At 40 years old and with more than 25 years of career, actor, director and creator Filipe Codeço debuts his newest challenge in theater with the show “Língua”, which explores the intersection between pounds and Portuguese. The play, which premieres on June 6th at Sesc Copacabana, is not limited to a conventional translation, but truly immerses itself in the fusion of the two languages. In addition to being part of the creation, Filipe also plays the character Félix, a hearing taxi driver who needs to learn to communicate with his deaf friend, Matias. With a remarkable trajectory in theater and audiovisual, including participation in “Vai Na Fé” (Globo) and “Essa História Dava Um Filme” (Multishow), Codeço reinforces its commitment to diversity and inclusion on stage, highlighting the importance of technique and art as a tool for transformation.
Filipe, you have more than 25 years of career in theater and audiovisual. How do you see your journey so far and what are the main milestones of this journey?
A career spanning 26 years. I would put as my first milestone the play “Capitães da Areia”, which was my second or third work, but it was the first work in which I had a larger character and the audience’s reaction was very strong. It is a play based on the work of Jorge Amado. I would put as a second milestone a show that I wrote myself, called “Mono Diálogos a Macoretas”, which I wrote when I was 19. And then, when I was 20, I put together this show. part of a movement called New Brazilian Dramaturgy. I really like what I was reflecting in that work.
I will also mention here the show that I created based on the experience of the laughter ward, which is clowning, it is a very important aspect of my work. I even have a group called Bando de Palhaços that is dedicated to this language. I was part of the Riso ward, which was a graduation and extension research project, involving the three academic bodies. We performed regularly in hospitals and did a show called “Clowns”, which was based on everyday life in the hospital world and we took this show to Tunisia, where we won a festival.
With the show“That Which Cannot Be Spoken About”,my first work involving pounds in Portuguese, I was awardedat APTR Nacional 2021 as best actor in a leading role.It was an immense challenge, really. Because, to make things even more complex, we created this show during the pandemic. The rehearsal process, via Zoom, was very difficult. But, for me, being a show in which I acted alongside a deaf actor is a completely different act, because there are two languages, an oral language and a visual language. Anyway, it’s been a 26-year career, so it’s very difficult to summarize, because there are many, many, many works, both in theater and audiovisual.
His new show “Língua” explores the intersection between Libras and Portuguese. What inspired this research and what was the process of creating this project like?
The Língua project was created by me, in partnership with Vinícius Arneiro. This is our second work involving this bilingual dimension, which today we also consider bicultural, as the deaf experience is a cultural experience distinct from ours. What inspired us to carry out this second project was a provocation from Vinícius Arneiro himself. Initially, my show Aquilo de Que Não Se Pode Falar would be a solo show based on the novel Vaca de Nariz Sutil, by Campos de Carvalho, an incredible author. The book is narrated by a character, a former army soldier on leave due to schizophrenia, who lived through some wars. After being removed, he starts living in a state-supported pension, sharing a room with a deaf person.
At some point in the process, Vinícius proposed an idea to me: “What if we also put this Aristides character as the protagonist? If he also acquired the power to narrate?” I thought it was incredible. Our inspiration came from the need to go a little deeper into the relationship of daily and artistic coexistence between deaf and hearing subjectivities, as, in fact, it is a distinct perception of the world.
You mention that communicating with the deaf community is a challenge due to the language barrier. How does “Língua” seek to break this barrier and promote greater inclusion?
I already started to answer a little of the third question in the second, but let’s go a little deeper. Regarding the language barrier, it is important to highlight that sign language, as a form of communication for deaf people, was banned in a large part of the world for around 100 years. In 1880, there was a congress in Milan with educators of deaf people, most of them hearing, who decided to exclude the teaching of sign language. They believed that this created a separate community, making state control difficult.
This decision resulted in the imposition of oralization, forcing deaf people to learn lipreading and the country’s spoken language, such as Portuguese in Brazil, instead of sign language. Although many deaf people are able to make sounds, they cannot hear their own voice, which makes communication very difficult and exhausting for them. This places deaf people in a disadvantaged position in the hearing community, whereas in deaf culture, they find themselves in a more accessible and familiar environment.
This resolution was in force from approximately 1880 until 1980, with the Libras law being quite recent, from the 2000s. This period caused great trauma in deaf communities and generated a significant lack of knowledge about sign language. Our project seeks to break this barrier by promoting coexistence, as inclusion involves understanding and coexistence, which help to break down prejudices and mistaken views.
