A musical for every Pinoy

"It will make you cry," said Ernie Pecho, referring to St. Louis Loves Dem Filipinos...The Musical. "You should see it!"

On that note and upon the invitation of Floy Quintos who wrote the musical (book and libretto, with Antonio Africa doing the original score), I watched the musical at the Wilfrido Guerrero Theater in UP Diliman which was so full of people that Sunday afternoon, mostly students paying P250 each, that extra seats had to be brought in but still not enough, forcing latecomers to sit on the aisles.

Except for a sketchy backgrounder I got from Miguel Castro (who alternates for the lead role as Bulan, a Bagobo warrior, with Arnold Reyes), I was clueless what the musical was all about. According to the playbill, St. Louis Loves Dem Filipinos was first written as a straight play in 1991 and it was Tony Mabesa ("mentor and friend" of Floy who asisted him in the production) who directed the world premiere for Dulaang UP in 1992 as well as the second production in 1998. Floy has done other plays (Fluid, a witty and elegant satire of the arts scene; and Laro, the overtly homosexual adaptation of Schnitzier’s La Ronde, co-written with Miguel Castro) but St. Louis Loves Dem Filipinos...The Musical remains, according to the production notes, "his most valuable contribution to Philippine theater."

For the sake of other "clueless" readers, let me give a bird’s-eye view of what the musical is all about. The play revolves around the 1904 World Trade Exposition in St. Louis, Missouri (where, if memory serves me right, the Bells of Balangiga were brought after they were taken from a Samar town during the American Occupation). It was in that world expo where Filipino ethnic groups (the Bagobos from Davao and the Bontocs/Igorots from the Mountain Province) were put on display like objects of curiosity – you know, dem treated like monkeys wearing g-strings and living in trees (a dance sequence shows the actors dancing like monkeys).

Congratulating the Dulaang UP for opening its 30th theater season with this musical, UP chancellor Sergio S. Cao noted in his message that the event (the St. Louis World Expo) "is important in Philippine history as it legitimized the imperialist agenda of the American government in the Philippines... The musical version of the play offers a more complex view of that colonial experience...a western genre, and its appropriation by Filipino artists shows how the colonized can use art forms borrowed from the colonizers to empower themselves and overcome their subjugation."

Floy wrote the musical and all but two of the songs in English.

Very interesting, I thought as the musical unfolded on what I thought was a stage much too small for such a production that deserves a bigger venue like, why not, the CCP Main Theater.

During the almost three-hour presentation, I anticipated the parts which, as Ernie Pecho said, would make me cry. Well, I almost did cry when...

1. The Bagobos, led by Miguel Castro as Bulan, and the Bontocs/Igorots, led by Raffy Tejada as Antonio the Bontoc chieftain, are measured from head to foot like "specimens" by the staunch imperialists, organizers of the St. Louis Expo, reducing the poor tribal creatures into mere objects.

2. Bulan’s wife Mamayon (played with quiet sensitivity by Mae Ann Valentin), weakened by a bout with smallpox during the three-month boat ride from Manila to Missouri, dies in Bulan’s arms while in quarantine during the tribes’ arrival in Missouri.

3. Bulan and company are treated as, that’s it, objects of curiosity in the "circus," a scene that, I’m sure, aroused a feeling of outrage in the audience, and...

4. Bulan, after jumping ship on the tribes’ journey home, is reduced from prince to pauper wandering the streets of hostile America where he has lost not just his traditional clothes but his identity. Is America really in the heart, even if it turns colonial-minded Pinoys into second-class citizens ("Like Oreo choco, brown outside, white inside," according to one of the songs)?

The scene that certainly warmed the cockles of the audience’s heart showed President Roosevelt declaring as he applauded the Filipino ethnic groups during a visit to the world expo, "St. Louis loves them Filipinos and so does America!" That made the "specimens" raise their heads high in great pride.

Miguel Castro in his first musical role acquitted himself pretty well, rising to the challenge of the role. He has the good singing voice and the acting ability the role called for. (I heard that Arnold Reyes is just as good.) Raffy Tejada made his role as the Bontoc chieftain pleasing and hilarious by "adlibbing" (as Bibsy Carballo, Miguel Castro’s manager seated beside me, pointed out every time Raffy did so).

The other players were – how should I say it? – fantastic, including Jake Macapagal (of Miss Saigon fame) as the narrator and Leo Rialp as the sympathetic humanist Gustavo Niederlein. (Bibsy couldn’t believe it when I told her that Leo was among the original members, along with Celeste Legaspi, of the singing group The Ambivalent Crowd which was popular in the late ’60s and early ’70s.)

Well, I thank Floy Quintos for that great theater experience, director Alexander Cortez (for his controlled direction, an Herculean task considering the material on hand) and the other talents behind the scene (too many to mention here).

Anyway, as I followed Ernie Pecho’s advice, I say the same to you: Go watch St. Louis Loves Dem Filipinos...The Musical and cry. More performances are scheduled at the Wilfrido Guerrero Theater today at 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. and tomorrow, July 31, also at 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. (with repeats on Aug. 2 and 4, 12 and 14, same venue.) For inquiries, call the Dulaang UP at 926-1349 or 920-5301 (local 6441).

* * *

E-mail reactions at [email protected]