Anatomy of passion binding fan to his idol

 

Sigmund Freud must surely have made a study of such a relationship but I haven't had the chance to read it or hear about it. 

I guess it's natural for anyone to prefer a certain singer, actor or any public figure over others. Everyone has his or her favourite actress, favourite band etc. And we're not talking here about sports fans that may kill and maim in the name of their choice football team. 

I think I was an early 'lover of show business figures'. In 1959, when I was 10, I had a favourite singer in the person of teenager Celly Campello, the queen of Brazilian rock. I also treasured to browse magazines like 'O Cruzeiro' & 'Manchete' which depicted endless photos of Beauty Contestants from around the world who gravitated to Long Beach, California to compete in the Miss Universe Pageant every year come June. Brazilians had been into that wave since 1954, when Miss Brazil, Martha Rocha was chosen as the 2nd most beautiful woman in the Universe. I had a special predilection for Terezinha Morango, Miss Brazil 1957, who also got to be the runner-up. 

I loved going to the movies every Sunday afternoon since I was 7 or 8. I don't remember having a particular adherence to a certain act but I relished watching those 25-minute cliff-hanger serials they showed at the end of a double-feature session. The Copperhead, a young-man on a mission played by US actor Robert Wilcox in the 1942 Republican serial 'The mysterious Dr Satan' turned into my first male hero. This is probably where the expression 'matinee idol' comes from. I was 11 then. 

But nothing compered in admiration, reverence and the attachment I devoted to Italian teen-age rock'n'roller Rita Pavone since I first saw her on TV Record on 25 June 1964; a Thursday night I happened to be visiting a cousin's wife called Maria Puerta who had a TV set in her living room. Mariinha usually watched 'Moacyr Franco Show' at TV Excelsior and I had become a fan of that variety show ever since I made a habit of visiting Mariinha on Thursdays a few months ago in late 1963. I remember when I and my younger brother and sister arrived at Maria's house and she told us she wouldn't be watching Channel 9 that night. I felt really downhearted but didn't say a word. She would be watching Channel 7 which would be presenting an hour-long recital Rita Pavone had given 2 days before. 

My best period of being a Rita Pavone fan ran from that Thursday night - 25 June 1964, when I saw her in concert at Channel 7 and the 1964 Christmas week when all the Hit Parade programmes I'd followed on various radio stations through the year claimed 'Datemi un martello' as the hit of the year. Six months of sheer pleasure and wonderment. That doesn't mean I didn't have other good phases too but that time frame was remarkable in its intensity. Suddenly I had found out I had a heritage in my being descendent from Italian grandparents that had migrated to Brazil in the 1880s.

Now, if I had to choose the very best time I would certainly say it was the week in September 1964, when I bought my very first record player and the album 'Meus 18 anos'. I could easily say those 4 months I walked in the air. I couldn't get enough of that album that I played non-stop before going to work, at lunch time when I came home for an hour and at night before going to night school and after I came back from classes, around 11:30 pm just before laying myself to sleep on my bunk bed.

My attachment to that diminutive Italian belter made me realize I had an Italian heritage myself and suddenly I was proud of it. My Mother's mother & father had both been born Italian who migrated to Brazil in the 1880s still in their late teens. Marco Giovanni Battista was 16 going on 17 when he arrived in Santos-SP with his parents and a younger brother Francesco and sister Marianna. I grew up listening to Mother's praising her family so I had a conviction deep inside that everything Italian was really good so Pavone, Endrigo, Paoli, Fidenco, Morandi and the other acts in the album 'Via Tiburtina km 12', only upheld that notion. 

By the end of 1964, I had met one other fan of Rita, in the person of Walter Teruo Tsutsui, who tended his father's mixed-business grocery located three houses past where I lived on Rua Simpatia, 103, Vila Madalena. Me & Walter soon built a friendship based on our musical tastes centred on Rita Pavone and pop & rock in general.

I always kept an eye on magazines that might carry an article or a photo of Rita, but as 1965 progressed, especially after 22nd August 1965, with the advent of 'Jovem Guarda', a rock show shown on Sunday afternoons commanded by Roberto Carlos, Italian acts started being gradually ostracized in favour of the native product and Anglo-American music which made serious inroads in the Brazilian charts through the Beatles, Dave Clark Five, Beach Boys, Animals etc.  

I used to buy 'Revista do Rock', a monthly magazine published in Rio de Janeiro, my older brother used to collect starting back in 1960, when we still lived in Marília, a small city 500 km away westbound. I don't remember exactly when, but one day, opening 'Revista do Rock' I read a little note of a certain Fan Clube Rita Pavone which accepted membership from any fans of the Italian rocker. I sat myself down and wrote a passionate letter claiming I was the greatest fan of Rita Pavone that had ever lived. A few weeks later I got an answer from someone called Antonio Carlos Faria who lived at Bosque da Saúde, a suburb next to Vila Mariana. 

