PARTY | Here Lies Talent: Celebrating the Fil-Am cast of HERE LIES LOVE

NEW YORK CITY: Let's toast these amazing actors and performers: Renée Albulario, Carol Angeli, Melody Butiu, Nathaniel P. Claridad, Natalie Cortez, Debralee Daco, Joshua Dela Cruz, Jose Llana, Kelvin Moon Loh, Jaygee Macapugay, Jeigh Madjus, Ruthie Ann Miles, Maria-Christina Oliveras, Clint Ramos, Conrad Ricamora, George Salazar, Trevor Salter and Janelle Velasquez. These Fil-Ams are the talented stars and crew of HERE LIES LOVE, the immersive musical event by David Byrne and DJ Fatboy Slim, currently performing at the Joseph Papp Public Theater.

Filipino Mundo-NYC, Filipino American Press Club of New York and Ugly Kitchen are honored to recognize and celebrate the Filipino-American theatre artists whose ensemble commitment has made HERE LIES LOVE the most acclaimed musical production of the season.

On Saturday, July 20th, from 1:00 pm to 3:00 pm, these Filipino-American musical performers will gather for an afternoon of drinks and conversation at the Ugly Kitchen restobar (located at 103 1st Ave  New York, NY 10003). This Kapihan is called "HERE LIES TALENT: Celebrating the Fil-Am cast
of HERE LIES LOVE."

HERE LIES LOVE at the Public Theater through July 28th

"This gathering is not a panel discussion. It is a Kapihan, a coffee break," says Randy Gener, an award-winning editor/writer, curator/organizer of Filipino Mundo-NYC and the only Asian-American recipient of George Jean Nathan Award for Dramatic Criticism. "This afternoon event takes the form of a long table, using the intimate form of a klatch as a structure for public conversation. Aspiring young actors and musical performers are most especially welcome to come. It is a unique opportunity to meet the show's original cast and to share professional experiences with these amazing Fil-Am performing artists* before the Public Theater's engagement officially ends on July 28th."

What's on the menu? Marcos history. Theatrical performance. Cultural legacy. Philippine pride. Filipino food house specialities served from Ugly Kitchen restobar. What does it mean to be a Fil-Am musical actor performing in this season's most culturally significant event about Philippine history? What can these Fil-Am talents share with us about what they know, remember or have learned about the past and the Marcos legacy? What is it like to perform nightly in an immersive theatrical musical where audiences stand, dance and move with the actors?

Click on the names of these performers to visit their websites and articles written about them:
1) Renée Albulario
2) Carol Angeli
3) Melody Butiu
4) Nathaniel P. Claridad
5) Natalie Cortez
6) Debralee Daco
7) Joshua Dela Cruz
8) Jose Llana
9) Kelvin Moon Loh
10) Jaygee Macapugay
11) Jeigh Madjus
12) Ruthie Ann Miles
13) Maria-Christina Oliveras
14) Conrad Ricamora
15) George Salazar
16) Trevor Salter
17) Janelle Velasquez

RSVP is a must. RSVP on the website of Filipino Mundo-NYC located at http://www.meetup.com/FilipinoMundo-NYC/events/128902652/.

*Participants are subject to change. Please come on time. Although free appetizers will be served, be prepared to pay if you decide to eat a full meal.

The men of HERE LIES LOVE

Filipino Mundo-NYC is a meetup group of young professionals and visual/performing artists socializing and creating art and performances in changing Manhattan venues. The group aims to cultivate a connected Filipino community; to enrich our experiences as global citizens enhancing, defining, and enriching the Filipino voice in harmony with the chorus of its surroundings -- and at the same time to give voice, venue and appreciation to new generations of Filipino and Filipino American artists, musicians and performers whose lives, creativity and work provide a rich contribution to our American present. Visit www.meetup.com/FilipinoMundo-NYC

Filipino American Press Club of New York is the first organization for Fil-Am journalists in New York. Its members are traditional and online journalists as well as bloggers. It was created in September 2011, and one of its activities is a monthly Kapihan where they facilitate a dialogue between leaders and personalities and members of the community.

Now fully owned by Filipinos, Ugly Kitchen is re-launching this month (July 2013) as permanent bar/restaurant in the East Village. It is the brainchild of Chef and Owner Aris Tuazon who was most recently the chef at Krystal's Cafe 81. Tuazon established the popular Filipino pop-up venue Bar Kada, which had taken up a Sunday residence at Ugly Kitchen. Having now changed its menu, Tuazon serves a fusion of Filipino American food everyday. Visit theuglykitchen.com

The women of HERE LIES LOVE

HERE LIES LOVE received the Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding New Off-Broadway Musical; an Obie Award for Outstanding Music and Lyrics; Drama Desk Awards for Outstanding Music, Lighting Design, and Projection Design; and Theatre World Awards for Ruthie Ann Miles (as Imelda Marcos) and Conrad Ricamora (as Nonoy Aquino).  Within a pulsating dance club atmosphere, composers David Byrne and Fatboy Slim deconstruct the astonishing journey of Filipina First Lady Imelda Marcos retracing her meteoric rise to power and subsequent descent into infamy and disgrace at the end of the People Power Revolution.

