My friend Danuza Leão

Went to Danuza. That she was, first and foremost, a woman of extremes: extremely intelligent, extremely beautiful, extremely free – a powerful combination that she knew how to use like no one else. I had the luck, the honor and above all the great pleasure of living intensely with this extraordinary woman who taught me “almost everything”, to use the title of her wonderful autobiography, in a fundamental phase of my formation as an adult.

When we met, Danuza had just reinvented herself once again: after losing her son Samuca, her sister Nara and as a consequence of this unfair accumulation of tragedies on the floor, she resurfaced with the bestseller “In the room with Danuza”, whose verve earned him an invitation to write chronicles in the “Jornal do Brasil”. From there to take over the social column of “Caderno B” in place of Zózimo was a leap. I was an aspiring post-teen journalist eager to do anything but gossip. But someone in the newsroom saw me as the perfect duo for Danuza. I tried to resist; she won me over with a look that I know (or try to) imitate to this day. And off we went. Fortunately.

Danuza loved to work. She loved journalists, perhaps because of her eternal admiration for Samuel (Wainer, father of her three children), and took up the job willing to win the war – although Danuza was always willing to win any war. Finding such a unique voice as a columnist was one of her great prides. She invented catchphrases, brought in anonymous faces to share the photos with
society bigwigs, managed to print his ma-ra-vi-sa intonation to the text, launched successful campaigns, such as the one that changed the name of Galeão airport to Tom Jobim. I remember Danuza euphoric on the day of the rebaptism ceremony. Ah: she made a point of wearing the shirt intended for the press at all the events she covered, even if it was the Copacabana Palace Carnival Gala.

Another passion was Paris. No wonder Danuza began her life walking for the stylist Jacques Fath, when she got involved with actor Daniel Gélin – yet another tasty story, involving high doses of glamor and heroin, which she loved to tell. Later, she spent many years staying in a very simple hotel in Saint-Germain-des-Prés: she liked it because it was cheap, she liked being treated like family – Madame Lêáô – and she liked being next to a very trashy bar. that never closed. Every now and then, when we traveled together, she would call my room in the middle of the night, inviting me to have a calvados. I recently learned that this same bar was frequented by the writer Julio Cortázar, who spent nights writing at the bar. I ended up not telling her this, and she would surely tell me, just to be against it: “Hey, Bel, we’re going to need to drink somewhere else.”

His charm and good taste materialized in all the countless homes he owned throughout his life. And Danuza was always dreaming of the next one. When he lived in an apartment on Avenida Atlântica, still working at the “Jornal do Brasil”, he enjoyed leaving Geraldina, a faithful squire for years, watching the New Year’s Eve fireworks from her cabin while she traveled to dozens of parties, with her pad in her hand, to write the next day. Shortly after, at the time when all the so-called nice houses were taken over by white sofas, she soon moved to a gothic building in Praia do Flamengo, whose stories she knew in detail and loved to tell. Months later, she called me to see the new changes she had made to the apartment: “I got sick of the rococo: now it’s all white!”

Generous Leo, it was difficult to leave Danuza’s house without an incredible piece of clothing, with an even more incredible story, which she took out of the closet to give as a gift. The rule was clear: “If one day I regret it, I can ask for it back, okay?” She never asked. Another story: once, a great politician who was visiting the newsroom of “JB” stopped by our little room to say hello. Danuza welcomed him with a smile, and all he had to do was turn his back to say: “Did I give it to him?” She immediately picked up the phone and tried to get the hang of it with a French friend, who she didn’t remember either, but snarled: “Knowing you, it must have been yes.” Danuza – who boasted of having lived in a world after the pill and before AIDS –
laughed a lot that afternoon.

Yesterday, when I learned that Danuza was leaving the hospital, I ran there in the vain hope of saying goodbye. I spoke some nonsense in her ear and left with the comforting certainty that I will never say goodbye to her.