Haroldo de Oliveira

Brava Gente was a television series aired by TV Globo in Brazil between 2000 and 2003, initially as a special year-end. The program was adapted from stories and national stories, and plays by famous playwrights, screenwriters and signed by a number represented by several actors and actresses. The genres of the stories varied each week with the style of each director or author. Brava Gente in the stories ranged from comedies and dramas. In all 53 episodes were shown, broadcast on Tuesday nights.

Set in 19th-century Brazil during the waning years of slavery, Escrava Isaura tells the story of Isaura, a white-skinned enslaved woman raised with the manners and education of a noble lady. Though treated with affection by her mistress, Isaura remains legally enslaved and becomes the object of obsessive desire by Leôncio Almeida, the cruel heir to the plantation. After the death of her protector, Isaura falls under Leôncio’s control. Despite his attempts to seduce and dominate her, she resists, determined to preserve her dignity and freedom. Her father, Miguel, helps her escape to Recife, where she adopts a new identity and meets Álvaro, a wealthy and principled abolitionist who falls in love with her. Leôncio eventually tracks her down, leading to dramatic confrontations. In the end, Álvaro rescues Isaura by purchasing Leôncio’s debts, securing her freedom and affirming the story’s central themes of justice, love, and resistance against oppression.

Seven high school friends reunite after 20 years. Memories of the past and coincidences of the present reveal the secrets and affections that bind the women and their families.

In the backlands, the drover Ricardo marks the destiny of young Maria. Years later, in Xique-Xique, a mistake between two identical women rekindles passions, separations, and an impossible love.

The story, inspired by Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel of the same name – which fueled the abolitionist movement in the United States – depicts the conflict between enslaved American cotton planters and wealthy landowners in the South. The fight for freedom is led by Uncle Tom and his wife Chloe.

The central theme of the soap opera is the struggle for political control in the interior of Bahia between the two most powerful *coronéis* (landowning bosses) of the cocoa region: Sinhô Badaró and Horácio da Silveira. Virgílio, an ambitious lawyer, is summoned to the town by Colonel Horácio but ends up becoming involved with Ester, the colonel's wife. Captain João Magalhães is a card sharp who poses as a military engineer, successfully deceiving the entire town. He falls in love with Sinhô Badaró's daughter, Donana. By the end of the story, he reveals that he had only gotten close to the Badarós out of opportunism. After numerous clashes with Sinhô Badaró, Colonel Horácio secures political power in the town of Ferradas, with the acknowledgment of the local population.

On Paquetá Island, Carolina dreams of reuniting with a childhood sweetheart, unaware that it's Augusto, her brother's friend. After adventures and misunderstandings, the couple struggles to stay together.

Mário Fofoca, a bungling detective, moves to Rio and, with the help of a friend, investigates cases—starting with a wife's suspected infidelity.

Antônio is on his deathbed after helping a Black man escape his own father's plantation. Before dying, Antônio asks his father, Judge Queiroz Antunes, to raise the young enslaved boy, Bento, as his own son.

Rio's criminal underworld is run by an unexpected boss: a femme Queen with a taste for power and violence. But heavy lies the crown: what Queen can trust her subjects, however fabulous? When she sets up a stoolie to take the fall for her boy, a plot against Her Majesty arises!

A newlywed woman, frustrated after her honeymoon, decides to search for lovers on the streets and ends up causing a conflict between her husband, a baker and a black artist.

A man leads a double life: during the day, he's the manager of a car shop but, when the sun goes down, he becomes a crook, pretending to be a playboy (the target being old women), a sultan who is gathering money for his cause, helped by a fake baron and his beautiful daughter.

Two criminal friends pick up two women.

Five segments about the hardships faced by people living in slums on hills in Rio de Janeiro.

Man leaves his family behind and moves to Nova Iguaçu, a poor and violent city in the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro. He tries to rebuild his life, but falls in love with a woman who despises him, which drives him mad.

A young female fugitive escapes from a juvenile institution (the Child Assistance Service) and joins a group of poor beggars with the intention of finding a potential partner to marry in order to avoid her return to that place.

Young robber, son of a prostitute who had killed herself, gets involved with two police informers, who force him to share the loot he gets.

A talented songwriter of sambas is forced to face the social injustices of the city around him.

Rio de Janeiro crooks rove about, performing petty tricks to survive, and get involved with a woman who steals cars.

Galanga, king of Congo brought to Brazil as a slave, finds gold in Vila Rica, in the State of Minas Gerais, and buys his enfranchisement, the properties of his former owner, and his companions' freedom, becoming Chico Rei, the first black man to own lands in Brazil.