GRANDER TOURER; Piloting the Z8-based Bertone Birusa.(Cover Story)

Byline: Matt Davis

In the local Turin dialect, its name can mean either a quick-witted person or a clever, naughty girl. Our drive in the Bertone Birusa dream car shown in March at Geneva proves the prototype-chosen as AutoWeek's Best Concept of the show-possesses enough substance to satisfy the most intelligent or wicked.

It had been a while since we'd seen a Bertone concept that really grabbed us-maybe the Alfa 166-based Bella 2+2 at the '99 Geneva show came closest, apart from its slightly beaked face. Within 45 minutes of the `03 show, we were introduced to the Pininfarina Enjoy built on a Lotus Elise chassis, the Bertone Birusa and the Corvette-based Italdesign-Giugiaro Moray. The one we kept coming back to and admiring the most was the Birusa, like a good vintage that needs to sit alone out of its bottle for several minutes before revealing its yumminess.

Back in May 2002, the Birusa started at Bertone's style center under design director Giuliano Biasio.

After pushing the SKF drive-by-wire technology for the past two Geneva shows with the Filo and Novanta show cars (not to mention building the recently tested GM Hy-Wire), Biasio admits, "We wanted to get back to creating a GT dream car that commanded immediate reactions from people's hearts instead of their heads.''

Whenever BMW allows others to play with its platforms, it rarely lets even a hint of BMW styling be shown. Due to the long BMW-Bertone relationship, however, the Birusa got special dispensation. The front hints heavily at a pair of kidney-shaped grilles, the headlights are based on recent Bimmer eyes, and the fore and aft profiles and proportions put us in mind of the Z4, or spy shots of the upcoming 6 Series.

What did Chris Bangle think? As Biasio tells it, "We showed them a scaled-down model in September 2002 and they really liked what they saw. At no point did they tell us to alter anything we were doing.'' Even so, unlike last year's Novanta concept with its Saab badge, BMW allowed all this to happen with the understanding the BMW logo would appear nowhere on the car-a common request on such outside projects. Biasio goes on, "After that, the next time Chris Bangle saw the car was just a few hours before its debut for the press at Geneva, and he was really wowed by it.''