Theater review: One-dimensional 'Himala' as musical 

You do not go to see “Himala The Musical” for Elsa. That is the saddest thing about this production. 

 

In celebration of the 10th year since its first staging, I watched “Himala The Musical” to a PETA Theater filled mostly with supporters and friends of the Theater Actors Guild, members of the press, all of whom made for a very very kind audience. 

 

And I mean that with all kindness in my heart too, for an all-original Pinoy musical, one that dared do a version of the monolith that is Ishmael Bernal’s film opus “Himala.” This is something you need to see, because you need to hear it done live. This is something that will stay with you because of a libretto by Vince de Jesus.   

But if you are in love with “Himala” as I am, if you have turned it around in your head, have assessed and re-assessed the complexities of this film, the relationships it brought to life, the society that existed as Barrio Cupang, you will be disappointed by this production. 

 

The devil, of course, is in the details.

 

Against the original

 

We always say that the movie version of any book will fail, if only because words will be difficult to reimagine for cinema. If this production is any indication, the same might be said for the move from film to musical. 

 

Barrio Cupang is the smallest it can be here, like the world of one episode of a soap opera. It is unclear whether this was the point: that is to do a version that’s smaller in scale, in order to fit it on that stage. But it seems too small for comfort, and I didn’t even have an expectation of pomp and pageantry. 

 

The great thing about “Himala” has always been its complexity. It is also crucial that in this musical, Elsa articulates her wanting to be immortal. That isn’t what strikes you at all about Elsa in the film, and it’s a reading that is highly arguable. 

 

These, of course, are the faults of an adaptation that dared bring this film onto the stage. I do not speak of the libretto – for that is in fact quite haunting. Here it is the story itself that is amiss, that seems painfully simple, its treatment too, simplistic. Not quite the “Himala” we know.

 

The failure of perspective  

 

It is entirely possible that the crucial failing here is in this fact: it made Orly, the documentary filmmaker, the central speaker onstage, which he wasn’t in the original film. There, Orly is stranger and is secondary character; in this musical, the story is his to tell, literally. That is, it begins with him, it ends with him, and he speaks to the audience in retrospect, as someone who had witnessed this story, and has learned from it.

 

As such this musical doesn’t just imbue this character with far more power than he is given in the original, it messes with the original story where everyone was powerless and voiceless. This shift in the narrative itself, decentralizes the story of Barrio Cupang and Elsa. In the process, it makes Elsa and Barrio Cupang’s reaction to her irrational by default, because after all, here is a man, an outsider, who didn’t buy into it. 

 

And he is the one speaking. 

 

The original “Himala” did not trust anyone to tell the story of Elsa. In the film, part of Elsa’s charisma was her individual voice, crucial were the different complex voices within Barrio Cupang, ones that dared speak in the midst of noise that notions of miracles bring.

 

In the musical, all other voices are puny, including Elsa’s, existing as Orly does as central speaker. They are singing of course, but you know I mean those voices to be puny in the figurative. Or not.

 

Beyond the original

 

Two great things that will take you aback – in a good way – are the music and lyrics. Working with the limits of the adaptation, and save for that last song that painfully repeats that worn-out cliché about miracles, the songs here surprisingly take you out of that adaptation and into the original film. 

 

And yet one has a sinking feeling that these songs’ success is really borne of who is singing them, failing as some of them do, brilliant as some of them are.

 

Say, that ensemble (Viva Voce and University of Santo Tomas Singers Alumni) that outdid many of the major characters onstage. The moment they do “Bulung-Bulungan” they will awe you by the precision of their performance, by how they create a sense of a whole town with mere body and movement. 

 

Say, Isay Alvarez as Nimia, who takes over that stage, and nope, it’s not because she’s the only one wearing some color. Alvarez’s Nimia is everything that is in the film, and more, including but not limited to the fact of her swagger. By the time Nimia sings “Ako’y Mayroong Kuwento” where she unravels before Elsa, she is the most real character on that stage. Nimia is all Alvarez. 

 

OJ Mariano’s Orly is the right amount of innocence and despair, and as center of this narrative, no matter how that is questionable, one cannot complain. Suffice it to say that across the musicals in which I’ve seen Mariano the past two years or so, in “Himala” he also proves that his talent is not limited to one language, neither is it only for one kind of stage. 

 

Wala ngang himala

 

The bigger problem of “Himala The Musical” is that it all seemed to be stuck on one note – and I don’t mean the music. At some point it became apparent where characters were going to come from and where they were going to exist, and all of the movements on that stage ceased to be a surprise. People were walking, in and out, in and out, with nary a sense of on what side of town they were at, or if they were in that town at all.

 

And then there is, ultimately, the failing of May Bayot as Elsa, who reminds that sometimes there are no miracles. The night that I watched she messed up most her songs, barely getting to the high notes, or getting to them but failing at the grand build-up. I would’ve forgiven her anything – anything – had she not messed up “Walang Himala!” the grand climactic ending. No dice. Her scream was weak, the moment was over, and it was lost.

 

So no, you don’t watch “Himala The Musical” for Elsa, because here she does not have the charisma, and neither is her quiet and calm something that is on that stage. Granted that the original Elsa was played by Nora Aunor, there was no reason to lose the complexity of her character completely in this musical version. In fact, if at all, a musical adaptation should be able to imbue these characters with more meaning, if not more complexity. 

 

You want a watered down version of Ishmael Bernal’s film? Well, here it is. —KDM/KG, GMA News 

 

“Himala The Musical”, a production of the PETA Theater Center and Touchworkx Group, Inc., is on its last weekend, March 23 and 24, at PETA Theater in Quezon City.

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