Rustica Carpio:

She glides into center stage, serpentine skirt swishing and crisp kimona shimmering with every step – the emerald terno bringing out the inextinguishable fire in her eyes. She sang the kundiman and the FEU Auditorium was transformed into a magical place. Our ears throbbed with every note of her velvety lyric mezzo soprano voice, our eyes flickered with every gesture of her frail hands, our hearts swelled with the sight and sound of this ethereal muse – her blissful magnificence lifting our spirits to heights sublime.

It was an afternoon sublime, with no less than the diva of Philippine radio, dear immortal Tia Dely Magpayo and the feisty Mabuhay Singers keeping Rustie in august company, making the moment unforgettable. And it is propitieous that the event transpires at what used to be the premiere theater of Manila when the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) was not yet a glint in Imelda Marcos’ eyes. The Far Eastern University Auditorium was, and continues to be a landmark in this university at the heart of Morayta, where culture continues to throb, as envisioned by its founder, Don Nicanor Reyes – dubbed by National artist Nick Joaquin, as Mr. FEU.

Rustica Cruz Carpio, educator, stage, TV and movie actress, singer– Filipino artist par excellence, is celebrating 45 years in the legitimate stage this year. Recently, she staged a dramatic monologue of the character Kikay (whom she popularized from Marcelino Agana’s New Yorker in Tondo), at the Paco Park to commemorate this milestone in her long and colorful career in the theater. She has reprised the role more than 20 times, immortalizing it with leading men Eddie Rodriguez and Robert Arevalo.

She is an alumna of the former Philippine College of Commerce (now Polytechnic University of the Philippines) where she finished Associate in Commercial Science with honors. She finished her Bachelor of Arts major in English from Manuel L. Quezon University (MLQU), magna cum laude; her Master in Education, major in Speech Education from New York University, as Fulbright grantee and International House scholar, and Doctor of Philosophy, major in Literature, meritissmus, from the University of St. Tomas. She was a UNESCO fellow in Dramatic Arts at the National School of Drama and Asian Theater Institute in India.

She has reaped laurels in the Philippines and abroad (Korea, China, Europe) performing on stage and to date has received 45 honors and awards for these sterling engagements. She has acted in 45 films which won for her numerous nominations and honors. She has acted in 45 television programs/episodes as guest character actress – the longest of which was as Hermana Pule in the 13-episode Noli Me Tangere directed by National Artist Eddie Romero.

On the recurrence of the figure 45 in her career, she can only ponder: "Is this accidental, coincidental, or providential?"

But the overwhelming number of plaques, trophies and other tokens of the public’s adulation for her artistic merits underscores the last rationale as the wisdom behind this astonishing number.

"I am donating these awards to the PUP archives and the Women of Malolos shrine in Bulacan as my way of thanking the Filipino people for appreciating my art over 45 years," Rustie confides. She is even giving away her costumes and other personal memorabilia to these museums, in grateful acknowledgement of the public’s patronage.

She had to turn down offers for a number of full-length roles in movies because she did not want to sacrifice her academic responsibilities.

"All my life, I had been a teacher and one time or another, an administrator," she discloses. Many a time, she had to put her acting career on hold to fulfill the demands of a profession that is in her blood. Her parents were teachers too, from Bulacan, land of poets and patriots. She was born in Paombong and raised in Hagonoy, where she imbibed the passion for excellence in the arts.

"I used to dream of becoming a lawyer or an opera singer," Rustie relates. But the groves of the academe beckoned stronger. At 23, she became the youngest faculty member of PUP. Her committed service was interrupted only by study grants in Illinois and New York University. She joined Far Eastern University (FEU) and 10 years later, organized the mass communications program for the Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila (PLM). She was holder of the Manila Bulletin professorial chair in Journalism at the PUP Graduate School and the Albertus Magnus professorial chair in Humanities at the UST Graduate School. She was thrice dean at PUP and is currently the head of the President’s Committee on Culture at FEU.

"She keeps the arts alive here and I’m sure my forebears are smiling from where they are, because this is the way they want the ambiance to be in the institution they founded," Dr. Lydia Reyes Echaus, FEU President, volunteers.

Rustie is not only a denizen of the stage in remarkably memorable roles, but also a much sought-after director. As director/principal actress/leader of the low key Sining Silangan, the first and so far the only Filipino theater group ever to have performed in China, she has proven her mettle as helmswoman of the stage. Those who have had the pleasure of being directed by her are unanimous in their testimonies of how cool and composed she is when she does her job. Never one to scream and scold to clip her thespians’ wings, Rustie has nothing but words of encouragement to help them soar.

Dame Rustie knows, as she wrote in her Discourse Analysis in Drama (a paper she presented during the 18th annual Convention of the Council of Department Chairpersons for English in 2001) that "going to the theater and watching a play helps the audience embark on an exploration of the dramatic vision of the authors, as incursion, as it were, into the recesses of reality, a visit to life as a condition of disequilibrium."

Thus, as director, she helps the audience analyse human nature as it unfolds through the drama of theater. This month, she is staging Leonor Rivera for FEU with faculty and students in her cast, as she tirelessly advocates for the survival of theater in the academe.

No less than veteran writer and critic, Amadis Ma. Guerrero, in a recent review of her book Life is a Stage, wrote:

"There are many distinguished men and women who should be national artists by now but for some reason – they lack political patrons, the organizations concerned don’t nominate them – they are not. Among them is Rustica C. Carpio…"

In this review, Guerrero called her a Renaissance woman, because of her wealth of travels and rich experience in the humanities.

But this is not the only accolade fitting for the lady, as she has been called a multitude of names, most heartwarming among them Doris Day of the Philippines, as she was the youngest member of the First Filipino Entertainment Troupe sent by the Philippine government to Korea and Japan during World War II. It was then that a battle ground was named "Rustie Hill" after her and was adopted in the war maps of Korea.

Despite the paeans of peers and superiors, Rustie has remained humble and amiable. Dr. Belen Tangco, now dean of the Faculty of Arts and Letters of UST, her colleague at the UST Graduate School Academic Theater, remarked in an interview for the Varsitarian in 2001:

"Rustica has remained warm and humble because her attitude is more of a professor than a celebrity… She is a celebrity in her own right, an excellent performer and a great academician."

Her former students, both in the undergraduate and graduate programs, attest to the enriching quality of her teaching, which continue to sustain the vanishing discipline of literature.

Indeed, despite 45 years of fame and glory, Rustie remains a humble prophetess of Philippine theater. She has, and will always be its advocate through public perception may wax and wane on its relevance. As ever, she will bear witness to its agony and ecstasy after each curtain call.