RM Ph 09/2017

I S S U E 1 1 3 ———— C O V E R S T O R Y

CONTENTS September 2017

TAL K IN G TO M YSELF

“I started wondering what I was doing all of this for.

Is it to win awards? Or could I be doing more?”

After dominating the covers of society and fashion magazines in the early aughts, Mai Mai Cojuangco left home for a life in Florence, Italy. Years later, the erstwhile It Girl makes a quick stop back in Manila and looks back on the state of independence she’s crafted for herself.

IZA CALZADO

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LE T HER E AT CAKE With a hit drama on television and her first international acting award under her belt, Iza Calzado is celebrating with a kiddie party. Philbert Dy finds himself on her birthday guest list and paints a picture of the actress in what isn’t the peak of her career—not by a long shot.

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H E R SIDE O F T H E STORY With a hard nose for journalism and a quiet mystique rarely found in the industry, Isabella Montano has only just begun telling Manila’s stories. Emil Hofileña sits down with the CNN Philippines correspondent as she narrates hectic days on the job and restless nights covering the war on drugs.

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PHOTOGRAPHED BY RALPH MENDOZA

I S S U E 1 1 3 ———— F E A T U R E S

CONTENTS September 2017

T H E RIGHT HAND

IT H A PPE NE D AT TH E LO B BY

BAD B E H AV I OR

After helping spearhead the President’s historic campaign, Finance Secretary Carlos “Sonny” Dominguez has set his sights on a new target: the administration’s controversial tax reforms. On a holiday afternoon with the Secretary, Claire Jiao discovers the hunt is indeed on.

A bastion of elegance in a rough and tumble nation, the Peninsula Manila has remained the beating heart of society for just over four decades. Jerome Gomez drops in to listen to its pioneers and gatekeepers tell the stories of illustrious guests, coup attempts, and misbehaving visitors.

Straight-laced, prim and proper threads may be what’s written on the invitation, but everyone knows that breaking away from expectation with the devilmay-care cuts and dark hues that figure into the best apparel this Fall/Winter 2017 are the rebel’s only real way to go.

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T H E PART Y CRASHERS You can call casting TV journalist Atom Araullo and film ingenue Max Collins as the leads of Citizen Jake, Mike de Leon’s longawaited return to cinema, an unusual choice—but the brilliant director will only tell you, as he’s told Jerome Gomez, that the results are cause to celebrate.

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STAR DUST M E MORIES It’s been 25 years since the death of director Ishmael Bernal, fearless intellectual of local cinema’s Second Golden Age, and the National Artist is still waging war against middle class totems and taboos, innocence and ignorance in his anti-memoir ProBernal, AntiBio.

“Some idiots that wore uniforms thought that taking over a hotel would be tantamount to asking a government to step down. What is it about the Pen that equates it to the seat of power?”

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EVELYN LIM FORBES

PHOTOGRAPH COURTESY OF THE PENINSULA MANILA

I S S U E 1 1 3 ———— S E C T I O N S

CONTENTS September 2017

AGENDA

SPACE

Allan Briones enters his newest playground as Old Manila’s first Filipino chef de cuisine; one new exhibit and a massive tech upgrade later, the National Museum Planetarium is recapturing contemporary imaginations; Jesus Christ dons Lanvin and Gucci in Marc Gaba’s visual commentary on the adaptable images of religion and fashion.

A settler, an architect, and a philanthropist are building a strong case for locally-sourced materials and low-impact design along the coastlines of Mindoro; in celebration of its heritage, Bulgari pays tribute to its most iconic piece, the seductive Serpenti, with the unveiling of an art, design, and jewelry exhibition in Singapore.

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“We don’t have an actual [figure] of Jesus Christ. It’s all imagination. It’s the same with fashion. It’s all responding to the time and the culture.”

MARC GABA

THE EY E

TH E S LA NT

The season’s masculine timepieces balance contemporary and classic with their bolder shapes, softer edges, and geometric elements; Montblanc takes inspiration in an age-old symbol in its latest collaboration with UNICEF; the MaArte fair returns for another year with its signature offerings, the finest creations from Filipino artisans.

What do you get when you put celebrated director Erik Matti, award-winning adman David Guerrero, and breakout broadcast journalist Chiara Zambrano in one (packed) room? One hell of a conversation. Rogue brings together three standouts in their respective fields to talk about the art of building ideas and chasing stories.

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ARTWORK BY MARC GABA

Editor-in-Chief JONTY CRUZ Executive Editor JEROME GOMEZ Managing Editor JACS T. SAMPAYAN Features Editor PHILBERT DY Style Editor MANO GONZALES

ON THE COVER Photographed by Ralph Mendoza Styled by Pam Quiñones, Sam Potenciano Makeup by Anthea Bueno using Laura Mercier Hair by Suyen Salazar, Ogie Rayel Photographer Assisted by Gio Cruz Stylist Assisted by Leanne Ledesma, Alvin Navarro, Rod Malanao Makeup Assisted by Luisa Jardinero

Associate Editor PAOLO ENRICO MELENDEZ Staff Writer EMIL HOFILEÑA Editorial Assistant PATRICIA CHONG

ART

Iza Calzado wears a Wearing Miss Keith dress and Jul B. Dizon rings.

Isabella Montano wears a Syne dress.

Mai Mai Cojuangco wears Nami earrings.

Art Director FRANCESCA GAMBOA Junior Designers PIA SAMSON, MARK SANTIAGO Online Art Director MAGS OCAMPO Online Junior Art Director ANDREW PANOPIO

Contributing Writers NANA CARAGAY, DEVI DE VEYRA, CLAIRE JIAO, IDGE D. MENDIOLA,

ERRATUM In our August 2017 issue cover story, KC Del Rosario’s makeup should have been credited as Anthea Bueno using Laura Mercier. We apologize for the oversight.

KARA ORTIGA, JAM PASCUAL, KATRINA STUART SANTIAGO, MIXKAELA VILLALON Contributing Photographers & Artists GERIC CRUZ, TAMMY DAVID, SHAIRA LUNA, RALPH MENDOZA, ARTU NEPOMUCENO, CENON NORIAL, MILO SOGUECO, JILSON TIU Interns CARLA AGUIRRE DE CÁRCER, GELO DIONORA, CARMELA FORTUNA

PUBLISHING Publisher VICKY MONTENEGRO / vicky.montenegro@roguemedia.ph Associate Publisher ANI A. HILA / ani.hila@roguemedia.ph

Unit 102, Building 2, OPVI Centre 2295 Jannov Plaza, Pasong Tamo Extension Makati, 1231 Telephone: (+632) 729-7747 Telefax: (+632) 894-2676 Email: mail@roguemedia.ph

Senior Advertising Sales Director MINA GARA / mina.gara@roguemedia.ph Account Managers VELU ACABADO, DENISE MAGTOTO Marketing Manager TRIXIE DAWN CABILAN

Online Presence:

rogue.ph Facebook.com/rogue.magazine

Publishing Assistant MADS TEOTICO / mads.teotico@roguemedia.ph

Twitter: @rogueonline

Advertising Traffic Officer & Production Coordinator MYRA CABALUNA

Instagram: @rogueonline

Associate Circulation Manager RAINIER S. BARIA Circulation Supervisor MARK ROLAND LEAL

Tablet version available at:

Zinio.com/Rogue

Circulation Assistant JERICO ALDANA Dispatch Supervisors ERIC GARCIA, JIMUEL TATAD Controller EDEN G. ARGONZA Finance Analyst JEMMALYN LUCERO Official Internet Service Provider: Credit & Collection Officer MISCHELLE MOLA HR Supervisor RUSCHEL REYES Administrative Supervisor DEANNA GUEVARRA

This issue would not have been possible without the help of MARIANO GARCHITORENA AND GRACE LIM OF THE PENINSULA MANILA

For subscriptions, back issues, bulk orders, and other circulation concerns please contact: Rainier S. Baria (+632) 729-7747 rainier.baria@roguemedia.ph ROGUE MAGAZINE IS PUBLISHED MONTHLY, ELEVEN TIMES PER YEAR. THE EDITORS AND PUBLISHERS OF THE MAGAZINE MAKE NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES IN RELATION TO THE ACCURACY OR COMPLETENESS OF THE CONTENTS OF THE ADVERTISEMENTS, PRODUCTS, AND SERVICES ADVERTISED IN THIS EDITION. OPINIONS EXPRESSED IN THIS MAGAZINE ARE SOLELY THOSE OF THE AUTHORS AND DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THE VIEWS OF ROGUE MAGAZINE. THIS MAGAZINE IS FULLY PROTECTED

BY COPYRIGHT, AND NO PART OF THIS MAGAZINE MAY BE USED OR REPRODUCED IN ANY MANNER WHATSOEVER WITHOUT THE WRITTEN PERMISSION FROM THE EDITORS AND PUBLISHERS.

ISSUE 113

THE GUEST LIST September 2017

SHAIRA LUNA is a self-taught freelance fashion and advertising photographer based in Manila, Philippines. Try flipping through the closest local magazine: there is a 70 percent chance you’ll see her name there.

ARTU NEPOMUCENO is an art, fashion, and portrait photographer.

After he graduated from college, he founded an ice cream sandwich shop called LouieLuis, managing this establishment while shooting for publishing gigs.

SAM POTENCIANO was the digital editor of L’Officiel Manila, the founding editor of The Neighborhood, and the editor-in-chief of Candy Magazine.

In this issue, she styles Isabella Montano and Mai Mai Cojuangco’s covers with Ralph Mendoza.

TAMMY DAVID is a photographer, videographer, and content strategist based in Manila.

She’s taken photos for publications such as Esquire Philippines and the Philippine Daily Inquirer. Here, she photographs Secretary Sonny Dominguez.

MILO SOGUECO is an award-winning filmmaker and photographer.

Sogueco also actively supports independent cinema through his positions at the Movie and Television Review and Classification Board and Quezon City Film Development Commission.

PHOTO OF TAMMY DAVID COURTESY OF GERIC CRUZ

CLAIRE JIAO has been a journalist for five years and currently works for CNN Philippines, reporting on business and the economy and providing political commentary.

She has profiled personalities such as Rodrigo Duterte, Bongbong Marcos, and Grace Poe.

CENON NORIAL is a freelance fashion photographer based in Manila. He is also the editor-in-chief and creative director for ADHD Magazine, which covers art, music, and fashion. He’s taken photos for other publications such as Preview and L’Officiel Manila.

PAM QUIÑONES was the editor-in-chief of L’Officiel Manila and is one of the most sought-after commercial and fashion stylists in the country today.