I was so excited to have received a letter from the President of F.C.R.P. that I decided to take a bus and show up at that address to know more about the Fan Club. When I arrived at the place I sensed something was not right. The address was of a very small house, actually it was only a two-room abode. I got there in the afternoon, probably near 4:00 pm and a Black lady said that if I was looking for Antonio Carlos Faria I would have to wait until 7:00 pm for he worked as an office-boy at a stationary shop on rua Afonso Celso off rua Domingos de Moraes. I told her I had written her son about the Fan Club R.P. and was a little disappointed I had not been able to meet him. Her name, I later came to know was dona Dermantina Oliveira de Faria aka Tina. She was a nice lady and seeing my dejection she asked me to wait a minute, went into her room and brought out a stack of letters that Antonio Carlos had received from Rita Pavone fans all over Brazil. I was really surprised to realize there were so many young people who shared the same passion as myself for the freckled Italian singer. She said I could peruse the letters and that's what I did. Not only perused them but copied various addresses off the letters I found more appealing. 

I must have stayed on the steps of dona Tina's door for a quarter-of-an-hour. When I realized it was high time I went I bidded my farewell to such a lovely lady and went back home to Vila Madalena. Soon as I got home I started writing letters to all those fans whose letters I had perused. Silvia Paula Jentsch, a young lady who lived in Vila Clementino, not too far from where Antonio Carlos lived - was the first of my list for I liked her style right away. Besides her handwriting was great. She even drew a figure which portrayed Pavone.

Silvia Paula answered my letter immediately. When I read it I was most enthusiastic, got me the telephone-book, found a number belonging to a house near where she lived on Rua Coronel Lisboa, asked the person who answered it to, please, call Silvia and 3 minutes later I was talking to her. She invited me to visit her on the Saturday. 

Silvia had lived a sheltered life within a German family. Her father Otto had migrated to Brazil in the late 1920s to work as an engineer at Light & Power. He married a German-Brazilian young lady in 1940. Silvia was born in February 1942 and her brother 2 years later. They spoke only German at home so when Silvia went to primary school in 1949, she had a hard time for she didn't speak Portuguese. She eventually caught up with the rest. Silvia loved listening to the radio and became a serious fan of Brazilian music and by 1957 when rock'n'roll took hold she converted wholeheartedly to the new sensation. The family found out that Silvia was an accomplished artist. She could draw pictures like nobody. 

Watching how popular her drawings were among relatives and acquaintances Silvia's Mother thought she'd make money out of her daughter's talent. Silvia could draw beautiful flowers and other stuff on porcelain and they started a business which eventually took the whole family. Silvia would draw on white china and they would burn it on ovens the family bought. Their house in Vila Clementino turned into a porcelain business. Silvia was happy with the arrangement so that she didn't have to go out to work. She worked for herself and her family. They soon bought a VW beetle so they could have family outings on weekends. They were a self-contained unit. 

By 1964, Silvia had graduated from Brazilian music, American rock'n'roll, local TV watching and was deeply interested in the Italian rocker Rita Pavone who instantly became something of a role-model for her. Silvia approved of Pavone's short hair style and emulated it as soon as she saw her first album 'Rita Pavone', released circa November 1963. When I finally met Silvia in mid-1966, she had already seen Rita Pavone live when the Italian bombshell visited São Paulo in June 1964. Silvia was a member of three different fan-clubs, having visited the Sorocaba Rita Pavone Fan Club and met Leda Gonçalves, the F.C. President who happened to be the daughter of parents who owned a roller-skating rink in Sorocaba where the only records played were those of the two Rita Pavone albums already released by RCA. 

Silvia went to Sorocaba alongside her brother, Mum & Dad. Silvia was already 22 years old but she behaved like she was 13. She didn't have a life of her own. She worked for her family and went out with them on weekends. 

After we met, Silvia and I would go visit Pavone fans we had written to. On Saturdays we usually went out somewhere in the various suburbs of such a sprawling city as São Paulo.

May 29, 2021

to Doris

não sei se v. notou, mas na 'Gente', eles falam do 'drama' de Rita Pavone! Depois de Julho 1967, palavras como 'drama', 'calamidade', 'brigas' etc. sempre vinham em reportagens sobre a Rita... a Oposição do Signor Pavone foi bem explorada pela media italiana...

Ah, v. comentou em outra mensagem que eu 'mudei' em relação a Rita qdo ela se 'ligou' ao Teddy Reno...

Não, não foi o meu caso, pois minha 'paixão' por Rita já estava em baixa... como te falei, depois que conheci a Silvia Paula Jentsch em Junho-Julho 1966, eu transferi a maior parte de meu ardor por Rita para a própria Silvia... 

Depois que conheci a Silvia, minha vida mudou radicalmente. Eu passava meus week-ends na casa dela; chegava no sábado e saía de lá no domingo à noite. As vezes, a família (que tinha um VW) vinha me trazer à Vila Madalena no carro deles. Dona Paula gostava de mim.  Acho que ela achava que a Silvia tinha, aos 24 anos, finalmente, se interessado por um 'rapaz', e 'incentivava' o 'namoro'. Mas a Silvia já tinha me dito que (pasme!) gostava de meninas. Sy gostava de mulheres mais velhas; era fã da Hebe Camargo desde o final dos anos 50s, antes de ter sido fã da Rita... 

