Prince of drama

MANILA, Philippines - As the crowd cleared out of the CCP Main Theater last Sunday night, one kid was on everybody’s mind — eight-year-old Marc Justine Alvarez, who plays Joshua in Transit.

A finalist in Cinemalaya’s New Breed category, Transit tells the story of OFWs in Israel grappling with a new law that aims to deport their children. Director Hannah Espia tells the story through five different perspectives, through repetition and jumps, like lines in a poem that grow in emotional resonance as the context around them shifts. The cast — which includes film festival veterans like Irma Adlawan, Ping Medina, and Mercedes Cabral — turn in typically superb performances, essaying characters that live and breathe on screen. But it’s the two young actors who really surprise.

Jasmine Curtis-Smith, as a teenager struggling with racial identity, beautifully underplays and gives a character that could’ve easily lent itself to stereotype (the rebellious teenager) an aching, honest center.

And Marc Justine Alvarez astonishes. As a kid trying to understand race and the seismic changes around him, the eight-year-old actor — who’s clocked in work in GMA 7 shows like Indio (“madami akong natutunan kay Senator Bong”) and One Day, Isang Araw (he says co-stars Joshua Uy, Milkcah Wynne Nacion, and Jillian Ward are all fun to work and play with)— displays nuance and subtlety far beyond his years. Like Justin Henry in Kramer vs. Kramer, it’s one of those child star performances that’s impressive even without putting his age into consideration — not to mention the fact that almost all his lines were in Hebrew.

“It’s always tough to learn a new language,” Espia says. “Marc is really good at memorizing, but we really had to work with his pronunciation because Hebrew has a lot of sounds that are not in the Filipino language. When we were in Israel, sometimes he would get afraid especially during the scenes where he had really long dialogue. Sometimes we would say a prayer, but usually when he made mistakes he’d get it after the second or third try.”

Talking to him a few days after Transit’s Cinemalaya gala, the eight-year-old doesn’t seem aware of his achievement, aside from the fact that a lot of grown-ups asked to take a photo with him after the screening. “Mag act tsaka maglaro ng iPad” are just two of his favorite things to do.

In his short career, the kid’s done everything from fight kapres (the favorite thing he’s done) to sing a Hebrew praise song to prove his citizenship. Herculean feats for anyone but to MJ Alvarez, it’s all in a day’s work. After all, he’s got bigger things to worry about: Math. The deal is if MJ gets a grade lower than 80 (he’s currently in the third grade) in any subject, he’ll have to stop acting. And so far, he’s been doing well, balancing work with school with a smile on his face.

And as long as he studies hard, there doesn’t seem to be anything stopping him. “I don’t think I’m alone in saying that Marc has a bright future ahead of him,” Espia says. “I’m rarely impressed with child actors but Marc’s performance is top notch. I hope he keeps making films.”