Monday, December 8, 2014

CHERRY PIE BEYOND THE SHADOW OF THE STORM

11 November 2014

CHERRY PIE BEYOND THE SHADOW OF THE STORM
By Marcel Ricacho

Cherry Pie Picache bravely moves on...
Photographed by Mark Joseph Griswold
IT’S easy to say that Cherry Pie Picache might have braved the storm, after all what happened to her sprightly 75-year-old mother, Zenaida Vidor Sison, and the flurry of activities that followed in the tragedy’s aftermath, because of her strong and steady faith. Nevertheless, the pain still lingers in moments both random and deliberate, and forgetting is yet beyond her in many respects, even if she always has taken perpetual succor under the wings of the Blessed Virgin. Indeed, it is something that has served her exceedingly well in times of trials and great need. 
            However, as the ceremony master says, the show must go on. Within the month of the family’s mourning and composing, the actress-mother has traveled far and near to support her son’s passion and pursuit on the tennis court.  And it’s no mean feat for a no mean player: 12-year-old Nio P. Tria is currently ranked as the country’s number two in the 12-and-under category of the racket sport.
            At any rate, their recent trip to Singapore may not have yielded any silver or gold, but it proved to all and sundry that Nio and his team’s storming performance could smash a well-funded and well-trained national tennis team of the First World host. Small wonder, to think that tennis, as many people know, is not a popular item or event in the list of the Philippine Sports Commission.
               Recently, Nio and his young teammates played “host” to a group of world-class professional tennis players at the Mall of Asia Arena, under the auspices of the International Premier Tennis League, with Manila as its first stop. Also in the IPTL itinerary, among other places, are Singapore, India and Dubai. 
            About a month of her mother’s passing, Cherry Pie received an appropriate award, in recognition of her consistent charity work for the men and women behind bars, from the Episcopal Commission on Prison Pastoral Care (ECPPC) of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP).  The irony of the award given at this time is not lost on those who are aware of the stark reality of the actress’ situation, considering that the suspect to her mother’s murder is now in prison.
            Through the guidance of her friends, the actress has charted a different path far from the madding showbiz crowd.  On certain occasions, especially during the annual Prison Awareness Week in October, Cherry Pie finds time to visit and bring food and other goodies as well as good will and glad tidings to the inmates of both the Correctional Institution for Women in Mandaluyong City and the New Bilibid Prison in Muntinlupa City.
            Now on respite from the punishing schedule of TV soap operas, the Oxfam ambassador (“Reduce Food Waste”) and longtime Boardwalk endorser goes back to mainstream movies, shooting her scenes for Chito Rono’s Feng Shui 2, Star Cinema’s official entry to the 2014 Metro Manila Film Festival, and already almost through with its principal photography.  Because of her delayed work on the Kris Aquino-Coco Martin film, Cherry Pie has decided to go double time and shoot for successive days – well, hopefully.
Cherry Pie Picache with host Boy Abunda at  Inside the Cinema interview.
Photographed by Mark Joseph Griswold
            As of this writing, however, her “promised” days are hardly over, just like her pained promise not to cry again whenever the thought of her dear departed mother crosses her mind. Indeed, the slow wisdom of grief slackens the pace of our healing, even as we grow in the process.  The important thing is what Cherry Pie has learned – and is still learning – under the circumstances that have transpired since that fateful day.
            Meanwhile, the fortysomething actress has finished one other film earlier, tucked under her belt, and probably slated for next year’s release, if and when the “whistle blows.” More scripts are coming her way, “indie” or otherwise, and it seems Cherry Pie is bent on working away her sadness and sorrow by keeping herself busy on several fronts as actress, mother, sister, friend, advocate, whatever.
            What about love?
            “That can wait, “ she snaps, “that” meaning a lover (and beloved) who has yet to find a face in her dreams and schemes, for quite sometime now.  Meanwhile, the heartfelt outpouring of sympathy and well wishing continues to affect the actress and her family.
            What happened has left an indelible mark in Cherry Pie’s psyche and physical reality; and the scar is growing, as the wound heals. Besides, the deep realization about life and living is overwhelming, and everything as we know them or expect them to be is systematically challenged or compromised. The evil that people do nowadays seems to grow into forces that we should all be vigilant to fight or guard against, the still-grieving actress warned.
            She doesn’t have to say it but her thoughts can be heard, if only one cared, enough to listen to her heart speak, mostly in silence.  Again, a message from the land of Olympic tragedies and Socratic ironies reverberates from the pen of one of its less well-known writers, as though to soothe the grieving.
            To wit, and for whatever it’s worth: Life has it that, according to the sages and the experienced, “three things are always current in human affairs.  One, that there is no justice in this world. Two, that injustice can only be tempered if there is good education, respect for a set scale of values, and a stable family.  And three, that the state can afford only as much freedom for the individual as does not jeopardize its own system.”
            Of course, such a redeeming insight is quite a welcome spell. No matter what the situation, for Cherry Pie Picache, life goes on despite, and beyond, the shadow of the storm.


