the first episodes that, you know, there's this British, this, this Anglo-American half of your brain and this Italian half of your brain, and the Anglo-American half is quite trying to calm down the Italian half. Like, no, let's be, let's be rational here, let's look at this cold and calculated. How did, how did you navigate that? [00:17:03] Nicolo: Yeah, that's a great question. And it's one that, it came from a really visceral place for me, for my personal history, and, and it's something that I think people ignore unless belong to this very specific type of person, um, unless you, unless you know what I'm talking about, which is, um, basically, I, I grew up in Italy and I moved to the United States when I was a, a little, little kid. And, um, I, coming from Italy, you hear a bunch of operatic stories all the time. Everything has a hidden meaning. Everything has a kind of conspiratorial hue to it. And my identity was always, as the Italian in the United States, to overcorrect. I always thought, well, I, I need to prove this wrong, be it a small thing or a larger thing. Um, so, you know, how do I -- the, this story is a conspiracy. This story is, is ridiculous on its face. If I tell you that a guy was found hanging under a bridge in London because he was laundering money for the mafia through the Vatican Bank, uh, through a bishop who was best friends with the Pope and his bodyguard because a secret society in Italy of right-wing Freemasons needed him to get them a bunch of cash so they could finance Latin American dictatorships. Um, that, that's there, there's gotta be some part of that, which is ridiculous. [00:18:25] Matt: Yeah. [00:18:25] Nicolo: Uh, so the story, the, the, the story, the logline of the story is ridiculous on its face. Um, and when I went and looked into it, I was excited to prove almost all of it wrong. Um, and what I found was that when you research this stuff, you are immediately met with some tinfoil hat stuff and some not. So how do you distinguish it? Um, a thing I tried to do more than anything was, can I go to people who were there? First and foremost, the primary source sources through, through the, through the person of an actual character who was there. Um, at which point I can then look at, at where was he? Can I corroborate it with, uh, every book, I can find, every article, every friend of his at the time, and can I place this person here? And is what he's saying, more or less correct in terms of at least where he was? I don't care what he thinks, but or he or she, where they were. Um, so this podcast, first and foremost, tries to find the people who are there and there aren't that many who haven't been interviewed to death, so I tried to find the, the, the, the participants who were there, who haven't been interviewed a ton. And I have to say I found a good few of them. So, um, the first kind of, uh, insurance policy against the tinfoil hat, uh, is, is can I find people who are there? Um, and then just a ton of research in Italian. Um, cross-referencing it with the trial of the death of Roberto Calvi, which has really definitive kind of reference points of where the facts lie, the really boring dry facts of where people were on a certain day. These are tens and tens of thousands of pages, just a trial that lasted years and years and years and years. And I went, and I, this was the bulk of my time, I have to say, Matt, sitting there in Italian, reading and listening their audio tapes of it and, and cross-referencing and checking and referencing. And, and that work helped me add in the podcast only that, which I found to be credible. [00:20:30] Matt: Mm-hmm. [00:20:30] Nicolo: Um, and, and so that, I would say, to answer your question, find people who were there and cross-reference against trials where people were under oath, uh, and couldn't lie. Um, but, and then a little bit, honestly, a small percentage, is just judgment. There's some incredible theories that I just couldn't put in because even, even for this, they seemed, you know, um, too crazy. But, but it, it was really hard, and I understand why people are, you know, don't do these shows very often because to have a fact-checker for every statement -- let me tell you, if you make a show like this, and the great companies I'm associated with are obsessed with checking that every statement is provable. Uh, boy. Real, real effort there. Uh, um, and so it, it took, it took a long time. Every sentence is, you know, Hey, you said that this guy was here on December 31st. Where