Translations: German / Spanish

Opening Lines

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I arrived from Arvada at the age of 17 brimming over with aspiration and opinion…not always a great combination. I expected to become a star, IMMEDIATELY. I mean, didn’t this country realize how fantastic, how astronomical a star I could be?!
No. Oh.

5. Ad On!/Grave Matters
6. The Solo Cutting
7. The Old College Tries/Die Fledermaus

Manila Theatre Guild

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During the 60’s and 70’s, the leading theatre group that did productions in English was the Manila Theater Guild (MTG) and one day, it held auditions for Royal Gambit, a play about Henry VIII and his wives. Though I was only 18 at that time, I thought I’d try out for the lead, a move which, needless to say, didn’t pan out. But the audacity of my audition (what else would you call it when a teenager thinks he can play Henry VIII?) did leave some kind of impression and it wasn’t long before I was back at MTG, no longer trying to play king, but just plain playing, and having the time of my life.

8. Damn Yankees/Guys And Dolls/A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum
9. The Solo Cuttings
10. Ang Binhing Pilipina

Repertory Philippines

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Having decided that I preferred theatre to opera, I went to Repertory Philippines (nicknamed Rep) to audition for what was already its 13th season. I still had these dreams that I would become the World’s Most Fantastic Star Stage Performer and I hoped these people might have the gift for spotting my tremendous potential, whoever these people were.
I was not familiar with all Rep had done before that time, how it had brought about a very high level of professionalism to its productions – with much screaming, chair-throwing, even gun-toting – all of it with the singular, all-be-damned purpose of… achieving a very high level of professionalism in its productions. With an ego bigger than my talent, I entered such territory.

11. Juno and The Paycock/How The Other Half Loves/12 Little Indians
12. Mame
13. Same Time, Next Year

Losing Direction

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A couple of years after joining Rep, for reasons I now credit to Divine Intervention, I was asked to direct. Thrice I was asked, each time I agreed. Because I had never studied for this, I knew it would not be easy. But I didn’t realize it would become the elemental baptism of fire…plus earth, plus wind.

14. Catch-22
15. The Killing of The Star Spangled Girl

Acting/Coach

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Throughout the latter half of the 70’s, my life was all about Rep. Regardless of what role I was playing – size? doesn’t matter – I was also the assistant director and acting coach in every production so somehow, some way I was always earning something.
I had become a true theatre professional, or so I liked telling myself, in a land where theatre wasn’t even yet a profession.

16. My Fat Friend/The King and I
17. Lea and Gerard Salonga/Annie/The Bad Seed
18. Fiddler On The Roof/The Ritz
19. Six Rms Riv Vu/Gemini/The Rose Tattoo/The Bed Before Yesterday/P.S. Your Cat Is Dead
20. Cat On A Hot Tin Roof/Let’s Get A Divorce!/California Suite/The Norman Conquests

Outside Theatre

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As the 70’s were about to close, other venues wanted Rep to stage its shows in their places, too, usually after a meal…each show the future of a repast.
So show our shows, we did — at the Plaza Restaurant, the Makati Sports Club, the Mandarin Hotel, the Top of the Hilton, or the Playboy Club. Yes, the Playboy Club. And you will not believe which of the shows below we did there.

21. Don’t Drink The Water/Same Time, Next Hotel/Come Blow Your Horn/You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown
22. Lunch!
23. Walang Sugat Tour
24. I Do! I Do!/Crashing The Joy
25. The Glass Menagerie/Habeas Corpus/Diary of Anne Frank/Member of the Wedding

Off-Off Season

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In between theatre seasons, there were other opportunities to keep on earning. Giving drama workshops, for one, and not just to kids but to business executives as well. Surprising how many bankers want to be in the theatre! Except that they know where the money is. With them!
Then I also had the chance to try writing my very first Stage Musicale, an experience I will always hold dear. And speaking of dear, my heart had its own season, too, though an extremely short one and why love would come in pairs, a couple of couples, is beyond me.

26. A Magnificent Experience/ChinaBank Workshop/BPI Bank Seminar Tour
27. Folks, Ermita and Malate
28. Mga Laruang Alanganin (Odd Toys)

Final Acts

By 1981, I was able to appear in a movie, try playwriting, sing at the Presidential Palace, and, after six years of having virtually lived there, body, heart and soul, each one getting broken one way or another, leave Rep.

