Brazilian-Italian writer-director duo Filipe Matzembacher and Marcio Reolon made their feature debut in 2015 with the queer coming-of-age drama Seashore (Beira-Mar) which premiered at the Berlinale and went on to win three prizes at the Rio de Janeiro International Film Festival. Their captivating 2018 sophomore feature Hard Paint (Tinta Bruta), exploring the double life of a gay webcam performer, also premiered at the Berlinale where it won the Teddy Award. Partners in the production company Avante
Filmes, away from cinema they have directed music videos and the four-episode miniseries The Nest (O Ninho) about an army runaway searching for his missing brother in the queer underground of a reactionary Brazil.
Their latest feature, the seductive queer erotic thriller Night Stage (Ato noturno), sees the pair return to the Berlinale for the third time and is the Closing Night selection of the 2025 BFI Flare: London LGBTQIA+ Film Festival. Exploring the boundaries between performance and reality, Night Stage follows an ambitious actor, Matias (Gabriel Faryas), and a cutthroat mayoral candidate, Rafael (Cirillo Luna), as they embark on an illicit affair. Discovering a shared passion for sex in public places, the closer they get to their dreams of fame and success, the more they feel the urge to put themselves at risk.
Following the world premiere of Night Stage at the 75th Berlinale, Filipe Matzembacher and Marcio Reolon speak exclusively with The Queer Review’s editor James Kleinmann about their collaboration as filmmakers, what excited them about the erotic thriller genre, returning to shoot the film in their hometown of Porto Alegre in Brazil, and the queer films that have had the biggest impact on them.
James Kleinmann, The Queer Review: you made your first short film as co-writer-directors in 2012, so this collaboration has been going on for a while now. How did you begin working together?
Marcio Reolon: “Filipe and I met at film school and we immediately started working together and dating at the same time. So we don’t know working together without dating or dating without working together. It’s kind of the same thing for us. At the very beginning we weren’t co-directing, but one would co-write the script with the other or act in the other’s film. So there was always some sort of collaboration. But soon enough, we started co-directing and since that point we’ve kept working that way until this day and all our next projects will go in that direction too. We don’t have anything solo planned.”
How does it tend to work? Do you make all your decisions together or go off separately and then come back together?
Marcio: “We don’t split tasks. We do everything very collaboratively. We discuss things a lot to create a solid common ground for our stories so we’re both thinking of the same thing. For example, when we’re writing a script and we create a character we establish a visual reference. It might be a photograph that we find on the Internet or even a friend of ours, but whenever one of us says the name of that character we know that both of us are thinking of that same image. We do this with locations and every other element so we’re constantly making sure that we are making the same film.”
Filipe Matzembacher: “Ensuring that we have plenty of time to develop the project is also really important to us. We watch the same films and share those references with the cast and crew so that everybody has the same vision in their minds. The process is unique for each film, but being on the same page is vital.”
Marcio: “The collaboration between the two of us goes so deep that once we finish a film we never think, ‘Oh, that part was my idea’ or ‘That was your idea’. We don’t even remember any of that. What we see on screen in the finished film is the work of a duo and it works super well for us.”
As you’re a couple as well as being filmmaking partners, I imagine ideas might come up at any time when you’re working on a film. Do you have any ground rules for when you can or can’t discuss work?
Marcio: “At the beginning we realized that we were working 24/7 and agreed to only talk about work during working hours. That lasted for about two days! But at least now we feel confident enough to say, ‘No, I don’t want to talk about this right now, let’s leave it for tomorrow’.”
Filipe: “But if it’s a really great idea then we’ll say, ‘OK, let’s cancel dinner and sit down and write!'”
Talking about great ideas, what was the spark of inspiration for Night Stage?
Filipe: “We thought about this character who has to live out two different personas. They are a completely different person when they’re pursuing their professional career and trying to achieve success, than when they are more connected with their desires. That was really fascinating to us and we wanted to play with that idea with our actors.”