do you, who said that? You have to go back to the trial and say, well look, these three policemen, and then there's this book and then this, his wife said she saw him there that day. Um, so-- [00:21:37] Matt: It kind of, it, it kind of starts to drive you nuts after a while because, like, in your head, like you, you know, or you think you know, and then you get faced with these kind of -- I guess we'll say challenges, for lack of a better word that pops into my head right now -- these challenges, and you're like, No, I pretty, I, I I know that is that, that that is what happened, that is what was said. But then you sort of like, there's a degree of gaslighting yourself that you're like, wait, is that, is that actually true? No, we should, we should check that. [00:22:00] Nicolo: Yeah. But also then like the, on a broader scale, when you find certain of these things to be true, like, I don't wanna spoil it for the audience, but there's a certain degree of, um, it, you know, Italian organized crime was part of the, the Calvi world, and he was using the Vatican Bank, um, for, for money laundering. Then, you know, and I, and I, I, I try, I'm not, my brain is, is, is really against kind of conspiratorial thinking, but even me, then I start to think, Well if that's true, you know, what else is, what else is there out there? And your brain starts to kind of, kind of like sever into these two, these two characters. [00:22:40] Matt: Let's take a break and we'll be right back. There's also a degree in this, over the course of this series, that you try to, and I, I, I appreciated this, this a lot because I think it's a problem in our society in general, but you sort of, you, you try to argue, I think that, like, there's still a lot of unknowns in this story, stuff that we may never know and like that's okay. Like, "We don't know" is an answer to some questions. [00:23:23] Nicolo: Yeah. Yeah, "We don't know" is an answer to some questions and it can be a really profound answer to say, you know, in this, in this moment, I think we're drawn to people who have clear answers. And we've always been drawn, as humans, we want certainty. We, we like people that say this is so because of this reason. Um, and, and I was deeply attracted to also a story where you can figure out about 70%, but there's a 30%, uh, you don't know. You don't know. [00:23:56] Matt: Yeah. [00:23:56] Nicolo: And, and I think it's, it's a, it's a humbling exercise to say there's some things we, we just, we just don't know. [00:24:01] Matt: Yeah, at some point you just have to be okay with that and, and walk away and just, that's, that's part of the story that you tell. [00:24:07] Nicolo: Yeah, yeah. [00:24:09] Matt: Yeah. [00:24:09] Nicolo: That's right, that's right. [00:24:11] Matt: Um, so you, you say at one point you never met a mafioso or a spy or a smuggler before working on this. Um, tell us about that process. What was it like to track down these people and get them to talk? [00:24:23] Nicolo: Yeah, it was, it was hard in some sense because all of them had their own, you know, conditions. There's, there's some people who, um, which I can respect because of my profession, aren't happy to speak without an attorney, um, present so that they don't, that they say the right, they don't incriminate themselves. Um, some people just are, uh, older and are just not online. Uh, some, so there, there's all these logistical challenges, defining people and then convincing them to tell their story, which is, uh, something people don't do easily or, or, you know, like telling such a sensitive story on, on mic to somebody you don't know is not a natural instinct of a human being. So there's an enormous amount of back and forth and building trust with people and, and saying like, you know, we're gonna tell the story and we're gonna try to tell an angle of it without entrapping anyone that is possibly intended to set the historical record a little bit straighter, um-- [00:25:25] Matt: Right. [00:25:25] Nicolo: But, so you track them down through, I had a wonderful, um, journalist in Italy, whose name is Simona, uh, Simona Zecchi. Uh, and she is deeply embedded in these worlds. Uh, and we met and we talked and we, we became friends, and she has these ways of communicating with, with people. Uh, and then through her I would go speak with them. Um, but, you know, I never thought I'd, I'd, I'd speak to people in, in those walks of life. And then when you're there, you're kind of struck by, on one hand how, how different