FQ makes this important text by the Brazilian film historian and theorist Ismael Xavier available for the first time in English. A member of Brazil's first generation of film-studies academics, Xavier was one of the first scholars to write extensively on Coutinho's work. This article, originally published in Portuguese, was the first to name Coutinho's practice as one of theatricality ( jogo de cena ) as well as conversation and was therefore influential not only for later scholarship but for Coutinho himself.