“Marcio and I both have a background as actors, and Marcio stills acts. So we loved the idea of playing with this duality as filmmakers and giving the cast these possibilities of danger and desire to play with too. We were both really excited when this idea came to us and at the same time we wanted to make it a noir erotic thriller because it’s a genre that we love and are really passionate about.”
“Until now we’ve mostly made more realistic and grounded dramas, so we wanted to make a film that was a little more playful. Night Stage is tense and serious in some ways, but it’s also far more playful than Hard Paint and Seashore. Not just in tone, but in the images and iconography. It plays with form and narrative structure as well as the way that the actors perform.”
When you knew that you wanted to make an erotic thriller, what were some of the films or filmmakers you turned to as references or inspirations?
Marcio: “Filipe and I are both cinephiles and our cinephilia goes through different moments in film history. When we started developing the project, we initially thought of classic Film Noir from 40s and 50s. We were watching loads of those as well as classic thrillers by Hitchcock, but as the process went on we realized that the story we were creating was more fitting for an erotic thriller. So we began looking into other filmmakers we love like De Palma and Verhoeven and took a deep dive into that moment in film history in the late 70s, 80s, and 90s.”
Filipe: “We even found aspects of it in Brazilian cinema. There is an amazing film that we both adore, RepĆŗblica dos Assassinos by Miguel Faria Jr., which is a queer Noir film from 1979. Actually, we’re so in love with that film that the main character in Night Stage, Matias, has a huge poster of it on his living room wall which you can see in the background in the scene when he’s dancing alone in his apartment. So that was our tribute to RepĆŗblica dos Assassinos. We were so inspired by the playful aspect of the erotic thrillers we watched and that was something that we were very excited to do ourselves.”
You mentioned Verhoeven and the rivalry between the actors in Night StageāMatias and his roommate Fabio played by Henrique Barreiraāmade me think of Showgirls.
Filipe: “Oh, I love that! Verhoeven is amazing. I love the way he creates worlds. It’s crazy how his films were part of mainstream cinema. They were far more daring than mainstream cinema is nowadays. That was also important for us and we’re happy that an adjective that keeps coming up from people who’ve seen the film in Berlin is “unapologetic”. Our characters are unapologetic about their desires and we tried to be like that when we were making this film.”
When we first meet Matias, who is a dancer and an actor, he’s on stage. Could you talk about your exploration of performance and real life and how the lines between them blur?
Marcio: “For us, performance is always a key thing because of our background as actors. I think that was already apparent in Hard Paint where the characters were webcam erotic performers. In that film though it was more about the distinction between their online and offline personas. We love the idea that our actors are able to move between two different characters within the same role. I think that’s something super rich and challenging to do. We wanted to explore that direction even more but in a different setting with different consequences and motivations.”
“With Night Stage it’s more about public and private life and these people whoāin order to achieve the idea of success that they’re aiming forāfeel compelled to perform public personas. The lead characters are both actors in a way. We approach the role of the politician as a performer who addresses thousands of people, just as the actor does on stage or TV. To create characters within the characters was fascinating for us and for the performers as well.”
In order to be cast in a major TV show, Matias has to agree to hide his private life and project a more stereotypically masculine image that fits in with the character. To play another role in his daily life essentially.
Filipe: “That’s something really relevant nowadays, how an actor has to behave a certain way in their own life in order to be cast in a specific role. I think that’s really sad. If you talk with actors they have so many stories regarding that.”
Marcio: “After the Berlinale screenings we’ve had so far, we’ve received a lot of messages from queer actors who watched the film and who shared their personal stories with us. They’ve told us that they felt really connected with what those characters were going through. They shared how they often feel compelledāobligated actuallyāto repress their gender expression or their sexuality in order to achieve what they want in their acting careers.”
Let’s talk about your lead actors Gabriel Faryas and Cirillo Luna, who are both excellent in the film, what did you enjoy about bringing these two together in these roles?
Filipe: “It was a really fun and beautiful process. They have very different backgrounds. Gabriel is a stage actor and also a visual artist, whereas Cirillo is a TV actor and he’s been the lead in a few soap operas.”