these people are from you. And then you are immediately transported into the world of the Cold War. And everybody was a warrior on one side or the other. There was a war going on and, and the stakes were, we were going to annihilate each other in a nuclear holocaust. So you, the stakes could not be higher. Um, and everybody was operating, every day you woke up and you thought at some, at some level, there's a struggle going on, the end point of which is we are all toast. And so whether you're talking to a person in the mob, whether you're talking to a, just a, a, a smuggler who's running goods up and down the border, um, or whether you're talking to a high, high, high-level Vatican spy. All of them were operating under that premise of, I'm on one side of this two-sided struggle where we're all at one point gonna die unless we fix this. And that's so incredible and frenetic, you know? [00:27:06] Matt: Yeah. [00:27:06] Nicolo: There, there's a survey that came out at some point back then, and it's re-published now, and Americans were asked, what is the, what is the thing you're most afraid of that you're going to, if you were to die, immediately, before your time, what's the thing that would most, you'd most be afraid of? And, you know, it wasn't heart disease, it wasn't a, a a, you know, a burglary gone wrong. It was nuclear holocaust, and it was more than 50%, high, high, high 50s in the 60s -- I, I need to get that statistic right -- an overwhelming majority of Americans when polled said, I'm scared I'm gonna die in a nuclear holocaust. [00:27:38] Matt: Yeah. [00:27:39] Nicolo: And people lived like that for years. And so not only the world leaders, not only the Nixons, not only the Maos, not only the, you know, Khrushchev, but the, the lowest of the lowliest, um, enforcer in a, in the mafia in Sicily, or the highest spy, everybody, everybody was operating in that framework under that, that premise. And so what I found, and, and I'll I'll end here, is that when you're operating under that framework, you are willing to do anything at any point because the lowest of the soldiers or the highest of the people are on this kind of crusade. I mean, it's a crusade. You're, you're fighting for the survival of, of, of, of who you are, of your species, of your everything. I mean, I don't know, it it, it was an unintended consequence, but when you interview people in that era, in that war, in Italy, um, I was surprised by how much of a kind of holy mission everybody was on. I, I respect that, I get it. [00:28:34] Matt: Yeah, yeah. So, this story isn't just a chronicle of Calvi's downfall, it's about how opaque, unchecked institutions interact in the shadows. There's a, there's the world and then the systems of that world. Um, what did, what, what did the Calvi case, uh, expose about how power actually worked in Cold War Italy? [00:28:54] Nicolo: Good question. I think that the thing I was most struck by was how people will find sources of financial, uh, sources of capital to further an end that they think is, you know, a legitimate end and how creative we are as human beings in sourcing capital that can be deployed for an end we deem super important. [00:29:25] Matt: Mm-hmm. [00:29:25] Nicolo: And in this story, people on both sides of the Atlantic found ways to generate cash in relatively illegal ways through the kind of rough and tumble of the Italian economy, and then funnel it through a bank whose primary and only shareholder is a man whose title is the vicar of Christ on Earth. And that money was then sent in cars across the Iron Curtain, uh, to people who would use it to, um, bring down the Soviet Union and create the world we know today. But all of it, none of it is possible without money. Money, whether you are super evil or super good, is the only capital, broadly speaking, that allows you to further that mission, and when we are in a pinch, when we are fighting for our, whatever mission it is, we become very, very creative financial actors. And that's fascinating to me. And that, this story is the, the ultimate like financial gambit. Um, and you know what? You know, a lot of these people helped, um, kind of bring down the wall. It, you know, there, there, whatever, whatever you think of, I, -- nobody, nobody can bless what these people did, I mean, they were acting outside of the bounds of the, of the law -- but you know, by God, they got, they, they moved in such creative ways, both John Paul II and Calvi and the cadre of, of people surrounding them, um, that, you