Carminha Brandão

Patricia, an orphan living in a traveling amusement park, believes the stars will bring her happiness. One day, an astrologer predicts the impossible: the young woman, an Aquarius, will fall in love with a Pisces boy, a sign initially incompatible with hers. The girl does, in fact, become enchanted by the wealthy student Renato, but he doesn't feel the same way. Patricia travels to Rio de Janeiro, where she befriends a gentleman whom she affectionately calls Mr. Pepe, unaware that he is Renato's great-uncle and the owner of the company where she begins working. Mr. Pepe discovers fraudulent activities committed by his family and decides to fake his death to observe the dispute over his inheritance.

The irreverent Dulcinéa struggles to keep her revue theater, *Mambembe*, afloat; the building itself belongs to the traditional Maldonado family. The patriarch, Salvador Maldonado—a conservative man—keeps a tight rein on the clan, maintaining control over both the business and his children: Joana, an elegant and snobbish woman who is the staunchest defender of the views held by Pops, as the children call him; Téo, who has always silently submitted to the old man's high-handedness; Walter, dominated by his older sister and his father's favorite; and Lalucha, the youngest, a film student who challenges the status quo and rebels against the family's stuffy conservatism.