The departure of Tamara Pettinato from Bendita TV it always generated cross versions. Now, Beto Casella returned to that episode and explained how he experienced the moment when the leaked video broke out in which the panelist appeared in the presidential chair with Alberto Fernández, in the middle of strict quarantine. That image went viral in a matter of minutes and unleashed a storm that also reached him.
According to Casella, the impact was immediate: he received an avalanche of messages demanding that he kick Pettinato out of the program. “They were telling me to take it out right now,” he said. But, in parallel, another part of the public asked her exactly the opposite: not to leave her alone “at such a delicate moment,” precisely because the panelist was going through strong media and emotional scrutiny.
That jerk left him in an extreme situation. Casella acknowledged that he went through an internal crisis and that he evaluated what decision to make without letting himself be dragged by the pressures of the networks. But finally, he said, there was no need to intervene: “I’m calm, she left alone.” Pettinato decided to step aside on his own initiative and the driver assures that this closure was, all in all, the most orderly possible in the midst of the scandal.
The episode became relevant again a few weeks ago, when Alberto Fernández, in an interview with Tomás Rebord, gave his own explanation about the video. He said that that recording – which showed Pettinato in the presidential chair – had been intended as a nod to Ernesto Tenembaum, after criticism that he considered unfair. According to the former president, “poor Ernesto did not receive it” because “Tamara never said what I asked her to say,” and the gesture ended up becoming a public scandal.
For Casella, the issue is now behind us, but it still works as an example of how an external controversy can interfere with the internal dynamics of a program and expose to the maximum the tension between divided audiences, social networks and live television.