know, they, they accomplished what a part of what they wanna accomplish. Um, uh, but more, to answer your question, it, it's, it's fascinating to see, um, how people gain access to, to money, um, when they really, really need to. [00:31:23] Matt: Well, it's, it's, I sort of found it very striking how you described, um, John Paul's trip behind the Iron Curtain into Poland. This sort of like triumphant, um, homecoming. And I think it was a pleasant shock for the West and for the Vatican and for John Paul himself. At the same point, a very kind of paralyzing, chilling fear for the Soviets, for the communist Polish government at the time that, like, they could stop it, but to stop it would invite much worse consequences for them. So they had to just sort of let it go and try to manage it as best, and to me, that was sort of kind of a preview for how the two Germanys reunited and how the wall fell at the end. That like, yeah, we could open fire on all these people crossing the border, but it would be a bloodbath and it would just not end well for us. [00:32:15] Nicolo: Right, right. The, the John Paul II trip to Poland, um, was fascinating because I grew up in, um, in Italy in the 1990s and you would hear of this trip and later in, you know, Catholic people would always say, Oh, and John Paul came and he, because of John Paul, the wall fell because of his trip to Poland, and I always thought, Well, how silly, come on guys. Like, they, that the, the notion that this had any impact at all, let alone like definitive impact, but even a small impact, I, I was always quite perplexed by this and, and I, um, I thought, well, this is kind of silly. And then really, really looking into it, when you research that trip, when you research the young John Paul II, Karol Wojtyła, uh, in his, this just, I mean, I don't know what to call it, this bonanza, this declaration of war, this, this PR stunt, this, you know, liturgical event. I mean, it was, you could do a movie on this. It, it was incredible. Uh, there were millions of people in the street, and to stop him would've been impossible because then you are shedding light on, you know how twisted your apparatus is that you can't even let you know you're proud, your, your, your, the prodigal son that is returning to his country. Um, but having him enter was a disaster. I mean, it, it, millions of people on the street came out to celebrate a mass, a Catholic mass at the heart of a communist country. That's outrageous. I mean, that is, you know, I, I don't know what the equivalent today would be, but it would be preposterous. It'd be some, some, some, I dunno, Marxists coming into the United States and millions of people coming to like hear his, it was just unthinkable. [00:33:54] Matt: Yeah, yeah. It would be like a, I don't know, some televangelist going into China and bringing out, you know, crowds of millions of people and the government can't, doesn't know what to-- [00:34:05] Nicolo: That, that is a infinitely better, uh, comparison. Right. Analogy. That, that it is exactly as if it, that's exactly what it is. And the trip was fascinating and, and it, it helped -- I, I, I, I can say along with, you know, many historians that, that actually it is true. It, it really did help put that first crack in the wall, it opened a line to which a little bit of light came through. Um, and it was, um, you know, John Paul II was, um, the pope and Archbishop Paul Marcinkus was his person at the Vatican Bank, and Roberto Calvi was his banker, so there's a direct line to this story in that trip. Um, and one of my favorite episodes that comes out, um, that is, you know, coming out now and, and it'll be out when you, when this is released, is, is the episode about the pope trip to the, uh, to Poland. [00:34:56] Matt: Yeah, yeah. That's a, that's a fantastic story. [00:34:59] Nicolo: Yeah. You know, and by the way, like, I mean, it, people know this story, anybody above 40 and, and, and in their 50s know this story, but, but I, but I think a lot of people don't remember this history. Uh, you know? People don't remember this history, so I, so I don't mean to say I -- by the way, Matt, like I haven't uncovered anything particularly because I, I, I hope people in their 60s don't listen to this and think This, this idiot kid, like, we've known about this. So I, I, you know, it, it, this is known, but it is a little bit forgotten and, um, and I think it's a, it's a wonderful story, uh, just, just by virtue of these characters. You can't make them