10/11/14


Monday, December 1, 2014

‘RAK OF AEGIS,’ SPANKY MANIKAN, JED MADELA LEAD 27TH ALIW AWARDEES

 26 November 2014
FREE FORECAST

RAK OF AEGIS,’ SPANKY MANIKAN, JED MADELA LEAD 27TH ALIW AWARDEES
By JC Nigado

27th Aliw Awards before the announcement of winners at ResortsWorld.
Photograph by Mark Joseph Griswold
THIS year’s Aliw Awards, as usual, is easy to see.  Its curious mix of eclectic nominees invites speculation the kind of which has hounded the group, or any award-giving bodies for that matter, since God knows when.
            At any rate, one does not really need an expert to elicit the right choices for the awards, but some common sense and pragmatic practice will do. Even an amateur diviner can see through the so-called short list, which is quite long in its 40 or so categories.  So brace yourselves and, with further ado, here goes the lucky or unlucky ones. (By the way, in case you don’t know, an award is either a blessing or a curse, depending on its circumstances.)
            This is no love story, but where do I begin, as the song goes? Should I follow in order the nine-page 2014 Aliw Awards list of finalists or should I go random as the nominees seem to be? Of course, there are criterions and there are criterions. The Aliw Awards puts premium on good live entertainment, which are preferably enjoyed by many. For them a good show loses its meaning and relevance if it has a lean audience. But in a world of sin and sorrow, as W. Somerset Maugham would say, who cares about criterions amidst the blighted realities of here and now?
            PETA’s Rak of Aegis, despite its tacky title and hackneyed narrative, is the season’s best musical production.  With 10 nominations, Rak leads the pack with three other winners, namely: Maribel Legarda, best stage director (musical); Kakai Bautista, best actress in a featured role; and Jerald Napoles or OJ Mariano, best actor in a featured role. On another day in acting court, however, I would pick Joel Trinidad for Wait Until Dark, from Repertory Philippines, in the latter category.
Spanky Manikan receives his Aliw as fellow awardee, Liza Macuja-Elizalde, looks on.
Photograph by Mark Joseph Griswold
            The 72-year-old Spanky Manikan walks with the best actor (non-musical) trophy, for his dynamic delineation of “old age,” both in character and in condition, from Tanghalang Pilipino’s Mga Ama, Mga Anak.  Aliw has erred in ignoring Manikan’s alternate, Robert Arevalo, by depriving the latter a nomination, to say the least. Also conspicuously ignored was Der Kaufmann's Jonathan Tadioan, whose painstaking performance of the Jewish merchant Shylock in Rolando Tinio's translation of Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice is almost at par with that of Manikan's.
               The best cultural group is definitely Aliw’s favorite, Tanghalang SLU of Baguio City, now winning two years in a row and a candidate to the hall of fame. St. Louis University may have a good campus theater, but in terms of cultural relevance and reach nothing beats the impressive and busy Sirang Theater Ensemble Of Leyte Normal University in Tacloban City. Under the leadership and tutelage of Jose N. Lianza, the STE-LNU, I dare say, has no equal in the theater cultural scene, especially in its recent Yolanda-inspired performances that toured the affected provinces.
                For best new artists, former X-Factor (Phils) contender Michael Pangilinan (male) and US-educated singer and songwriter Mica Javier (female) won’t be taking unawares by bagging their respective awards, considering their looks, talent and name recall vis-a-vis their peers or co-nominees.
               Ballet Manila stands out in the best dance company contest, as Acapella Manila sings softly to win the best choral group, with the Ateneo Chamber Singers providing stiff competition.
                As for the best instrumentalist, either Christine Coyuito should bang the piano to announce her win, or Brandley Bascon should fiddle with his violin once more, and raise the roof, as it were, to prove he deserves better.
                 The best female emcee award must go to Toni Gonzaga and Luis Manzano must be accorded the best male emcee honors. Otherwise, it’s a toss among the passables and the incompetents, as expected.
            To be sure, the best stand-up comedian is undoubtedly Ate Gay, the Nora Aunor impressionist who, kidding aside, is sometimes better than the original in certain respects.
            Liza Macuja-Elizalde, petite but great, towers above the rest as the best classical dancer, but any one of the three other nominees from Ballet Philippines could spring a cold surprise.
