Consider Carlos Bulosan Theatre's new original literary and theatrical work "Anak" as it renders a familiar plot, offers a different context but have universal appeal that can resonate with audiences of diverse backgrounds.
One of the most important cultural values among Filipinos and other people of colour is familism, or the emphasis of the family as the primary social unit and source of support. Anak is that kind of show, relationship-driven drama with nothing like a highchair idea or unusual twists save for the commonplace experience. There's comfort in conventionality because you can easily console yourself despite the pain it brings.
The pain is delivered in the tensions among the families Tomas and Villanueva. The former belongs to a nuclear family of housewife Connie (Alia Rasul), provident father Derek (Richard Mojica) and secretive yuppie Peter (Anthony Raymond Yu); the latter, however is fragmented where parent-child relationship does not follow straight paths. At the beginning, a more naturalistic sequence shows every character together. Single-mom Carmen Villanueva (Belinda Corpuz) goes out to her nursing job after daughter Irene (Isabel Kanaan) goes on her graphic design gigs. She turns her head quite casually, and suddenly you find an opening out of the narrative as she is up front, together with the stubborn Connie and indefatigable Derek talking to the audience. This was, in a way, close to traditional plays of realism.
There are a few certain diversions. Topical singing à la Filipino KTV (karaoke television) that turns into a beauty pageant, which alludes to the infamous 2015 Miss Universe gaffe, aside from other comedic, sometimes histrionic, references to pop culture emerge in the middle of the show. Here, one may draw on Filipina-American scholar Lucy Mae San Pablo Burns’ notion of puro arte where gestures are exaggerated to put on a display and to surpass disappearance of the performing subject. And that beyond the stage, performance can also be observed in the everyday acts of survival.
Puro arte is brilliantly manifested in the thematic design of the set by the use of pieces of mobile furniture--folding chairs, extendable bench table, sectional sofa, kitchen island cart and portable panel room dividers—as actors multitask as stage crew. In one car scene, Derek and Irene emerge behind a tall end table with two pot lights for a dramatic effect. The uncle eloquently urges vis–à–vis an unwanted pregnancy. “Unfortunate choices don’t make you sinful,” he utters. The line becomes the springboard for Derek to justify his position in the midst of pressures he bear on the corporate life as a city government staff. (His finance report is the indirect reason to her sister-in-law’s job termination). We are also reminded how economic changes induce social conflicts.
Then the imaginary curtains close as the stage is engulfed by darkness. Oftentimes, Belinda Corpuz’s improvisation piano solo helps to create the combination of warmth and hopeful mood.
The second-half though, almost like another play, has much more meat and works much better, when Peter’s sexual orientation and struggle for parents’ acceptance are revealed. But the high-point was an excellently played out dialogue between Carmen and Irene, when the mother said “I didn’t come here for you to struggle.” The play ends with the same table setting as in the opening. A tableau of a family ritual: shared mealtime.
Through its current crop of artists, CBT’s latest opus constructs Filipino-Canadian drama and its sensibilities against the backdrop of a Philippine migration history and integenerationality. It is a testament to how theatre can become more truthful in performing the vernacular and how far could it be staged to be more accessible to the community.
Making decisions in life is hard, Anak tells us, and it also comes with repercussions, though usually not as momentous as one may think. Circumstances unfold, sometimes beyond one’s control; there is no learning curve, only incremental changes that lead to dilemma and turning points.
CBT staged the world premiere of Anak in St. Paul United Church, Scarborough March 2017.
Anak
By The CBT Collective (Ann Paula Bautista, Belinda Corpuz, Isabel Kanaan, Richard Mojica, Alia Rasul, Anthony Raymond Yu, with contributions by Ulysses Valiente and Ray Jacildo); directed and dramaturged by Leon Aureus; sets & props design by Jackie Chau; lighting design by John Cabanela; sound design by Belinda Corpuz, costumes by Richard Mojica; projection design by Kevin Feliciano; stage managed by Maricris Rivera