up. [00:35:36] Matt: Yeah, no. I mean, it, it, it to that, to that point, it's, for me at least, this was all a few years before, before my time, before I, you know, spawned onto the earthly plane. Um, but I, I mean, I, I, I knew about it, but it's not in my lived experience. And there's something that, I mean, there's a lot of Gen A, Gen, Gen A and, and and Gen Z people out there who are now adults who don't have the memory of 9/11 and what it was like living here as a kid in the aftermath of that. And there's just a context of, of, it, it fundamentally changes how you see the world. So I think telling that story again, that's, that's important, you know? [00:36:17] Nicolo: Yeah. [00:36:17] Matt: You don't have it because you weren't, you weren't there. [00:36:19] Nicolo: Right, right. You weren't there, and so it's helpful to retell it slightly in the, in the medium of today, which is podcasting and, and kind of, you know, it's YouTube and video podcasts and podcasts. And so it's, it's a slight repackaging of a, of a, of an old tale. Um, but, um, but it was really wonderful. And for me, as I, you know, I, as an Italian, I lived at kind of a stone's throw from, from the Vatican growing up, it's, it's an interesting way of, of relearning the, uh, about this great kind of apparatus that was very much, as you say, like it was a, it was a company, it was an intelligence agency, it was a religion. It was, you know, and in no way sort of blessing or condemning the Catholic Church. I, I have no interest in, in, in, in making any kind of pronouncement in that sense. [00:37:04] Matt: Yeah. [00:37:04] Nicolo: But, but, but boy, what a phenomenal story. [00:37:08] Matt: Fascinating organization, truly. No matter what you think about its mission-- [00:37:12] Nicolo: Right. [00:37:12] Matt: Or how it preaches, or how it conducts itself, it is a fascinating organization. [00:37:15] Nicolo: Of course. All sides, believe me. Absolutely, I, I agree with all that. Um, um, because that's, I'm a lawyer, so I love disclaimers. If I, if I could, didn't check myself, I'd always be like, notwithstanding the foregoing, all sides have access to their meritorious reasons. [00:37:30] Matt: Yeah. [00:37:30] Nicolo: I do not approve or condemn, I have to stop myself because you sound like a computer. [00:37:35] Matt: Yeah. For sure. [00:37:36] Nicolo: Anyway. [00:37:37] Matt: Um, so this story spans decades. What kind of challenges did you face stitching it altogether into a tight eight-episode arc? [00:37:45] Nicolo: Yeah, it, it's, it's, it's hard to tell a story for the ear, um, the human ear listening to a podcast. Um, when you watch something, the eyes are a lot smarter and have a lot of more tolerance for nuance, and you can show visuals, and you can, um, give people a lot of material and the eyes can scan quickly. The ear I, I have learned over these many years, um, you have to be ruthless as an editor and boil it down -- as you guys know, and, and have known probably before me -- to the true bare essentials of a sentence, a story, a paragraph, a thought. Do not overdress and, and elaborately kind of, kind of set design a scene when you can just say, No, no, no, this person was scared. Don't say the person with brown hair as the shine sun was shining. My instinct as a, as a, as a writer is to, I love to kind of overdo it a little bit. [00:38:40] Matt: Yup. [00:38:40] Nicolo: And in radio, you have to simplify. So both in the, in the form of it, your writing has to be tighter, but in the substance, too, you have to choose in a story which has, you know, 10,000 possible routes, I had to be, I think, ruthless and, and with the wonderful teams I've had, um, to edit out so much. You know, you edit out so much, you kill your babies as they say, the things you love. You kill your darlings, and, and you, I had to, the challenge was how do we make something that is, maintains the richness but is not overwhelming? Um, and, you know, you can't have episodes that are an hour and a half, and so how do you tell, you know, a story that's three hours long in 30 minutes? Um, the truth is, you, you, you edit down, you make decisions, and the result is, um, you have a story that people can digest and remember. Um, but boy is it hard. Lemme tell you, to answer your question, Matt, uh, difficultly. Terribly. Painfully. [00:39:38] Matt: Yeah. [00:39:38] Nicolo: Um, but, but, but ultimately you do it. And I mean, I love those, those podcasts that are like four hours, what a dream. Maybe one day, like that's