HERE LIES LOVE is neither a period piece nor a biography, neither a play nor a traditional musical but an immersive theatrical event combining songs influenced by four decades of dance music, adrenaline-fueled choreography, and a remarkable 360-degree scenic and video environment to go beyond Imelda’s near-mythic obsession with shoes and explore the tragic consequences of the abuse of power. HERE LIES LOVE has set design by David Korins, costume design by Clint Ramos, lighting design by Justin Townsend, sound design by M. L. Dogg and Cody Spencer, and projection design by Peter Nigrini. Alex Timbers is the director. Annie-B Parson is the choreographer.

“Staged with INFINITE INVENTIVENESS and INSIDIOUSLY INFECTIOUS songs.”
–The New York Times

“Eye-popping, head-bopping and immersive – THE MUST-SEE EVENT OF THE SEASON!”
– New York Observer

The staff of UGLY KITCHEN

CAUSES | Professor Emeritus Jake Highton creates scholarship endowment for journalism students

Professor Jake Highton

Why you should donate to the Highton Scholarship Endowment for students
Professor Emeritus Jake Highton has established a scholarship endowment in his name to support journalism students at the Donald W. Reynolds School of Journalism and Center for Advanced Media Studies.

Jake arrived at the University in 1981, taught for three decades and was a four-time Senior Scholar mentor. He spent 15 years in newspapers and was a reporter for the Baltimore Evening Sun, copy editor for the Los Angeles Times and Detroit News, editorial writer and columnist for the Detroit News and book reviewer for the Detroit Free Press. He has also written a history of Nevada journalism, textbooks on reporting and editing, and 16 books containing 25 years of his columns for the Sparks Tribune. Highton writes cover articles for the Reno News & Review and still speaks at media conferences.

To learn more about supporting the Jake Highton Scholarship Endowment or to support the Reynolds School of Journalism, please contact Kristin Burgarello, director of development, (775) 784-4471 or kburgarello@unr.edu

Story about the fund: http://journalism.unr.edu/blog/highton-scholarship-endowment-for-students/

Link to donation page (click the drop-down for Jake's endowment): https://supportnevada.unr.edu/sslpage.aspx?pid=353

How I got Jake'd
In an interview I gave for my alumni magazine, the editors of Nevada Silver & Blue asked: Which University of Nevada-Reno faculty inspired you the most/made the most difference in your becoming the successful writer that you are today?

It was the perfect moment to share what I really felt about Jake — to out Professor Softie who teaches under the guise of the Toughest Grader of the Wild Wild West.

His name is Jake Highton. A longtime journalism professor, he is my teacher, friend, adviser—and fellow letter-writer. I took every course Jake taught. I was not scared of Jake's reputation as a tough, pugnacious and fiery taskmaster. He was the professor to avoid if you were looking for an easy A.

Noting that he seldom gives A’s, Highton said, “A means excellent. I have few students that are excellent.”

Jake was so hard-line measly at giving A's that when he retired someone created a Facebook support group for those who got "Jake'd"!

There's a spot-on blog post, "The Jake Effect," which made me laugh when I first read it. It made me realize that I belong to an unofficial club: Those Who Survived a Class with Jake. The blogger Amy Minor wrote:

"The club was made up of stressed-out students comparing equally bad grades. The amount of his hastily-penned — perhaps even violently-scratched — red-ink corrections caused almost everyone considerable anxiety. The harsh feedback I received remains etched in my memory, like the beautifully alliterative: “WOEFULLY WEAK.” But as time goes by, a sense of pride sneaks up on you as you say, “Yeah, I had Jake, too.”

To this day, I follow the Highton Style of Attribution: It’s so-and-so SAID! Not said so-and-so. Reading other journalists' articles, I frown when I see how they always attribute quotes with ‘said’ in the wrong place. Usually at the very end of an over-long quote.

Full confession: Jake violently scrawled red-ink notes and corrections over the articles I banged out in class. Nevertheless he gave me straight A's in all his classes.

Maybe I am biased. As a former student said: "If they every make a movie about Jake, they should get Johnny Depp to play him. No one else could capture that swashbuckling yet sensitive bird-watching French-infused hard-hitting journalist thing he has going on."

One day Jake struck up a conversation with me. He invited me to his office. He said that he had been avidly reading my movie columns in the Sagebrush, the college newspaper. He wondered why I did not sign up to major in print journalism.

