In May 2003, 150 women signed a letter calling for the expulsion of Brazilian sex workers from Bragança, Trás-dos-Montes. It would have been another of the similar movements in the region, if it hadn’t made the cover of TIME magazine. A few months later, 200 Brazilian women were banned from the city. The theatre-documentary show crosses the events of the ‘Mothers of Bragança’ phenomenon with the real stories of actress Tati Pasquali, who suffers the consequences of this social-collective movement in her personal life 20 years later, Camila Cequeira, an actress who migrated to Portugal in the year of the event, and Eliene Lima, a real character who played a leading role in the phenomenon. Lives that invite reflection on stereotypes, machismo, racism, xenophobia and patriarchy. Who wins from disputes between women? In times of the rise of the extreme right all over the world, we go back to the roots of systems of oppression to question the dichotomies between mothers and prostitutes, between outsiders and patriots, between the self and the other.

Creation, staging, dramaturgy and texts
Maria Giulia Pinheiro (@mariagiuliapinheiro)

Texts and interpretation
Tati Pasquali, Camila Sequeira and Eliene Lima
(@tatipasquali, @acamicerqueira)

Video Realisation and Projection Direction
Anna Zêpa (@annazepa)

Stage Direction and Lighting Design
Lucas França (@francalure)

Movement Direction
Deborah Kramer (@deby_kramer)

Soundtrack
Ágatha Cigarra (@cigarra_soundsister)

Exterior look
Patrícia Portela and Jorge Louraço
(@peixinho_da_horta and @jorgelouraco)

Graphic Arts
Pat Cividanes (@patcividanes)

Production
Tati Pasqualli and Maria Giulia Pinheiro

Financial Management
FALA (@fala.pt)

Support
Lisbon Libraries, Lisbon City Council, Rua das Gaivotas 6, GDA Foundation

Residencies
Alcântara Library – José Dias Coelho

Maria Giulia Pinheiro
Maria Giulia Pinheiro (São Paulo, 1990) is a poet. As a poet, she also works as a playwright, director, actress and researcher. She won the 2nd edition of the Prémio Nova Dramaturgia de Autoria Feminina (Cepa Torta/DGArtes), with her work ‘Isso não é Relevante’, and is the author of five books of poetry and dramaturgy, published between Brazil and Europe. She has created several theatre shows in Brazil, as well as literature and performance events, such as ZONA lê Dramaturgia. In 2019, he created ‘A Palavra Mais Bonita’ (staging, dramaturgy and performance), which has been travelling around Portuguese-speaking countries ever since, having already had seasons in Mozambique, Brazil, Portugal and Spain (Galicia). For this project, he moved to Portugal. In Portugal, she created SLAM at CAM (Gulbenkian Foundation), Todo Mundo Slam, Slam Camões (Coimbra City Council) and Ginginha Poética, as well as writing the dramaturgy for the show ‘Palimpsesto: o que se apagaga para escrever de novo?’, directed by Lucas França and supported by DGArtes and the GDA Foundation. Since 2017, she has created and coordinated the Feminist Dramaturgy Centre, where she teaches dramaturgy based on the work of women artists. In 2020, these classes went online, which attracted more than 500 people around the world and resulted in the publication of two anthologies, as well as three seasons of the fiction podcast ‘Corte Perfeito Para’, both projects with texts written from her classes.