In this issue, she styles Iza Calzado’s cover with Ralph Mendoza.

RALPH MENDOZA was born and raised in Manila, where he currently works as a photographer. In this issue, he shoots all three covers with Iza Calzado, Isabella Montano, and Mai Mai Cojuangco.

ISSUE 113

THE EDITOR’S NOTE September 2017

There’s a Party Over Here “THIS HAS NEVER been done before,” says Mariano Garchitorena.

The Peninsula Manila’s Director of Public Relations is referring to us shooting Mai Mai Cojuangco, arguably the It Girl of her generation, right inside the hotel’s famed fountain. There she was in designer wear doing her best pose while feeling the effects of the fountain’s rushing waters (read: getting drenched).

This was all for our September Style issue and all of it started with a text message late at night. When I messaged Rogue Executive Editor Jerome Gomez, the rest of Manila already asleep, I told him we should finally do an idea we’ve wanted to do for so long.

“Let’s shoot an entire issue in one place in one night,” I said. “Let’s make this issue a real event! A real party!”

September has long been the flagship month of magazines the world over. It’s the month publishers and editors alike pull all the stops and leave no stone unturned.

It’s become an event in itself with different titles trying to do different things to stand out from the competition. From multiple covers to shoots in exotic locales to controversial cover lines, there is no better time to publish your biggest stories than

September. In recent years, that same level of excitement has also been a cause for concern. Back in 2012, Vogue produced the biggest September issue ever, clocking in at 912 pages. That stunt got attention but raised many questions. What was there left to do for September? What could any of us do to stand out?

When I joined Rogue, I kept reiterating to the team that the magazine should be an event, that every month was a new opportunity to do something special. And while great stories will always be at the forefront of Rogue, for this September issue, we wanted the magazine to feel, live, and breathe like an actual event. So with that fateful text, we scheduled our stories to be shot and produced all in one night (well, more or less) and shoot them all in one location. And while ideas were being thrown around about where exactly we could host everything, I had already made up my mind the second I texted Jerome. It had to be The Peninsula. No other place could match the prestige, the history, and the authenticity we wanted to capture in our pages.

Much like Rogue itself, The Peninsula has played host to everything from culture, society, and politics. Who could ever forget

JONT Y CRUZ Editor-in-Chief

the November 29 siege back in 2007 when a tank rammed towards the Pen lobby as rebels led by now-Senator Antonio Trillanes occupied the hotel, demanding the ouster of then-President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo? It’s moments like this that capture a country’s attention and add to the myth and legend of The Peninsula. The hotel has long been a symbol of the elegance and perhaps decadence of Manila. And for over 40 years, The Pen has garnered its fair share of secrets, scandals, and intrigues.

Shooting three covers, two editorials, and several key features all in one location in the span of more or less 24 hours is unheard of in local publishing. There are too many moving pieces, too many variables that could potentially bring everything down.

But where is the fun in a risk-less pursuit?

Where’s the excitement in something that’s been done over and over again? If every month we have a chance to make the magazine an event, then what better event is there than the grandest, most unpredictable party with the coolest and most interesting characters in town? And whether we succeed or not, at the end of it all, at least we got to do something that’s never been done before.

September 2017

Edited by

JEROME GOMEZ

AGENDA

Issue

113

F O O D + E N T E RTA I N M E N T + C U LT U R E + T R AV E L

WORDS BY IDGE D. MENDIOLA

You might not associate Manila’s most elegant restaurant with sleeve tattoos, but Chef Allan Briones proves that when it comes to his impeccably plated dishes, looks can be deceiving CHEF PORTRAIT BY JILSON TIU

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“I want to be the cool guy whom everyone learns something from.

I don’t like to inflict fear,” he stresses.

AGENDA FOOD

IT WAS ONLY a couple of months

ago when 37-year-old Allan Briones entered his newest playground, and already he’s established he’s not one to be messed around with. As the first Filipino chef de cuisine of the iconic Old Manila at The Peninsula Manila, Briones has crafted a menu that showcases the many facets of his personality.

“I think the whole menu reflects what I am and where I’ve been,” he says. Straight out of his training at the Center for Culinary Arts, the young Briones rose through the ranks in kitchens both here and abroad.

That’s why the current Old Manila menu reveals noticeable influences of his work in the Middle East, as well as his French and Italian training under renowned British chef Marco Pierre White. It was at the latter’s restaurant where Briones’ knife skills were put to the test. “If you have a weak heart, you

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DELICATE UNIVERSE

Outfitted in white and a lot of glass, Old Manila, a pillar of the Peninsula and of the city’s dining scene, remains one of the most elegant restaurants in the country. Inset: the foie gras torchon shares space with salted caramel dots and Davao chocolate mousse.

Previous: Old Manila’s Malagos chocolate cake with crunchy pili nut and carabao’s milk ice cream.

cannot work there because everyone’s going to eat you alive,” he recalls.

Though the chef has worked in the kind of kitchens where plates and pans are thrown around, he doesn’t necessarily apply the same stringency in his Manila kitchen. “I am strict when it comes to presentation, methods of cooking, the basics. But I would like my guys to have fun with me; that’s why I never adopted violent practices, even shouting or cussing. I want to be the cool guy whom everyone learns something from. “I don’t like to inflict fear,” he stresses.

You might have expected otherwise from Briones, especially once you see what the chef has up his sleeves.

Some years ago, before finding his place in the culinary world, Briones co-owned a tattoo shop in Sampaloc, Manila. While he never got addicted to them, he knows how one can get tattoo fatigue: “When you have a small tattoo and you keep seeing it every day, you get tired of it. And then you see these other guys with bigger tattoos. You get jealous.” Eventually, they closed shop. Today he wears full-sleeve tattoos on both his arms, plus other ink jobs concealed under his chef’s whites.

In all the kitchens he worked at, the traditional Old Manila included, he was never given a directive to hide his tattoos. “During my interview, I raised the concern and rolled up my sleeves, but my interviewer said it wouldn’t be a problem.”

If its not readily seen in his arms, his artistic streak appears on the plate.

His foie gras torchon stands tall in the midst of salted date caramel dots and an encased Davao chocolate mousse paired with carabao milk ice cream.

“That’s the beauty of plating. When you do things people don’t expect,” he says.

Briones is a chef who knows how to balance creativity and restraint. A duck tortellini in tamarind essence is infused right on your table, but there is also the option for an excellent miso-roasted Chilean sea bass. Even the seemingly simple heirloom tomato salad showcases the chef at his best— playful yet mature. What’s yet to come as he continues to settle in his domain? “Given that the name of the restaurant is Old Manila, I still want to incorporate more local ingredients, even indigenous ones in the dishes.”

He’s only getting started.

MAN OF THE PEN

Briones, 37 years old, is Old Manila’s first Filipino chef de cuisine. His French and Italian training was under Marco Pierre White. “I think the menu reflects where I am and where I’ve been,” he tells Rogue.

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AGENDA CULTURE

STARS IN OUR EYES With its recent equipment upgrade and pioneering exhibit of pre-Hispanic astrology, the National Museum Planetarium stands to retain its position as a space of awe and discovery for all ages WORDS BY PAOLO ENRICO MELENDEZ PHOTOS BY JILSON TIU

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THERE WAS A time when the National

Museum Planetarium was synonymous with discovery. A field trip staple, the small museum would wow visiting schoolchildren with its collection of miniature spacecraft, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) prints, and an actual meteorite.

The Planetarium, which opened in 1975, served as an adjunct to regular curricula, and was thus supported by the education department, which funneled school kid traffic during the peak months of August to March. Kids would mill slack-jawed as they held hands with their “buddies,” giddy at being outside the classroom for once—

Film-showing Day adrenaline except 10 times over.

It is not surprising that a place that has brought such compelling wonder to so many batches of kids has become a cultural phenomenon. For instance, the Planetarium grounds was the site of a particularly spirited set by jazz/spoken word outfit Radioactive Sago Project sometime in the early aughts, which many critics remember as a high point in modern musical improvisation. The Planetarium was also the subject of the late writer Luis Katigbak’s last full-length fiction published by a local magazine. Of the museum’s projector, which is the heart of

STARGAZER

The Planetarium’s newly outfitted projector boasts new lenses and a modernized system that allow for a more immersive tour through the galaxy.

It is not surprising that a place that has brought such compelling wonder to so many batches of kids has become a cultural phenomenon

565 PADRE BURGOS AVENUE, ERMITA, MANILA; 527-7889

its permanent exhibit, Katigbak wrote: “With the great machine, I can give the old man his sight back, better than before. I can make sure that the young man and young woman make each other happy for always. I can revive my grandmother, and she can accompany me to the British library, and use her card to let me borrow the books that I want. I can bring everything back; I can make sure nothing is lost.”

Back then, the purely mechanical projector could but show the stars and major planets— enough to impress gadget-less 80s kids whose idea of futuristic was silver spandex jackets with blue lightning streaking down the lapels. Good luck wowing a kid with smartphone and tablet these days, though.

But the projector is all good and modernized now, and stands a better chance at capturing contemporary imaginations.

Belen Pabunan, who handles visitor operations across the central museum system—Fine Arts, Anthropology, Astronomy, and the soon-to-open Natural History—shares that after a decade of trying to secure funding, the Planetarium has retrofitted the dome exhibit with, well, the works.

Two fish-eye lenses integrated with the old projector, giving visitors a wider panoramic view of the galaxy and neighboring star systems. New computer. Digital control console. Even the chairs are larger, the air-conditioning is a better match for the space, and the carpet is new. Put together, these improvements make the museum the first hybrid planetarium projector in the country.

It’s an impressive vault from the old show. The pre-retrofit images used to be static, and not so much flashed as shuffled along, like commuters in a queue. But with the modernized system, the pre-packaged Planetarium Program kicks in with a cinematic boom, complete with uplifting soundtrack and reverb-y narration about the wonders of the galaxy.

Outside the dome, where things remain physically neglected, one can otherwise find what is shaping up to be the museum’s most exciting educational innovation. After gathering and cross-checking ethnographic data from regional and area museums across the country, the Planetarium is now home to an exhibit that shows how pre-Hispanic Filipinos used their knowledge of astronomy to plan and execute their agricultural efforts.

This exhibit on ethnoastronomy, the first of its kind, shows how an outwardlooking hard science and inward-looking social discipline can work together much like a venerable machine with a modern retrofit. Pabunan and her colleagues think that the ethnoastronomy exhibit will be the museum’s unique selling point, and it is not hard to imagine it so.

