Building an audience for books & movies

When an artist moves to advertising, he is said to have sold out. When a poet or a writer goes to television, he has similarly sold out. Ricky Lee is fortunate for having maintained his independent spirit while earning his keep.

On his second novel Si Amapola sa 65 na Kabanata, Ricky has come out with a hit exhibiting his mastery of the common man’s language, while keeping away from stereotypical characterizations, and getting the approval of vaunted literary fi gures such as National Artist Bien Lumbera. Ricky knew that to connect to a generation immersed in showbiz reality, he had to speak their jargon. Which he does in this book. Which he repeated in the launch that put all TV premieres to shame, with thousands packing the SM theater Dome; which had the biggest and best of ABS talents from Juday to Ma’am Charo reading passages from it, and visually sending a message of endorsement. This, he could only have mastered through 150 plus movie scripts, and soaking in the thousands of television material he has been charged to oversee at ABS-CBN through the years.

In a matter of days, Amapola sold 10,000 copies while serious literary authors fi nd it diffi cult to dispose of the fi rst print order of 1,000 copies in a year! It wasn’t easy. It took him three years, several drafts that ended in the waste can. Obviously, this phenomenal success can be attributed to Ricky’s knowing his audience and addressing them. Amapola written in gay Taglish tells of a band of manananggals (the Filipino fl ying vampire who leaves his bottom half on land while sprouting wings in search of animal food as he stays away from humans) and who, like the vampires of the West have been attracting audiences from books to television.

Amapola speaks of an unrequited love Manananggal Sepa has for hero Andres Bonifacio in the 1898 revolution against Spain. Ageless Sepa in 2011 is still roaming the grounds of Tomas Morato searching for the love she had abandoned. Meantime, Amapola, a female impersonator at a bar on Timog, who is a schizo with the other two personalities within her often at odds with one another, has her own love problems. Underlying the love stories are unforgettable lessons in history. A diffi cult mix to attain for while it is fi ction, it is also fact with addresses that bring readers searching in the nooks and crannies of Tomas Morato.

We ask Ricky for updates and fi nd that even he is amazed that his fi rst novel Para Kay B and Trip to Quiapo have been discovered by readers looking for his other works. CCP’s Tanghalang Pilipino has offered to do a theater version of Amapola on the 150th anniversary of Bonifacio in 2012. And there are movie and TV offers. But Ricky prefers fi rst to concentrate on book tours from Chefs Bistro Morato to UP Mascom, Laguna, Naga, Davao, Bulacan, Angeles City and Marinduque.

Brillante Mendoza and the movie audience

Ever since Brillante Mendoza became the first Filipino to win the Best Director trophy at Cannes in 2009 for Kinatay which brought him international fame, he has gone on a campaign of developing an audience for Filipino films. We had met him during his first year at Cannes in 2008 when Serbis caused so much controversy in being tagged as rubbish and “the worst film in the festival” by a reviewer. With the Kinatay win, came another controversy since he won over internationally-acclaimed directors Pedro Almodovar, Quintin Tarantino, Ang Lee, Lars Von Trier, Alain Resnais and Park Can Wook.

Since then, direk Dante as he is still fondly called by friends, has been traipsing all over the world, attending festivals as jury, competitor, festival-goer. He has learned to use his fame and controversy to bring Filipino movies back into the consciousness of the world. He brought Lola to Venice as a surprise entry which resulted in numerous international requests for personal appearances of its octogenarian stars Anita Linda and Rustica Carpio.

He is competing in February in Berlin, another important market with Captive (previously Prey) featuring French actress Isabelle Huppert, Katherine Mulville, Marc Zanetta, Romy Lazaro, Raymond Bagatsing, Sid Lucero and Angel Aquino based on the kidnapping of an American woman by the Muslim extremist group Abu Sayyaf. When in the country, he goes on talks before student groups all over the archipelago, promoting Filipino fi lms. Like Ricky, he has learned to seek out his audience and bring them back to the fold.

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