Against all odds: Contra Mundum

MANILA, Philippines - How many times can one stage A Portrait of the Artist as Filipino? Since its first performance in 1955, it has become one of the most frequently staged Filipino plays, its two leading roles essayed by actors of the screen and stage (among them Celeste Legaspi, Zsa Zsa Padilla, Lolita Rodriguez, Rita Gomez, Gina Alajar, Charito Solis and National Artist Daisy Hontiveros-Avellana). 

More important, why another staging, as the various units of the Ateneo de Manila University are threatening to do, in a production called Contra Mundum: A Devised Reading of A Portrait of the Artist as Filipino by Nick Joaquin?

“It is Nick Joaquin’s 10th death anniversary, after all,” explains Glenn Mas, a Palanca-award-winning playwright and current moderator of Tanghalang Ateneo.  “And what better way to commemorate a National Artist than by mounting a reading of his play about art and the nation?”

Portrait is set in Intramuros on the eve of World War II. The Marasigan sisters, Paula and Candida, have been living with their father, Don Lorenzo, once a famous painter, now a recluse. He gives his daughters a mysterious painting titled Retrato del artista como Filipino, which shows Aeneas, with his father Anchises on his back, escaping from the burning city of Troy. Don Lorenzo has painted himself as both Aeneas and Anchises. 

As the painting hangs from the “fourth wall” of the stage, it is invisible to the audience — and thus the object of much speculation. What does it mean?  What’s “Filipino” about it? The characters react to the painting differently, but always in a way that reveals them to themselves and to the audience. 

The play raises many questions, though it is ultimately irreducible to any one of them — about the gap between the generations and the cultures they represent, about the value of art in society, about keeping one’s integrity in the face of change. With the sisters living with reduced means, the play also brings to the fore the dilemma of art and commerce. Should the sisters sell the painting, as their boarder, the frustrated piano player Tony Javier, urges them to do; sell the house and put their father in hospital, as their more practical siblings advise them; or stick with their father come poverty or war — contra mundum?

A play with as ambitious a scope as Portait threatens to be unwieldy. When Joaquin finished the play, his sister-in-law, stage actor Sarah Kabigting, deemed it “unstageable.” (In fact, Joaquin described the original complete play as a “novel in the form of a play.”) Dennis Marasigan, who directs this latest performance of the play, recalls that until Nonon Padilla’s production in 1989 for Tanghalang Pilipino, previous stagings had relied on an abridged text.

Even a simple reading will have its difficulties, especially if it is run on a school budget (with contributions coming from a few patrons and groups like Lyric and Repertory Philippines). Contra Mundum will not be a reading of the entire play. Marasigan and Palanca-winning writer Guelan Luarca draws on Joaquin’s original text and various translations of the play — Bienvenido Lumbera’s Retrato ng Artista bilang Filipino, Lourdes Castrillo Brillantes’ Un retratro del artista como filipino, and Rolando S. Tinio and Ryan Cayabyab’s Larawan, the Musical. (The last, incidentally, is currently being adapted into film, starring Rachel Alejandro, Joanna Ampil and Tom Rodriguez.) Portions of National Artist Lamberto Avellana’s now classic film adaptation, made in 1965, will also be used.

The idea was to bring together actors who were in some way connected to the play. The final cast is formidable: Irma Adlawan and Liesl Batucan, who played the Marasigan sisters in a 2009 production by Repertory Philippines. Their singing counterparts are Banaue Miclat-Jannsen and Delphine Buencamino. Urian award-winner Menggie Cobarrubias plays Don Perico, with Eugene Villaluz, who played the role of Manolo in Ang Larawan, his singing counterpart. The ’80s movie heartthrob Romnick Sarmenta plays Tony Javier. The role of Bitoy Camacho, who represents the voice of the young, is aptly played by student-actor Luarca. Stage legend Naty Crame-Rogers, who played Paula in the original 1955 production and in Avellana’s film adaptation, will make a special appearance. Cayabyab’s music will be played by Mary Anne Espina.

And why Marasigan as director? Mas explains: “Dennis used to joke that his last name being Marasigan, he was the illegitimate son of Paula Marasigan and Tony Javier.” Marasigan starred the UP Repertory Production of Larawan in 1982.

Contra Mundum: A Devised Reading of A Portrait of the Artist as Filipino by Nick Joaquin promises to be a unique staging of Portrait. We hope it will be a worthy one. “At the very least,” says Mas, “it’s free. Nobody has to sell a painting to watch it.”

Contra Mundum will be mounted tomorrow, Oct. 1, at the Rizal mini-theater, Ateneo de Manila University, Loyola Heights campus, at 7 p.m.  (There is an exhibition on Nick Joaquin ongoing at the Rizal Library, Special Collections Building, of the Ateneo de Manila University.)

For details, call 426-6001, loc. 5340.