It is also worth noting that admission prices remain at spandex-era rates: P30 for students, P50 for adults.

The poet Gemino H. Abad once said of his reaction to a collection of stories, “—an old man with his young eyes back.”

That collection of stories was Katigbak’s; “Planetarium” was part of, perhaps even central, to it.

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AGENDA ART

VERSACE ON THE CHRIST Marc Gaba’s latest series is about the economics of worship— clad in designer clothes WORDS BY KARA ORTIGA PORTRAIT BY GERIC CRUZ

HERE’S A SIGHT you don’t see every day: Jesus Christ clad in Gucci. The two elements— Christ and Gucci—are familiar to all, but to see the Jesus lounging comfortably in a living room, reading a book and sporting a pair of Alessandro Michele-designed furry slip-ons forces one into serious introspection.

The untitled work is part of an ongoing

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series by contemporary artist Marc Gaba, who replicates real fashion advertisements by employing The Great JC as brand ambassador. In another canvas, Gaba paints Christ in Louis Vuitton, the prophet’s brooding good looks decorated with an iconic LV scarf wrapped around his neck.

“I thought of abstracting him,” says Gaba of how he initially planned to paint the worldfamous figure. “But it felt wrong because Jesus Christ is the figurative image of God, who is abstract.”

While the artist leaves the interpretation of his works to the viewer, he hopes to communicate the idea that the face of Christ is as subjective as fashion. “The way Jesus Christ was painted in early Irish art is different from the way he was painted in Rome,” says Gaba of the way people visualize the Son of God. “We don’t have an actual [figure] of Jesus Christ. It’s all imagination.

It’s the same with fashion. It’s all just responding to the time and responding to the culture.”

A compact figure of friendliness and

nervous energy, Gaba asks me suddenly, “But how do you see it?”

I tell him that I’ve come upon the same realization I had when I squeezed myself among thousands of devotees walking through the streets of Quiapo during this year’s Feast of the Black Nazarene. Passing tight rows of makeshift stalls, vendors selling merchandise with their own rendition of religious figure, it dawned on me that Christ, much like fashion, is one of the most adaptable items in the universe of consumer goods, one that can easily be packaged according to the specifications of its market.

BIBLICAL PROPORTIONS

Gaba’s past and discipline as a poet inform his canvases in that almost every detail comes from a conscious decision. Above: detail of an untitled work that portrays a lounging Christ in Hermes. Opposite: the artist at home, and another untitled work from the same series, with a reading Christ clad in Gucci.

Gaba’s rendering of Christ in fashion is the second of a three-part show that tackles Catholicism, a visual intersection of religion, culture, and politics. In his first series, Days of Creation, he referenced his own understanding of the Book of Genesis through a collection of abstract paintings in oil on canvas, and a series of installations, all showing a progression of movements.

Altering lines, shapes, gestures, and colors on a canvas, Gaba mirrored God’s act of dividing and multiplying. In the third and last part of the series, the artist says he will tackle the Apocalypse.

Before immersing himself full-time into visual art two years ago, Gaba was an award-winning poet and professor who once taught at the University of Iowa where he graduated with a Master of Fine Arts. His foray into contemporary art actually began during his time as an academic, driven by

countless readings on the art movement.

Gaba’s strength as a visual artist is his ability to execute images with a very specific yet philosophical perspective. Although he says that his poetry has never dictated his visual art, it’s hard to ignore its influence: every detail, line, color, and use of space in his canvases seem meditated on.

Even the folds of his paper boats in a geography-themed installation at the Fundacion Sanso are made with intention, and yes, philosophized.

“Contemporary art is so violent in a way that it takes out the ways that you were trained to see what is beautiful,” he says, recalling something from his readings.

“Your prejudices are called into question and slowly eroded, [but in the end] life becomes more interesting.”

Perhaps much like seeing Christ swathed in floral-print Hermes.

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AGENDA BOOKS

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HERE’S LOOKING AT YOU In a new book, Matthew Rolston captures 80s icons with an Old Hollywood aesthetic WORDS BY JAM PASCUAL

© HOLLYWOOD ROYALE: OUT OF THE SCHOOL OF LOS ANGELES BY MAT THEW ROLSTON, TO BE PUBLISHED

BY TENEUES IN SEPTEMBER 2017, TENEUES.COM.

PHOTOS © 2017 MAT THEW ROLSTON CREATIVE, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. HOLLYWOODROYALE.COM

TO KNOW MATTHEW ROLSTON, one must

first understand Andy Warhol.

One could say that the American pop artist Warhol made fame and artifice his main subjects, and because of this, he was never far from the life and imagery of Hollywood.

Of all his creative inclinations, it was his Interview magazine that best demonstrated his fixations on the glamorous, the glitzy, the ideal.

As Warhol’s fame grew, so did his circle.

And in interacting with various Hollywood giants, he became hungry for nostalgia, for the Old Hollywood glamour aesthetic. You know the look. That Audrey Hepburn image.

That Clark Gable vibe. The kinds of shots you’d probably find on a La La Land mood board. But American society was well past the point of black-and-white cinema, and mass media wasn’t into that aesthetic anymore. Matthew Rolston, who shot for Interview and made a name for himself as a sought-after Hollywood photographer, pulled off that look and he did it HOORAY FOR like nobody else.

HOLLY WOOD To celebrate Rolston’s Rolston captured legacy, teNeues the essence of old Hollywood’s glamour (teneues-books.com) in the 70s and 80s is releasing Hollywood through his portraits Royale: Out of the of its icons, such as School of Los Angeles, a (opposite, clockwise from top left) Tom monograph containing Waits, Cybill Shepherd, some of Rolston’s most Steven Spielberg, and memorable shots.

Isabella Rossellini.

The book is a testament to his reputation as master of light and shadow, capturing the entertainment icons of his time—from Michael Jackson to Cyndi Lauper—in a way that couldn’t be replicated by the sensibilities of modern television or cinema, or any of his contemporaries, for that matter.

It would be reasonable to designate Rolston’s work from Interview magazine as his pivot point. In the essay “Matthew Rolston: Warhol’s Post-Modern Glamour Photographer”—which is featured in the book, along with a few other essays that shed light on his oeuvre—Rolston “executed his first real glamour portrait” when shooting Martha Davis, front woman of the New Wave band The Motels, for Interview.

From there, his style became more defined, and he portrayed his subjects in a vintage light, as if shoving them into a period of time in which they could not possibly inhabit, if not for Rolston’s eye. It’s evident in the plates. Madonna looks more Casablanca than Vogue. Sylvester Stallone looks like a jet-set shipping magnate.

Make no mistake: Rolston’s work is hardly cheap nostalgia. While his photos are reminiscent of Old Hollywood glamour, they are shot with an ironic eye, so to speak, portraying the cult of fame in a way that resonated with Warhol’s view of the world: Hollywood not as an idea rooted in the romantic, but Hollywood for the sake of itself.

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AGENDA CULTURE

THE BOOK OF EROS Eros Atalia, the man behind this year’s Palanca-winning novel, likes to tackle the big issues brewing within small worlds WORDS BY MIXKAELA VILLALON ART BY PIA SAMSON

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IN MANY WAYS, the current Philippine

literary scene looks like the current Philippine film scene. In both fields, its creators can be polarizing figures. Some works are accessible to casual audiences made by perceived sellouts, while others are nearly incomprehensible, made by people who fancy themselves avant-garde. Some create works that are more valued abroad than locally.

There are classics, classicists, the bold, and the up-and-coming. There are those who want to break the rules of the game before learning

them. There are gatekeepers and awardgiving institutions that sprinkle validation on a chosen few. The only difference, it seems, is that one group is more fashionable than the other.

Cavite-born writer and multiple Palanca Award winner Eros Atalia draws another parallel to the literature-and-film analogy.

“May mainstream at may indie,” he says.

“May sariling audience ‘yung dalawa, pero may overlap. In the end, pareho lang ang intention: magkuwento. Magcommunicate sa iba.”

Atalia’s written work straddles the line between classically literary and contemporary pop fiction. His themes and story structures tick off the basics of any college-level creative writing class— unsurprising, as Atalia teaches Filipino, Journalism, and Creative Writing at the University of Santo Tomas. At the same time, his writing style and language are firmly vernacular. His narration and the way his characters speak would be very much at home at any side street inuman. “Ganito ako magsalita at mag-isip.

Paputol-putol. Hindi ko kaya mag-isip ng sobrang haba na nakakahingal,” he offers.

“Kaya ganito ako magsulat.”

Atalia’s writing style has made many of his readers wonder if he could be the alter ego of another popular Filipino writer—the mysterious, never-before-seen Bob Ong. “Pareho kaming under Visprint (Inc., a publishing house), pero hindi ako si Bob Ong. Ako si Batman,” says Atalia, clearly used to and amused with the question.

It is not just his writing style that makes him suspiciously similar to Ong. They both write about mundane, slice-of-life stories that are familiar to any Filipino born or raised in the country in the last 50 years. “Hindi ko kayang magsulat tungkol sa maliliit na problema sa malaking mundo. Kaya kong magsulat tungkol sa malalaking problema sa maliit na mundo. Batang walang pamasahe para sa eskwela—mga ganyang kuwento. Maliit lang ang mundo, pero napakalaki ng problema niya.”

His latest novel, Ang Ikatlong Anti-Kristo, expresses Atalia’s skill at presenting a largeproblem-in-a-small-world conflict. The story revolves around charismatic Father Marcus, a model priest who possesses both good looks and near photographic memory of the Lord’s word. The priest’s predictions come true, his prayers heal the troubled and infirm, and his flock of faithful grows when he is allowed to preach on television. In spite of all evidence, Father Marcus doubts his own gifts.

He must then grapple with the realization that his blessed powers come from being the third Antichrist.

On the surface, the novel seems to showcase a large problem in a larger world, but at its core is just a man with doubts about his faith. In the introduction of his novel, Atalia highlights the value of doubt in this day and age: “Para sa panahong tulad nito, na ang lahat ng nangyayari mula sa balita, bigas,

gulay, gamot, relationship status, gender, social media account, balita, viral o trending video hanggang sa kuwentong kanto… pwedeng pagdudahan.” Ang Ikatlong Anti-Kristo placed first in the Filipino novel category of the 2017 Palanca Awards.

Atalia shakes his head at the idea of writing the Next Great Filipino Novel. Far too many aspiring writers have that in mind before they type out their first sentence. Some dream of awards, fame, or a lucrative publishing contract. While there’s nothing wrong about dreaming big, Atalia insists that the first step is to just tell a story. A story that people can read and understand, and hopefully enjoy.

