Erehwon Center for the Arts produced its first full-length feature film, “Ang Amon Banwa sa Lawud” (Our Island of the Mangrove Moons), directed by acclaimed theater and film director and playwright Anton Juan. Dramatically shot in Suyac island in Sagay City, a major fishing coastal community in the province of Negros Occidental, the film shows how people fight to preserve their marine environment amidst the threat of big-time, foreign trawlers. The incursions threaten to devastate their daily lives, and cast to oblivion their customs and traditions.
Working with Negrense playwright Mark Raymund Garcia, Juan devised the screenplay of Ang Amon Banwa sa Lawud from Onofre Pagsanghan's Filipino adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize-winning play “Our Town” (1938) by Thornton Wilder. Co-producers are the Kellogg Institute for International Studies of the University of Notre Dame, the Negros Museum, and the City of Sagay.
The performers are all community artists. The language is in the local dialect, with English subtitles, but the context of ordinary folk versus might is universal.
The premier was held at the Cinematheque Center in Bacolod on January 6, 2023, and the following day, at the Suyac Island Mangrove Park.
"The mangroves grow following the shine of the moon," Anton Juan said during the program opening, as he underscored the angst and pain of the island dwellers desperately protecting the only way of life they’ve long known. "And in the fullness of the moon, the fish rise. The memories of the ocean are carried on by the waves and crests that touch the island, trying to reach the sky, other lands, and other minds by telling stories. The mangroves tell their stories to the moon as they grow. . .with roots shaped like our Baybayin script that tell the stories for us. And one day, the mangroves may not want to tell their stories and just be quiet. Because they were stories that just may be too painful to hear. And therefore, someone must tell their stories for them."
Writer Butch Dalisay regarded the film as “a tribute to Pinoy industry and courage, and also of the sense of community that seems to have frayed for our people on a national scale.” He further added, “…most of us have lost touch with our maritime culture --- the sea hardly figures in our literature, for example, except as a romantic backdrop --- despite the fact the ours is a country of many islands. Anton’s film offers hope --- but also delivers a stern warning about the dangers hovering on the national horizon.”
Erehwon Celebrates Arts Month with “Buwan”
Erehwon Center for the Arts culminated its series of performances in 2022 with two events. One was a major anniversary set of plays by the UP Repertory Company; the other was a recital organized by classical tenor Malvin Beethoven Macasaet.
Erehwon Center for the Arts, in cooperation with Artist Playground, lit up the stage with the dramatic performance of “Buwan,” a Filipino adaptation of Federico Garcia Lorca’s tragic play, “Blood Wedding.” It was experienced through eight shows, from February 25 to 26, 2023, at the third floor of the Art Center, with diverse interpretations by different sets of casts.
The women in the play are contrasts, some finding comfort in traditional gender roles at that time, another pretending obedience but seething at the lack of freedom and restrictions put upon women. The mother bewails the tragedy, the feud that snuffed the lives of her husband and son, only to have to steel her feelings when her last remaining son falls in love with a young girl whose previous suitor was a relative of the family who waged this bloody vendetta against them. The tragedy is compounded even more when her son’s bride runs off with her previous lover on the day of her wedding. Both men kill each other, leaving a wailing wife, a mother so overwhelmed with grief that she borders on insanity, yet, determined to make the bride live through the horrifying tragedy she has caused.
Artist Playground, represented by its Artistic Director Roeder Camanag, is the newest resident theater company of the Erehwon Center for the Arts. The play was directed by Paul Jake Paule, with Christian Silang as co-drector. The translation into Filipino was done by Anthony Dusaban. Reyn Pia Mercado Jr. was the production designer.
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