29. Sari-Saring Ibong Kulasisi (All Kinds of Chicks)

30. Shadow Box/Deathtrap/Blithe Spirit/Private Lives
31. Whose Life Is It, Anyway?/Morning’s At Seven/A Bedful of Foreigners/La Cage Aux Folles
32. Pippin/The Sound of Music
33. Malacanang Palace
34. South Pacific

Up and Away

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By the time the rains came, I was gone. From the hot asphalt of Manila, I moved to the cool mountains of Baguio City, my pocket packed with all my savings. I borrowed a friend’s vacation house to stay in and immediately went around looking for a new job. Almost found one, too: teaching art at an international school. Thing is, when the school dean perused my CV and noted that I had spent quite some time as an actor, he balked, unsure what else I might teach the kids other than art.
Still in all, Baguio clicked with me big time. It had natives, bohemians and millionaires, all of whom you could bump into just walking down a couple of blocks and none of them, none of them knew who I was. I could not have picked a better place and time to be a bum.

35. Café Amapola
36. The Fantasticks/Myth Mountain/Signs of Life
37. No More…Signs of Life

Musical Theatre Philippines

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Sad fact was I could not make enough money in Baguio to sustain me. I had to get back to Manila and it was at that time Musical Theater Philippines (MTP) was formed. I was welcomed with open arms, split legs and some of the most bone-bending dance stretches known to man or snake. MTP’s sense of movement was spot on, its sense of business, spotty. But those productions kept me on stage, in the papers and, of all places, the plastic surgeon’s table. Sigh, the things we do.

38. I Love My Wife/The Apple Tree
39. Man of La Mancha/The Wiz
40. Oliver’s Flute

Old and New

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In the early 80’s, Repertory, for reasons I no longer remember, asked me back to act in a couple of shows with them. I said Yes.
Around the same time, Teatro Pilipino beckoned. This pioneering group had whipped up a sparkling reputation as the prime translator into Filipino of classical plays written originally in English. Now, for the first time, they wanted to stage some plays in both Filipino and English using the same cast. I really should have said No.

41. Passion/A Little Night Music
42. The Promise…Muli (Again)

Ephemeris, Pholks

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Until this time, I still considered myself an actor and nothing but. BUT! Aye, there’s the rub. In my walk as what I believed to be the World’s Most Fantastic Star Stage Performer, there crossed my path a smaller road…a gentle invitation to direct a couple of theatre pieces.
Despite the nasty memories I carried from my earlier forays into directing, and because I needed the job, I accepted. I can tell you now, not one single regret, not a one. This time around, the universe was aligned. Heaven must have had something to do with it.

43. Jesus Christ Superstar
44. A Life In The Theater

SRO

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By 1983, dinner-theater had become a staple on the entertainment page. We stage actors all wanted to be involved with dinner-theater, I certainly did, because it paid so much better than regular plays. It was also always pleasant, shallow material with deep pockets.
I was a free lancer now and I needed to earn ALL the time and a good-paying job was always worthy of attention. So when SRO Philippines, the leading producer of dinner-theater at that time, asked me to read for a part in their next sex comedy, hello, I’m Freddie and I’m ready!

45. Shut Your Eyes…And Do It!/Norman, Is That You?

46. Clowns and Witches/Clowns and Burgers/Paper Moon
47. Love, Lea
48. The Comic Strip/Sweeney Todd…Sort Of/Charleston!
49. Nineteen Eighty Four-tunes
50. Evita

Something Drinks?

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As the child of a bank manager father, I was witness to a number of cocktail and dinner parties held at our house in Cebu City. Strangely enough, the chit-chats I overheard the most were the ones that extolled the virtues of scotch, specifically, Ballantine’s (Blended Scotch Whiskey). My father always had a bottle on hand to serve his guests and they always, always enjoyed it. At least, that’s what it looked like to me.
As the child of a daughter of plantation owners, I would spend summers in Mindanao, the southernmost region of the Philippines, where my mother’s clan had a coconut plantation. Here’s what happens: the trees do all the work. Even the fruits drop by themselves. The rest of the time, you sat around enjoying the one by-product of the coconut tree that is enjoyable all year round: Tuba (tu-BAH) or coconut liquor. My uncles always had bottles on hand and they always, always enjoyed it. At least, that’s what it smelled like to me.
Admittedly, this apple did not fall far from the coconut tree.

51. Peninsula Lobby/Whistlestop/Oar House