Everything that comes after that is a bonus.

He talks about how teenagers who have never attended writing workshops can write chapter after chapter of their fiction on online platforms like Wattpad and be read by millions. After the United States, the Philippines is the second largest content contributor to Wattpad. These kids publish their stories for free, with little to no regard for the trappings of literary criticism.

They just want to tell their stories. Of course, most of the stories are cliché romances, but what do you expect from teenage writers?

“Iyon lang ang alam nila, pero gusto pa rin nilang magsulat. ‘Di pa ganoon kalawak ang nababasa at nae-experience nila, pero nagsusulat na sila.

Kailangan ma-sustain ‘yun at mapalalim ‘yung gawa, pero writer ‘yang mga ‘yan.”

There are a lot of writers and readers in the country, Atalia points out. The difference is that people are not writing or reading what is prescribed inside classrooms and curriculums, and that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. “Ang literature, hindi ‘yan dapat dinedefine ng akademya. Ang nagde-define n’yan, ‘yung mismong nagbabasa. May mga nananalo ng Palanca na hindi na natin naririnig. Meron naman mga writer na hindi nananalo, pero nirerespeto. Dati, hindi nakita bilang panitikan ang Agos sa Disyerto (an influential anthology of short stories that championed social realism in the lead-up to Marcos’ declaration of martial law) kasi balbal daw ang salita. Pero ngayon, classic na.”

Strong words from someone who has three Palanca awards under his belt. But Atalia is nothing but frank about the relevance of the prestigious accolade. “It’s validation. Minsan, masarap rin ‘yung nava-validate ka, ‘di ba?”

He must then grapple with the realization that his blessed powers come from being the third Antichrist.

VOX POPULI

Atalia’s works are written in the common vernacular, to reflect the worldview of his simple characters.

Above: Four novels from his bibliography.

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DESIGN + INTERIORS + ARCHITECTURE + TECHNOLOGY

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Through humble and grand deeds, a settler and his architect, together with a philanthropist, might just make Mindoro great again

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t has forested mountains, endless coastlines, the second largest reef in the world, minerals, and a rich biosphere. Mindoro is the ultimate fantasy for divers, refuge seekers, science researchers, and mining companies.

Despite its promising future, the island province is, in reality, at present, not in its finest form, what with the spurt of resorts clustered in Sabang and White Beach compromising the surrounding waters. This resulted in the UN threatening delisting

Puerto Galera from the Biosphere and Man Reserve program, where the international organization assists local governments and communities in creating sustainable developments.

A proposed mining site encroaches on ancestral land and a watershed.

Much like the rest of the country, there are families who live in poverty amidst the tourism boom.

But hope is on the horizon. The local government, together with Mindoro’s private sector, is rallying to oppose select mining operations. Concerned

citizens have taken it upon themselves to help educate local communities about protecting and preserving the province’s natural legacy. Wind mills are set to rise on Mindoro’s slopes to provide renewable energy.

In a bid to stymie tourism growth, two families—the Zobels and the Locsins—purchased huge swathes of prime realty. On a humbler scale, a settler and his architect build a case for low-impact design.

It will take time, but Mindoro will one day have its own shining moment.

AS NATURE INTENDED

“For me, design never happens in mid-air,” says architect Laudico. “It’s always very site-specific.” She familiarized herself with the area’s cycles, and the landscape. In addition, 95 percent of the materials used for the house were sourced from Mindoro.

NATURALEXECUTION Architect Popi Laudico’s triumphant execution balances the needs of both client and environment

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PATRICK JOHNSON FOUND Mindoro by accident.

The American didn’t know “anything or anyone,” having just arrived from Taiwan to start work in Manila. “The only available flight was to San Jose in Mindoro, so I went there to snorkel,” Johnson recalled.

In his hotel, he would meet an Australian couple who offered to take Johnson to an island aboard their small aircraft before hitching a ride on a chopper for the last leg of the journey. The party of three landed in a place the Aussies deemed as unfit parking for their airplane—Mindoro’s penal colony.

So they stayed behind and suggested for the American to go on ahead, alone. “Sure!”

Johnson told them in a blink.

Upon landing, Johnson got out of the chopper—apparently the island’s VIP guests’ service courtesy of the military—and saw a family of four frolicking on the beach.

The chances of finding a top Hollywood director on a remote Mindoro island are nil.

But not in 1977.

“I didn’t know them, but later on I found out who they were,” he admitted. It was Francis Ford Coppola with his wife, Eleanor, and their two kids, one of them the five-year old Sofia.

Perhaps, for a fleeting moment on that island, Coppola found relief from the anxieties of filming his over-budget masterpiece, Apocalypse Now. According to rumors, the director wanted to buy the property, but local laws prohibit foreigners from owning land. He did find something close. Years later, the director bought a patch of land in Belize that reminded him of the Philippines and transformed it into a boutique resort, now part of a successful chain operated by the Coppola family.

Johnson would keep coming back to Mindoro before purchasing the hilltop sprawl where he decided to build his dream getaway, 23 years after first setting foot in the province.

When asked what drew him to the place, the American replied that “it’s far enough away and the water prevents a lot of people from coming, so it has a lot of solitude to it.”

His demands for his house were simple: “I just wanted a nice, comfortable place to stay, with a pool, where I can enjoy the view, the air, the garden. The style was to use all native products. I think 95% of the materials are from Mindoro.” Johnson’s architect step-daughter,

STONEY END

For the thatched roofing, Mindoro cogon, whose endurance proved remarkable, was used. The steeped angle allows for rainwater to fall off to the sides, preventing leaks, and ensuring longer life for the material.

“When you respect the existing conditions of a location, it will in turn respect what you’ve contributed to the environment.”

Popi Laudico, was called in to realize what he had in mind.

It took many visits to the site before Laudico put pen to paper. She wanted to familiarize herself with Mindoro’s cycles and the property’s landscape, elements that lie at the core of her practice. “For me, design never happens in mid-air. It is always very site-specific… even more than client-specific actually. When you respect the existing conditions of a location, it will in turn respect what you’ve contributed to that environment. When you disrespect an environment as strong as where this house is located, well, in the end, guess who wins that kind of a battle?”

Just to make sure that everyone was on the same page, Laudico devoted the first year to constructing the caretaker house and the

power house, much like a dry run before a main event. “In the process, Patrick and I also learned a lot about how to work with the materials, the design and the site. It’s an extremely hand-made house in a remote location. Once all of us understood how it was to be constructed, we started on the main house, which took another two years to build.”

The locations for the smaller huts were also meticulously plotted out: “Part of experiencing the site all year round was the need to understand the energies of the site in order to properly locate and orient all the structures. I guess you could say that it was the sites that wanted them.”

With materials, method, and design attuned to the environment, the 17-year old house has weathered Mindoro’s raging storms, merciless summer heat, and corrosive seaside air. The thatched roofs’ endurance is particularly remarkable. Laudico used Mindoro cogon, which she said was of superior quality. The steeped angle allows for rainwater to fall off to the sides, preventing leaks and ensuring a longer lifespan.

Notable too is the absence of an architect’s hauteur. Laudico’s gestures are discreet and devoid of gimmickry; her strokes are more felt than seen to provide a unique domestic experience.

From the entrance, narrow paths lead to the architectural volumes, starting from the staff housing and service areas on the lower grounds, to the breakfast and massage huts that rise above deep crevices. The main house reveals itself as one climbs higher.

Laudico maintains a cohesive aesthetic,

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with all the structures displaying similar skins and roofing. The homeowner’s residence is a cluster of flowing spaces that look out to the spectacular view. Through the years, the nature all around has embraced the added structures with vines creeping over roofs and windows, trees and shrubs providing shade and buffering winds. Birds, butterflies, and other insects roam freely.

Summer brings gusts of sea breeze that cool the house. During the rainy season, excess water flows down natural paths that run through the slope, while bullfrogs erupt in a joyous chorus of mating calls.

The entire estate is a testament to Laudico’s credo. By listening to Johnson and the landscape on which his house now stands, nature and client triumph in the end.

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“Partofexperiencing the site was to understand the energies of the site to properly locate and orient all the structures.”

BIG AND SMALL

The locations of the smaller huts— the staff houses, the service areas, the massage and breakfast huts—were meticulously plotted out, while the main house was placed in such a way that it reveals itself little by little as one reaches higher grounds.

The Patroness of Mindoro How Bea Zobel Sr. is championing the craft and heritage of her adopted paradise

Doña Beatriz Zobel de Ayala Sr. recalls the moments before she stepped on Philippine soil 59 years ago. “I remember in the plane, I looked at my passport.

I don’t know how my father-inlaw did it, but I already had a Philippine passport. So, the minute I landed here, I thought, I’m going to love this country and I’ll try to behave as much as I can as a Filipino.”

And she did, in a grand and gracious manner. Now 81 years old, Zobel Sr. has devoted a great part of her life to championing the country’s heritage crafts, helping the less-privileged, and exploring the Philippines. Of all the places she’s visited, it is perhaps Mindoro that’s closest to her heart. “I try to visit once a week,” she admits.

She and her husband, Don Jaime Zobel de Ayala, patriarch of the family-owned conglomerate and listed in Forbes Magazine’s’ Philippines’ 50 richest, built several houses in Mindoro’s coastal enclave, Puerto Galera, including one that stands close to the beach. “We followed all the rules,” Zobel Sr. said, “like you have to be so many meters away from the sea and all that. I also wanted something that is integrated with the environment.”

Designed by her close friend, architect Noel Saratan, the Zobels’ seaside retreat is a striking, generously scaled Filipino-style home befitting Zobel Sr.’s stature. But to the horror of Zobel Sr.’s friends, there is no garden. “Yeah, I like it, no garden. All my friends ask, ‘Bea, where is the garden?’ I say the garden is in Manila. I want to live like if I was in the mountain, you know what I mean?... Here I have my garden, but this would not go in that atmosphere, you know?” Zobel Sr. told Rogue as she sat on a sofa in the living room of her Forbes Park home, coiffed and dressed for her many appointments throughout the day.

Her house is surrounded by well-tended greens, but it is nothing compared to what she has in Puerto Galera.

The entire house is bookended by the forest toward the back and the sparkling emerald sea in front.

TEACH THEM HOW TO FISH “I’ve made it a point for them to understand that for them to have a better life they have to work,” Zobel says of the Iraya-Mangyans.

Below: the Zobel home in Mindoro faces the ocean.

Unlike other estates around the area, the Zobels’ property isn’t enclosed in massive walls but fenced in with humble chicken wire instead.