Marcio: “Cirillo had never done a film before and Gabriel had never done any acting on camera.”
Filipe: “So it was interesting to bring these two performers together and see the synergy that they created between them. They have really strong chemistry and it was beautiful to see how they became friends and created an empathy towards each other. I felt touched by that. We love rehearsals and try to have a long process which helps to create a connection between the whole cast.”
It’s clear from the performances that you’re not just thinking about the look of the film, but also what the actors need to succeed.
Filipe: “A lot of directors are scared of actors, but we would feel like complete failures if, for example, we gave the cinematographer a lot of time to light a room and then only gave an actor five minutes to do the take. For us, the soul of cinema is realized in the acting, in the performances. Of course, we love a beautiful image, but we try to create a space to build everything together and allow the actors to shine.”
What were your guiding principles for the look of the film?
Marcio: “We really wanted to pay homage to the 70s and 80s cinema that we find aesthetically beautiful, but at the same time we wanted to make it our own, to make a queer Latin film from 2025, to put our own perspective and lens on those references.”
Filipe: “With this film, the concept of the stage was essential to us. So the mise-en-scĆØne, the blocking of the actors, the lighting, and the production design all create this idea of the stage many times. Even when the scenes are backstage at the theatre. That idea really guided us throughout the process of making the film. The lighting design frequently creates a spotlight and we use a lot red curtains. That’s something that brings a fluidity to the way that our characters go on and off stage, literally and figuratively.”
Marcio: “Their roles as performers overflow from their jobs into their personal lives, so they also play their public personas even when they’re off work, and we wanted the stage to overflow the theatre space and the political environment to enter the other scenes. The cruising area, for instance, is all quite staged; the way the trees are lit; the blocking of the actors. All these elements feel like they are part of a performance.”
Filipe: “When we were deciding where the last scene of the film should take place we found this area in the park that looks almost like a stage. It was perfect. We instantly knew that we had to end the film there.”
I love the cruising sequences. What was your approach to sex scenes in the film more generally?
Filipe: “Eroticism is something that’s very important in our films, little by little it has started to grow in our filmography. We’re interested in the way that bodies in front of the camera and sex scenesāespecially queer sex scenesācan be very political and provocative. It’s fascinating to see the audience’s reaction to those scenes, that’s always very exciting.”
“Given our background as actors, we try to create a long process leading up to shooting those scenes. We are very open and honest with our cast from the beginning. We’ll say, ‘We want to create this kind of film with these kinds of images and there will be this numbers of encounters’. When it comes to shooting those scenes we approach them almost like dance scenes. So we have our choreography, we have a warm-up, and we have a process for the actors to know their own bodies and each other’s bodies to create a sense of intimacy between them. With the cruising scenes it was about bringing in people who we knew would be willing to do it.”
Marcio: “Basically, we created a group of friends and lovers and people who we knew would be up for it. We had a really nice group process with them as we were coming up with what to do in each moment.”
Filipe: “I loved shooting those scenes. There was this moment when we were all in the middle of the biggest park in our hometown in the middle of the night shooting our cruising scenes where a lot of people were actually cruising.”
Marcio: “So we were almost like voyeurs there.”
Filipe: “The filmmaking became a bit meta. We were amazed by it and we knew that this was going to be something unique.”
So you shot in a real park where guys actually cruise, but you were away from the action?
Marcio: “Yeah, exactly. We didn’t want to spoil their fun!”
Speaking of fun, sometimes cruising scenes in films can feel ominous or scary, but the only threat here is the police. What kind of tone did you want to strike?
Marcio: “The cruising is grounded in a sense of reality, but it’s always seen from Matias’ perspective. So it’s a bit magical in a way; it’s idyllic and not entirely naturalistic. It’s more about capturing his idea of freedom, of crossing that line that he feels he cannot cross.”
Filipe: “The first time the cruising area appears in the film is just after Rafael tells Matias that once he gets what he wants in his acting career he’ll have to behave differently. Then he finds that cruising area and discovers that possibility too. He realizes that he doesn’t have to fit in with what Rafael was describing. That really changes the direction of his journey.”