Fortunately, Jake did not judge my wrong-headed academic choices. He did not push me to switch majors. He mostly encouraged me to study investigative reporting and editing, which I did. His media-law and ethics classes fired my passion for First Amendment absolutism, progressive politics and the Supreme Court. His classes on the history of New York newspapers spurred me to take that first cross-country ride in a Greyhound bus from Reno to New York.

I have a vivid recollection of that May evening when I drove up to Jake’s old apartment in my secondhand Toyota. I showed up at his door to take my leave. I told him I was moving to New York for good.

Jake and I have kept in close contact over the years. Every time I visit Reno, we always have lunch at Archie's. He was one of the first people I informed after I received on Thanksgiving Eve a phone call from the chair of the Nathan Award who informed me that this year’s judges selected me as the winner of the George Jean Nathan Award for dramatic criticism.

A few days later, an envelope appeared in the mail. It contained Jake’s clippings, I assumed (rightly), from the morgue he fastidiously keeps. Over the years Jake would randomly send me clippings of articles he's read, usually with felt-pen markings on them. The articles explained everything about the noted drama critic George Jean Nathan, the journalist-critic H.L. Mencken (whose gleeful barbs Jake quotes by heart), and the two ferociously funny New York magazines they had founded called The Smart Set and The American Mercury. But I digress.

In classes and in his columns, Jake styles himself as vivid anti-establishment voice — a rebel. There are strong political reasons he slapped the titles No! and Wrong on his most recent books. This thorn-on-the-side-of-mainstream attitude harks directly to the first book I read of his, The Spirit That Says No.

But let me clue you into a big secret: Jake is actually a guy’s guy with an enormous heart.

From the very beginning, Jake pushed me to think bigger — to test my mettle in a bigger pond. “Discipline, discipline, discipline,” Jake frequently avows.

Look, the guy has financially supported me. When I attended Bard College to study film criticism and social-issues reporting (under New Yorker writer George W.S. Trow, New York Magazine film critic David Edelstein, New York Review of Books author Sue Halpern, and the great environmentalist Bill McKibben), Jake donated funds to help pay for my transportation. The time I spent at Bard College changed my life.

When I settled in New York City and began writing for the Village Voice, Jake made me the subject of one of his Daily Sparks Tribune columns. Who does that?

I think of Jake as a wild cat–dreamer — a closet Romantic. He puts on a fierce demeanor. Yet hard-hearted Highton cares. He inspires his students to aspire to be the greatest journalists of our generation.

The Jake I know is the spirit who consistently said Yes. — rg

SYMPOSIUM ON DOCUMENTARY THEATRE | Austria, Germany, Switzerland, U.S. artists stage "Theater of the Voiceless"

WASHINGTON, DC |  At invitation of the Austrian Cultural Forum, Goethe-Institut Washington, Embassy of Switzerland and Georgetown University’s Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics, I will participate in two panel discussions in an international symposium on documentary theater, taking place Monday, June 17th at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.

I will moderate a panel on creative approaches to documentary theater as performance and will speak on the implications of documentary theater for government policy and post-conflict reconciliation.

Called “Theater of the Voiceless,” this festival and symposium runs June 16 to June 19. The symposium offers a unique opportunity for U.S. artists, critics and documentary-makers to compare creative approaches among leading practictioners of the genre in Austria, Germany, Switzerland and the U.S.

RSVP here: www.theaterofthevoicelesssymposium.eventbrite.com

Without question, documentary theatre has become all the rage in Europe and the United States. The modern practice called documentary theatre emerged from the aspirations and practices of the historical avant-garde. Most critics presume that documentary approaches are realist in their practice and aim. But in fact the word "documentary" is problematic. Its treatment of source materials, documentary theatre itself follows the same avant-garde practices as collage, montage and assemblage. The current belief that the real can be reliably documented is something of a fantasy. The idea that the resulting documentation can be objectively interpreted by trained professionals (journalists and historians, for example) is fundamentally a modern idea.

Swiss playwright Milo Rau's Hate Radio, part of "Theatre of the Voiceless" in Washington, D.C.

What is exciting about "Theater of the Voicesless" is that it is a multi-stakeholder project by representatives of German-speaking nations (Austrian Cultural Forum, Goethe-Institut Washington, Embassy of Switzerland).  Although in the U.S. and in the Eastern parts of Europe, the dramaturgy of the real is seen as "new," the key figures in the development of documentary theatre actually go as far back as Germany and Austria. "Theater of the Voiceless" is trans-national in its approach: U.S. vs. Germany vs. Switzerland vs. Austria vs. Bangladesh vs. Africa.

The Symposium will begin with a presentation by Ping Chong, an internationally acclaimed director, playwright, video installation artist and a 2013 recipient of the Doris Duke Performing Artist Award. He will be accompanied by Bruce Allardice, managing director of Ping Chong + Company. Together, they will speak about the power of documentary theater to affect social change.

