A NETFLIX ORIGINAL SERIES
- What is it, Dodoi? - Hold on.
You know I hate surprises.
Just stay quiet.
- I'm going to hit the wall. - No.
- What are you up to? - Just wait!
We're not repeating what happened at Carmen's.
You'll like it.
- It's too far. - We're almost there.
All right, hold on.
- Cool, right? - What's all this?
The dressing room of an actress married to a lawyer
- who knows her like no one else. - You think this is me?
Literally.
I wanted you to feel at home, you know?
I don't want to look like an old child star
trying to prove herself in a serious play.
But isn't that who you are?
Was! From now on, my art speaks for itself.
Do you like it?
I'm the main character, right?
It's a monologue. It's in the contract.
- Then I'll be alone? - Unless there are any animals...
I don't act with animals!
- Carmen is a serious director. - Serious, really?
Didn't you see that picture at her house?
And the snacks: a grape inside another grape?
I had five of those at once.
We can expect anything from a person like that.
Like this?
And now?
Like this?
- Carmen, dear... - I've told you to leave me alone!
Oh! It's you.
I'm having a huge problem with this lighting technician.
How hard is it to understand the concept of a dark light?
Well, they are opposites, so...
Exactly.
Even Samantha got it, and she's from television!
- Ready to rehearse? - I didn't get the script.
What matters is what's between the lines.
- The punctuation? - The breathing.
A true actor impregnates the air
with the play's emotion.
In this case, abandonment.
By that, you mean
there will be no one else on stage. Not even animals?
Who do you think I am?
The only animal on my stage was that dead horse, and never again.
Oh, good, I don't have a problem with dead animals.
Samantha, you're going to have the privilege of acting
in a Belarusian quintessential play
about the solitude of an orphan.
Is everything all right, Samantha?
I'm okay...
I'm just thinking...
that it's going to be a challenge
to play a character who wasn't loved as a child like I was.
That's why we need to work on your breathing.
A balloon, Carmen? I thought this was a grown-up job.
Blow it up.
Each blow...
is a happy memory from your childhood.
A mother's hug.
A Christmas gift.
This is the love you received in your childhood.
Stored, protected from the world's cruelty. Isn't it beautiful?
It's orange. That's in fashion.
And now you've lost everything. Everything!
Go! What are you feeling?
A whistle in my ear. I think I'm a bit deaf.
That's not possible!
Every actor ends up in tears!
Tissue companies sponsor my workshops.
I haven't cried since I was five.
It makes your face look ugly.
But if I have to, I have a trick. Give me a second.
Fine. Television ruined you a bit, as a human being.
But one exercise never fails.
There's a straitjacket in your dressing room. Put it on.
Go!
Help me out here, Dodoi.
One sleeve... The other one.
After this, you can go.
I'm putting you in a straitjacket. I should stay.
Dammit.
Argh, those needy people from school won't leave me alone. You take it.
Hello? Oh, hi...
What? A fight?
- Which one? - Both of them.
They are in the principal's office. What now?
There's a conflict for you, Dodoi the lawyer.
Good luck. I think you're going to need it.
In theater, you say "break a leg."
Ouch, stop it!
Samantha, breathe like you're in your mother's uterus.
- I can't! - Exactly.
Isn't it nerve-racking? Are the tears coming?
Just the smell. Where do you keep this?
Forget the superficial, the carnal.
When I'm stuck inside the uterus, I feel everything.
The moment I left the uterus,
compressed by those damp and oppressive walls...
- Gosh, she's crazy. - Oppressive...
The world expanding, blood streaming through my nostrils.
The light of day blinding my retinas!
And when I left, I did the impossible!
You were born?
I didn't cry!
You remember all that?
- I cry every time I think about it. - No!
This memory of the tough separation of the womb,
the fact that you will never be this close to your mother again.
Did you feel anything? Where are you?
A studio.
What's it like?
Cold. I mean...
There's a great air conditioner...
lights...
glamour...
Glamour? Samantha, separation from the womb is our first trauma.
- You didn't feel anything? - Shortness of breath.
Memories of autoerotic asphyxiation? Any trauma is useful at this point.
No, it was just the sheets. I'm great now.
No one gets out of the uterus feeling great.
Tell me one actor who hasn't come out of a uterus?
Everyone comes out of a uterus.
Exactly.
And that's what we need to find in you.
Maybe it only works on people who had a troubled childhood, no?
You acted with a cigarette. That must have scarred you.
Correction: I played with a cigarette. It's a dear memory.
The person who inspired that horrible book must have traumas.
The book was full of lies, Carmen.
Even if half of those were lies, you were clearly a troubled child,
stuck in a Brazilian version of The Shining.
I see, you only watched the movie!
I was short on time.
I hated that performance.
If I saw Laila, I don't know what I would do...
I am not just a father, I'm also a lawyer.
In the making.
I'm not leaving without fighting for my kids' right to defend themselves.
- OK. - That's it?