During the creation processes of “Aquilo de Que Não Se Pode Falar” and now “Língua”, we had a new dimension of the daily lives of deaf people. For example, when I invited Marcelo William da Silva, a deaf actor who played Aristides, to read Campos de Carvalho’s book, we realized that reading it would not be simple for him, although the book was already complex for hearing people. The first month of our process was dedicated to reading and discussing the book with Marcelo and our interpreters and translators.
Our objective is to promote coexistence between deaf and hearing people both in the artistic environment and in the audience. The play is developed in Libras and Portuguese, providing a unique experience in which, at times, deaf people receive information before hearing people. However, at the end of the show, everyone will have a very close perception of the whole. For us, promoting coexistence is the most effective and relevant way to break down barriers and promote inclusion, generating affection and mutual understanding.
The play is described as a bilingual and bicultural work, without the presence of a simultaneous interpreter. What were the biggest challenges and learnings when working in this format?
So, in answer 4 I already touched a little on answer 3, but let’s dive deeper. The presence of an interpreter in shows spoken in Portuguese, when made accessible to deaf people, generally places the interpreter outside the scene, in a point of light, outside the main field of vision. This means that deaf people have to look away from the scene to the interpreter, unlike watching a film with subtitles, where the subtitle is integrated into the image. Although watching a film with subtitles can generate some losses, they are much smaller compared to the losses of a deaf person watching a show in Portuguese with an interpreter outside the scene.
This removal from the scene results in an experience that resembles storytelling, where the deaf person has to look away to understand what is happening, causing great loss of context. The deaf community resents this, although they recognize the importance of accessibility. However, we consider this to be a modest step and one that requires further action. Today there is a lot of research to make accessibility more interesting, such as the use of shadow interpreters, who are inside the scene, behind the characters.
Our goal is for the accessibility process to also be an aesthetic effort. We want translations from one language to another to happen within the scene and dramaturgy. This is challenging, as it involves characters with different levels of fluency in Libras and Portuguese. For example, my character, who is hearing and does not speak Libras, lives with Matias, a deaf character who basically speaks Libras and reads a little Portuguese, and with Félix’s mother, Virgínia, who speaks Libras and Portuguese, as well as others. bilingual characters.
At times, the play is entirely in Libras, which puts the hearing audience in a position similar to that of deaf people in their daily lives, trying to understand what is happening without understanding the language. This is an important statement for us, as it reflects the experience of deaf people, who often observe the world without understanding what is being said around them.
An inspiring example for us is the film “The Tribe”, which is entirely spoken in Ukrainian sign language without subtitles. Even without understanding sign language, the audience can follow the plot and understand the situations, forgetting that they do not understand the language. This film also portrays deaf people in a non-ableist way, showing them as ordinary people, with flaws and virtues, without forced heroism.
Tell us a little about your character Félix in “Língua”. What are the dilemmas and emotions he faces when trying to communicate in an environment where he does not speak the language?
About Félix, he is a listening character who doesn’t speak anything about Libras. He arrives at a house where everyone communicates in Libras, and some speak Portuguese. Despite receiving some accessibility, he often does not understand anything that is happening. He is a very rich and challenging character for me, but it is also very rewarding to bring this figure to life.
It’s interesting because the listening public will certainly identify a lot with this character. In many moments, the audience will experience something similar to what Félix experiences in the scene, not quite understanding what is being said and needing to turn to someone to understand what is happening. In this sense, Félix experiences, in a very light way, a bit of what a deaf person experiences in a predominantly hearing world.
Félix is in a situation where he constantly needs to turn to people to access information and to make himself understood. The show, therefore, talks a lot about communication, not just about the language barrier, but about communication itself. Often, even people who speak the same language have difficulty communicating. The show addresses these complexities of communication.
In Félix’s case, he is a friend of Matias, the protagonist who is a deaf taxi driver. They both work in the same cooperative and have a friendship that, although affectionate, is superficial due to the communication barrier. This is common even in families where hearing parents have deaf children but do not speak sign language fluently, generating superficial communication.
Communication between a deaf person and a hearing person who does not speak Libras is often limited to gestures, and it is important to note the difference between gestures and signs. A sign is part of a language, while a gesture is just a communication effort. This entire process has been very beautiful and enriching.