Enfim, a partir do meio de 1966, minha 'paixão' pela Rita diminuiu consideravelmente. Mas eu ainda gostava muito; queria traduzir as músicas em alemão e inglês etc.; tentava escrever uma biografia dela, colecionava discos importados...

Já p'ro final de 1967, qdo começaram a chegar ao Brasil as reportagens sobre o 'drama' de Rita; e a mudança de gravadora, eu não liguei muito; eu nem gostava, nem desgostava. A Silvia, por outra lado fora taxativa: qdo Rita casou-se em 68, ela se desligou afetivamente dela.

Tem outra, justo nesse interim, em Janeiro 1968,  me aconteceu minha tragédia particular, que foi eu ter que servir o Exercito lá em Santana. Deixei meu empreguinho na rua Theodoro Sampaio (que fazia desde 1961) e fui 'marchar' no quartel da rua Alfredo Pujól, em Santana. Foi um período muito infeliz p'ra mim, portanto a Rita Pavone ficou em 3o plano. Ah, em março 1967, eu tb. comecei a gostar do Paulo Naoto. 

Veja que tudo contribuiu para eu me afastar da Rita de maneira natural... 

Meu afastamento da Rita foi totalmente diferente do da Silvia, que foi 'estudado'. 

Ah, em janeiro 1968 começou a 'invasão' da música Anglo-Americana nas rádios Excelsior e Difusora, e eu 'embarquei' de cabeça nisso. Já comecei a 'menosprezar' as músicas que vinham da Italia, que já estava passando do Auge de 1963-1964-1965. É incrivel como a musica italiana decaiu em 1 ou 2 anos... 

Lá por 68 e 69, me lembro que, as vezes, ia visitar a Silvia, que nessa altura tinha brigado com a Mãe, e conseguiu alugar um apto na Bela Vista (rua paralela à Rua 13 de Maio) para ficar com a Claudete. Nos finais de semana, a 'turma' (fãs de Rita e 'agregados') enchiam o apto. Já naquela época, a própria Claudete começou a gostar de Dionne Warwick (Do you know the way to San Jose?), eu do Simon & Garfunkel, 'Everybody's talking'... etc.  

Um dia, todos reunidos no apto, puseram o compacto 'Grassa, grassa... Il Ballo dell'Orso'... e todo mundo começou a rir. Provavelmente  foi aí que eu percebi que a Rita não tinha jeito mesmo. Estava muito além de ser 'resgatada'. Gostar da Rita significava 'atraso cultural'. Eu nem comprei o LP 'Zucchero'. Meu 'afastamento' da Rita começou em 1967, se intensificou em 1968 e concluiu em 1969.

pronto, ai está minha biografia de fã de Rita... vou até usar isso na minha postagem (que ainda estou escrevendo)...

Boa pergunta, meu caro Zé Luiz... e comecei uma postagem para analisar a relação entre o fã e o ídolo... vou te mandar o link, embora não esteja pronto... inclusive o próprio 'rascunho' (em português) está lá... Na ultima vez que pensei nesse assunto eu tinha já, separado algumas ideias explicativas sobre o vínculo... Os vínculos foram múltiplos... a língua italiana, que eu ouvia muito pouco em casa... na verdade só ouvíamos palavras esparsas, mas eu sabia que meu 'nonno' (avô) era italiano... e minha Mãe o idolatrava... Antes do aparecimento da Rita eu não tinha tido relacionamento com a música da Península... quando ouvi aqueles arranjos sinfônicos para música popular eu 'pirei'... A figura de 'menino travesso' da Rita caía perfeita em meu psiquismo já adrogino. Eu sabia que, um dia, eu teria que 'namorar' e 'começar a gostar de garotas (sexualmente)... eu gostava de garotas, mas como seres humanos... amigas.  o JEITO masculino dela foi o que mais me chamou a atenção, além de ser bonita (para mim)... a capa do LP 'Meus 18 anos' era LINDA... o rosto muito bonito dela... e o fato de eu sempre ter gostado de coisas que (filmes, música, time de futebol que fizeram sucesso (em 1958 eu me tornei Santista, pois o Santos F.C. tinha sido campeão e tinha uma TAÇA na página de figurinha deles... Sempre gostei de Paradas de Sucesso, quase que 'venerando' as músicas que conseguiam chegar ao topo... eu escolhia quem seriam meus cantores favoritos pelos primeiros 5 postos da Parada de Sucesso... com forte tendência de me 'demorar' no Primeiro Posto, Primeiro Lugar... Rita ficou em 1o lugar de compactos simples, compactos duplos e long-plays... Desde que comecei a seguir o Hit Parade, nunca tinha visto tal 'arraso'... Pronto, aí estão os vários fatores para a 'sedução' ser completa... Preciso copiar esse texto e já deixar colado lá no blog...