Anjos vs Joana Marques. What's at stake?

Nelson even resorted to legal language. “Her video was causing us financial damage. Many of those cancelled concerts were going to be held in Portuguese communities, abroad, therefore, Switzerland, Germany, France, Luxembourg, and the managers didn’t want to risk [hiring us] when everyone was making fun of us on the internet. If that [video] hadn’t happened, they would never have cancelled the concerts in their lives”, he assured. And, because of that situation, they lost “two major sponsorships, which were going to run digital campaigns”.

The brothers said they were “forced to go to court”, justifying that they were in charge of “a team of more than 28 people waiting to be compensated”.

For Sérgio Rosado, it is “very difficult” to talk about everything that happened. “But the damage has already been done. The family is suffering a lot because of this. We couldn’t let it go, it was too serious. Don’t we have a sense of humor? They accuse us of not having a sense of humor? What is humor for?! To make us laugh. To entertain. If I tell a joke, and I see that it causes insults or other types of problems on the other side, I have to admit that I was not very good”, lamented Sérgio.

“The discussion in society is going to be very complex. ‘Is anything worth it?’”, Nelson said. “For me, freedom of expression has a limit: it is from the moment you cause harm. That is the limit”, he defended, guaranteeing that there was never an attempt to “reach an agreement” financially, that there was no such desire on the part of the person in question, and that for the musicians “it would have been enough to have removed the video at the time”. Sérgio Rosado also revealed something: “My daughter, who was nine years old at the time, was bullied at school by her classmates”.

Nelson also said that both would also end up being bullied: “Joana Marques’ video is the only one [on the internet] in which we don’t appear singing the anthem in its entirety. There were technical errors and those who had to apologize acknowledged them. There are parts of our performance that don’t appear in Joana Marques’ video. And we were accused [of disrespecting the anthem] by groups probably linked to the far right, namely nationalist groups, who take it seriously, and I think that’s very right. Who made the video? Who manipulated it? Was it me?!”

For Sérgio, Joana Marques “acted in bad faith”, hence the high value of the compensation: “Of course the value [of the compensation] is very high. But there are four authors [of the complaint], me and Nélson, and two other companies.”

Waiting “to be compensated” are “ roadies , musicians, technicians, production staff, runners, stage hands, very important people [at the concerts]”, who were “truly harmed”. “It was not easy to manage the mood of our entire team. Because they are people, some of them quite humble and… rude. What are we waiting for to happen? A tragedy?! That someone commits suicide because they are a victim of bullying ? [Exaggeration?] It is not an exaggeration”.

If the topic of the limits of humor has long been discussed, punishment has been on the agenda due to the conviction of Brazilian comedian Léo Lins to eight years in prison and a fine of 1.4 million reais for jokes on the program Perturbador, which was removed from YouTube.

The Joana Marques vs Anjos case has been the subject of comment from several Portuguese comedians, including João Manzarra. “It’s about making a subject last over time,” said the presenter on the podcast A Beleza das Pequenas Coisas , from Expresso. “If there hadn’t been this case, no one would be talking about it. This makes everyone watch the video.”

Diogo Batáguas, author of Conteúdo Batáguas , addressed the topic on the monthly program : “Come on, guys, it was a one-minute video with funny faces. The Dom Bacalhau restaurant in Lausanne is not going to stop hiring you for the 35th anniversary gala of the ethnographic folklore group from the lands of Santa Maria Rio de Meão just because Joana Marques made a joke on Instagram.”

Ricardo Araújo Pereira, in the podcast Assim Vamos Ter de Falar de Outra Maneira , which he shares with José Diogo Quintela and Miguel Góis, also spoke out: “It’s a video that Joana made on Instagram, a video that’s one minute long. That one-minute video caused damage worth 1.1 million euros. What the Anjos claim is that the video caused them damage in terms of contract breaches, producers who stopped inviting them to work, to give concerts. Now, the agency itself reveals that in the last, I don’t know, 12 years, they have earned a little over 200 thousand euros per year. Therefore, Joana’s one-minute video caused them a loss equivalent to seven years of work. They have since gone back to work and, well, they haven’t complained”, summarized the comedian.