In the afternoon, I will lead and moderate a panel discussion, “Documentary Theatre: Creative Approaches,” featuring U.S. and European creators who will discuss the research, creative process and staging of documentary plays and their many forms. It will be a special privilege to share the stage with Doug Wager, artistic director and head of directing for Temple University. Wager adapted and directed In Conflict, based on the book about Iraq war veterans speaking about their experiences. He also worked on a multimedia ensemble docudrama Shot! about gun violence, which got produced at Kennedy Center.

Chris Jennings (Managing Director, The Shakespeare Theatre Company) and David Snider (Director of Artistic Programming, Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater) will also share their most recent docu-projects. Konradin Kunze (Playwright, a small, small world) will discuss his own German approach.

The evening will be devoted to politics. After the staged reading of the Swiss play Hate Radio by Milo Rau, there will be another discussion, entitled “Documentary Theatre: Implications for Policy and Post-Conflict Reconciliation," focusing on how theater and performance can serve as tools for diplomacy. This panel features, among others, policy expert Michael Pelletier, who is Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs in Bureau of African Affairs in the U.S. Department of State.

Swiss playwright Milo Rau's Hate Radio, part of "Theatre of the Voiceless" in Washington, D.C.

Rau, the director and playwright, was born in Switzerland in 1977, and shuttles between Zurich and Berlin at present. His interest is dealing with the aesthetic of re-enactments. In addition, he is the director and founder of the International Institute of Political Murder (IIPM), an organization established in 2007 for the purpose of promoting and bringing forth the re-enactment of traumatic historical events by means of theater, film, fine arts, and research. One of IIPM’s latest projects, the re-enactment The Last Hours of Elena and Nicolae Ceausescu (2009-2010), has been performed in Romania, and is considered a great step forward towards that country’s coming to terms with its past.

Hate Radio re-enacts hate speech in Rwandan media. On April 6, 1994, the airplane of the Rwandan President, Habyaruman, was hit by two missiles as it tried to land. This event signaled the beginning of the most brutal genocide since the end of the Cold War. In the months of April, May and June 1994, the Central African state murdered an estimated 800,000 to 1,000,000 of its Tutsi minority and thousands of moderate Hutus. The tools used to humiliate and kill people of all ages and genders were simple: machetes, sticks, and a few guns. In addition, the most powerful instrument of the genocide was the “Radio-Télévision Libre  des Mille Collines” (RTLM). Central to the project is the re-enactment of an RTLM show, run by its hosts -- three Hutu extremists and the white Italian-Belgian Georges Ruggiu. How racism functions is the subject of Hate Radio: how human beings are “talked out of” their humanity. --rg

Austrian Cultural Forum, the Goethe-Institut Washington, the Embassy of Switzerland

and the Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics at Georgetown University

Host

“Theater of the Voiceless:

International Symposium and Festival of Documentary Theater

Washington, DC

June 16 - 19, 2013

In partnership with Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater, Forum Theatre, Shakespeare Theatre Company, The Studio Theatre, and Taffety Punk Theatre Company

Participants include Eva-Maria Bertschy, Ping Chong, Randy Gener, Derek Goldman, Konradin Kunze, Cynthia Schneider, Sophia Stepf, Doug Wager

WASHINGTON, D.C,|  Documentary theater possesses a unique ability to respond to issues of pressing political import and social justice, and provides a platform and voice for the dispossessed. “Theater of the Voiceless” — an international symposium and festival produced by Zeitgeist DC (Austrian Cultural Forum Washington, Goethe-Institut Washington and the Embassy of Switzerland) and the Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics at Georgetown University — takes place June 16 - 19, 2013 at various venues around Washington, DC.

A centerpiece of “Theater of the Voiceless” — led by festival artistic director Gillian Drake — is a daylong symposium that will be held from 11 am to 10 pm on Monday, June 17th 2013 at Georgetown University, Davis Performing Arts Center (37th and O Streets NW, Washington, DC).

To RSVP and for more information, visit www.zeitgeistdc.org.

The symposium will begin with a presentation by Ping Chong and Bruce Allardice of Ping Chong + Company, from its Undesirable Elements series of community-based oral histories.

Global migration challenges, government-sponsored genocide, terrorism and other manmade disasters that permanently alter our world view — these universal topics are addressed in non-fiction plays by playwrights interested in using their art for social change: Konradin Kunze and Sophia Stepf (Germany), Milo Rau (Swiss founder of the International Institute of Political Murder), and Kathrin Röggla (Austria).

Two panel discussions featuring artistic leaders, artists, and cultural and political experts  from the United States and Europe will focus on the power of documentary theater to effect social change. The afternoon panel discussion, “Documentary Theater: Creative Approaches,” will be moderated by Randy Gener, the Nathan Award-winning editor/writer of Critical Stages and founder of TheaterofOneWorld.org. It will include Doug Wager (Artistic Director and Head of Directing for Temple University), Chris Jennings (Managing Director, The Shakespeare Theatre Company), David Snider (Director of Artistic Programming, Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater), and Konradin Kunze (Playwright, a small, small world). They will discuss the research, creative process and staging of documentary plays and their many forms.