Zobel Sr. is an avid adventurer who, during her younger years, explored what Mindoro had to offer.

She recalled going down one of Mindoro’s mountains, trying to keep up with travel buddy Maribel Ongpin’s brisk pace until she fainted. “So I woke up with a rosary in my face. Maribel was praying because she thought I had died already,” Zobel Sr. says, laughing.

Her trekking skills would come in handy later on during her visits to Mindoro’s shy, mountain-dwelling IrayaMangyans. For some time now, the province’s indigenous people have benefited from Zobel Sr.’s philanthropic sweep, the result of a heartbreaking encounter many years ago. Zobel Sr. remembered going to town where she spotted some Iraya-Mangyans sitting on the floor. They were being laughed at, she recalls, visibly saddened by the memory, “as if they were monkeys.”

She knew something had to be done about their state.

The philanthropist’s project with the iraya-Mangyans, perhaps her most high-profile and most ambitious so far, reveals Zobel Sr.’s steely resolve and admirable humanity. It also shows her remarkable sensitivity for a people’s ways.

It was a long, well-considered process to ensure that the Iraya-Mangyans were gently ushered into civilization without shocking their systems. She started to make simple homes designed by Noel Saratan. Zobel Sr. wanted something that wasn’t made with cement, “to keep them a little bit as they were, but with bathrooms,” she stressed, “because you can’t just change their lives also.” Saratan created the huts and pavilions made from native materials that now stand at the Iraya-Mangyan’s new address—a picturesque sprawl at the foot of Mount Malasimbo, thickly forested, just like their previous habitation, and with a river running through it.

Education was next on Zobel Sr.’s agenda. She pushed the Mangyan youth to attend the public schools. “After that came the part of telling them, ‘Look, you have to earn your living.’ So that’s when I started the baskets, because I saw that they could do baskets. So I pushed them, and we sell them in Manila where they sell well.”Later on, the Iraya-Mangyans were taught sewing and beading. “I’ve made it a point for them to understand, that for them to have a better life, they have to work.”

Unbeknownst to most, Zobel Sr. initially financed the whole project and its subsequent maintenance singlehandedly. “It’s not officially a foundation,” she said of the village she created, “it’s me financing everything. I’m on my own, and I maintained it for many years. Jaime doesn’t give me enough money,” she said with a laugh.

Apart from the Iraya-Mangyans’ plight, Zobel Sr. is deeply concerned about preserving Mindoro’s environment.

Through the years, she’s witnessed the unregulated development in White Beach and Sabang. “Well, I find that in the Philippines, there is no great ambition for development.

The way they develop areas, whether for vacation or even for a housing project, something is missing there... I must admit that Jaime bought all that area [surrounding the Zobels’ property], almost to the beach, because we could see some monstrosities happening. People have these funny ideas of creating something suddenly, like a tower or a castle.

So we decided to protect that area. To leave it beautiful.”

The couple’s good friend, the late architect Lindy Locsin, also purchased much of Puerto Galera’s prime beachfront acreage for the same reason. It was Locsin’s late wife, Cecile, who was more passionate about preserving Mindoro’s natural legacy as an advocate of low-impact development.

The Locsins also went about their philanthropic work in a quiet way, supporting scholars, and building the port.

For Zobel Sr., continuity is important. The livelihood projects ensure sustainability so as not to leave the financial load on the village’s future caretakers, Zobel Sr.’s heirs.

“There is still much to do,” she said, “and there are many who help, but we need more. Everybody should do something for others. Even if you have the moon, as I have, you must help.”

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LAST SEDUCTION In celebration of its heritage and most iconic piece, Bulgari pays tribute to the sexy, seductive Serpenti with the unveiling of an art, design, and jewelry exhibition in Singapore WORDS BY NANA CARAGAY

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WITHIN THE FIRST few minutes of stepping into the exhibition hall at Marina Bay Sands’ ArtScience Museum, a girl in our group immediately realized she had made a terrible mistake.

“I’m scared of snakes!” she groaned, shuddering visibly, and unfortunately, from where we were standing, snakes were everywhere: colorful ones slithering up the walls, projected against a backdrop of scales.

A miniature sculpture of a berobed figure standing upright, but instead of a wisened old man, it bore a snake head. A wooden bench dotted with red flecks, blue eyes, and a red flag for a tongue, with flattened edges on the crooked body where you could sit. There were gowns with extended pointy serpentine tails and a cape punctuated by rearing cobras, and

sinewy stuffed forms scattered in an artfully arranged pile on the floor. It was enough to give anyone with a genuine fear that dreaded, creepy-crawly feeling.

Bulgari SerpentiForm is the Roman jewelry brand’s landmark exhibition first unveiled at Museo di Roma’s Palazzo Braschi in March 2016. Now it ventures outside of Italy for the very first time, making a stop in Singapore before heading to its next destination, Tokyo.

The move was no small feat and took months in the making, considering that this latest edition welcomes a host of new additions from this side of the globe.

“In Rome, it was only, I think the square meters were 400. Here, it’s more than one thousand—bigger, taller, and more modern,” says Bulgari Brand and Heritage Curator

SNAKE CHARMERS

The eight-room setup concludes with a showcase of Bulgari heritage pieces, some of which date back to the 1950s. Opposite: The 150-piece exhibit includes works from the likes of Keith Haring, March Chagall, and Michael Velliquette.

Lucia Boscaini, who holds an extremely unique position—that of being both a curator and guardian of sorts for the extremely valuable properties associated with the more than 130-year-old brand. “After working on the exhibition in Rome, we realized that the material, the possible content of an exhibition with this topic, is really much bigger than the one we were able to put together. We wanted to enlarge it, as much as possible, especially adding the Eastern culture and artists that were completely missing in Rome.”

The expanded exhibition that debuts in the Lion City is far better for it, with, among the notable additions, stunning, sprawling works from the likes of Japanese contemporary sculptor Motohiko Odani, the aforementioned wooden bench by Misaki Kawai, and a multipaneled opus occupying one entire wall

by Kaneko Tomiyuki. (Tomiyuki’s piece, composed of ink, acrylic, gold paint, and shell powder, has the snake poised in a zigzag coil, eyes fixed on the viewer with a hypnotic stare.

It was so huge and imposing that our poor snake-fearing friend couldn’t bear to linger in the room it occupied.)

Boscaini talks about how the exhibit’s annexed form was a joyous challenge to work on, as she has found new favorites among the added works. In its previous incarnation, she was drawn to the pieces by French-American artist Niki de Saint Phalle, still present here and highlighted in one room. “She had this playful, childish approach, turning a scary kind of animal like the snake into something that you are willing to play with,” she says,

“In Rome, I think the square meters were 400. Here, it’s more than 1,000—bigger, taller, more modern” and Saint Phalle’s bright yellow polyester “Pouf Serpent Jaune” was certainly among the more whimsical, less threatening items on display. But Boscaini was particularly impressed by a submission from Beijing artist Wu Jian’an, titled “The White Snake Hid Immediately.”

It’s a witty name for such a clever and painstaking piece of work; in fact, the ultrafine details are so subtle and obscure that I took one look at it from afar when I saw it the first time before quickly and dismissively walking away. It was Boscaini’s impassioned, animated description that implored me to go back and examine it more closely, this time revealing all of the craftsmanship that had previously been hidden in plain sight. “The White Serpent legend is told throughout the whole body of the snake; it’s full of scenes from the story. And the

BULGARI: SERPENTIFORM RUNS AT THE ARTSCIENCE MUSEUM, MARINA BAY SANDS, SINGAPORE UNTIL OCTOBER 15. SERPENTIFORM.BULGARI.COM

whole artwork is papercut, it’s wax on paper, and it’s super tiny. You have to have a closer look to appreciate the passionate craftsmanship that’s behind it. I truly like it because of the story and the technique used, also because it’s really one of the best examples of past tradition and legend interpreted in a very contemporary language, and this is very much Bulgari—the capability to take inspiration from our roots, from our traditions, but in a very contemporary way.”

The last room in the eight-part exhibit is dedicated to the heritage pieces collected by the jewelry house over the years, including bracelets, necklaces, and watches dating back to the ’50s and ’60s, made out of precious gemstones, enamel, and gold. There are also sunglasses, bags, and belts on display, giving viewers the full scope and appreciation for the evolution of the original Serpenti form.

“We wanted to really offer an immersive experience,” Boscaini explains.

Among die-hard jewelry lovers, the supple, tactile quality of the metal has made the Serpenti the ultimate jewelry crush. Elizabeth Taylor wore it well, dating back to her Cleopatra days, and a new generation of stars like Zhang Ziyi and Bella Hadid have been spotted in it of late. The exhibit opening’s special guest, Alicia Vikander, attended that night’s party in a necklace and earrings from the “Eyes on Me” collection, glittering against her tanned skin as she leisurely circled the exhibition hall. Seductive, slithery, and with an element of danger, the Serpenti is an icon of the jewelry world—even our snake-phobic friend would have to agree.

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The masculine timepiece gets a welcome upgrade featuring bolder shapes, softer edges, and geometric elements. It’s the perfect balance of contemporary and classic MODELS ADRIAN TONGKO OF MERCATOR AND BRUNO KODAMA

BULGARI IS AVAILABLE AT GREENBELT 4, AYALA CENTER, MAKATI; HERMES IS AVAILABLE AT GREENBELT 3, AYALA CENTER, MAKATI; H&M IS AVAILABLE AT SM MAKATI, MAKATI; ZARA IS AVAILABLE AT GREENBELT 5, MAKATI

HERMÈS ARCEAU WATCH, ZARA LEATHER JACKET, H&M T-SHIRT, ZARA PANTS PREVIOUS: BVLGARI OCTO WATCH, H&M PULLOVER, ZARA PANTS

H&M IS AVAILABLE AT SM MAKATI; ZARA IS AVAILABLE AT GREENBELT 5, AYALA CENTER, MAKATI

BVLGARI OCTO ROMA WATCH, H&M PULLOVER, ZARA PANTS

OMEGA AND FRED PERRY ARE AVAILABLE AT GREENBELT 5, AYALA CENTER, MAKATI; COSTUME NATIONAL IS AVAILABLE AT ARCHIVES D’HOMME ET FEMME

OMEGA SPEEDMASTER WATCH, FRED PERRY PULLOVER, COSTUME NATIONAL PANTS

LOUIS VUIT TON IS AVAILABLE AT GREENBELT 4, AYALA CENTER, MAKATI; ZARA IS AVAILABLE AT GREENBELT 5, AYALA CENTER, MAKATI; H&M IS AVAILABLE AT SM MAKATI

LOUIS VUITTON TAMBOUR MOON WATCH, H&M PULLOVER, ZARA JACKET

OMEGA AND FRED PERRY ARE AVAILABLE AT GREENBELT 5; LOUIS VUIT TON IS AVAILABLE AT GREENBELT 4, AYALA CENTER, MAKATI; COSTUME NATIONAL AVAILABLE AT ARCHIVES D’HOMME ET FEMME.

