Informant: One of the biggest is the myth surrounding saying the… “Scottish Play” name, or… Macbeth, which I typically don’t like saying, because – I used to not be as superstitious about this as I am, but… anyway. Originally, I believe, it came from the fact that there are witches in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, and they’re showing magic onstage, and I’m sure to a bunch of villagers seeing Shakespeare, that would’ve probably provoked a different reaction than it would today, hence leading to the idea that the name “Macbeth” is associated with an evil curse. 

So typically, the way this manifests in theatres, if someone says “Macbeth” backstage of a show that is currently running or in rehearsal – first of all, they will immediately be shunned by all of their friends. Second of all, they would have to perform some sort of ritual to break the curse. Now I’ve seen multiple versions. Some are like, spin around three times, spit, and swear. There’s another where you have to physically leave the theatre and wait for someone to let you back in. I don’t know what these are supposed to do besides help me feel better, but it does definitely prevent people from saying it, besides the fact that there is generally bad luck associated within the production itself. It’s supposed to cause some sort of tragedy onstage – which, in my experience, has actually happened, so now I don’t mess with that. 

Me: What happened?

Informant: So, on three separate occasions, when someone said it during a run of a show, a lead has had an injury onstage. Something – I mean, arbitrarily minor. In one, we had this old rusty stove – I was the lead in this production, which is why I remember it the most – and I ended up slamming my finger into it, and causing, like, gushing blood onstage, and they thought I’d need to get a tetanus shot. So that was fun. Now I don’t mess with it, and I will make you spin around three times and spit and say – oh! Or say your favorite Shakespeare show, or favorite line from a Shakespeare show. I don’t know what that’s supposed to do besides, like, appease the Shakespeare gods, but whatever.

Background: 
My informant is a 20-year-old college student, majoring in theatre, who recently returned from a study-abroad semester in London, England. She’s been doing theatre for twelve years now in various parts of the country, so she’s heard many versions of theatre legends, tales, superstitions, and other pieces of theatre folklore.

Thoughts:
I’ve also heard many versions of the Macbeth legend, but the one that I’ve heard most often is actually a different version: I’ve heard that the lines the witches say are actually real witches spells, and the witches he took the spells from were angry (like an early copyright problem!) and put a curse on the play. All of the antidotes though are familiar, and I’m certain there’s more out there that neither me nor my informant had heard before. While I’ve never had a direct interaction with the Macbeth curse, I’ve heard many stories of those who have, enough that I believe in the curse too. At the very least, I try to avoid saying Macbeth in a theatre out of respect for tradition, and out of respect for those who do believe in the curse.

Informant: A lot of Brazilian mythology is either trying to scare children, or – trying to scare children from being bad – or trying to scare people away from messing with anything nature related. And there’s also a lot of weird ones that involve sexuality, but we don’t have to go into those, those are just strange. Actually no, I will go into one. There’s one – I don’t know what this animal is called in English, but you know those dolphins that aren’t dolphins, they’re just pink?

Me: I think I know what you’re talking about, yeah.

Informant: In Portugese it’s called Boto, and it’s basically just a pink dolphin. And they have them by the Amazons or whatever. And there’s a myth that one of the – ‘cuz these animals are like dolphins, they’re fun and want to play all the time, and they’re usually seen as tricksters or whatever, like they’ll play with you. Well, for some reason, Brazil was like, “Wow, that means evil.” So they took this poor creature, and they – there’s a myth behind it that one of these animals is, like – at a certain point of time in the night, it’ll transform into, like, a man. A really fancy looking man, who’s good looking and kinda shady, and he’s always wearing a hat, because – you know how dolphins have holes on their heads? The man also technically has a hole in his head, and he has to wear the hat to hide it. And essentially, when he comes out of the water and goes out to mingle out at night, he’ll find some random woman and make her fall in love with him in… one hour, or whatever. And they’ll have sex and she’ll get pregnant and he’ll leave. And then – I don’t know exactly what this says about the culture of Brazil, like, I don’t know I don’t know, but a lot of people use it to be like – if someone doesn’t have a father, they’re like “oh haha your father’s a fuckin’ dolphin.” And I’m like… “Whyyyy? Why a dolphin?” It’s supposed to be spooky. Not really. It’s a dolphin. It’s cute and it’s pink. The concept of a man with a hole in his head? That’s spooky. But not the dolphin.

Background:
My informant is a 19-year-old college student at a small liberal arts college in Washington state. She was born in Brazil, and grew up there, moving to Florida in late elementary school, back to Brazil for a few years, then finally settling outside of Seattle in our last two years of high school. Her father’s American, and her mom’s Brazilian. Portugese was her first language, and she still speaks Portugese at home with her mom. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, this piece was collected via an interview that took place over FaceTime. 

Thoughts:
I think it’s really interesting that in Brazil, the man to stay away from is actually a pink dolphin, because in America, that’s one of the least threatening animals and one of the least threatening colors. I agree with my informant that it’s not particularly spooky. The fears of getting pregnant by someone who’s evil and will leave you is a universal one, but I can’t think of an American comparison to this myth that would involve a character who had the connotations of a pink dolphin. Maybe the fact that he’s a dolphin is trying to emphasize a theme of being afraid of creatures that seem boundlessly joyful, that maybe they aren’t what they seem? I’m not sure, but I find it fascinating. 

Informant: This is kinda like a… guardian spirit type of thing? Some people interpret him as evil, though never in my lifetime was he interpreted as evil in anything anyone ever told me ever? I’ve only seen this character as a good creature, but I’ve heard some people see him differently. I don’t know. Anyway, it’s a character called – ugh, this is stupidly named, so I’ll have to say it in Portuguese. Saci-pererê. And he’s a black young boy who wears red shorts and no shirt and a red hood, like a pointy hood that just falls down. Like Santa Clause without the pom poms. And he only has one leg, so he just hops around. He’s essentially just like a trickster, and he’ll mess with people. He’ll make them trip or, like… I don’t know, steal their blanket. When I was growing up I was told he was a friendly… friend. Who would do stupid shit. Nothing serious. I think some people thought he would do so many goofy things that he’d eventually do something serious, like… burn your house down or beat you while laughing. But I think most of Brazilian culture interprets him as nice! It’s just some people… Yeah. Tough crowd. 

Background:
My informant is a 19-year-old college student at a small liberal arts college in Washington state. She was born in Brazil, and grew up there, moving to Florida in late elementary school, back to Brazil for a few years, then finally settling outside of Seattle in our last two years of high school. Her father’s American, and her mom’s Brazilian. Portugese was her first language, and she still speaks Portugese at home with her mom. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, this piece was collected via an interview that took place over FaceTime. 

Thoughts:
I find it really interesting that even within Brazil, people have different interpretations of the character. I thought that opinions on characters only differed when the character exists in multiple different cultures, because they would be seen in different contexts and would probably have slightly different versions of the stories surrounding the character. This one, however, is within Brazil, where I assume the details of the character stay the same. It makes me wonder what the difference of opinion says about Brazil, if their opinions vary drastically across the country.