In the evening, after the staged reading of Swiss playwright Milo Rau’s Hate Radio, Professor Cynthia Schneider, Co-Founder of the Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics at Georgetown University, will moderate “Documentary Theater: Implications for Policy and Post-Conflict Reconciliation," a panel focusing on how theater and performance can serve as tools for diplomacy. This panel features, among others, policy expert Michael Pelletier (Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs in Bureau of African Affairs in the U.S. Department of State) and Eva-Maria Bertschy (Dramaturg, International Institute of Political Murder).

The staged readings of a small, small world will be directed by Serge Seiden (The Studio Theatre), and include cast members Maboud Ebrahimzadeh and Jonathan Feuer.

The staged readings of Worst Case will be directed by Jenny Lord (The Shakespeare Theatre Company), and will include cast members Gabriela Fernandez-Coffey, Heather Haney, Joe Mallon, Max Reinhardsen, Michael Rudko, and Emily Townley.

The staged reading of Hate Radio will be directed by Derek Goldman (The Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics at Georgetown University), and will include cast members Caroline Clay, Crashonda Edwards, Rick Foucheux, Kenyatta Rogers, Erika Rose, Joshua Street, Baakari Wilder, and Michael Anthony Williams.

Details and Reservations: www.zeitgeistdc.org

FESTIVAL SCHEDULE

Sunday, June 16, 7 pm
Goethe-Institut Washington (812 7th St. NW, Washington, DC)
a small, small world 
(with Konradin Kunze and Sophia Stepf, Germany)
Staged reading directed by Serge Seiden (Associate Producing Artistic Director, The Studio Theatre)

Monday, June 17, 11 am – 10 pm
Georgetown University, Davis Performing Arts Center (37th and O Streets NW, Washington, DC)
Theater of the Voiceless Symposium

11 am – 12:15 pm Presentation: “Undesirable Elements: Real People, Real Lives, Real Theater”
Ping Chong and Bruce Allardice (Ping Chong + Company)

  1 – 2:30 pm a small small world (Germany)
Staged reading directed by Serge Seiden
(Associate Producing Artistic Director, The Studio Theatre)

  2:45 – 3:15 pm Artistic response by Forum Theatre

  3:30 - 4 pm Reading of excerpts from Worst Case (Austria)
Staged reading of excerpts
Directed by Jenny Lord
(Resident Assistant Director, The Shakespeare Theatre Company)

4 – 4:30 pm “This Really Happened”
Artistic response by Taffety Punk Theatre Company

4:45 – 6:15 pm "Documentary Theater: Creative Approaches"
Panel discussion moderated by Randy Gener (Critical Stages and  TheaterofOneWorld)
Panelists: Colin Bills (dog & pony dc), Chris Jennings (The Shakespeare Theatre  Company), Konradin Kunze and Sophia Stepf (a small, small world), Jocelyn  Prince (Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company), David Snider (Arena Stage), Doug  Wager (Temple University)

7:30 - 9:15 pm Hate Radio (Switzerland)
Staged reading directed by Derek Goldman (Director, Georgetown University’s  Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics), in partnership with Arena Stage  at the Mead Center for American Theater

9:15 - 10 pm "Documentary Theater: Implications for Policy and Post-Conflict Reconciliation"
Panel discussion moderated by Cynthia Schneider (Co-Founder, Laboratory for  Global Performance and Politics at Georgetown University)
Panelists:
Eva-Maria Bertschy (International Institute of Political Murder), Ping Chong,  Randy Gener and Michael Pelletier (Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for  Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, US Department of State)

Panelists for "Implications for Policy and Post-Conflict Reconciliation"

Tuesday, June 18, 7:30 pm
Embassy of Austria (3524 International Court NW, Washington, DC)
Staged reading of Worst Case (Austria)
Staged reading directed by Jenny Lord (Resident Assistant Director, The Shakespeare Theatre Company)

Wednesday, June 19, 6:30 pm
Goethe-Institut Washington (812 7th St. NW, Washington, DC)
Screening of the film of the groundbreaking Rimini Protokoll documentary theater piece Soil Sample Kazakhstan (Bodenprobe Kasachstan)

PRESS CONTACTS:

Gillian Drake, Festival Artistic Director

gilliandm@gmail.com

Norma Broadwater, Goethe-Institut Washington

nbroadwater@washington.goethe.org

www.zeitgeistdc.org

###

"NOLI" OPERA NEWS | Investors and advocates pledge their support for NYC production

NEW YORK CITY |  The grand opera “Noli Me Tangere” has edged one step closer to the American mainstream.  At a special dinner held in Manhattan in late March 2013, leaders and advocates of the Filipino American community in the Northeastern U.S. have pledged to do their part to invest funds and raise public awareness for the highly anticipated New York premiere of the “Noli” — a landmark opera based on the great novel by the Philippine national hero Dr. Jose Rizal.

