MANILA, Philippines - Tata Nanding Josef, on the occasion of Tanghalang Pilipino’s 26th season. The interview was initially intended to mark TP’s quarter century last year.
STARweek re-emailed Josef, TP artistic director who has also taken the role of “Pramoedya†in Boying Pimentel’s play on the Indonesian author in the recent Virgin Labfest, the embargoed interview on theater and TP in general. What follows is an updated article a year in the making. — Juaniyo Y. Arcellana
As artistic director of TP, what are some of your thoughts that wouldn’t make it to any souvenir program?
If you ask me which thoughts will I make sure that appear in all the souvenir programs, it will be my advocacy that the national government and the private sector and the business companies recognize, before it’s too late, that artists and cultural educators are the key catalysts that can hasten the much elusive social transformation that our country needs.
I personally believe that the REAL ARTISTS (not the few self-centered, materialistic, egotistic ones) are the most honest, most righteous, most courageous, most patriotic, most compassionate, most democratic, most sacrificing, most generous, most incorruptible, most respectable, most creative, most expressive members of Philippine society, and the entire human society. Am I exaggerating? Maybe not.
In the quarter century of its existence, what other bases has TP yet to cover?
TP has accomplished a lot already – revival of sarsuwela and other folk traditions, producing new Filipino literary and theater classics, featuring artistic genius of established playwrights, directors, actors, designers, composers, dancer-choreographers, technical and lighting directors.
Using acquired and evolved Filipino theater aesthetics, TP has produced plays that reflect not only the historical past struggles and the heroism of the Filipino people and our counterparts in other parts of the world, but also the immediate past’s realities that confront and threaten our present physical or material existence, and our psychological, cultural and spiritual well-being as individuals and as a society.
TP has also mounted a string of highly successful and critically acclaimed translations and adaptations of classics and contemporary theater pieces, both from the West and other Asian countries. The illustrious 25 years of hard work of TP, largely under the leadership of Nonon Padilla (with significant contributions from Herbie Go and Dennis Marasigan) has been recorded, hopefully immortalized, in TP’s Silver Anniversary book, which is available in book stores and at the TP office.
However, even with so many accomplishments, we say that we have barely scratched the surface of what might be several lifetimes’ work in theater. If TP wants to be really worthy of its name, Tanghalang Pilipino, literally, Philippine Theater, which connotes National Theater of the Philippines, it has to not only continue what has been started by the past leadership, but to recognize the changing times, both in terms of contemporary national and global realities, so that while the roots are never forgotten, experimentations and innovations are embraced and explored in the context of the felt psycho-social, artistic-cultural and economic needs, of both the Filipino artists, the theater-going public, the national and global community.
This is the reason why we did plays like “Walang Kukurap,†a dramatization of corruption in the Philippines; “Ibalong,†a Pinoy ethno-rock version of the Bicolano epic that underscored the need to protect our environment. It is also in this light that TP’s program must include the discovery and use of artistic and cultural forms and content that are from and are reflective of those of the other regions of the country – the Muslims, Maranaos, Ifugaos, Mangyans, Aetas, T’bolis, Talaandigs, Bisayas and the other indigenous groups of our archipelago.
What are some of the things that ail Philippine theater and how does TP as a major company intend to address these?
Philippine theater is an art form that is in search of its identity, in much the same way that the Filipino or the Philippines is in search of a national cultural identity. Or, perhaps, we can say that Philippine Theater is presently the summation of an ongoing national theater movement. It is the synthesis of the products and processes being undertaken by the different theater companies and performing groups all over the country, the school-based groups, the existing indigenous rituals of the different tribes in the different regions, the Christian folk traditions in the parishes.
Philippine theater is not a homogeneous art form. Is this a problem? Maybe yes, because in a sense, the different forms suggest division or disunity; or maybe not, because the differences define our diverse roots and therefore our colorful history as a people, and maybe, what we just need to do is to come together, showcase one another’s form, recognize the uniqueness of each one, and then identify commonalities that can be woven together into a tapestry that might turn out to be what Philippine Theater is.
Does TP intend to address this? We definitely will, and we will do this together with all other theater groups and other Filipino artists.