OMEGA SPEEDMASTER MOONWATCH CHRONOGRAPH, COSTUME NATIONAL TURTLE NECK, FRED PERRY X RAF SIMONS POLO SHIRT

LOUIS VUITTON TAMBOUR MOON WATCH, H&M PULLOVER, ZARA JACKET, TROUSERS

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SPREADTHE WORD Montblanc’s latest collaboration with UNICEF is inspired by an age-old symbol WORDS BY JACS T. SAMPAYAN

IN 2004, MONTBLANC began a partnership with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) that raised funds through the sale of limited edition pens.

Backed by a global campaign that had 149 celebrities talking about the importance of writing, the collaboration was a success and kick-started a 13-year run and $10 million in funding for educational programs in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

Montblanc president for Southeast Asia Matthew Dupont was in town to talk about this year’s iteration of the partnership with UNICEF, the “Writing Is A Gift” collection, as well as the brand’s refurbished boutique in Rustan’s.

Tell us about this year’s partnership.

2017 marks a new collaboration and collection with the UNICEF. It is a wide and strong collection with wire watches, writing instruments, leather goods,

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and even accessories that really helps to support some specific programs that fight against illiteracy across the world including Djibouti, China, and Brazil.

There’s a lot to support this year.

Can you tell us a bit more about the design concept?

So you’ll see some colors which are definitely inspired by UNICEF. You’ll see some of our writing instruments or leather goods and accessories that utilize some letter from six major alphabets across the world. We’ve also taken inspiration from the Rosetta Stone, which is a symbol of discovery, civilization, of deciphering and, therefore, understanding. It’s beautifully done. It’s very elegant and functional at the same time.

You’ve recently redesigned your store here in Rustan’s. What’s the idea behind it?

It’s a first in the Philippines. You’ll see that every product category is highlighted in its own “universe,” in color coding and materials. You’ll see use of copper. You’ll see use of walnut wood. You’ll see use of resin, and shinier materials depending on where you are, and what you are browsing.

How would you describe the typical Montblanc user?

I don’t think we have one. That user can be either a man or woman, can be early twenties or older. You’ll see that again this year with our new colors, which appeal to a different, maybe younger audience. Summit, our new smart watch, is very interesting because it doesn’t conflict at all with our mechanical watches. I wear it on a regular basis. It’s a fantastic piece to hold. Every now and then, you know, I change to a mechanical timepiece. They go very well together.

For a brand like ours, it works out.

MONTBLANC IS LOCATED AT RUSTAN’S, AYALA CENTER, MAKATI; 813-3739; MONTBLANC.COM

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REAL MEN WEAR IKAT This year’s MaArte fair boasted the best from the Filipino artisan and offered men a reason to discover what the always-awaited fair is all about WORDS BY CARMELA FORTUNA

FROM THE ROOTS

Filipino-inspired items by Filipi+Inna were among the MaArte fair’s offerings this year.

THE MUSEUM FOUNDATION of the

Philippines, Inc. (MFPI) recently held its annual three-day shopping event, this time at The Peninsula Manila. Also known as the country’s finest exhibition of Filipino craftsmanship and artisanal products— now on its 9th installment—the MFPI put consultants Vicky Jalandoni and Katrina Gonzalez in charge of transforming the hotel’s prestigious The Gallery into an intimate and elegant trunk show. The select 31 merchants showcased their wares in tropical living room vignettes, featuring a range of products including clothes, accessories, furniture, home décor, gourmet selections, and more.

Originally a simple private sector initiative to raise funds for the National Museum, the MFPI prides itself in the MaArte fair’s transformation into a community-driven enterprise. A platform for upcoming microentrepreneurs and a showcase of world-class Filipino craftsmanship, the MaArte fair has become a relevant creative institution bringing together friends, family, artisans, and art lovers.

Ultimately, the MaArte fair has created a community that values and promotes the richness and beauty of Filipino culture, making relevant a craft in a time when it is most needed.

Specifically for men, MaArte at the Pen had

an exciting selection of novel products.

Head designer Marga Fajardo of Stockton Row provided an exquisite collection of hand-made brass rings dipped in yellow gold.

A definite signature accessory, the selection of George Rings came in Black Onyx, Lapis Lazuli, and Mother of Pearl.

Handcrafted and produced in the Philippines, Oscar Mejia incorporates distinctly Filipino elements like sampaguita, camia, rosal, vetiver, and more, into a line of artisan fragrances for men. His selection includes Paradiso (a blend of spiced lemongrass, ylang-ylang, lavender, and opium), Morning Mist (a cool, crisp blend of baby cologne refined by notes of lemon, bergamot, and freshly cut grass), and Sun Soak (an aquatic blend of essential oils of bergamot, olive, patchouli, lavender, ginger, and lime.)

The brand Filip+Inna, which does successful trunk shows here and abroad, combines traditional designs and contemporary clothing to come up with a timeless and unique collection of Filipinoinspired items. Using weaving, embroidery, and beadwork inspired by different indigenous groups in the Philippines, Filip+Inna works with talented artisans across the archipelago to deliver a unique range of hand-crafted men’s shorts, polos, and pocket squares.

SEPTEMBER 2017

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Promotions and releva ant items, direct from our partners

Just Shoe It

Virgil Abloh reimagines 10 iconic Nike sneakers in The TEN

OFF-WHITE CREATIVE DIRECTOR (and Streetwear Man

of the Hour) Virgil Abloh and footwear giant Nike come together for their most epic collaboration yet. Pinch yourself, you’re not dreaming. It’s called The TEN, and it features 10 of Nike’s most iconic shoes, reimagined by Abloh himself.

The TEN is divided into two distinct yet coherent themes.

“Revealing” is designed to look accessible by appearing hand-cut, open-sourced, and reconstructed. For Abloh, this collection articulates a “Just Do It” mentality, rooted in grit and perseverance in realizing one’s own potential. This theme includes the Nike Air Max 90, Nike Air VaporMax, Nike Air Presto, Nike Air Jordan 1, and Nike Blazer Mid. Inspired by the cutting-edge cushioning of Nike Zoom Vaporfly Elite and React Hyperdunk 2017, “Ghosting” employs translucent uppers to bring the collection together.

The Nike Air Force 1 Low, Nike React Hyperdunk 2017, Nike Zoom Fly SP, Nike-owned Converse Chuck Taylor, and Nike Air Max 97 make up this set.

Abloh’s history with Nike began in his teens, when he and

his friends first mailed sketches of shoe ideas to the sportswear brand. Now 36 and based between Milan and Chicago, he recalls being enamored with Air Jordans, and equating Michael Jordan to Superman. “My entire design background and ethos came from the 90s,” he says.

Besides showcasing Abloh’s unmistakable design aesthetic—note the playful text placements on the shoelaces and sides of the sneakers—The TEN also highlights Nike’s seamless design and manufacturing.

“These 10 shoes have broken barriers in performance and style. To me, they are on the same level as a sculpture of David or the Mona Lisa,” declares Abloh. “You can debate it all you want, but they mean something. And that’s what’s important.” —CARMELA FORTUNA The first five icons of The Ten—the Nike Air Jordan I, Nike Blazer Mid, Nike Air Presto, Nike Air Max 90, and Nike Air VaporMax—will be prereleased at NikeLab stores in New York City (Sept. 9-13), London (Sept. 18-22), Milan (Sept. 21-25), and Paris (Sept. 26-30).

September 2017

Edited by

PAOLO ENRICO MELENDEZ

THE SLANT

Issue

113

OPINIONS + IDEAS + PERSPECTIVES

It’s like an accident: you can see in slow motion, you don’t know what’s going to happen, but you just hope you’re going to be okay at the end of it.

Tell It to Me Straight PANEL INTERVIEW BY JONTY CRUZ Last month, Rogue and National Book Store hosted a panel on creativity featuring celebrated director Erik Matti, advertising icon David Guerrero, and breakout journalist Chiara Zambrano. It was kind of a big deal.

TELL IT TO ME STRAIGHT Last August 26, Rogue held a panel featuring leaders and standouts of their respective fields: David Guerrero of the award-winning advertising agency BBDO-Guerrero; prolific and celebrated director of On The Job and Honor Thy Father Erik Matti; and breakout journalist Chiara Zambrano for a discussion on building ideas, creating stories, and the challenges they face today. What follows is the complete transcri y ART BY MAGS OCAMPO

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ROGUE: Did you always want to be in the field that you’re in?

David Guerrero: Actually, I had no idea what I wanted to do. It was a difficult thing to find something that you could do anywhere in the world. I grew up in England, but I wanted to work [in the Philippines], so I tried to find something [and that was] advertising.

ROGUE: Was there any point early on when you thought you’d do well in advertising? Were you thinking of campaigns and slogans when you were growing up?

DG: Yeah, sure. When I was growing up, I started to see advertising being used in political campaigns. That’s what got me interested—I got interested in the idea that [advertising was not just used] to sell products, but to sell ideas. I think that’s the transformation that the industry has made. It’s gone from being a very narrow thing—about selling soap, powder, ice cream—it still does that, but now it also sells choices, it sells attitudes, it sells ideas... It has become more of a relevant industry in this age, in the digital age.

“Nagboom ’yung cinema, pero wala naman nakakapanood. Is it not painful for a filmmaker that you made a film and then kapatid mo lang ’yun nanonood? ‘Ui, ganda ng film ni kuya!’”- ERIK MATTI ROGUE: What would you consider your first big break?

DG: I guess the first big break was just getting a job. I got my first job, actually, in London— that’s where I grew up. I offered to work for a week for free. Actually, for the price of a bus fare. But that, unfortunately, only got me a job for a week. And then I had to start again. Yeah, the big breaks were just about getting jobs and showing up. Woody Allen said 80 percent of success is showing up. So I went to London then Hong Kong. When I got here, I actually came in as a creative director. That was my break coming in here in 1995. And then I’ve just been really lucky, to be honest. It’s luck— being in the right place at the right time.

ROGUE: What about you, Erik?