Your kids are not in a courthouse, they're in school.
Kids, I need a moment alone with your father.
Wait in the new Zen vegan space.
That's what we call the little empty room where we send the kids.
"Solitary" is no longer a pedagogically accepted term.
Where were they hurt?
No one is hurt. At least not on the outside.
But you said they were in a fight and they had serious injuries.
Feelings were hurt.
Clearly, you didn't read the school manual.
- School comes with a manual? - Yes.
The manual of the conflict-free education for well-adjusted children.
VECINO THEATER
It took you forever. I'm glad you got my message to come with your costume on.
I feel great, Carmen.
I just thought about putting a belt on,
show my silhouette, prove the years haven't affected me.
Exactly what I did.
Love it. It's kind of hashtag #EcoBagDress.
Laila? What is she doing here?
You said this was a serious place.
With all due respect, dear.
I'm not offended.
This play only has one actress, and that's me.
Calm down, Samantha, Laila is only here as your understudy.
Understudy? Carmen, I don't need an understudy!
When I do, I'll be dead!
Don't go getting any ideas.
This is a great opportunity for her to really understand you,
to see the Samantha that wasn't in the movie.
Laila will be your mirror.
Up close. We are hashtag #Twins.
Every actress needs someone to challenge her.
I challenge myself.
I've worked with chicken pox, mumps, swine flu, and comedians.
I survived the biggest epidemics of the '80s.
Samantha, theater is not like television
where something goes wrong and you just edit it.
I directed Hamlet while my grandmother was dying.
- In the hospital? - Right there, during "to be or not to be."
Think of your kids' well-being.
And in the power of intense coexistence.
This is how it starts.
First you curse someone, then steal an eraser,
and suddenly, you're being charged with aggravated triple homicide.
None of this would have happened
if your son knew the truth about his nature.
Samantha and I talked
and we'll let him figure himself out alone.
I'm not talking about that, I'm talking about him being white.
- What do you mean? - Brandon said he was a black author.
A classmate said he wasn't a minority, just a white boy.
My mother calls him that.
Well, Brandon called the boy a liar.
Cindy defended her brother
and called the boy racially insensitive.
I know that finding out that your kids
are capable of using such words is a shock.
They must have learned that from Marcinho.
I think it's a miracle that the boys say "anus" instead of...
Apart from their vocabulary,
I believe Brandon deserves to know the truth.
- Yes, that everybody says "ass." - No. That he is adopted.
Me and Samantha made that boy the old way.
Did you see her pregnant?
No.
After that, she had to go on a nine-month tour
- on the Paranácoast. - Paraná?
I know... Paraná.
Dodoi, I have a Ph.D. in Biology and Genetics from Harvard.
And you ended up here?
My point is...
the chance of a black man and a white woman having a son
as pale as him is one in a million.
It's just that Brandon isn't used to playing outside, you know?
He got sunburned from the English room's UV light.
He could only be whiter if he was... albino.
In fact, the chance of him being albino would be 1 in 1,300.
It would be more likely...
Me having an albino kid than Brandon?
Exactly.
The inexorable weight of this metaphysical feeling.
Mom, it's in this silence you leave me.
In this emptiness of soul, of mind, of human warmth.
Samantha, stop. I can feel that you're acting.
- Oh, great! - That isn't good.
You have to act without acting. Feel it. Cry.
Laila, your turn. Dive into it.
Hashtag - #NudeAtTheTheater.
Emotion beyond the words!
She just got naked.
In this emptiness of mind...
of human warmth...
Look at the realness of the lack of warmth.
And the emptiness of mind too.
Go, Samantha, speak your truth.
My truth...
is that her nipples are different sizes.
I knew someone would figure that out! I'm a freak!
Cindy, I need to write about slavery. I don't have time to read.
Let me present a new topic for you. More artistic.
All these stories are about people who lost their parents.
What do you want to do with Mom and Dad? Nothing Dad said could have been this bad.
- It wasn't anything Dad said. - Oh, good.
Nothing Mom said could have been this bad.
These stories are about people
who are different from their family.
- Don't you identify with that? - With Mowgli, I do.
Surrounded by savages, he's the only sophisticated one.
But the others...
Are you trying to say that I'm adopted?
It doesn't matter where you came from, you're my brother. Come here.
Samantha, the principal said that the chance of a black man's son
needing factor 50 sunscreen is one in a million.
- A hundred. - No. A million.
Brandon's sunscreen is 100. With 50, he looks like raw salmon.
I'll understand if you had other affairs. I was in jail, the fault is all mine.
What are the chances of me having a daughter
who cares so much about the world when I only care about myself?
Not many...
Less than one in a million.
Kids are something no one can explain.
I need silence! Carmen's voice is echoing in my head.
You can't explain luck either, Dodoi.
And we got very lucky with our kids.
- Okay. - See you later.
Just do it, Laila!
Cindy, where's Brandon?
Dealing with the fact that he is adopted.
