“What progress have we made?”

Armando Babaioff participated in an interview on the Vincent Villari on YouTube and commented on the importance of representation of same-sex couples in soap operas.

The actor commented on Thales, his character in the soap opera Ti Ti Tiand his romantic partner Julinho, played by André Arteche. Armando took advantage of the moment to criticize the networks’ regression in censoring gay kisses in soap operas.

“It was already pioneering work at the time. The way he was approached by the press was also pioneering. I came in to play the character with a huge responsibility”, he said.

“I took the opportunity to make Thales a gay man who I hadn’t seen represented on television yet. I didn’t have a reference like that when I was a teenager. All the gay characters were caricatures and so were the public figures”, he reflected.

“Today we have the issue of homophobia, because in Brazil, we actually live in a country that kills the LGBTQIPNA+ community the most in the world. So there’s this place, and that’s why Ti Ti Ti was very important and is still important today”, analyzed.

Regarding the non-display of gay kisses in soap operas, Armando said: “It is still current today, oddly enough. And I also thought that starting with ‘Amor a Vida’ (2013) we would take a little faster steps.”

“I thought that from then on the discussion would go a little faster. And then, recently, we had a mega-success, ‘Vai na Fé’, which took place in 2023 and, suddenly, the noise came… a scene that doesn’t happen, in a same-sex relationship between two women”, continued.

“We know it happened, but the scene was edited. So what’s this discussion? What progress have we made?!”, finished.