what I'll do. [00:39:47] Matt: Like each episode? [00:39:48] Nicolo: No. Well, I don't know. But like the, you know, you hear these talk shows and people that like sit around for four hours. Um, if I had four hours to tell this, each episode, it would be a delight, but probably people would fall asleep and nobody would listen. Um, but, uh, yeah, and, and, and, you know, the, you do it through music, too. Music is very important. Um, you know, I wrote -- I, I was so lucky that the, the, the companies I worked for allowed me to, to, I wrote a lot of the music. We had a, we had a cellist come in to perform original music I wrote, which was, seems like a luxury from another time. I'm glad we did it. Uh, and, and I think it helps because it's all, the same team that brought you this process is also peppering it with its own music and its own, you know, sound design. Um, and it's a small thing, but it's also, I think, a, a really important thing. Um, so, yeah. [00:40:40] Matt: Yeah, no, that's a, that's, that's a good point. It's a, it's a great story, but it's also, it's a, it's a fantastic production. It's, it's, I don't know if this note came up in some editorial meeting or something, but it is as a, I don't know, focus group feedback, it is, it is fun to listen to. [00:40:55] Nicolo: Oh, that's wonderful. More than anything, you wanna make something that people wanna listen to and is exciting. [00:41:00] Matt: Mm-hmm. [00:41:00] Nicolo: You don't wanna, you don't make a history lesson. Um, it, so-- [00:41:06] Matt: It's not a lecture. [00:41:06] Nicolo: I really, I really appreciate. Yeah, yeah. And by the way, like a lot of iterations. It's, it's, it's opened my eyes to what these people at these, at these, you know, media companies do when they create these wonderful series. Um, it's an enormous amount of work. You know, I was, I, we did an Italian version of the show, like a sister companion piece that comes out every, every day the US version comes out, there's an Italian sister, uh, podcast. And I, and we, the Italian show, we made much more, we made it like down to the wire, so I was editing just a draft yesterday that's gonna come out today and it was like version, I think it was like V-, V-13, version 14. Um, you'll never see that obviously, but that means there are 14 iterations. [00:41:49] Matt: Yeah. [00:41:49] Nicolo: We, that we rethink and rethink and rethink and rethink. So, um, yeah. [00:41:54] Matt: Yeah. [00:41:54] Nicolo: Elbow grease. [00:41:55] Matt: Let's take a quick break and we'll be right back with more. So, I'm sensitive to, to spoilers here because, um, I, I want people to go listen to it and I'm not positive how many episodes will be out by the time this airs. Um, but in the end, uh, this case technically remains unsolved. Um, what do you think that says about power, justice, or truth in a story like this? [00:42:34] Nicolo: Yeah. I think it, it says that, you know, the, the, the true heart of these matters, um, requires you to have access to moments that are so tightly guarded and so well concealed, that it really requires a moment like the, the, the Kennedy document, uh, turning point. Um, but I mean, look to, to answer your question in, in a straightforward way, it, powerful interests are very good at concealing when they've messed up. You know, when they, when they've had an oopsie, um, these actors are, uh, prodigious at, at kind of concealing what they've done. That's the history of, of, of humans. Um, but I think that, you know, more often than not, people commit small mistakes in their operations and, and then there's a little crack, and that little crack -- and the season is an effort at assembling all the little cracks -- there's a little bit of light that shines from the truth and what we are on the other side of the wall where we can't see it, and I am very interested -- not because I, you know, want to destroy anybody's life. These are stories from many, many years ago, most people are dead -- but I'm interested in when those little cracks emerge and you can start to see behind the curtain, behind, you know, the darkness and the slip ups often are an incredible source of information of color and contour. Um, and if you can't have the entire full picture, you can have these kind of like little, little episodes that stitch together tell you an almost complete picture, and of course then you wait for the moment where the whole thing crumbles and you can, you can have full -- but, but maybe someday, of course, maybe you'll, you'll