El Chavo del Ocho: background nostalgia
Just watched this beautiful video essay (in English) about El Chavo del Ocho, and as a Brazilian, what I have to say about the topic wouldn't fit into a yt comment. If you're not familiar with this show, go ahead and watch the video. This post will be waiting for you when you're done.
Done?
Let's go.
First off, about the video specifically: if I had a nickel for every Japanese person who commented on a video essay in English about a Mexican sitcom who has its biggest fanbase in Brazil... I'd have two nickels, which isn't a lot but it's weird that it happened twice.
Now, on to The Thoughts.
I don't think there's anything non-Brazilian that's more Brazilian than El Chavo del Ocho (or, how it was aired in Brazil, Chaves). The way it raised two (three?) generations of kids who watched broadcast television and how it became a staple of Brazilian culture is unprecedent. No Marvel superhero movie has ever achieved the level of enmeshment Brazilian kids have/had with this show. Its characters are common carnival/halloween costumes, people quote it constantly (foi sem querer querendo; sigam-me os bons; isso, isso, isso), it's become a meme during the dawn of Facebook/Instagram, and it'll beat whatever sitcom you think is a big deal in your country in terms of popularity.
I remember being a little kid, maybe six or seven years old, and watching it on TV (that was probably around 1996) and then learning that those children were played by adult actors! The suspension of disbelief was strong for me, but it speaks to the level of immersion and quality of the world Bolaños and his peers created two decades before I was even born.
And what kid wasn't traumatized by the episode where everybody accuses Chaves of stealing? Peak emotional damage at a tender age. Maybe the only thing more heart-wrenching than that is the Acapulco episode when he's (almost) left behind, or that time in the fake "wishing-well" when he says the adults could stop wishing for their enemies to die and instead wish he could have a proper meal every day. So many little moments scattered around this Mexican 1970s sitcom that just tugged at my heartstrings and stayed with me to this day.
I remember how the entire country was shocked and saddened by the passing of each actor behind Chaves. When Bolaños passed I was around 24-25yo. It was national news, everybody was talking about it (the radio, the tv, newspapers, magazines), hasty documentaries and were put together by a bunch of different TV stations, people mourned publicly on social media and in the streets. We watched the funeral live on TV as a nation.
Now, as a 36-year-old adult, El Chavo del Ocho/Chaves is still a part of my life--it's my husband's comfort show/background noise for cooking and doing other chores around the house. A day doesn't go by where I don't hear it playing in another room, or that I don't sit down to have a meal and join my husband to watch whatever episode he has on.
The nostalgia the quirky music and tape-recorded laughter evokes in me is very stark, and like a lot of nostalgia, it's bittersweet. You see, Chaves was also there, playing in the background, while I went through the roughest patches of life, when depression was eating me alive, and the chuckle I mustered rewatching it was sometimes the only thing that made me smile that day. It also reminds me of being a kid and spending long hours alone at home, waiting for my parents to come home, my nervous little body riddled with longing for my mom and my dad while side-eyeing the nanny that I didn't like playing with my baby sister.
Of course it's not perfect--if you've watched the video or know a little about the backstage of the show, you know what I mean. But here I'm not talking about real people and their shenanigans--I'm talking about this made-up orphan boy who spent his time inside a barrel and got into all sorts of silly trouble in the neighborhood.
As a show that was always on, Chaves is rooted in a lot of core memories and fuzzy feelings from the past. And as someone with a very bad memory, sometimes I can't really put my finger on what type of emotion the show evokes in me when it's playing in the background. I'm left with a feeling of the passing of time, how different life was, how different I was... how the world's changed, even though--much like this show--it still works kind of the same way.
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