The Dragon Year 2012 cast the niaga, the native dragon – IPAG’S logo — to the limelight flaunting its fiery character that inspired MSU-IIT’s resident group to charge full steam.
“Tales From Mindanao” opened in January electrifying capacity audiences in the Bicol provinces and filling to capacity the large Legaspi Astrodome.
Then it was the turn of “Uwahig,” the multi-media deconstruction of the Indarapatra-Sulayman epic, that headlined Tanghal for the Philippine International Arts Month. “Uwahig” later joined leading theatre companies in the 4th National Theatre Festival of the Cultural Center of the Philippines in November playing to good reviews.
IPAG joined the premiere crop of Philippine performing companies when it celebrated Philippine Independence Day in a program watched by thousands live at the Quirino Grandstand and on TV.
Palanca first-prize winner “Ming Ming” gathered SRO audiences in its two-week 19-run series in July at the MSU-IIT in Iligan City. Engaging young audiences who pieced the jigsaw segments of the plot, the non-linear play struck audiences more awed than confused.
In July, too, “Sarimanok” the dance-musical previewed, teasing the large gym audience with snatches of its compelling music and choreography. This dance-theatre piece will be the flagship production in 2013.
“Crossing Poetry,” the “transcreation” of poetry to performance bannered Philippine Theatre high when the UNESCO-ITI Asia Pacific Bureau Drama Schools featured the IPAG in its festival in Taipei in September.
Capping IPAG’s prodigious Dragon Year in November, a two-day four-show run of “Tatlo Sa Isa” (Three peoples in One Island) featured Mindanao stories that engrossed large audiences at the MSU-IIT gym. “Tatlo sa Isa” earlier regaled jampacked audiences at the same Astrodome in Legaspi that responded with full standing ovations.
If fire was 2012’s image, it is water in 2013, as IPAG slithers astute into the Year of the Water Snake with more inspiring theatre pieces here and abroad.
(photo credits: Jez Orbe, Albay Tourism, IPAG, CCP)
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