never have it. Um, power is, is, is, is very good at maintaining it's, it's own control over, over whatever it's powerful over, and, uh, it doesn't want you to see the cracks. Um, that's a very philosophical answer to to, to say that, you know, it's -- people are good at covering up when they've done bad things. [00:45:04] Matt: Do you think Calvi's story resonates today politically, culturally, even personally for listeners who maybe too find themselves -- consider themselves, think of themselves -- as passengers, um, in a political system that perhaps appears hopelessly fraught, uh, corrupt, favors the strong, wealthy, and connected, and often sees no justice brought to them. I don't know, I just saw some, you know, everything that's old is new again, or perhaps never went away to begin with. [00:45:34] Nicolo: Sure. I mean, yeah, every, every history, every story about history is a story about today. Um, you know, I, I inadvertently, because I, I was hoping to make a story that, um, showed that there was a logical explanation for a lot of these things, and they're a lot more boring, and this man had actually killed himself -- as actually very, very authoritative British scholars, some, some still maintain Roberto Calvi killed himself, including Charles Raw, author of The Money Changers, which is the definitive tome on Calvi in the British world -- um, but instead, I ended up making the story that I didn't wanna make, which is, Hey, all these kind of sketchy conspiratorial backwaters in this very defined specific case ended up being true. Um, so in one sense, I, I didn't wanna make a story that says, Hey, we should, we should, we should question everything because there's murky, there's murky, foul play everywhere. [00:46:25] Matt: Yeah. [00:46:25] Nicolo: In every level of government, always. Certainly not my intention. And I, I'm not trying to be cute, it truly was not my intention. And, and, and the result was a little bit that. So, you know, um, I think, yeah, there, there, there's a, there's a direct line to today, um, certainly with, with polarization, with people thinking that there is, they're, they're fighting a, um, an important, holy, absolute war, whatever that is. At the time, it was for survival, it was for the, the economic system, communism versus capitalism. Some people are fighting a religious war. But it's certainly a story about what happens when people think the fate of humanity rests on them, and that, that certainly I'm sure is a story that can be applied today. On, on, ask anybody, and if anybody you ask on the street and -- you know, the right, left, center -- and they're like, I'm, we're fighting for our lives here! [00:47:15] Matt: Yeah. [00:47:15] Nicolo: This is a moment. You know, and, and of course, of course we are. [00:47:18] Matt: Yeah. [00:47:18] Nicolo: We always are, perhaps. Um, and, and this story is a, is, is, just as we are today, this is story about when that was happening in 1981. In 1981, I think the silliness in how wrong they were is exposed because we know that what happened later, you know, we, we, a lot of what they were operating under, the fears were misguided. Some of them were right. Um, I see a lot of, I see a lot of 1981 in today. [00:47:41] Matt: Oh, yeah. [00:47:41] Nicolo: Um, but their, but their clothes were funny and, and the Vatican was, was, was really powerful. And so we can, we can look at it with some remove, where it's safe to look at 1981 because that's different. People had, you know, weird ties on and weird briefcases and, you know. Um, I can't tell if that was, if I just gave you a lawyer answer, but it seems like a, I, I, I mean it as a, as a true, uh-- [00:48:04] Matt: Yeah, it's a tricky question. But no, I, I think there definitely are a lot of, a lot of parallels and just the kind of sense of, of frustration of not having resolutions, um-- [00:48:16] Nicolo: Yeah. [00:48:16] Matt: Satisfactory resolutions and sort of like, like we sort of talked about earlier, knowing that we don't know is an answer and at some point just kind of leaving it there. [00:48:26] Nicolo: Yeah, but also like I, I, as, as I say, I'm, I'm convincing myself more and more of, of, of the answer that, that I gave, that you've elicited with your expert questions. It, it, it really is, it, it's a moment where people were thinking, we're fighting a holy war. [00:48:39] Matt: Mm-hmm. [00:48:39] Nicolo: We're fighting a holy war for our way of life. The way Italy has become, um, is, you know, is eroding and