Franco Alfano nine months on the following concluding duet and at his death had left behind a whole ream of sketches... Alfano had to reconstruct...according to his best assessment...and with his imagination and magnifying glass" since Puccini's material "had not really been legible." "Alfano's reputation has also suffered [IC:along with Mascagni], understandably, because of his willingness to associate himself closely with Mussolini's Fascist government." Alex Ross, in "The New Yorker", notes that a new ending of "Turandot" composed by Luciano Berio premiered in 2002 is preferred by some critics for making a more satisfactory resolution of Turandot's change of heart, and of
Simonetta Puccini started in 1980, Simonetta was proven to be Antonio's daughter and was assigned one-third of her grandfather's (now greatly diminished) estate, which included his villa in Torre del Lago, and took his name. The remainder of the estate remained in possession of its original heirs, who were not related to the Puccini family. Another claimed heir, Nadia Manfredi, believed her father Antonio to be Puccini's illegitimate son, but her case was not proven, and was opposed by Simonetta. After taking ownership of the villa, she established a non-profit "Friends of the Homes of Giacomo Puccini" to restore and maintain it.