Retreads in Rio

Retreats in Rio

Security and peace of mind, according to an old Brazilian adage, is a strong house, a tame horse and an ugly wife. If the maxim still applies, Rio de Janeiro is a less secure place today. For the former capital of Brazil has become a world capital of the plastic-surgery industry, and ugly wives by the hundreds are being remolded into well-proportioned visions of beauty. The deft use of vanity surgery, as the Brazilians call it, has provided women who flock in from all over the world with new faces, larger (or smaller) bosoms, slimmer hips and even bottoms sculpted into svelte contours more suitable for slacks.

Vanity surgery is now as acceptable in Rio as bleach-blonde hair. One local television personality, Dercy Gonc,alves, who has been thoroughly reshaped, is not in the least reluctant to discuss it. She has been known to close her TV program by cheerily confiding, "Well, next week I'm going to have a complete retread." Once, when she appeared on camera looking younger and trimmer than usual, she announced that casual sit-down chats with guest stars would be out of the question for the next few days. "I've had three operations on my face and one on my stomach," Dercy says, "and I'll have 20 if necessary. Wherever I droop, I want it taken off. I wasn't born with anything sagging." Most of the American and European women who make vanity trips to Rio lack Senhora Gonc,alves' sangfroid; they prefer to sneak away "for the carnival," returning miraculously refurbished to the astonished delight of their husbands and friends. The undisputed king of Rio's colony of cutaneous cutters is Ivo Pitanguy (pronounced pee-tahn-ghee), a theatrically handsome 44-year-old doctor who jets from his clinic in Rio to ski slopes in Europe, hotly pursued by glamorous, albeit sagging socialites. Admitting to "the largest experience in breasts in the world," Pitanguy has a small clientele on the Continent but does his major overhauls in Rio.

Replaced Navels. Very popular in Rio is the Pitanguy nose (cute, petite and slightly upturned) and Sophia Loren eyes (almond shaped). The latest rage is carving clefts into chins or, for those whose chins are already cleft, smoothing out the cleft. Much of Pitanguy's time is spent sculpting bustlines into more sedate proportions. "Brazil has more big breasts than anywhere else in the world," he explains. Whether the breasts are expanded or contracted, however, they remain functional after Pitanguy's alterations: milk flow is unimpaired, and nipples are normally positioned. The doctor is also known for his skill in removing fat from the abdomen and trimming bulging "riding breech" hips and then tucking the scars into natural lines among folds of the skin. These alterations often result in a misplaced navel. Cutting and stitching skillfully, Pitanguy moves it back into the proper place.

Such virtuosity does not come cheap. Pitanguy's work earns him hundreds of thousands of dollars a year--in a country where a first-class brain or heart surgeon can expect to earn only $50,000. But Pitanguy has demonstrated time and again that he is not greedy. He spends Wednesdays operating for free at Rio's General Hospital. In the tradition of most doctors, who soak the rich and salve the poor, Pitanguy donates his services to the maimed and the malformed, whether they can pay or not. "I'll give you a price," he told one American who came to get his deformed ears reshaped. "If that price is too high, I'll give you a lower price. And if that's too high, I'll operate for nothing."

Wart Removal. A Rio face-lift costs $500 to $1,600, about 20% less for the doctor and 50% less for the hospital than it does in the U.S. Traveling expenses raise total costs for Americans to about what they would pay at home, but the pleasures of a trip to Rio (and the advantage of secrecy) give Brazil a definite edge. "One woman came here from Beverly Hills to have a wart removed," says Pitanguy, "simply because she likes to travel."

Seeking to lure even more visitors, some of Pitanguy's competitors have begun to branch out. They now offer restorative surgery for women who for reasons of their own wish to return to their virginal state. Pitanguy will not even consider such tampering. "That," he says contemptuously, "involves another ethical pattern."

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