Tanghalang Pilipino & Dennis’ Brave New Season

Theater and independent film director Dennis Marasigan is on a roll: After earning good reviews for his film Sa North Diversion Road under CinemaOne, he is now getting ready to shoot Tukso, one of ten finalists in the 2007 Cinemalaya film festival which screens in July. In between these two films, coincidentally starring his better half Irma Adlawan, he has found time to virtually reinvent himself and make a career change, from bureaucratic meister in the CCP to director of the Tanghalang Pilipino next door. This cyber interview with Marasigan comes years after the phone interview with his Tanghalan predecessor Herbie Go appeared in this same magazine. Go has since settled abroad. Tanghalang Pilipino celebrates its 20th year on March 24.

You mentioned during the Cinemalaya orientation that now that you are in Tanghalang Pilipino, you can now do the plays you’ve always dreamed of doing. What exactly are these plays and why do they rank high in your dream theater? 

There are a lot of plays I have always wanted to do or be a part of. The problem I’m facing is how to program them into some sort of coherent season. For my first season with the company (the 21st season 2007-2008) I am planning on putting in at least three of the plays I have often thought of doing -  Lope de Vega’s "Fuente Ovejuna," Schiller’s "Mary Stuart," and Mustapha Matura’s "The Coup." I am adding Tiongson’s sarswela Pilipinas Circa 1907, a new version of Mulan (written by Rody Vera) and a chamber musical version of Peque Gallaga’s Oro Plata Mata. Presto! I have a season about power and politics. 2007 is election year, and all these plays speak about how individuals and individual relationships are affected by power and politics.

The other problem I am facing obviously is that I cannot direct all of these plays, so I will have to count on other directors whose work I respect to see some of these through. 

And then there are other plays I would like to program into the season sometime in the future: Cayabyab’s lost musical Kapinangan (based on Demetillo’s The Heart of Emptiness is Black), any of Chekhov’s major plays (particularly Uncle Vanya), Pirandello’s Six Characters In Search of An Author, Shakespeare’s The Tempest, any of the Brecht’s musicals.

Tanghalang Pilipino’s logo is the Mangyan-Hanunuo symbol for Man, representing the belief that at the core of the performance is the Actor. Necessarily, my programming choices for Tanghalang Pilipino’s seasons will feature actors prominently in plays that allow them to extend and expand their craft. Plays from the world repertoire, original Filipino writing—they will be in the Tanghalang Pilipino season side by side.

As a footnote, Tony Mabesa was my first director in UP and has been more than a mentor to me (he even stood as our wedding sponsor since it was in his production of Midsummer Night’s Dream that Irma and I met). I will have to admit that having studied and worked with him for many years, he has had a large influence in my career and play choices.

You’ve directed your wife Irma Adlawan before in Sa North Diversion Road as well as a couple of plays, and now will work with her again in Tukso. What do you expect of her in the film and is there any anecdote you would like to share in your past conjugal works, the advantages as well as disadvantages?

Irma has many things going for her. She’s been described by Nonon Padilla as a chameleon, able to get under the skin of the character she is playing. This she does not only because she is intuitive and has the right instincts, but even more so because she invests anything that she does with passion and energy. You can trust that she will not let herself look stupid in anything that she does. Once she has decided to do something she will try to learn everything that there is to know and put her whole mind, body and soul into it. For a director, she is a joy to work with because you can let her be. Even so, she takes directions very well, and our years of working together has given us the opportunity to learn a language common to both of us, resulting in faster and more efficient work.

The downside is that when professional disagreements get in the way (as in how a character is to be interpreted or in the way the production is progressing), you cannot let the day pass without reaching some sort of equilibrium again.

 

Tukso seems to be an adaptation of Rashomon in the Pinoy setting, only this time it is a young woman who is murdered. Herb Go once mentioned how the Kurosawa film had such an impact on him; can you say the same thing and how would your treatment in Tukso depart from past variations, i.e., Guillen’s Salome?

Honestly, I wasn’t thinking of Rashomon and Salome when I proposed the project. It is more like Agatha Christie meets Boomtown (a television show where the same incident is shown from the perspective of different characters.) Maybe the difference is that unlike Rashomon or Salome where there are different versions of the story as related by different characters, Tukso will show the same events, only from different points of view.

Also, do you foresee any problems working with Marilou Diaz as project monitor (for Cinemalaya projects)?