We heard everything.
And where did you get the idea that he's adopted?
There are no pictures of Mom pregnant.
She must have found him abandoned somewhere.
Mom loves finding free stuff.
Cindy, she was doing a tour on the coast of Paraná.
Some places don't deserve pictures.
Then Brandon is a rarity? One in a million?
Who in this family isn't? Think about it.
How did you learn to care so much about bees?
- Brandon is my brother! - Of course he is.
Turn your backs to me.
Laila, go to your dressing room, look at yourself naked,
and find out what else is flawed, darling.
I couldn't wait to be free from Laila.
And from the burden of having to play this orphan character.
So I'm out?
No. I created a new character more suited to your dramatic limitations.
You will be the ghost of Laila's mother.
And now I'm playing a character who's not even alive?
That's art, Samantha.
It's unpredictable.
Unless...
you can also do something very traumatic...
dramatic.
Look at my son, who inherited soccer from me! Hey!
I'm only here because having balls thrown at me is good for my character.
This school ended bullying three years before I started here.
As a tormented artist...
That's the son of Samantha, pure!
- I'm not an adopted orphan? - Of course not, son.
I see. It's even worse.
I'm the bastard son of an affair that my mother had on a beach in Paraná!
Brandon, you're my son.
But we have nothing in common.
Of course we do!
Have you ever seen a family like ours?
Well, no. Everyone looks more normal.
If anyone in this world were one in a million,
it would be someone in our family.
And that's you.
You are special.
And I'm really proud of you, dude.
Okay?
I'm ugly! I'm ugly!
And everyone tells me to be beautiful just because I'm a woman!
Wonderful, Laila.
Think about your body, which shouldn't exist.
Is this theater haunted?
It's me...
the ghost of your mother...
who didn't love you...
who left you...
who sees you as nothing...
recycled toilet paper of existence.
Is this in the script?
This is much better than the script. Go, Samantha, poor it all out.
The only ones without mothers...
are those who don't deserve them.
This is you.
A nothing.
A void.
Bottom of the well.
I knew this was going to work!
Laila, I've created a new exercise.
Go to the corner of the stage and stand still.
- Can I blink? - No! It's for art.
Samantha, that was excellent!
There never was a ghost of Laila's mother.
The part is still yours.
But what about Laila?
That human void?
I said I don't work with animals.
She is only here because she's useful.
Ciggy, let's talk.
- Did you like that I played maracas? - I don't care.
What I want to know is why Samantha was two hours late for today's shooting.
She seemed tired.
We shot two shows straight, I didn't think it would be a problem...
Let me be clear, Ciggy.
Kids don't like a massive cigarette pack anymore, right?
Right.
- But you're still on the show, okay? - Okay.
Because you have only one job here:
to control Samantha.
To make her work!
You only have a job...
because you're useful.
Got it?
- My hairy toe. My nipple... - Go on, Laila.
You only have a job because you annoy Samantha.
Come on, Laila, no one deserves to be used like this.
Samantha, you told me that she is the worst example
of everything that's annoying about the internet!
Exactly. There's plenty of bad things on the internet.
Being the worst is to be one in a million.
Wow, that's beautiful!
She is rare, different.
Enough with being used.
Only with my consent.
Even with your consent, it's time you valued yourself.
Even though you are literally the most useless person I know...
you shouldn't be used like that.
Samantha, do you care about me?
A little bit. Maybe.
I've had many relationships in my life, but this is the first mutual one.
I want to hug the world!
Yes! Go, live life, Laila. Before I become your prison.
I know! I'II join that Indian hugging cult.
- That's not what I said. - You didn't have to say a thing.
Your love has lightened my way.
I need to find myself! Hashtag - #NewLaila.
#NewLaila!
Why are you here? There will be no rehearsal. There won't even be a play.
I can agree with that.
Without someone traumatizing you,
you don't have the depth to play this part.
Your past is pure glitter.
My past is much more than that, Carmen.
What about selling beer when you're nine years old?
Oh, come on, you loved that.
And being called "Samonster"?
Poor you, you had a nickname. Samantha, stop making up traumas.
There are plates deeper than you.
What about being abandoned by my mother at the door of a TV station
when I was just a baby?
Is that enough of a trauma for you?
You were abandoned?
I knew I felt something in you from the beginning!
A black hole of loneliness!
I was right!
You are The Orphan!
Like that jungle boy.
But I wasn't raised by wolves...
I was raised by show business.
Samantha, read the monologue while remembering that trauma.
"At the end of this long and disastrous dawn of my life...
I am nothing but a little..."
Orphan, Samantha... Say, "Orphan."
"Orphan."
What you said.
That's it. The play will be just you and a dark...
Light.
Exactly. Just one detail...
I want you to really pronounce the word "orphan."
With this emotional baggage,
this is the most important part of the play.
It's the reason we're doing this play.
Okay, sure...
I am nothing but a little...
What you said.
Subtitle translation by Guilherme Gama