The premise of Dear And Unhappy is a simple question: what of Josephine Bracken? Rizal’s wife and / or lover, depending on who you believe. Or depending on your internalized racism against the Irish woman our National Hero was enamored with — it is after all why Bracken remains marginalized in narratives about Jose Rizal’s life; it also has arguably spawned multiple texts about Bracken — the less we know about someone the more exciting our stories about her. (more…)
…Which, if we think about it, actually makes sense. Its subject matter is Pramoedya Ananta Toer, Indonesian novelist, jailed by the Suharto regime for his writings, the closest a Southeast Asian has come to being awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. (more…)
was it fun? yes. was it funny? absolutely. but also it banks on layer upon layer of intertextuality. you need to know some Shakespeare to have a sense of how absurd it is that these two actors Leo and Jack are in Amish country performing two-man-excerpts. you need to have a sense of the context that is York, as old and rich and conservative suburban community so you’d know how while Meg is a woman who knows of a bigger world, she stays put and is engaged to be married to the minister. you need to have a sense of how this small cast and its dynamism is premised on 1950s America and its changing cultural landscape, where a family doctor, an aunt Florence who refuses to die, and the most random of bimbos on that stage are but symptoms.
of course without banking on all of these, Repertory Philippines’ Leading Ladies would still be that funny play about cross-dressing British men. but appreciating it as such would be to think this nothing but a 1980s Roderick Paulate movie. (more…)