Philip Graham
Spends a Year
in Lisbon.
- - - -
Philip Graham, a writer who teaches at the University of Illinois, will be spending a year in Lisbon, Portugal. He will be reporting to us from there.
- - - -
D I S P A T C H 1 6
Light for Light.
By Philip Graham
- - - -
"So, Philip, what do you think of these socks?"
I'm sitting at Rui Zink's kitchen table, where piled before me are the latest examples of his generosity—a DVD of an obscure Andrei Tarkovsky film, a Sandman graphic novel—and I try to process the sight of him standing in the apartment doorway, each black pant leg pulled halfway up his calf to reveal a bright white sock.
"They seem to fit," I reply, still not sure what he's getting at with this sartorial display.
My friend's broad face deflates a little, because he's trying out a joke for tonight's show. And what a show it is. Rui is a cool guy (though his last name does sound like a Dr. Seuss character), and he's the kind of writer who'll take on anything: stories, novels, essays and political commentary, plays, graphic novels. His latest gig is in that eclectic spirit and beyond, because he's serving as a judge for a reality TV show, A bela e o mestre, a Portuguese version of an American show called Beauty and the Geek. Dumb and lovely gals pair up with smart and geeky guys to compete for a prize of 100,000 euros, and, as one local newspaper wryly observed, "Elas são bonitas, eles são inteligentes e o contrario não é verdade" ("The women are beautiful, the men are intelligent, and the opposite isn't true"). It's the country's most popular TV show right now, and Rui sees it as a great ironic leap into the belly of pop culture. He'd like everyone to be in on the joke, but I've met too many folks resistant to the show's charms. Just the other day, at the mere mention of the program, a mutual friend of Rui's and mine opened her mouth and pointed a finger inside for a spot-on pantomime of retching.
Rui goes back to fussing about this and that, ranging the rooms of his apartment, the necessary jitters before a show, until the phone rings. Rui picks up and tells his driver (now there's a sign of TV stardom) that we'll be outside right away. We hustle down the stairs of his apartment building, and I brace myself for a dose of staged American reality with a Portuguese accent.
Though I heavily favor the finger-in-the-throat point of view, I'd follow Rui just about anywhere; he's that kind of friend. He's introduced me to fabulous hole-in-the-wall tascas, out-of-the-way bookstores, and a gaggle of composers, filmmakers, magazine editors, comedians, and musicians, and tonight our destination is a TV studio near Mafra—a town famous for its huge, beautiful monastery, whose construction gobbled up a sizable portion of Portugal's wealth in the 18th century—where the latest episode is being filmed.
There's the company car, parked across the street, a blandly normal man and a stunning woman standing beside it. At first I peg this pair as contestants, but Rui introduces them as two of the show's producers. Which is odd, because the first thing the fellow says to me is, "It's such a stupid show," followed quickly by his colleague's "Oh, yes, such a stupid show." Rui gleefully nods agreement.
Before we can leave, though, some sort of negotiation sets in, cell phones are out and calls are being made. In the current state of my Portuguese, I can make out the fuzzy outlines of what's being said, while the tricky details lose me, so at moments like this I settle back into silence and wait to see if the conversational knots tighten or unbind. Rui leads me aside to explain that he neglected to mention he'd invited me along. Because the producers weren't expecting me, it seems I'm taking someone else's place in the back seat. I offer to visit the show another day, but Rui shakes his head. "No, trust me, I have to play the prima donna now. It's the only way things get done in their world."
Oh, Rui, I think, don't lose yourself in this part, but I keep it to myself and simply nod. Finally, we're off, though I'm not sure anything has been settled. As we pass through Lisbon's narrow streets, I forget about backstage politics, because the beauty of the city's nooks and crannies always puts me in a meditative mood. I take in swift glimpses of rows of tiny shops, ranging from narrow pastelerías to pocket-sized hardware stores to clothes stores barely larger than a closet, each artfully brimming with inventory, because the Portuguese know as well as the Japanese how to sculpt a tight space. Then we're barreling down a broad avenue darkening from the shadows of evenly spaced trees cast by the setting sun. Then we pass a park, a fountain, a café.
The producer stops the car on a side street in front of some sort of warehouse, and the cell phones pop out again for more mysterious negotiations. Rui and I step out to stretch our legs and he's back to pacing—it's getting dark, and still we haven't left Lisbon. We wait until a middle-aged woman sporting reddish-brown hair, accompanied by an off-white plug of a dog, approaches at a confident clip. Rui introduces her as Clara Pinto Correia, one of his fellow judges.
Clara sizes me up with a wry look and then says in English, "Welcome to tonight's descent into Hell."