You won the 2021 National APTR Award for “That Which You Can’t Speak About”. How did this previous experience influence your work on “Lingua”?
I already answered a lot of question 6 in the answer to question 2, but, thinking specifically about my work, I was very, very honored to receive the PTR award for this project. It is, without a doubt, the work that has challenged me the most in my career, mainly because it involves rehearsing via Zoom and interacting with people who speak a sign language and another, a spoken language. The scene rhythms are completely different. For example, in theater, comic timing is often based on rhythm – a question followed by a quick answer, with moments that can speed up or slow down, all of which define the mood. Understanding these times between oral and visual communication is a long process.
Marcelo, the non-hearing actor who participated in Aquilo de Que Não Se Pode Falar, took a while to understand that I had finished speaking. He needed to see that I had stopped moving my mouth to know that he could start signaling. If I had been looking elsewhere, he wouldn’t have known I was done either. This process is extremely complex, it seems simple, but it is very, very complicated.
This work was perhaps the biggest challenge of my career. Being awarded by him was something very special. I confess that I expected Marcelo to also be nominated, as we are both protagonists in Aquilo de Que Não Se Pode Falar. It was beautiful that, between us, we decided that the first prize that came out, whatever it was, would be received by Marcelo. When we won, he was the one who went on stage first, said what he wanted and then I went to receive the award. This was very symbolic.
Unfortunately, the awards were not accessible, but we made sure to ensure that. Jonathan Narciso, our translator-interpreter, was also in the audience, providing accessibility for Marcelo. This experience greatly influenced Língua and my entire life, because now I have a new relationship with the deaf community. I am increasingly interested and desire to understand how to create not only accessibility, but also conviviality and real exchanges. Ricardo Boareto, our protagonist of Língua, who plays Matias, is incredible and an important person within the deaf community.
In addition to acting, you are also a project creator and director. How do you balance these different roles and what do you enjoy most about each of them?
For a while, I defined myself as a transdisciplinary artist. I haven’t been using this term as much lately, as it seems to have become a bit pompous and academic. But, in fact, my work has never been limited to one place. I’ve never been able to see myself just as an actor, although I am, essentially, an actor. I have always considered myself an artist, because, since I was 14 years old, when I started studying theater, I already had a strong connection with writing.
I forgot to mention it in the first answer, but Monodiálogos Ancoretas is a text written by me. My grandfather was a lawyer and poet, and my uncle Renato Codesso, a very important figure in my life, was a devourer of books and also wrote very well, although he never published anything. I’ve always had a very strong relationship with writing, I’ve written plays, poems, and been awarded at poetry festivals.
I’ve always seen myself as an artist because I’m very restless and I’ve always tried to give vent to my concerns. I’m pragmatic, but I never stop feeding these concerns. I have always built myself as a multidisciplinary artist. While I act, I already have a director’s vision, and while I direct, I bring an editor’s perspective, considering cinematographic editing. I deeply studied film editing and worked as an editing assistant. Often, while directing, I think like an editor, visualizing how the scene will be edited.
My relationship with dance is also very strong. I already had a dance theater group, and my construction as an actor is very physical. The body is my access route to emotions and rhythms. I have a close relationship with music too, I have composed, played shows with a brega band, and continue to develop projects where I work on different fronts.
It’s not simple. There were times when I reached exhaustion. For a while, I did shows with Nivaldo Rosa, an alter ego of mine as a cheesy singer. I composed, thought about the aesthetics, produced, sold the shows and thought about the sequence of the songs. I often arrived at the show exhausted. During this period, he also produced Crônica de um Paraíso Fantástico, a show based on clowning, with influences from German expressionism from the 1920s. He also directed the Bandos de Clowns project, which operated in public hospitals in Rio de Janeiro, in partnership with Doutores da Happiness.
I reached a point of exhaustion, I could no longer handle everything. I stopped doing the Nivaldo Rosa show and suspended Crônica de um Paraíso Fantástico. That’s when I decided to do a master’s degree at Unirio, within the postgraduate theater program, with research focused on cinema, studying films that move between fiction and documentary. During this period, I also directed my first feature film, Somos Vivos, a Canal Brasil project in partnership with AK Vídeo. This film is very special to me.
Today, after this period of exhaustion, I can manage my activities more calmly. At 40 years old, I have more maturity to better select projects, avoiding doing everything at the same time. I still do a lot of things, but with less intensity than before.
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