Hosted by U.S. industrialist Loida Nicolas Lewis at her Fifth Avenue residence, the evening affair was intimate and one-of-a-kind.  Conversations delved deep into the subject of how a classical music piece from the Philippines could garner global appreciation from opera aficionados and Western centers of culture.  The New York dinner also offered a unique opportunity for lead sponsors and potential investors to personally meet Bayani Mendoza de Leon, the son of Philippine National Artist for Music composer Felipe Padilla de Leon who wrote and completed the opera in 1950.

“Lovers of Philippine culture would have heard of Rizal's classic novel,” says Loida Lewis, the project’s lead producer. “When they hear the ‘Noli’ opera sung in the Filipino language, Filipino Americans everywhere will be curious and amazed that this masterpiece could be presented in New York.”

Michael Dadap, Loida Nicolas Lewis and Bayani de Leon

As the guest of honor, Bayani de Leon told boyhood stories about growing up with a legendary father whose original music compositions celebrated the deepest meanings of significant events and symbols in Philippine history.  He stated that his late father’s affinity with Philippine folk culture was the foundation of a passionate Filipino nationalism, which he articulated through music.  After dessert, the guests retired to the living room.  Michael Dadap, music director of the “Noli” staging and Bayani’s childhood friend, entertained the guests by performing his own guitar arrangements of two kundiman songs written by Felipe de Leon.

“Noli Me Tangere: The Opera” performs October 4–6, 2013 at the Sylvia and Danny Kaye Playhouse at Hunter College.  What’s at stake goes far beyond ensuring the success of this stage production.  What ultimately matters, the dinner guests agreed, is the sustainability of Philippine arts and culture in an increasingly global landscape:  Can we promote and sustain the arts and culture we have created?  How do we U.S. Filipinos and Filipino Americans build, cultivate and engage passionate communities that will rally for arts and culture over materialism — for the perpetuation of Philippine art forms and musical literature that transcend language barriers?

If given the right level of support, the East Coast premiere of the “Noli” opera could serve as a model for the globalization of Philippine classical music and theatrical performance.  “Production members of the opera are fully engaged in making it a successful show,” says Stephanie Francine Osmeña, real-estate associate of Larry Kaiser Key Ventures.  “They are each one extremely talented.  By producing the ‘Noli,’ they are unknowingly uniting Pinoys and enforcing our sense of national pride and history.”

Edwin Josue, of Halstead Property, agrees. “Staging the ‘Noli’ opera in New York will showcase to the world that we Filipinos, lovers of theater and arts, can contribute to our nation’s heritage and culture,” says the real-estate broker.

“It is always an honor for me to be a part of promoting our Philippine arts and culture through music and dance,” says Nerissa Abadilla, wife of Philippine Ambassador Ariel Abadilla who represented the Bayanihan USA Alumni Association. “I will definitely spread the word and help in any way I can.”

“This ‘Noli’ production will have a tremendous cultural impact to U.S. Pinoys in Connecticut, especially since we have three chapters of the Order of the Knights of Rizal here,” says Dr. Edgardo Ragaza, a hugely esteemed cardiologist from Branford, Connecticut.  “Our Philippine-American Association in Connecticut, of which I am a co-founder and a past president, has supported or helped host Filipino artistic productions in the past. We are excited about this opera.”

In fact Dr. Ragaza and his wife, the internist Dr. Aleflor Gamo Ragaza, have committed to bringing two busloads of people to attend a Sunday matinee performance.

Since its 1957 debut, the “Noli” opera has never been produced in New York.  Ironically it is considered the most performed Filipino opera, having been staged more than 25 times in the Philippines and abroad.  The Foundation for Filipino Artists, led by executive director Aida Bartolome, has scheduled the opera for the Filipino-American History Month of October; it is the centerpiece of the nonprofit advocacy’s 25th anniversary year of promoting Philippine arts and culture in New York.

Those who invest in the opera are, in essence, taking part in a piece of classical-music-history-in-the-making.  In addition to the people already quoted in this article, the fundraising dinner has attracted Gail Alvarez, a philanthropist, and her husband Tony Alvarez of the global professional services firm Alvarez & Marsal; Angie Cruz, founder/president of the Institute for Spirituality in the Workplace and board member of Filipino American Legal Defense & Education Fund; Jerry Sibal, a New York event designer; and Nanette Sering Wright, San Lorenzo Ruiz Chapel Board of Adviser.  L. M. Reyes Wiesel, a family friend, hosted Bayani de Leon during his New York visit.