I have worked with Marilou several times before. I was Assistant Director to Ishmael Bernal in a number of films and in one of them, we had Marilou as a member of the cast (Hinugot sa Langit) aside from being one of Ishma’s close friends who were allowed to view the film in production and critique it as it was coming along. I had also acted for her in Jose Rizal and had actually assisted her (and even served as Assistant Cameraman to Manolo Abaya) in a Christmas special she did for then Presidential Candidate Salvador Laurel.

Was casting Shamaine (Centenera) as the detective intentional? When I read the script parang lalake kasi nakikita ko as detective.

It’s funny that you ask that, because in the first version of the storyline that I wrote, it was really a man that I visualized, something like Inspector Lebel in The Day of the Jackal (played by Michel Lonsdale). But I remembered a woman police Colonel I had met who seemingly could not be promoted to General because she was a woman and found that interesting — the whole idea of reaching a glass ceiling. Through different versions, the more I became convinced that it would be better to have the role played by a woman. When I was already writing the script, I was already set on Shamaine.

You and Irma as well as Nonie (Buencamino) and Shamaine are planned to be cast in Denisa Reyes’ Hubad. Would you care to comment on how much of the script is based on real life, e.g., your supposed fetish for nurses? Tutuloy pa ba ito ni Denisa at Mark Gary?

Ha ha ha! The point of the script was really to make the audience uncomfortable because they wouldn’t know where fiction began and reality ended. The writing process for Hubad involved all of us (the two couples) because the writers (Rody Vera and Lisa Magtoto) were mining whatever they could find from our real lives, including our hang-ups and fantasies. If I told you whether I really have a fetish for nurses or not, that would be going against the whole point, right? 

As far as we know, the film is still a go.

Your name was also mentioned as an actor in Lito Sulit’s Barako. A co-actor commented when it was your take, it was like, wala lang, parang huminga ka lang daw. Is theater and film and work in them as natural as breathing to you, and how do you differ one from the other, in short, paano mo dinidiskartehan and isa as compared to the other?

It may have appeared like there was very little effort involved, but is that not the point of acting — to try to make it look effortless? I’ve been in the theater for almost thirty years now, and started working in films not too long after I began work in the theater, perhaps I was able to pick up something here and there along the way. 

Tony Mabesa did tell me some time ago that I would never be half as good as an actor that my wife already was, and I agree, but there are some roles that I can comfortably and maybe competently play. 

I don’t really think of theater and film as that different from each other, and maybe that’s a mistake. I know that after I completed film version of Sa North Diversion Road, I realized that there were still a number of things that I could have done to improve it, as in being able to say something better "filmically" rather than "theatrically." Just the same, I approach work in both theater and film as requiring attention, preparation, concentration and dedication. I really don’t know. Maybe, having worked in these (and in television) for quite some time now, I don’t have that much difficulty shifting gears, but then again, I may be wrong.

There seems to be a lot of rearranging going on right now at CCP, where you worked for something like 20 years; do you think the changes will eventually work in favor of Filipino culture and do you have any regrets leaving the bureaucracy? 

I have no regrets leaving the bureaucracy nor having been a part of it for almost 20 years. For all you know, I may still go back (I am a Civil Service Career Executive Service Officer, meaning if I do go back, I have to be rehired at my CESO rank and not have to start off at the bottom). And moving to Tanghalang Pilipino did not really feel like I was leaving the CCP at all, I just moved offices again, this time to the next building.

I sincerely believe the CCP can and does do a lot of things for the Filipino. I just earnestly and sincerely hope it will not be politicized in the future. The worst thing that can happen is that the president and key officers of the CCP are chosen from among sycophants and other people to whom the powers-that-be owe their political positions, rather than from those who truly, genuinely, and competently champion Philippine culture and the arts.

How do you think your approach at Tanghalan will be different from Herb’s? May nabanggit siya dati sa interview namin na paborito niya si Chekhov.

I don’t know how it would be different. All I can say is that Herbie’s tenure at Tanghalang Pilipino is what I would describe as heroic. I can only hope that I would able to do better.

May plano ka rin bang mag-migrate balang araw?

Plan—meaning one with a timetable—no. Traveling is something everyone in the family likes to do, given the time and resources. But I am now taking each day as it comes along. Buti na lang, my family understands and supports me. My kids (twins Mira and Ira, 22, Mara, 17, and Mari, 8) know they are free to choose what they want to do. Right now, given the opportunities available to us here, we’re staying put. As I sometimes tell Irma, if we all leave, who’d be left in the country? Or maybe, who’d we be leaving it to?