Fazenda São Marcos is located approximately 20 km east of Aurora do Pará, off the Belém-Brasília highway.

Meira was a descendant of the Portuguese-born landowning family de Magalhães, who had lived in Brazil since the early 18th century; he aspired to a career as a diplomat, but after being rejected by the Rio Branco Institute, he devoted himself entirely to acting, for which he chose his mother's maiden name, Meira, as his stage name.

His first television role was in 1961 in the telenovela Maria Antonieta, and his first appearance in a feature film was in 1963 in Casinha Pequenina.

In 1968, Meira and Menezes were signed by the television network Rede Globo as permanent cast members for telenovelas.

Their first telenovela produced by Rede Globo, Sangue e Areia (1968), based on Vicente Blasco Ibáñez's novel Blood and Sand, enjoyed great public success.