The new Sky Original series Avvocato Ligas made its debut on 6 March — an Italian legal drama directed by Fabio Palladini and starring Luca Argentero. The first season consists of six episodes of approximately 50 minutes each, and will air exclusively on Sky with streaming availability on the NOW platform. Cinematography by Gogò Bianchi CCS.
The series was created by Jean Ludwigg, Leonardo Valenti and Federico Baccomo and directed by Fabio Palladini. A Sky Studios production made in association with Fabula Pictures, it is based on the novels by writer and journalist Gianluca Ferraris, whose work centres on the character of Lorenzo Ligas, a Milanese lawyer.
Played by Luca Argentero, Ligas is a brilliant and divisive criminal defence lawyer from Milan who, after being forced out of a prestigious law firm, starts over by taking on difficult and unpopular cases. Gifted with sharp instincts and a charismatic yet impulsive personality, he devises bold and unpredictable defence strategies, navigating courtroom battles, media exposure and the tensions that run through his private life. At his side is Marta Carati (Marina Occhionero), a young trainee who embodies a more idealistic vision of justice and gradually becomes his closest ally. Standing on the opposite side is public prosecutor Anna Maria Pastori (Barbara Chichiarelli), with whom Ligas maintains a charged professional rivalry.
The cast also includes Gaia Messerklinger as Patrizia Roncella, Ligas’s ex-wife and a civil lawyer; Flavio Furno as Paolo Scarpelli, the protagonist’s colleague and long-standing friend; and Mia Eustacchio as Laura, Ligas’s daughter. Further roles are played by Sergio Romano, Anthony Giunta, Eugenio Di Fraia and Valeria De Michele.
Gogò Bianchi told us:
‘Through an interplay of cold and warm light, working closely with director Fabio Palladini we sought not only to give form to a dynamic rhythm between day and night, but also to illuminate the contrasting worlds that constantly alternate in our protagonist’s life. On one side, the courtrooms with their icy daylight; on the other, the venues of the so-called Milano da bere — that image of a hedonistic, cocktail-hour Milan — bathed in warm, vivid colours, which Ligas frequents just as assiduously after dark. The pursuit of elegance was a constant in our visual storytelling; in certain shots we chose to subvert the classical compositional logic that places the protagonist dominating the frame, introducing instead a kind of deliberate imbalance — unexpected lenses and camera angles that allow landscape and architecture to claim their own presence as protagonists. The intention was to unsettle the viewer, guiding them towards a fresh perspective in which the familiar world can suddenly appear extraordinary. The ALEXA 35 paired with Canon K35 lenses in a 1.78 format felt like the most natural choice for capturing the vertical character of the city and its key locations — the courthouse, the courtrooms — while the Canon optics gave us a distinctly cinematic quality. The collaboration with my DIT Amedeo Lanza was invaluable.’
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