When the sarswela bleeds: ‘Randalama’ at UPV Little Theater

1 of 7

By John Anthony S. Estolloso

BIOGRAPHIES ARE hardly the stuff of theater. While stories of historical characters have invaded the stage time and again, they serve more as mediums for dramatic storytelling rather than historiographic readings. But such is Art: whichever hero, monarch, rebel, or founding founder apotheosizes into a sanctimonious figure becomes bound to the audience’s applause even while the historian is relegated to a dusty academic shelf. Ponder the thought: who remembers Ron Chernow when watching Lin-Manuel Miranda’s ‘Hamilton’?

But the high school artistic circles of the UP Visayas have another story to tell about this matter.

June 28 witnessed the production of ‘Randalama’, a sarswela staged jointly by the university’s Junior Theater Arts Club and the UP High School’s Kundiman and Gongs Ensemble, under the direction of Prof. Alfredo Diaz and the baton of Prof. Jose Taton, Jr. The play retraced the coming-of-age story of a binukot, one which saw the transformative experience of a village maiden to a freedom fighter, as set in a time of shifting values, political turmoil, persecution, and romance.

Steeped in history while embellished with artistic liberties, the sarswela elevates a biography of oppression and resistance into a total work of art. Punctuated with vignettes from Panay Bukidnon culture, the production becomes a shared aesthetic space where history and lore, music and dance, custom and costumery, and cultural artistic differences meld into a coherent narrative affirming that Art need not be appropriative when delving into these themes. To paraphrase Prof. Taton’s prologue to the play, it aspires to embed traditions into creative works where woven betwixt song, dance, and narrative, the past becomes contemporaneous, and what is intimate becomes public and political.

The contrasts were strikingly beautiful. Set against a Western-inspired set design of miniaturized hills and mountains, the indigenous courtship dances came to life onstage. The old myths retold were complemented with a balletic pas de deux. The rhythmic drumming of traditional percussion alternated with the leitmotifs and harmonies of a string ensemble. The violence of dictatorship and political upheaval were juxtaposed sharply against the tender trysts and tragedies of the characters and the bucolic scenes of life in camp and community.

Disturbing perhaps to more conservative sensibilities was the raw reenactment of violence and harassment on stage. Whether symbolic or verging on the literal, there was no sugarcoating of the recreation of torture methods, or the human rights abuses committed during the dictatorship of the elder Marcos. The atrocities – the castration of male characters – became motifs of the dramaturgy. Framed through the storytelling, the castrations were metaphors of resistance to male intrusion into a female narrative. While blood is metaphorically spilled on stage, it is more so symbolic of resistance to patriarchal impositions onto spaces and narratives where a woman’s voice – Randalama’s – is heard, heeded, and respected.

Julia Marie Barcelona as the eponymous lead character delivered a commendable performance: the singing was tremulously poignant and the nuances honest and heartfelt. Ronaldo Rivera as Badong played the rebel leader and love interest with verve and passion, reminding the audience through the course of the narrative that love in the time of revolution is fraught with heartbreaks transcendent of mere romance. Altogether, the ensemble was in top form that morning – red flags and all; granted, the fluctuations in the singing and the inconstant histrionics onstage did not go unnoticed.

The orchestration was excellently done, and credit goes to the performing musicians who helped in the arrangements. Far from the crude scoring of usual productions were the motifs working as melodic sinews holding both narrative and poetry together. While there were perceivable divides with how traditional percussion and Western instruments are orchestrated coherently, it was altogether a tasteful combination, one that could become a standard for future orchestrations and performances.

* * * * *

There is always that profound desire by amateur thespians and theater groups to mount a musical. Yes, it is deemed an extravaganza – more so if they demand a live orchestra or band to accompany the dramatics. Yet UP’s production of ‘Randalama’ somehow reassured all theater aspirants and enthusiasts in the audience that this is not necessarily so: there were no opulent stage design or groundbreaking stage effects, but the production was altogether relevant, profound, and elegantly done – and the attempt at biography bleeds profusely enough to drive home its point. Beyond the visual appeal was the drama and its advocacy and statement: when stories of oppression become legend and lore, we are left to ask how we can staunch the bleeding.

(The writer is a language and literature teacher of one of the private schools in the city. The photos are from Shas Hobilla.)