Well, that's certainly stronger than "It's such a stupid show," but before I can reply there's a brief anxious to-do about who fits where in the car. Rui sits up front beside the bland producer, I get to sit in the back between the stunning producer and Clara, and Clara's dog is relegated to the open trunk space behind us. So, I finally catch on, the pooch was my rival for the free seat.
Clara doesn't seem to hold it against me. The moment the car starts up, she turns to me and revs up, too—words and words and words. She can't stop. "Oh, this experience has been so revolting, so horrible. How to endure it? I can't stand it anymore. The depths of the contestants' stupidity keeps me from sleeping at night. What does it say about the state of our educational system?"
By the time we're on the highway, Clara's still at it, telling me she's a fiction writer as well, and also teaches biology at the university, but how can she teach when she's so preoccupied with this ridiculous show? "So I'm quitting—tonight. Why wait? There are no more surprises to be had; this show is only going to reach lower and lower levels of degradation. Besides, I intend to write a novel about the whole sorry experience, and I've already collected more than enough material."
She's in full venting swing, and I decide the right conversational strategy is to simply nod and line up a polite queue of ums and uh-huhs. Rui shifts uneasily up front. He's not immune to Clara's complaints, but he's had enough, and suddenly he's humming, low at first and then louder, building a buzz of off-key melody in his head that will drown her out. In the boot behind us, the dog, perhaps in sympathetic response to her master's low growl of misery, begins a counterpoint of whimpering. The two producers sit pinned to their seats, silent before this harmony of grumbling, humming, uh-huhs, and doggy whining, but I'm getting used to it, keeping up my part while hoping the turn-off sign to Mafra will show up any minute.
A child's sudden wailing interrupts our musique concrète collaboration, and I nearly leap from my skin. The sound comes from the beautiful producer sitting to my left, but her mouth is closed. Again, a little girl's voice cries out, "Mãe! Mãe!" ("Mama! Mama!") The woman pulls out her cell phone and answers, "Sim, querida?" ("Yes, darling?")
I'm staring at her, and though my mouth must be open wide, must be, no words will come. When she finally signs off, I manage to squeak out, "That's some ringtone."
"Yes, it's my daughter's voice."
"Your daughter's?"
"Her voice, yes. She's only 2 and a half, and when I work at night she misses me, and I miss her, too, you know?"
I nod, remembering how the lonely cries of my son and daughter when young echoed inside me. "Well, that's a ringtone that'll certainly get your attention," I say. "Now that I think of it, it's perfect, really—even if your phone goes off at the worst time, who couldn't forgive a mother the cry of her child?"
I'm babbling. She smiles wanly, then turns to the window.
None of this has put the breaks on the dog's quiet keening, and now Clara starts up again, saying that the entire show has been a humiliating experience, that her friends won't speak to her, and I'm back to my uh-huhs and Rui returns to his humming. This finely meshed production is so in gear that when the little girl's recorded voice cries out "Mãe! Mãe!" for a second and then a third time none of us bother to pause, and still we barrel through the dark, Lisbon now far behind us, the town of Mafra who knows where in the distance.
- - - -
The studio space is shaped like an amphitheater that's split in half, with the women in the audience seated on one side, the men on the other (though, for some unknown reason, a few guys behind me are cross-dressed as pirates with leopard-skin tricornered hats). Below us in the center of the set, while eight cameras cover every angle, a no-nonsense prompter with a Brazilian accent guides us through the niceties of the synchronized cheers and applause he expects us to master before the show begins. I'm having trouble concentrating, though, because I can't stop staring at two women on the other side of the audience who each wear a stark white mask, unnervingly expressionless. I wonder if they're here to cheer on a relative but don't want to be recognized by friends or co-workers.
The show's hosts appear—a painfully thin woman who must live on dabs of air spread over cloud crackers, and a fellow with a goofy grin who's nearly as skinny—and they unwind some scripted chitchat for us until the four judges arrive. Clara strides onstage along with her dog (on her last show, she'll do whatever she wants), followed by Rui, then the essayist Carlos Quevedo, and finally Marisa Cruz, a slinky blond model, and I'm reminded of why I love Portugal, a country where the presence of three writers defies American reality-show judicial tradition.
Rui tries out his white-socks gag, a lack of fashion savvy that draws the audience hoots he'd hoped for, and then the contestants march in, bosomy young women balanced in low-cut dresses, accompanied by guys who put the a in awkward. They're followed by couples sporting jaunty white banners stretched across their chests that announce "ELIMINADO." No anonymity for failure on this show.
