Melodrama, Camp, and Sexuality in Nelson Rodrigues’s O Beijo no Asfalto

While Nelson Rodrigues was known to incorporate melodramatic techniques in his plays, his specific bending of melodrama’s norms has yet to be fully explored. In his 1960 O beijo no Asfalto, the theme of sexuality together with the play’s melodramatic plot can be read through a camp perspective that offers more constructive readings of homosexuality than those present in previous criticism of the text. Through an analysis of Aprígio and his son-in-law and protagonist, Arandir, this essay points to the strengths of a camp reading of an already perverted melodrama by showing the sexual ambiguities that arise in the play: Aprígio’s masking and dramatic revelation of his homosexuality and Arandir’s conflicted views of the gay kiss that gives name to the play.