Elvira Pagã, Brazilian vedette, singer, and artist (born 1920)

Elvira Olivieri Cozzolino, better known by her stage name Elvira Pagã, was a Brazilian vedette, actress, singer, writer, and painter. She was the first Rio Carnival Queen, the first woman to wear a bikini in public, and one of the first women to undergo cosmetic surgery in Brazil. Talented and controversial, she defied the status quo and challenged prevailing machismo with fearless audacity during the Brazilian military dictatorship and the revolutionary 1960s. In her later years, Pagã withdrew from public life, devoting herself to writing and painting, and eventually died in seclusion.

A vedette is the main female artist of a show derived from cabaret and its subcategories of revue, vaudeville, music hall or burlesque. The purpose of the vedette is to entertain and captivate the public. Vedettes are expected to sing, dance and act on stage. Particularly accomplished artistes are considered super vedettes or first vedettes. Vedettes often wear flashy and revealing costumes and may appear alongside groups of dancers, magicians, comedians, jugglers, or even performing animals. Vedettes specializing in burlesque generally do striptease and may also perform nude on stage.