Dulcina de Moraes in Hollywood

In early March 1937, Dulcina de Moraes and her husband Odilon Azevedo, a partner in the Dulcina-Odilon company, left on a trip to the United States of America that would have a strong impact on the company's future work.

They landed in New York City, where they were guided by Ethel Fagan, a member of the WCA Federal Theater and Ted Mounts, Public Relations, who accompanied the couple for a trip that lasted about 6 months.

In New York they had the opportunity to see a series of plays from the Broadway circuit, get in touch with new technical resources in lighting, set design, costumes, among others, which would directly influence their future productions;...

...among them the plays Victoria Regina, by Laurence Housman, Tovarich, by Jacques Deval, and You Can't Take it With You, by Kaufman and Hart, were included in the Company's repertoire and staged in Brazil shortly after the couple's return.

Besides these, Claire Boothe's The Women was also on display during Dulcina's stay in New York.

This text was staged several times by Dulcina later on, including in a famous staging in the still under construction city of Brasília, which was to raise funds to establish the new headquarters of the Fundação Brasileira de Teatro in the city.

While still in New York they were able to come into contact with specialized theater bookstores such as Drama Bookshop, Dramatists Play Service Inc. and the proliferating acting research studios that brought their first contacts with...

...the Stanislavski system, such as that of Tamara Daikarhanova, Andrius Jilinski, and Vera Soloviova; the Dramatic Art School of Maria Ouspenskaia, and the Theater Group school.

In April they left for Washington and their arrival was reported in the Washington Post on April 15, 1937 with the following headline: "Brazilian Stars Here on Tour of America" and below the picture of the couple the caption: "Dulcina and Odilon Azevedo, The Linn Fontanne and Alfred Lunt of South America", comparing the Brazilian actors to the American actors.

After their passage through Washington they continued their trip along the Pacific coast, visiting tourist sites such as Niagara Falls, the Grand Canyon, Lake Michigan, the Golden Gate, and attending official social events, following Ethel's schedule.

In July they arrived in Hollywood, where Brazilian journalist Gilberto Souto joined the team of cicerones. With him Dulcina and Odilon visited movie studios and were able to visit the set of Ali Baba Goes to Town.

Dulcina had her makeup done by Max Factor and was photographed by a famous photographer of the time, Bruno Bernard, known as Bruno of Hollywood. One of Warner Brothers' top costume designers designed Dulcina's wardrobe for a US play Personal Appearance that was to be produced on her return to Brazil.

They returned to Brazil on the ship named Western Prince (Dulcina was completely averse to air travel) with plans for Dulcina's return to the USA.

She would go on to perform on Broadway stages, under the management of Ethel Fagan, playing the role of Yorrah, from the play La joie d'aimer, by Verneuil, a frequent author in Dulcina's repertoire.

Unfortunately for North America these plans were not realized and the New York stages never received Dulcina on stage.

Lucky for her Brazilian audience, who can enjoy the artistic consequences of the trip's influences on Dulcina's work, including her only incursion into the cinematographic universe, the film 24 Hours of Dreams, directed by Chianca Garcia, released in 1941.