Erik Matti: I’m from Bacolod. I’m Ilonggo. So I was studying for six years and couldn’t seem to finish college. I was into theater since my first year of college. I just wanted to branch out into something I was more interested in, which was [film.] I’ve done theater, but mostly, I realized that the things I’ve done in theater were mostly more toward cinematic stuff and not really theatrical. And when the opportunity came, I was offered to work in Manila, not even knowing how much I was going to get paid. I moved to Manila in 1993 and I worked my way up, from overseeing continuity to assistant direction, production manager... I went through all the positions.

Back then, I mostly worked for one director, Peque Gallaga. I had an opportunity to work outside also, but I chickened out.

So, I became a director in 1998. Then I went into advertising in 2005 because I fought with a lot of people. (Laughs) So, I was in contract with Viva for eight pictures. They were asking me to do another movie, [but] I did not want to do the movie. And that was the start. They didn’t give me any movie, so I started working outside. And then I got into a lawsuit. I wasn’t working for a year and a half, two years, and so my only option was advertising. (Laughs) DG: A last resort?

EM: Yes, last resort! (Laughs) ROGUE: Erik, you briefly mentioned working with Peque Gallaga when you were starting out. What was that like, being more behind the scenes and assisting everyone?

EM: I think when I started directing, most

of the things I’ve learned came from Peque.

If you want to be a filmmaker, the best way to study a filmmaker is really to become an assistant director, because you’re constantly talking to the director. I worked with Gallaga since 1993, and got my break in 1998, so that’s practically five years of just assisting him on everything.

I got my break directing in 1998 at Greenbelt 1. I had a beeper back then. It beeped and it read, “I have good news. Come to Lore’s house.” Peque has a partner in directing— Lore Reyes. When I got there, he told me he got a deal with Viva to keep on doing films only for P5 million. That’s the total budget. You can do whatever you want with the film. The first two movies already bombed at the box office. So, maybe they were trying to back out from the deal already, and they were looking for a way to get their money back. So they said, “Why don’t you do a sequel to Scorpio Nights, Peque?” And Peque said, “You know, I’m old, I’ve used up all my ideas about sex in the first movie. Maybe you need some young guy to do it!” (Laughs) And he just said, “Okay, I have an assistant director, let’s give him a break.” So that’s how I got the first movie.

ROGUE: Chiara, maybe you’d like to share how you fell in love with journalism, and how you started.

Chiara Zambrano: Growing up, I did not know really what a journalist was. I wanted to become a marine biologist. Kasi may mga kapitbahay kaming mayaman at may cable, and I watched a lot of National Geographic documentaries. I was hooked. I was fascinated. But then I realized that I sucked at math and science. Sa application form ng Ateneo, it tells you, this course requires you to be this kind of student. You have to be good in this and that. I wasn’t good at any of the subjects required to become a marine biologist, so I had to scratch that. I just sat myself down and asked myself, “What is it about being a marine biologist that I really wanted?” And then I realized, after I’d leave our neighbor’s house and go back to my own house, that I like writing stuff down.

I realized that, okay, maybe it wasn’t the marine biology after all. It was actually the story of the biologist, the sharks, the whales, etc. Nag-click na, that was the right thing for me to do. So I took up AB Communication in Ateneo.

ROGUE: Post-college, what were your early years in broadcast journalism like?

CZ: I was up late one night on the internet and an ad popped up saying, “Would you like to be a part of ABS-CBN?” I was like, “Not necessarily,” pero I clicked everything I saw, so ‘yun, it was an invitation to be trained in either production or news.

Pagdating ko sa ABS to apply, naka-board shorts lang ako—kasi mountaineer ako—tapos may puka shells pa ako. Tapos ang haba nung pila nung mga naka-power dress! Ako, “Oh, shit!

I did not think this through!” Tapos dire-diretso na, may exam, may mock interview and stuff. It

was a cringe-worthy moment, for sure.

But, siguro, I Ateneo-ed my way through it. Na parang... the Ateneo way—magis magis, ganun. So, I made it. And then the group— parang out of a thousand, we ended up mga 10—was asked, “Gusto mo ba mag-news reporter or producer?” I really just wanted to write and do documentaries. Being on camera, wearing fancy clothes and putting make-up on, it’s not fun for me. I still really don’t like it. Until today, I still YouTube my way through foundation and powder and stuff.

I started with documentaries, and I loved it—I still love it, which is... mamaya siguro ikukuwento ko na I’m going to be leaving for a while to study that. And that was it. It was just so much fun to explore and experience and learn. I’m sure madami nang nagtatravel ngayon because of the budget flights. ‘Di ba, how fascinating the simplest stories are? From the weirdest people? Or ‘yung mga pinaka-random na manong at manang na makakasalubong mo? That’s what I do for a living. It’s hard, siyempre, but it’s fun. So far, it’s a love-hate relationship. Half the time, iniisip ko: Bakit?

Bakit eto ginawa mo? But most of the time, it’s... sarap. Slow clap for me!

ROGUE: Who were your mentors when you started and what was their most memorable advice?

CZ: I started with a show called The Correspondents. And the people back then, they never really stepped out and said, “I will take you under my wing, child.” Sina Ed Lingao, Abner Mercado, they would just go their merry way, and the thing about them is that they weren’t arrogant. It wasn’t, “’Wag mo nga palapitin sa ‘kin ‘yang bata na ‘yan. Istorbo.” Puro, “Akyat kaming bundok. Sama ka?” Medyo na-aliw sila sa ‘kin na, “Sino ba ‘tong batang nagboboard shorts sa ABS-CBN?” Yung mentorship just came out naturally. They were the guys who taught me not just how to tell stories, but why we should keep telling stories, especially when people are making it hard for you to tell a story. They were the ones who taught me how to do it right. Hindi lang ‘yung pagalingan but the ethics of it. Kung paano ka ‘wag na ‘wag magsisinungaling, ‘wag mangloloko. At kung gaano man ka-tempting, ‘wag magsinungaling, magpaloko, at mangloko.

ROGUE: For each of you, what’s your process like in crafting stories? How do you think of an idea all the way to the final product?

DG: I obsessively check and study everything.

I think the idea is that at the beginning, everyone can have ideas. It’s the execution of the idea that makes the difference. Can you work through the details convincingly and the authenticity of a piece of fiction or something you’re making up? Do you actually believe the details? The story? Can you work it through? Everyone thinks they have an idea, but it’s actually doing it and getting paid for it—that’s probably the real challenge.

Especially now, where there’s zero barriers to entry and everyone can be a filmmaker, everyone with a laptop can be a journalist.

Everyone with access to the internet can

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“It’s not ‘The Chiara Zambrano show.’ Hindi puwede ‘yung, ‘If you don’t like my art, change the channel!’ If you change the channel on me, I lose my job! Intindihin mo ‘yun.” - CHIARA ZAMBRANO do advertising. But can you do it usefully and relevantly and most importantly, will somebody pay you for it? That’s probably the defining barrier. It’s both the good and bad thing about the internet. You have this open access to everyone, but there’s a disappearance of any kind of gatekeeping.

So all kinds of stuff can just come out— things like fake news and such. Everything is changing. We really don’t know where we’re going. But, to go back to the question about ideas, it’s about the execution, it’s about the making of it.

EM: My problem as a storyteller is that I jam so many ideas into my story. There are just so many ideas that you get lost. When it comes to my films, I’m somebody who usually initiates the story—who thinks of all the plotlines and almost always, the structure is a mess, but it only makes sense to me, so that’s the problem. But you do it anyway. I’m doing Buy Bust now with Anne Curtis, and I’m still rewriting everything on the set. I have a writer, but I keep on rewriting and rewriting and figuring things out on the fly while on the set. So the challenge there is to keep the story as organic as possible, and that’s tough. It’s easier said than done, to stay organic. But, it’s really, really hard to stay on the ball and focus on it.

CZ: How do I come up with my ideas? For news, the world comes up with ideas for me, ‘yung kasabihan nga na, when you’re in news, you can’t choose. Kahit na baduy na baduy ka sa isang road accident or domestic dispute, if you’re the nearest guy there, you’re going to have to take that story. Pero a lot of journalists can’t take that, so they end up leaving, shifting careers, kasi they think na

50 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 7

masyadong mababaw naman ‘yung coverage na ‘to. Puro CCTV, saksakan, sapakan, ganyan.

Sunog. Lalo na kapag may pinagtrabahuhan kang investigative na dalawang linggo mong tinrabaho, tapos tatanggalin sa line-up for one reason or another. That sucks, but that’s reality. The challenge for us, for me, if I want to stick around and do this well, is to not deny your audience. Intindihin mo kung bakit ‘yan ‘yung line-up ng news. You have to be humble and understand it. It’s not just a Chiara Zambrano show. Hind puwede ‘yung, “If you don’t like my art, change the channel!” If you change the channel on me, I lose my job! Intindihin mo ‘yun. Understand what they want, balance it out, speak their language.

ROGUE: What are the common mistakes you see in how you do your work, and within the industry? And what are the things you notice that can be avoided?

EM: Personal doesn’t always work. I’ve made that mistake. You come up with a story, and you say that it’s so personal to me, and you protect it and keep it close, pero a lot of times, if you’re not aware of who you’re telling it to, then most probably, you’d end up with something that’s not relevant to anyone.

I produced a personal movie out of my own money, and I never showed it. I showed it once in the Cultural Center of the Philippines.

It felt so personal to me, pero sobrang nipis ng kuwento. Because I was so close to the story, I did not realize that there were not enough layers to it. It wasn’t as complex as it should have been. Malaking problema kung puro personal and that, I think, is the problem also with independent cinema now. We’ve been here, what, 12 years na, ever since Cinemalaya

started. Siyempre, independent cinema was way before that, but ‘yung parang naging kilala siya ng mga tao was when Cinemelaya started.

Hindi pa natin napush ang sustainability ng Philippine indie cinema, mainly because everyone is just interested in “I will tell my own story. Fuck you if ‘di mo mapanood, ‘di mo maintindihan ‘to! Akin ‘to! Importante sa ‘kin ‘to!” So mahirap, parang paulit-ulit, back to zero palagi ‘yung indie cinema. Distribution is a problem, too.

DG: Don’t believe your own bullshit. I think the antidote to that is to work harder than you need to. Ask for criticism, not for praise.

The other problem I see a lot is people playing it too safe. People think the way to success is to do what has been done before.

That will be the safe thing. Actually, people don’t really want to see the same idea over and over again. They think there is a certain comfort to a formula, but you need to push for originality, authenticity.

The thing is to research the hell about what you’re doing. Make sure that you’ve really understood the whole context of it.

Look at other ways to innovate. There are too many mistakes, I’ll probably offend a ton of people, but those are the ones I can think of.

