30.03.21 - Amor de Mãe

Halloooo,

How goes it? Over here we've officially wrapped on Gaby's course, and have moved on to finding new lodgings for ourselves in the coming months. We also had the (vaccinated) grandparents over for lunch at the weekend, and did a big shop - a positively supercharged schedule compared to recent weeks.

I have also made a grand total of 2 (two) mixtapes, and my phrase of the week ("a mother's love") is the title of a "novela" (soap opera) currently on the air here, which is notable for being one of the first high-profile cultural casualties of the pandemic in Brazil, and one of the first shows to make a comeback once restrictions were lifted.

My forensic research on Wikipedia shows that "Amor de Mãe" premiered in November 2019, as Globo's premium show in the 9pm slot (people still watch terrestrial TV here!). Soap operas are produced at an absolutely relentless clip here, with new hour-long episodes released pretty much every day of the week for months at a time, and are obviously a huge advertising cash cow for the channels despite the rise of Netflix and its ilk. But production was shut down in March 2020, along with just about everything else in the country, and the slot was filled with re-runs.

Anyway, it's been back on the air for a while now, and we've caught bits and pieces of episodes on our sporadic visits to terrestrial TV. The network is at pains to point out that the new episodes were all shot in Covid-safe conditions, and I believe them because the show has now become an absolutely fascinating, eerie case study of how the entertainment sector has tried to press on in a world where no one can be within 2 metres of anyone else.

About 75% of the original cast has been culled, never to be heard of again, along with any extras; all the actors had to turn up to set with their hair and make-up done in advance (by their close family, presumably); all the scenes take place on huge, mostly empty sets with windows and doors open; scenes with more than two characters are largely eschewed; and often they'll involve one character on their own, filling someone in on plot developments over Zoom (sometimes laid out like a regular Zoom conversation on the screen). 

Covid-19 not only exists in the "Amor de Mãe" TV universe, it is frequently referred to and often drives the plot, which I would suggest is the last thing your average Brazilian wants to see when they turn on the TV at the end of the day, but would at least explain all the social distancing, and fits in with the whole "holding a mirror to society" aspect of soaps.

Despite all the disclaimers, the show has come under fire for having characters state that people who have been infected and recovered are no longer at risk, which suggests that maybe it should have downplayed the whole Covid angle while the pandemic is still ongoing or, you know, not bothered coming back on the air at all, especially since Globo has a near-infinite archive of re-runs to fall back on.

But who am I to say - ratings are up, meaning a lot of people will presumably watch just about anything as long as it's new and free-to-air. The other big TV hit at the moment is Big Brother Brasil, but that's another story for another email...

Speak soon!

Fredalo