The contestants get down to business, the geeky men proving themselves beginners at miniature golf and archery, while the women struggle to identify the images of famous people projected on a large screen. The imperious stare of Margaret Thatcher draws a blank, and the closest guess one beauty can manage for John Lennon is Elton John. The poor souls can't even recognize images of koalas or flamingos, and the folks I'm sitting among are an unruly bunch, guffawing at such egregious ignorance and offering rude back-seat advice. They even comment on Carlos Quevedo's Spanish accent: "Fala Portuguese!" ("Speak Portuguese!")
At the break, I'm guided backstage and up a flight of stairs, and everyone on the crew seems to know about me—or at least my country of origin. "You invented this!" more than one jokes reproachfully. I flash a smile that aspires to sheepish and ease past. I wouldn't mind making my own crack, because cultural influence works a two-way street. Alma and I recently threw a belated birthday party at our apartment for our daughter with her Portuguese school friends, a couple of hours' worth of pizza, rap music, dancing, and hula-hoop high jinks. An Americanized do on the surface, but I knew that Hannah—athletic, tall for her age, and standing out among her school friends—wished she could shrink herself down to the impossibly small package of a Portuguese girl (never mind that the whole country qualifies as the shrimps of Europe—only the island of Malta boasts smaller citizens).
Backstage in the judges' roost, glasses of whiskey and cups of espresso are passed around, Rui takes charge of the discussion, and I'm a little surprised at how easily it's decided which couple looks headed for the chopping block. Then we all return to the studio set for the second half of the show and Clara announces her departure, loyal dog by her side for moral support. While I can't quite follow what Clara's saying, surely her brief speech is a tad more tactful than what she railed about in the car, because when she's done the audience rises for a rousing ovation.
Before the clapping dies down, the two hosts lead Clara to the hot seat before the large screen and ask her to identify images of pop culture—apparently not her strong suit, as she's stumped by the hunky male actor from some daily soap and the prepubescent singing star. Clara takes it all in with embarrassed grace before she exits, and then only three judges remain, left behind to judge more of the same.
After the show, a subdued Rui and I munch on snacks in the backstage cafeteria, the contestants and eliminados mingling about, and he points out this fellow's or that young woman's backstory or personality quirk with his usual writer's eye for detail. I sit back and listen, certain that Rui knows he's in too deep, that the supposed joke of the show is costing him. But he's no quitter—he'll stick it out to the end and see where it takes him. He's a beast for experience, that's for sure, and if any novel ever gets produced from this mess, I think I'd prefer it be written by Rui.
Carlos joins us at the table and nibbles on some chicken. It's late, and he and Rui look tired. They've punched the clock at the American Cultural Factory and done their time, so we head outside and it's just the three of us that the bland male producer chauffeurs back to Lisbon.
I sit in the front seat, Rui and Carlos stretch out in the back and try to shake off the show by yukking it up and cracking open cans from a six-pack of Sagres beer that Rui commandeered from the cafeteria spread. I take pulls from a can, too, but I'm quiet, off in another place and time. Years ago, when Alma and I lived in our first small African village, the only Westerners for miles and miles, it turned out our neighbors held certain preconceptions about us, drawn from action movies that young men in the village had seen in larger towns when they'd served in the army. Everyone assumed I knew karate, and that Alma and I owned a handgun, secreted somewhere in our mud house. Didn't every American pack heat, as a backup in case the latest karate brawl wasn't going well?
Eventually I'd convinced the young men, hungry for lessons, that I'd always been karate-chop-challenged, and we kept repeating to our neighbors that we were firearm-unfriendly, but no matter: at the end of our 15-month stay, the villagers competed for the privilege of buying our nonexistent gun. Though we'd learned to speak well enough to communicate more than a glimpse of our essential selves, and had spent hours each day dispensing free medicines, the images from American movies—which only a few people in the village had actually seen—somehow trumped us.
I take another swig of beer as we speed down the highway, depressed at the thought that, wherever we Americans venture abroad, whether we like it or not we wear a crackling full-body halo (invisible, apparently, only to us), an aura of car crashes and gunfights; horror-movie monsters; martial-arts acrobatics and gangsta posturing; gaunt, haunted fashion models; all manner of inventive ka-booms and ka-blams; grainy porno close-ups; and now—thanks to the little emperor from Texas, bent on setting the world on fire—torture cages and carpet bombing. I'm my own blazing Fourth of July, I think.
Rui and Carlos still murmur and chuckle to each other in the back seat, old friends tending to current wounds over the last cans of beer. Lisbon eventually comes into view, and its faraway lights shimmer in the night through the trees we pass, flickering like muted fireworks. I sit up, charged by this illusion, and then, thinking ruefully of my own pyrotechnical display, I realize I match the city's distant dazzle light for light.
MORE DISPATCHES
Red dot denotes content that is new today.
Black dot denotes newish content.