MONGOLOIDA'S CASA DE PUNWritten by Claro de los Reyes
Directed by Guelan Luarca and Zoe de Ocampo
Enrica (Kakki Teodoro) was the daughter of a dark-skinned African-American man and a fair-skinned Filipina with Hispanic ancestry. After suffering a violent assault which resulted in the loss of her left eye, she decided to migrate to New York City to live her dreams in anonymity. There she had a Haitian-American landlord (Anthony Vaughn Merchant) and African-American neighbors Punnygal (Teisha M. Duncan) and Brownman (Ybes Bagadiong). Along with foreign celebrities like Queen Isabel II and Billy Ray Bates, Enrica also encountered local personalities like Imelda (Tata Tuvera) and Rizal, both of whom had her facial deformity.
This staged reading turned out to be quite a web odyssey -- an online orienteering course or an obstacle course. On its website, you follow a series of written instructions which would lead you through a maze of YouTube videos, as designed by the tech team of Kat Dizon, Franny Tan and Carmen Dolina. It was fun at times and frustrating at times, as you click on boxes and arrows to get to the next page, or click on numbers on the side to get side notes, or click on a box to drag and read the unintelligible dialogue, or click on drawings of open eyes to close them. Seeing Imelda and Isabel eating bangus with huge wooden utensils was truly bizarre.
I am not going to pretend to completely understand what this play was all about. I went through the videos twice and watched the after-show Q and A session, but I really do not get what Filipino-American playwright de los Reyes was trying to tell me exactly. I think it may be about the tough life ahead for those of either the "mongoloid" race or worse, the "negroid" race (as they were called in the play's archaic terminology) throughout history up to the present. I am really not sure, in fact I may be way off. However, in creating this unique "virtual theater" web experience, directors Luarca and de Ocampo made sure I kept my fingers busy clicking links instead of scratching my head in confusion.
Written by Bernice Dacara
Directed by Alon Segarra
Vito (Matthew Deinla) and Erik (King Velasquez) were both plebes in a military school. Their classmate Nico just died from injuries resulting from blunt trauma he sustained after their initiation. On the night before their recognition day, a distraught Vito engaged Erik to discuss what happened to their friend and how he suffered under the their sadistic upperclassmen. Later, the discussion turned to themselves -- on what they should have done back then, and what they could do now.
This was a straightforward two-hander about the sensitive topic of hazing in military institutions. Playwright Dacara admitted that her story started off as the experiences of an uncle. As she was writing though, the controversial news about the death of PMA cadet Darwin Dormitorio by hazing became a big national issue, and this made her story significant currently as well. That Dacara was able to convincingly write the culture of violence experienced by men with a balance of male and female perspective was notable.
The virtual staging by Director Segarra was quite basic, just one Zoom window for each boy as they were lying down on their beds conversing with each other. The progress of emotion was well-paced for both the nervous Vito and the pragmatic Eric. Both young actors were able to bounce off each other pretty well as the tension between them got more and more intense. The ending felt weaker than what the build-up promised, and could perhaps be polished more when it is actually staged. It was a bit distracting that Velasquez's ponytail and their scripts were both very visible, and their bedrooms looked very different, but then again it was supposed to be a script reading after all (but they could've gone for a full-on performance like the others readings did).
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