KULTURA
PHILIPPINE COLLEGIAN
Julian Inah Anunciacion THE LIGHTS OF WILFRIDO MA. Guerrero Theatre are dimly lit. A sharp sound of wood striking each other echoes through the theatre. Another pair enters, crisscrossing through the earlier sounds of striking wood. Soon enough a mixture of sounds filled the stage and enveloped the cold expanse of the theater in a sound of fierce fight. The Supremo entered, called Teatro Porvenir into a halt. The show begins. The audience remains spectator. Grand Entrance Dulaang UP (DUP) stages Tim Dacanay’s Palanca-winning play Teatro Porvenir under the direction of Alexander Cortez as the country commemorates Bonifacio’s sesquicentennial. Dacanay’s play, whose title was inspired by Andres Bonifacio’s own theatre group, expounds on the revolutionary hero’s mostly unmentioned life in the theatre before becoming the Supremo of the Katipunan. Together with Bonifacio’s friends, playwright Aurelio Tolentino and actor Macario Sakay, Bonifacio formed Teatro Porvenir, the “theater of the future,” in 1887. This theatre group was an unconventional form of theatre that showcased moromoro, comedia and zarzuela with subversive undertones, countering the then-traditional Westernized rival theatre group Teatro Infantil. Dacanay’s play also sets Bonifacio’s Teatro Porvenir apart from Teatro Infantil by utilizing arnis in its plays. In the DUP play, Bonifacio encouraged his men in the theatre to perfect the art of arnis: “Magagamit natin ito sa entablado at sa labas, sa bayang sawi.” Theatre emerged as a response to colonization. Bonifacio’s theatre featured voices from the margins, the usual spectators to colonial theatre admitted onto the center stage. Much to the disdain of traditional theater, Bonifacio’s modernist Teatro Porvenir changed the characters, setting and treatment of plays such as Bernardo Carpio to suit the time and the general audience. Most importantly, Bonfacio’s theatre fearlessly utilized Filipino in its plays when Filipino was considered the language of indios. This theatre work that mostly tackled the theme of indio versus colonizers gave Bonifacio the early epiphany for revolution, and that the revolution must step down the stage; thus the Katipunan was formed. The treatment of Dacanay’s play on Bonifacio as a lover of art attempted to make Bonifacio’s revolutionary image—and the revolution itself—more palatable to contemporary audiences which are mostly composed of the bourgeois and the petty-bourgeois, both of which have reason to fear the term. To have the revolutionary
LUNES, DISYEMBRE 2, 2013
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Viva el Supremo! Bonifacio’s sesquicentennial and art’s role in his revolutionary ideals
hero portrayed as a man of art— almost Rizalesque—is deemed as more acceptable. This added layer of representation to the image of Bonifacio brings about the danger of fictionalization. From the already distorted icon of Bonifacio in red bandana while holding a bolo, now portrayed more subtly is a man of the arts, further caricaturing the hero as a ploy to appeal to a perceived audience. The current influx of cultural capital on revolutionary figures such as the film The Guerilla is a Poet, the play Lean the Musical, and other biopics on famous revolutionaries such as poet-warrior Eman Lacaba, raises the question of purpose. The use of the brand of revolution in cultural capital ushers the danger of mythmaking. Art, especially whose material involves prominent revolutionary figures, must owe its purpose to the wider scope of audience outside the middle –class consumers of cultural capital. Main Act Dacanay’s Teatro Porvenir regards theatre as a separate entity from the revolutionary movement. The space between audience and actors which further creates the voyeuristic nature of the audience transforms the revolution into a mere spectacle to the middle class audience of Dacanay’s Teatro. Spectacle replaces social life with mere representation, forming a society wherein social relationships decline from being into having—and having into simply appearing—Guy Debord said in his Society of the Spectacle. Though art such as theatre can wield people into starting a revolution, the indifference of the current audience to the images of revolution in Dacanay’s play transforms the idea of revolution into a mere idea trapped on stage and fades as the curtain closes. An artist must not be separate from the ordinary people so that they can access these performances that are also about them. DUP’s
staging of Dacanay’s Teatro Porvenir however falls short in capturing this task. The arena of the revolution remains onstage, for the viewing pleasure of an audience. Bonifacio, had been portrayed as a revolutionary, yet the play ended on a note that does not, even at the least, foretell the revolution, satisfying the audience that the revolution is a spectacle and that art—with the character of Tolentino closing the stage—is the more important battle to win. The failed revolution was shown, with the actor-heroes dead. Dacanay however also attempted to present an alternate ending where everybody who died was resurrected into a dream-play. The play’s conclusion made the revolution seem like a menagerie, a play within a play. This adds to the lack of realism for which its main character had died for. Curtain Call The thoughts and feelings of artists must be one with the masses by conscientiously learning the ways of the masses, Mao Zedong said in a speech during the Yenan Forum in 1949. Art—including theatre—is a component part of the revolutionary machine that can be used as a powerful weapon to educate the people into revolutionary change. Dacanay’s play averted the idea of theatre being a revolution in itself—and not merely a spectacle that makes use for the revolution as its material for profit. It is only when art and theatre is liberated from the idea that art and revolution can coexist in pursuit of one goal can art be truly art with a purpose. Such art must acquire its material from among the ranks of the masses, and must attack the common enemy of prevailing postmodern thought where individualism prevails. So long as art that seeks to tackle the revolution is under the monopoly of this kind of intelligentsia from the bourgeoisie, art cannot be truly of the masses. ∞
Photographs: Kimberly Pauig Page design: Ashley Garcia