I love the moment after they’ve just been caught having sex in their car and they are both elated, screaming with laughter as they drive away.
Filipe: “They feel so free in that moment. They did what they were aiming for and they’re both succeeding in their careers.”
Marcio: “They find this collective euphoria in the thrill of being caught having public sex.”
Filipe: “They feel like they rule the world. They have the whole city beneath them. We can see all the city lights below them and they feel like giants at that moment as they laugh together.”
That view reminded me of Mulholland Drive in Los Angeles.
Filipe: “Yeah, that’s true. I’ve never thought about that before. We’d never been up that hill and we were amazed by the view when we were scouting for locations. We were both like, ‘Whoa, our hometown looks like that?! Cool!’ I didn’t know that it could be so beautiful.”
You live here in Berlin now, so do you have a slightly different perspective on your hometown when you go back?
Filipe: “Definitely, when we’re back in Porto Alegre we see the city a bit differently. We see some beauty as well as some problems that we didn’t notice before. But then we also see the same things about Berlin.”
I love the music, what did you want the score and songs to bring to the film?
Filipe: ‘Music is a really vital part of the process for us. When we have that first image set in our minds, we create a playlist with music that puts us in the same vibe and atmosphere. We listen to it for hours every day throughout pre-production and into rehearsals. We’ll end up using some of those songs in the film. With this genre, we could play with an original score too and it was so much fun doing that.”
Marcio: “With our previous films we avoided using an original score whenever possible, but this time we wanted the whole film to be more playful and we wanted the soundtrack to be part of that playfulness. We had the privilege of working with our friend Thiago Pethit, who is a brilliant Brazilian musician. Together with Charles Tixier and Arthur Decloedt, he created some really beautiful, amazing work.”
Filipe: “Like us, Thiago is such a cinephile. When we shared the script with him he immediately understood the references and came to us with so many ideas. It was a beautiful process. It was the first time that a score was so present in one of our films and I really want to do more films that way.”
Lastly, what’s your favourite piece of LGBTQ+ culture or a person who identifies as LGBTQ+; someone or something that’s had an impact on you and resonated with you over the years?
Filipe: “There are so many things I could say. Scream, for example, is a very queer piece of mainstream cinema that really shaped my cinephilia when I was a teenager. But I have to say Blue by Derek Jarman. That was a film that felt like a religious experience to me when I watched it for the first time. I was like, ‘Oh my God, I don’t think I will ever have that experience with another piece of art again’. It’s so poetic, so directly talking to the soul of the audience and it’s so explicit, yet you don’t see anything except the blue screen. I think it’s a masterpiece. I think it’s a miracle. It’s queer in many senses, especially in its formal and aesthetic choices.”
Marcio: “I will go with Gus Van Sant’s My Own Private Idaho. I can remember flipping through the TV channels when I was twelve years old and I stopped on that film and it immediately caught my attention. There’s this scene where River Phoenix and Keanu Reeves are sitting around the fire and River’s character says to Keanu’s character something like, ‘I really want to kiss you, man.’ At that moment, I felt something in my stomach and I knew I was gay. That film really marked me and became a big reference in cinema for me. Often, when I look back at my work as a filmmaker, many of the things I’ve done were attempts to create a dialogue with that film or at least with the impact that that film had on me.”
That’s another film that’s queer not just in its subject matter but in its form, narrative, and aesthetics.
Marcio: “Yeah, and it has a lot of playfulness in it as well.”
Filipe: “When we talk about queer art, of course themes and topics can be important because some of them are very urgent, but in the end we are all artists first and we should talk about form and aesthetics and how the narrative decisions are shaped. Those aspects can also challenge society in a way. These pieces are both aesthetically and formally bold, not just important in terms of what they have to say.”
By James Kleinmann
Night Stage (Ato noturno) received its world premiere at the 75th Berlinale, the Berlin International Film Festival, and was in competition for the Teddy Award. It is the Closing Night selection of the 39th BFI Flare: London LGBTQIA+ Film Festival on Saturday, March 29th, 2025.