            Tenor Dondi Ong sounds familiar to hit the high note for the best classical male performer, even as I hesitate to crack the crystal ball for his female counterpart in the same classical category.
              Stage and film actress Pinky Amador is a proud pick for the best crossover performer, even if the indefatigable Beverly Salviejo threatens to grasp the cap.
            The best production for children should fly to The Bluebird of Happiness, from Trumpets, or else Sandosenang Sapatos must be running the kids’ show.
             The correct choice between Ateneo Fine Arts’ Games People Play and Red Turnip Theater’s Rabbit Hole for the best non-musical production should put the stray issue of Wait Until Dark, from Repertory Philippines, to rest.
             For best stage director (non-musical), Ed Lacson Jr. of Games People Play and Topper Fabregas of Rabbit Hole should square it off, with the latter getting the upper hand in any view.
            Der Kaufmann’s Regina de Vera is the runaway winner in the best actress (non-musical) category, and no one dares come close, or else... I watched Der Kaufmann twice at the CCP's Tanghalang Pilipino, and every time I was pleasantly awed with De Vera's fresh approach to the "identity-changing"persona of Portia, thanks to her vision and the splendid direction of Rody Vera and Tux Rustaqio (sic). By the way, is the redoubtable Baby Barredo already a hall of famer in the same category that she seemed to have missed the nomination boat for her powerful turn in Cris Millado's August: Osage County, from Repertory Phillipines? 
            Youngish and energetic Red Concepcion of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, from Resorts World, is a popular choice for best actor in a musical, but Patrick Libao of Filipinas 1941, from the Philippine Stagers Foundation, looms large as a dark horse in the horizon.
            Likewise, Ana Fegi of Katipunan; Mga Anak ng Bayan, from Gantimpala Theater Foundation, is another popular choice for best actress in a musical, but Cindy Liper of Filipinas 1941 could pull the rug from under any old time.
            For best ensemble acting, the cast of Games People Play cannot hold a candle to the cast of August: Osage County, whose light shines brightest in every moment on stage.
            Johnny Manahan beats himself and two others for the best concert stage director award, for his wicked work in Jed Madela 10th Anniversary Concert.  The same Madela concert crowns Mel Villina as the best musical director without any trouble.
            For the best female performer in hotels, music lounges and bars, Judith Banal of Merks takes the cake, even though Juris of 19 East draws near to partake of the serving of the award.
            Noel Cabangon of Conspiracy Bar is always a wise decision for the best male performer in hotels, music lounges and bars, but Richard Merck of Merks could still stage an upset anytime.
            Jed Madela of All Request 2 at Music Museum wins the best male performer in a concert, leaving the competition way far behind.
             For her Pagcor series Dulce is certainly favored to win the best female performer in a concert, but, given the chance, I would rather settle for Jonalyn Viray of Dares to be Fearless at Music Museum or Sitti of Bossa Love, also at Music Museum.
            The Dawn mounts a resounding comeback in Landmarks at Music Museum to clinch the best group performers in a concert, although The CompanY of ValenTunes at Crown Plaza Hotel could provide the winning band some company or stand “alone’ on awards night.
            For best collaboration in a concert, the team of Jay R, Kris Lawrence, Salbakuta and Kley of Homeworkz Tour at the Giant Bar Antipolo blends well to a successful finish sans gimmicks or media hype.
            The eponymous The Minstrels/Circus Band Greatest Hits Reunion at the PICC perform their best major concert (group), and they should get the unanimous nod of Aliw, since Rivermaya at Marikina Riverbank and Parokya ni Edgar at CEU lack the luster of yesteryear.
            Again, Jed Madela’s 10th Anniversary Concert at the PICC wins the best major concert (male) and Lani Misalucha’s The Philippine Tour at Cebu Waterfront Hotel can claim the best major concert (female), no sweat.
            To top it all, who rules the roast with the singular Entertainer of the Year title? The federation’s bet is Jed Madela and the entire congregation must celebrate before it’s too late. But, wait, I mustn’t be spilling the beans as yet.
            The rest of the Aliw awards are either redundant or a recap of previous perks, given or missed.  A lifetime achievement award or a hall of fame is nothing if not well deserved or well chosen. I said it before, and I’ll say it again:  An award is only as good, or as bad, as its giver – no more, no less.

