HOTSPOT

Bonifacio Ilagan’s latest play, Spirit of the Glass (SOTG), premiered March 8, International Women’s Day, at the University of the Philippines’ Ignacio B. Gimenez-Kolehiyo ng Arte at Literatura Theater in Diliman, Quezon City.

I was fortunate to be invited to the press preview and did not miss watching this new collab between Ilagan and director Joel Lamangan.

SOTG is a courageous attempt to present the plague of red-tagging for what it is. It accomplishes this by summoning the spirits of our past changemakers in a story of four fairly young friends fleeing from the horrors of red-tagging to the comfort of a haunted ancestral house.

The use of audio and video honoring our heroes and martyrs establishes in no uncertain terms SOTG’s serious theme while leaving the audience wondering what’s the connection with the game of our younger years.

In SOTG, the past and the present interact in and occupy the same space of the haunted house and the same mind space of being for social change. As in real life, in this production, SOTG reminds us that activists share not just the radicalism and progressivism of their forebears and ancestors. The reformists and revolutionaries of the past were branded as bandits, in much the same way today’s activists are mislabeled as terrorists.

The spirits of lovers Lolo Fernando (Nanding Josef) and Lola Herminia (Edna May Landicho) beam proudly and lovingly at their great-granddaughter, reminisce the long time they were part of the long saga of changemaking and revolution, and in no uncertain terms summon the audience to carry on.

Edru Abraham’s Kapitan Franco is a powerful presence in the short time onstage, as this barangay captain manages to drive the friends Vivian (Elora Españo), Bale (Carlos Dala), Badong (Edward Allen Solon), and the two ghostly great grandparents’ favorite apo Rory (Barbara Miguel) from a sense of panic to a sense of security.

Some of the ghosts (an anti-Spanish rebel leader, a woman who fought the Americans, a victim of contemporary extrajudicial killings) who appear throughout SOTG don’t have lines, but their appearances at the right moments are powerful and gripping. They don’t need lines. Florencio de Guzman IV, Cristina Diego, and Bernadette Anne Morales who played the role of ghosts are always a tour de force.

The narrative of the ghost of Natalya (Angellie Sanoy), a disappeared activist, reframes SOTG’s issue and forcefully lays down the real crimes and the real criminals in this long-running misrepresentation of people like her who opt to be a changemaker in this country.

For the young actors, this is a great learning opportunity to share the stage with Josef, Landicho, and Abraham, and be under the tutelage of Lamangan and Ilagan.

In a phone conversation hours before the premiere, Ilagan told me the preparation for SOTG injected new inspiration into his mind, heart, and body.

He also thanks the UP College of Arts and Letters, especially Dean Jimmuel C. Naval, for backing and hosting SOTG.

Ilagan says he really wanted to create something to honor friends who have been subjected to redtagging, and also honor the memory of many desaparecidos, including his sister Rizalina Ilagan. The latter was abducted in 1977 and has never been found. Her name is among those etched on the Wall of Remembrance at the Bantayog ng mga Bayani.

Ilagan first shot to national fame as a student leader in the First Quarter Storm of 1970, and later as the playwright behind “Pagsambang Bayan.” Directed by Leo Rimando and later by Behn Cervantes, both icons of Philippine theater, the 1977 play became a landmark cultural production that inspired resistance to military rule.

Now 72 and unperturbed by last year’s surveillance and death threat, Ilagan says he would want to re-mount or even update “Pagsambang Bayan” if resources are available. Maybe opposition groups and enlightened investors would help make it come true.

But this weekend, Ilagan would be focused on SOTG’s inaugural run at UP’s IBG-KAL Theater. If colleges, universities, and organizations would be interested, he and the Tag-Ani Performing Arts Society would be willing to bring SOTG anywhere, anytime.

Show times this March 9-10 are 2:30 p.m. (sold out today, still open Sunday) and 7 p.m. Ticket prices: ₱850 (regular), ₱550 (for students, PWDs, and seniors), and ₱2,200 (groups of five). Reserve at bit.ly/TagAniSOTG2024

May the spirits be with you.