“It was the first time I met Bayani,” recalls Dr. Ragaza, who along with his wife convenes the Connecticut chapter of the U.S. Pinoys for Good Governance. “I am impressed with Bayani’s knowledge about Philippine music and the arts — and with his still-lucid memories and the pearls of wisdom he received from his late father, which guide him in his journey through life.”

The evening struck a personal chord with Stephanie Osmeña, whose great grandfather was the fourth Philippine President Sergio Osmeña. “My general impression of Bayani is one of deep admiration,” she said.  “He is simply a genius at manifesting music patterns, which to an ordinary ear would simply go unnoticed.  To be in the presence of the son who follows so unreservedly and remarkably in his father's footsteps is, for me, such a humbling experience.  The ‘Noli’ rekindles the desire in us, whether here or abroad, to treasure our Filipino traditions.”

“Noli Me Tangere: The Opera” is not just a Filipino event.  “It is a human interest story that reflects all our hopes and dreams,” avers Gerardo Gaddi, one of the opera’s New York producers.  “It is the coming together of a people who have a common interest to promote our rich musical heritage to the mainstream.  If we pull our resources together, no matter how big or small, we are all in this journey together as a unified people that represent what it means to be global citizens who promote diversity through the arts.” -- RG

Seated, left to right: Randy Gener, production dramaturge of “Noli Me Tangere: The Opera”; Stephanie Francine Osmeña, real-estate associate of Larry Kaiser Key Ventures; Aida Bartolome, executive director of Foundation of Filipino Artists; Loida Nicolas Lewis, lead producer of “Noli Me Tangere: The Opera”; Philippine composer and music scholar Bayani de Leon; Aleflor Gamo Ragaza, internist from Bacolod; Angie Cruz, founder/president of the Institute for Spirituality in the Workplace; and Michael Dadap, music director of the “Noli” opera.

Standing, left to right: Jerry Sibal, New York event designer; Nerissa Abadilla of the Bayanihan Philippine Dance USA Alumni Association; Nanette Sering Wright, San Lorenzo Ruiz Chapel Board of Adviser; Edwin Josue, real estate broker of Halstead Property; and Dr. Edgardo Ragaza, partner and founder of the Connecticut Heart Group, P.C., a cardiovascular specialty group, and president of the Federation of Filipino-American Associations of Connecticut.  (Not pictured but present at the party: Gail Alvarez of the Alvarez Family Foundation, and her husband Tony Alvarez of Alvarez & Marsal; and L. M. Reyes Wiesel, New York host of Bayani de Leon.)

Sponsors of the 'Noli" opera in NYC | Photo by Ediwin Josue

ROGER AND ME | Two thumbs up to Roger Ebert, 1942–2013

Gene saved Roger the aisle seat

Once upon a time, in a desert far far away, I dreamed of becoming a movie critic.

Not just any movie critic: I hoped to follow the footsteps of Roger Ebert.

I wrote voluminous movie reviews for a university newspaper called Sagebrush and doubled as the chief movie critic of a Gannett–owned newspaper, the Reno Gazette-Journal. I was an enormous fan of Roger Ebert's writings.  Because of their clarity, erudition and good sense. It was as if he were writing very candid letters about the movies, which he intended only for me.  

Ebert, who died of cancer Thursday April 4, 2013 at age 70, was a gifted stylist, but he wrote above all to be understood. He did not believe in being flashy or academic or verbally show-offy or richly aphoristic — and yet he never failed to articulate complex ideas and high-level thinking. The first movie critic to receive the Pulitzer Prize for arts criticism in 1975, Ebert wrote with sharp wit and blistering intelligence, but there was something easygoing and playful about his energetic prose. When you pause to think back on what he had written, you realize that he wasn't just telling you whether he liked a movie or not. He was also conveying his larger notions about movie aesthetics.

Anyway I wrote letters to Ebert. I wanted to know how he did "it."

To my surprise, Ebert responded back. Well, one of his people did.  A thick envelope appeared in the mail one day. It contained a form letter and several pages of frequently asked questions. The form letter explained that because of his intense moviegoing schedule, Ebert could not possibly respond to every single letter. Most letters he received, though well-intentioned and sincere, repeated one another. So he had prepared a packet that contained his responses to typical questions he was asked. 

Mind you that I was shocked that Ebert responded at all.  In the 1980s, critics on television were all the rage. Among the reviewers who put television criticism on the map, Ebert was the only one who cared enough about his admirers to put some thought on how he would engage with them.  Gene Shalit, who reviewed for NBC's "Today Show," never wrote me back.  (He was probably too busy scaring up bad puns and grooming his scarier moustache.) Joel Siegel, a longtime movie critic for ABC's "Good Morning America," returned my letter with hastily penned notes in the margins, saying he was too busy to give a proper reply.