JULIO CINCO NIGADO

Tagurabong City, Philippines, 2014

Sunday, November 16, 2014

‘EKSTRA’: SIMPLY SPECIAL, SIMPLY BEAUTIFUL

3/4 November 2014


‘EKSTRA’: SIMPLY SPECIAL, SIMPLY BEAUTIFUL
A film review by JC Nigado

Movie poster at Cinemalaya 2013
JEFFREY Jeturian is a prime storyteller whose film language is direct, unpretentious, almost unaffected.  From his first film, Sana Pag-ibig Na, to Pila-Balde to Kubrador to Ekstra and to many others in between, Jeturian’s straightforward style of filmmaking has always served him well, both in terms of craft and commerce.  Indeed, among the current crop of filmmakers he is the closest thing to Lino Brocka, not only in temperament but also in his mastery of the art and business of cinema, minus the obvious “politics” of it. Like Brocka, Jeturian is a disciplined actor’s director who always elicits the dramatic truth from his performers, and thus effects their best performances.
            In his latest film, Ekstra, one of the two best films of 2013 (the other is Lav Diaz’s Norte: Hangganan ng Kasaysayan), Jeturian has further distilled his “minimalist” approach to its basic essentials, making his work look simple and yet, simply special and beautiful. The Cinemalaya blurb was accurate when it described Jeturian’s entry as a “socio-realist” film, but, unfortunately, only a few seemed to have pursued the film’s course and defined its broad and deep meaning.
            Ekstra is David waiting to be discovered again. It is apparently small and easy enough to be viewed in one comfortable sitting, but big enough to encompass a sense of life as struggle of survival.  To date, the first Vilma Santos so-called indie has reportedly grossed close to 40-million pesos, probably the first of its kind in this day of digital movies.  It’s no mean feat, but small wonder, because the film features the biggest and most enduring star-actress in the history of Philippine show business.
            At any rate, mentioning Diaz here is deliberate because his Norte runs along parallel lines with Ekstra, especially in their characters’ naked guts and will to survive.  Besides, both Ekstra and Norte lend themselves well to interpretation and different readings, as the two films are translated from their respective literary sources.
            If anything, Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment (1866) is widely acknowledged as the basis for Diaz’s Norte. However, that’s acknowledging only half the story or half the film (Sid Lucero’s main protagonist); the other equally important half (Archie Alemania’s other principal character) is inspired by another Russian classic, a contemporary novel, in Alexander Sotzhenitsyn’s One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (1963). Both Denisovich and Alemania’s character in Norte are unjustly incarcerated, and, while inside, they acquire an inner dignity as they find some meaning out of their desperate and degrading existence, transcending their environment with an intense spiritual awareness, despite the growing dehumanization of prisoners.
            Like Solzhenitsyn’s One DayEkstra, unbeknownst to its writers (Zig Dulay, Antoinette Jadaone and Jeturian), is also rooted in the similar literary tradition of real-time narrative that happens in a day. Ekstra’s Loida Malabanan (judiciously portrayed by a plumpish Vilma Santos with striking sensitivity) hews closely to the character Guinevere Pettigrew in Winifred Watson’s 1938 novel, Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, an almost forgotten enchanting tale that unfolds over the 24 hours in the life of a neglected spinster.
            Malabanan and Pettigrew belong to the underclass, the underprivileged that are often irregularly employed or out of work.  Theirs are the stories of people who cope in the little ways they know how, keeping occupied with the mundane and absurd details of daily life, as they eke out a living, to make ends meet. Despite provenance and distant time, the novel and the film mirror each other, as they remind us that it is never too late to have a second chance, and that there’s always hope to go on living.
            There are other literary gems, which are also set in one day, and each uses and follows the same time-span to explore the vagaries and temporality of life, or lives as the case may be.  Like Ekstra, these novels deal with the tensions of everyday economics and practical philosophies that engage the otherwise ordinary people.  There are no grand schemes and evils here, only simple pathos and the careless indignities of everyday life – sans frills, fusses or any gimmicks.