there's divorce and abortion and kids with long hair running on around the streets. And there was a cabal of people who thought we're fighting a holy war, we gotta bring this back. Um, and, and so it's, it's dangerous on, on, on any side when people think that they're fighting for the survival of humanity. Um, because, you know, people can do sketchy things, they can hijack the Vatican Bank. It could happen again. [00:49:15] Matt: Indeed, indeed. They can, uh, attack train stations. [00:49:19] Nicolo: They can attack train stations, right. Critically. [00:49:21] Matt: Yeah. [00:49:21] Nicolo: So, it's a study of that. What happens when we think we're fighting for, for our lives? Maybe we are, I don't know, but I'm interested in, in how people operate and how they deploy capital and find it when they think this is it, like we are living at the, in the last year of humanity, unless we save it. I, I'm deeply interested in that. [00:49:38] Matt: Yeah. [00:49:38] Nicolo: And this is a story of, of that moment. [00:49:40] Matt: So, um, this is, Calvi's story is the first season of, of Shadow Kingdom. Um, you, you sort of said what, what, what interests you, how you're interested in looking at, at these, you know, complicated stories as a, as a, as a historian. Um, is there anything you can tell us about upcoming seasons? [00:49:59] Nicolo: Um, so the answer is no. Uh, no. But, uh, the, I would say definitely stay, uh, stay tuned. [00:50:06] Matt: Uh-huh. [00:50:06] Nicolo: Uh, for the, the Shadow Kingdom, which is this banner series that Crooked Media has where, um, Crooked Media and Campside Media made with me, uh, where the first episode is God's Banker. Mm-hmm. You know, it starts with a body and it zooms out and we ask a bigger question. That, that's kind of the "shadow kingdom." Um, so I, I, you know, I, I think they'll, they'll, if you watch this space, you'll, you'll find other things, but I don't, don't know that I can say more. [00:50:33] Matt: Okay. Alright, well, we'll have to be okay with, "We don't know." [00:50:36] Nicolo: But I, but -- exactly, Matt. Expertly done. Way to tie it up with a bow. But I will say, yes, there, there, there hopefully will be kind of other stories. [00:50:43] Matt: Mm-hmm. [00:50:44] Nicolo: And, and, and possible future attritions that I'm very, very excited about. So we'll have to talk again. [00:50:50] Matt: Okay. [00:50:52] Nicolo: Shortly. [00:50:52] Matt: Awesome. Well, this, this, uh, this season about, all about, uh, Roberto Calvi is airing right now as we record. And by the time this episode airs, I, I believe, will still be airing, I'm pretty sure. Uh, I've listened through to the end, perk of the job. Um, it's, it's fantastic. Highly recommend it. I think I told you earlier, my mom started listening. Um-- That's high praise. But, uh, where can listeners find more about, uh, Shadow Kingdom and your work? [00:51:21] Nicolo: Sure, yeah. So The Shadow Kingdom: God's Banker, um, made by Crooked Media and Campside Media is available, as they say, wherever you get your podcasts. Uh, so any place you look for it, just type in, um, God's Banker and you'll get it. And it, uh, it's airing now. And, you know, I think it'll, it's worth the fourth episode. By the time this airs, you'll maybe be able to get all them. And that, um, is, you know, primarily where, where you can find my work. Um, and, uh, I've recent, I recently did something for the BBC that, that I, that I really love, so if you're interested in additional kind of Shadow Kingdom stories, you can look up actually, uh, it's called Thirty Eulogies. So, a wonderful, um, piece about a man who overcame an incredible, an incredible story. It just recently came out with the BBC, it's a 30-minute documentary. [00:52:09] Matt: Cool, cool, cool. [00:52:11] Nicolo: But for now, I will promote The Shadow Kingdom. Uh, so God's Banker, type it anywhere you get your podcast and [00:52:17] Matt: Cool, cool. Well, uh, when, when there's a season two, whatever season two is about, I'm sure it will fall into our remit of the show, um, would would love to have you back on to talk about it then. [00:52:27] Nicolo: Oh, I'm there, I'm there. Thanks, Matt. [00:52:28] Matt: Yeah, all right. Awesome. All right, well, um, Nicolo, uh, Majnoni, thank you so much for coming on. Uh, it was great to, um, great speaking with you. [00:52:36] Nicolo: Pleasure. [00:52:37] Matt: Congrats on the show, too. [00:52:38] Nicolo: Thanks, Matt. [00:53:06] Announcer: Thanks for listening. This is Secrets and Spies.