It was a different case with print critics. Sheila Benson of the Los Angeles Times read my articles and gave me literary feedback. Pauline Kael of the New Yorker wrote me encouraging letters and phoned me at home to commiserate when I ran into trouble with the newly hired features editor of the Gazette-Journal. (The editor objected that my Top 10 List of Best Movies of the Year had too many esoteric films like Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown and The Unbearable Lightness of Being. "What about Twins?" the editor asked, referring to the movie starring Danny DeVito and Arnold Schwarzenegger.) The drive-in movie guy Joe Bob Briggs, whom Ebert dubbed one of the "supporters of the decline of civilization," mailed me political buttons, red-white-and-blue ribbons and professionally designed car stickers, because he was campaigning to be elected the next president of the United States.

But I digress.

I remember the first time I wanted to become Ebert. After seeing Milos Forman's Amadeus at the two-dollar movie theater, I turned on the television in my bedroom to watch a pair of Laurel and Hardy types fulminating about the sorry state of Hollywood and touting the rising significance of American indies. The syndicated show was called "At the Movies." The dueling TV critics were named Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert. Sometimes I thought of them as the Bert and Ernie of movie criticism. Because they fought and argued like brothers — who always patched it up in time for the next episode. Television lent their thumbs-up/thumbs-down reviews great authority and legitimacy. Television made them the most powerful film critics in the nation.  

I preferred Ebert's lean, poetic writing over Siskel's blunter style. I admired Ebert even though for years his reviews hogged the pages of the Gazette-Journal, shunting mine aside.  Because the Gannett-owned paper I worked for had paid for the right to reprint their syndicated reviews, my editors preferred using their reviews — more frequently: brief capsule reviews — over my reviews.  That meant that I needed to be really enterprising if my reviews were to take precedent over the syndicated stuff.  (For example, I contacted the owners of the local art house so that I could arrange to screen their films in advance of their local release. Covering their art films allowed me to write reviews with a more local angle. )    

My broadside in U. The College Newspaper

Because I filed copy at the city desk every week, I had access to all of Ebert's syndicated reviews — especially those that did not see print.  At some point I had become so obsessed with Ebert's film criticism that I started to make fun of him in print. I was pretty good at it, too. I wrote a piece of film commentary for the campus newspaper — which ridiculed Siskel & Ebert (see photo above) — that was a hit.  It grabbed the attention of the editors of U. The College Newspaper, which picked up and re-printed articles based on hundreds of campus newspapers from across the country. Someone entered my article for consideration for a Society of Professional Journalists Mark of Excellence Award for best campus writing, and it won first prize in the opinion writing category. 

Of course, the reason my article was such a big hit might have nothing to do with my writing. It was likely because it was accompanied by a hysterically funny cartoon.  The gifted cartoonists Paul Horn and Mark Nowlin illustrated Siskel & Ebert not just at each other's throats — they were sticking their thumbs inside each other's noses! My opinion piece was, in effect, an extended caption. It was a no-holds-barred broadside against the meaninglessness of the star-rating system — the dumbed-down advertising-pandering mentality that became a desperate byproduct of Siskel & Ebert's zero-sum, gladiatorial game of passing judgments.

So when Ebert eventually wrote me back with a smart, thoughtful and quite instructive package that offered greater insight and background into his film-criticism career, I had started to feel this intellectual and emotional distance from Siskel & Ebert.  They had begun to see more like sacred cows to take down rather than critics to put on a pedestal. That letter from Ebert instantly broke down that gap. I had succeeded in moving one step closer to the Master. It turns out that he wasn't all the bad. All the cynicism I had harbored went away. I admired him even more. That letter brought back the human being behind the TV stranger. Truthfully it also lessened the pain of the Gazette-Journal editors choosing Ebert's capsule reviews over my own writing.   

Ebert's form letter was not completely pro-forma. It was personalized. Ebert told me that he had started out exactly as I had; he was an opinions columnist for The Daily Illini, the college paper of the University of Illinois, where he received his undergraduate degree.  (One of the first movie reviews he ever wrote was a review of La Dolce Vita, published in The Daily Illini in October 1961.) He added that if I liked, he would autograph one of his books for me. All I had to do was mail the book to him, he would sign it, and he would mail it back. 

Remember: Ebert was by then rich and famous. I bet he hired people to answer his mail; all he did was sign his name. I did not honestly believe he would mail back any autographed book that I would send him. So I decided to grab his attention. 

Instead of asking him to autograph one of his movie books, I got personal. I sent him my copy of his book An 'Illini' Century: One Hundred Years of Campus Life, which details the history of the University of Illinois from 1867 to 1967. It was Ebert's first book.

What can I say? I charmed Roger Ebert! The man autographed the book with a personalized note. He mailed it back. In between the pages was a handwritten letter; he expressed his great appreciation and well wishes. He told me to have confidence in myself — and to never give up.

I still keep that letter from Roger Ebert. It traveled with me when I moved to New York City after college to become a writer.

Perhaps one day I may yet grow up to write about movies. -- rg