            Anyway, Jeturian and his co-writers may not be aware that they have touched common ground with the works of certain literary greats, and their film “adaptation” posing as “original screenplay,” as it navigates life from dawn to dusk to dawn.  Among the select, are James Joyce’s Ulysses (1922), Virginia Woolf’s The Waves (1931) and Saul Bellow’s Seize the Day (1952) – all presaging Ekstra by, pun unintended, a long shot.  Still, Jeturian’s film neatly, if humbly, reflects the said novels’ eloquent textual and textural one-day structure and plot development.
            Memory always serves well those who remember the exquisite relatedness of the various and diverse arts, especially the closeness and incestuous relationship of literature and film.  With such an illustrious “kin” for background, Ekstra can’t afford to remain the “poor relation” that it is perceived to be. Alas, the enclosed social world of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice of the early 19th century persists to this day and has transmogrified into a social bubble inhabited by cabal critics and bigots.
            But the fact that the movie is set mainly in tabloid TV, what with its dumbing soap-opera mindset and sensationalist mentality, somehow elevates Jeturian’s filmic discourse to the level of postmodernist culture and socio-economic politics.
            The film’s pervading theme of hope and survival is rendered powerless in a laissez-faire economy where commercial and fierce private interests rule. Jeturian deftly demonstrates the doctrine of individualism as personified by his sole principal protagonist, an everyday Filipino and a single parent, who faces the world and raises her collegiate daughter alone.  Maybe, it’s on purpose that there’s  hardly any mention of an absent husband or father throughout the film – it is not clear whether Malabanan was abandoned, separated, or the one who left her man in the movie. In addition, it translates well into the bigger picture that presupposes the absence of an authority figure that works for, and with, his people in a public trust. The true somebody who is looked up to and can be depended upon, in times good and bad.
            In a country with no one man or woman enough to lead it to people’s right progress and development, Ekstra fits the bill, as it were, tagging one and all the price we have to pay for bad government and public indifference.  Even God is silent, the film takes it for granted, and does not interfere in human affairs. Here, Big Brother brooks the form of an unseen force in the globalization enterprise of unrestricted corporate interests, where big business on a binge everywhere are buying and consuming us, as they practically take over and run our lives. 
Nationwide release poster
            The genius of taping a TV drama about the exploited sugar workers in a retrogressive feudal system within the film puts the ekstra character as sakada worker in “double jeopardy.” The extra in the movie is an additional role portraying another additional role of a sakada in the teleserye being shot. The sense of dramatic irony in the interweaving double fiction is exaggerated by the fact that it impinges on our own social and economic reality.
            Vilma Santos’s Loida Malabanan embodies the common Filipino worker, the overworked but underpaid all-around laborer who assumes various roles at multi-tasking. She then grabs every opportunity that is presented to her, unmindful of the required ability, skill or the appropriate equipment for the task, in order to earn more money for the long hours of toil, with no overtime pay. As such, Malabanan represents the majority of Filipinos who live in slum conditions, virtually imprisoned in abject poverty from womb to tomb, as they say.
            It is to Jeturian’s credit that, expectedly or unexpectedly, he refuses not to treat poverty as pornography. His “cinematic” slum area is not the usual squalid squatter colony that shows curios or “exotic” destinations before the world.
            Instead, he explores the microcosm of society (symbolized by TV) that has been reduced to mindless entertainment, as he exposes the systemic disease and disrepair of the general establishment (represented by the oppressive system and debauched working conditions).
            The film brilliantly ends at the same place, where it began, signifying a continuing daily cycle of quiet, bittersweet surrender that, unlike Ivan Denisovich’s single day in a decade’s prison term, could even last Loida Malabanan’s lifetime. Under the circumstances, redemption, or what passes for it, comes by embracing fate with profound resignation.
            Be that as it may, the ultimate defining scene where Santos, sensible and knowing, calmly gazes at the busy TV screen says it all: another day begins in repeat, as the world of corrupt culture and grasping politics turns.

JULIO CINCO NIGADO
Tagurabong City, Philippines, 2014