I think it was the guy on Saturday Night Live who said, “It doesn’t go out because it’s finished. It goes out because it’s 10:30 on a Saturday night.” The deadline can be a lifeline. The fact that you have a deadline is going to make the thing happen.

CZ: Yeah, the deadline kind of rules the world for us. And your boss will say that very bluntly. “Wala akong pakialam kung Atenista ka, kung ikaw ang pinakamagaling magsulat dito.

Kung late ‘yang [story] mo, hindi ‘yan e-ere.”

The other mistake is that because of the deadlines, you come to work with templates in your pocket. Parang, hmmm, this requires Template C. Tapos fill in the blanks. It becomes impersonal and mechanical. A lot of people still do that. It does the job, they write much faster than I do. Editors love them for that.

But they hate me kasi ako ‘yung palaging late.

“Nasaan na naman ‘yung [istorya] mo?” But I can’t do it that way, and we shouldn’t.

ROGUE: Where do you think your respective industries are at now and what should we be looking out for?

DG: What’s happening with advertising right now is that everything is happening online.

It’s been going on for years, but essentially now, we’re moving from an age of broadcast to, theoretically, an age of interaction and two-way communication between brands and audiences, publishers and audiences... you can see that in Facebook where it’s turning into a sort of default media channel for advertising. That’s good in some ways, but also a lot of unintended consequences arise from that.

We’ve all been pretty much concerned with this problem that people only read what they want to read, they hear what they want to hear. They create their own filter bubbles, so they make friends [with people] who like the things that they like, they never

see any opposing views, so their news feed ends up reinforcing their opinions rather than changing anything. There’s hope that we can get beyond it, but right now this ideal of objective information is under threat. We don’t really know what we’re reading or who we’re reading it from. It’s like advertising has become the most honest thing you can actually see. Because we have to deal with a system of self-regulation where you can’t really say something overtly false about a brand or situation. Whereas in news, sometimes it can just be completely made up online.

I think [that’s] what we’re doing about it— trying to tell good stories, creating projects that do good in themselves, and getting brands that do actual things in the world beyond advertising, to actually create useful things for people. A few years ago, for Pepsi, we had the bottled lights initiative, where we helped communities without access to light or electricity, and that did well. It’s those kinds of activities that brands get to do beyond going on billboards or putting out commercials but actually doing useful things for people. Those are the challenges that we’re facing. It’s a constant struggle to try and make things that people want to engage with and are useful to people, that will make people happy. Those are the issues I can think of—this complete transformation of media, it’s kind of in slow motion now but you can sense it. It’s like an accident: you can see in slow motion, you don’t know what’s going to happen, but you just hope you’re going to be okay at the end of it.

EM: Currently, sa films, our main problem is distribution. But beyond that, aatras pa ako, it’s not just distribution. It’s really being able to show as many types of films in our cinemas. Andyan na ‘yung argument lagi ng indie vs. mainstream, pero hindi naman ‘yun ‘yung point, eh. The main point really is, we need to show as many kinds of films sa cinemas. Right now we’re stuck with the same kinds of stories. Of course, chicken and the egg. We’re stuck with the same kinds of stories, but those are the same stories that also make money. As long as the demand is there, a lot of the producers come back to the same kinds of stories. They’ll tweak it a bit, modify it a bit, pero practically pare-pareho lang siya. That’s where we are right now.

Personally, I am in this fight because my movies are not the kind of movies that are shown in the cinemas. I’m lucky that in the last 4-5 years my movies get wide releases, but there are a lot that deserve wider distribution, deserve to be seen by many. And I think timing ‘yung talk na ‘to, kasi Pista ng Pelikulang Pilipino is showing right now. Pista earned probably P140 million. One hundred million of that went to just one film. Hindi niya kasalanan ‘yun na kumita siya. But again, the remaining P40 million is divided by11 movies. Ang liit nun. Maliit ang kita. And Patay na si Hesus probably made the most money out of the 11. If Patay na si Hesus got P20 million, so that’s P20 million left divided by 10 films. So ‘yan ‘yung mahirap. It underlines

the idea that indie cinema is not marketable, it doesn’t make money. Why are you asking us for more distribution circuits? Pero, we all knew, the industry people knew that August is the Ghost Month. It’s a bad month. Nobody shows; if you want to kill your competition, you show the movie in August.

So ‘andun ‘yung problema. Of course, the audience has to demand for different kinds of films, not just the same kinds of movies.

Nandun ngayon ‘yung cinema natin. We don’t know in the next few years what’s going to happen, there’s so many Filipino movies being made, don’t get me wrong, it’s not like konti ang ginagawa. So many movies, that not a lot of them are being seen not just locally but internationally. A lot of the local films are hoping for international festivals, but there’s just so many Filipino films being made that even the international film festivals don’t have enough time to see them all. Nagboom ‘yung cinema, pero wala naman nakakapanood. Is it not painful for a filmmaker that you made a film and then kapatid mo lang ‘yun nanonood?

“Uy, ganda ng film ni kuya!”

CZ: People who do documentaries usually have some kind of yabang against people who do news. I also felt the same, that’s why I didn’t switch to news until I absolutely felt I had to, just because, creatively, it wasn’t for me. But I’m glad that I decided to also shift to news without necessarily letting go of documentary, kasi it made me really understand the value of it, of updating people, informing people. It’s a minor miracle na makabuo ka ng isang newcast. Feeling ko milagro

na siya, kasi never ka magkakaroon ng araw na madali. You come to work with a story, you have an idea of how it might turn out, but it never turns out that way. Bigla na lang, a simple interview can become a shouting match, or your exclusive suddenly, magbaback out ‘yung interviewee mo, something like that.

And people will lie to you. I thought we were all taught by our parents to tell the truth and not hurt others. There are so many evil people out there! And they will try to lie to you but through me. So it’s my job to not be stupid, so that they don’t get to you.

Especially now with fake news and with social media and the internet. And with our audience, mahirap din for them to discern what’s real and what’s fake. “If it comes out of a fancy screen, it should be true, right?”

Ang hirap nilang pigilan, ang hirap kausapin na hindi po ‘yan totoo. Hindi ako dilawan, hindi kita kaaway!

Lalo na sa Marawi, it’s hard enough to not die and to still be on-cam for the newscast.

And then you go online and you get all that hate. “Dapat hindi niyo pinapakita ang position ng mga soldiers!”, “Ang tanga-tanga n’yo, ABS-CBN!” And you’re not even sure anymore if you’re speaking to real people. Is this a troll? Is this a very angry person that I need to engage with? Doon ko narealize that it’s important to stick to what we do, and not fall into the trap of just engaging with hate. There are lots of people who don’t want to listen.

They just want to intimidate you or piss you off. You just have to keep on doing what you’re doing.

SEPTEMBER 2017

51

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IT’S A DAY BEFORE MY DEADLINE FOR THIS ESSAY and like my younger self, I am cramming—the way I used to for homework and studying—to get this done well and to my liking. Or rather, to get this done great and to my loving.

So after traveling two countries and four cities (all in a week, and not for transit), it’s only apt that I am writing this Letter to My Younger Self back here in my bedroom in Manila. I also haven’t written a personal essay in years, by the way.

When I was asked to write this article, my first reaction to it was, “I don’t really have anything to tell the younger me except that it’s never too late because everything you didn’t do before, you’re doing now.” But in the course of my travels and house cleaning, I realized that my thought process about this didn’t have to come from that perspective.

I can imagine, as many would, there are those things we always wanted to do but haven’t yet (in my case, to sing in a band), but life goes on, and I say “never say never.”

I can probably start by reflecting on the things that I’m glad I did and began when I was in my early teens. At this, the first two words that immediately come to mind are sports and design.

My love affair with sports began with football during my first year in high school.

I’m proud to say that we were part of the first ladies team sent to Sweden and Norway to represent the country. It was also the first time I had a taste of traveling alone with friends, far away from home. In addition, health-wise, sports was also what cured me of my chronic asthma. When I wasn’t busy training for football, I went to the gym and learned how to box. That was 26 years ago before boxing became fashionable and more usual for women (here, at least).

Everyone asked me, “Isn’t that for guys?”

And I would say, “Yeah? I don’t think so.”

Having begun fitness at an early age made me stronger in so many ways. Today, I can attribute muscle memory, more efficient weight loss, and better lungs to sports and my healthy lifestyle in the past. So, thank you, Younger Mai. Simultaneously, I dove deeper into design, where I first began at 13 with a hand-painted white t-shirt collection for Shoemart, followed by a few more collaborations after. At 18, I officially discovered graphic design and received my first Mac desktop computer.

I was always into the arts, and liked designing and making clothes. But then I would discover later on my passion for accessories. So I studied, worked, and focused

on that field which I continue to do until today.

Graphic design has been my constant companion and advantage with every transition I’ve made in the creative field— from fashion to my tech startup today.

During those teenage years, there was apparently the “it” girl phase as well, when I did back to back magazine covers in an age and time when the words social media didn’t even exist.

I never thought that being the “it” thing was an achievement, given that it’s pure genetic lottery with no real solid contribution to society. I therefore could never be (and was never) proud of this “title” or description. My opinion about this has remained the same throughout all these years.

At some point, I moved to Italy when I finished college. Statement of fact: after having made that decision, I matured tenfold, and developed a level of gratitude that only real, hard experience can teach. I strongly believe that this is the tendency at some point when you leave a comfortable, loving home, and most especially, when you bear your own children.

I gave birth in 2009 to a beautiful daughter, who is my life. The rest is history, and time continues to move forward, bringing forth new things in my life.

You see, at the end of the day, I am that same person as before in many ways. I still never lose control, I was and always have been cautious about my actions, and have always remained a very private kind of person.

Regrets on dangerous habits and addictions? Nail-biting for decades, and selfdiagnosed tricotillomania at a certain point.

But for the rest? Nah, never even tried.

What I can say today is that the person I have become is one who is less afraid, and certainly much more confident. I am very pleased to say that my young “me” would actually have been proud if she could only see me now.

I certainly would have told her to travel more, work in different places, explore, suffer, expose yourself more, and get married at a later age, and only when you’re done with doing all of that.

I would tell her that what I’ve done and achieved in the past four years probably covers 15 years worth of experiences she had gone through in her past life. That’s how fast things have been going for me in the recent years. Changing, adjusting, struggling, adapting, compromising, making important

life decisions, but only moving forward, while taking note of even the smallest triumphs and accomplishments.

By the way, on a lighter note, I cut three inches of my hair the other day here at home with my mom’s office shears. The yaya freaked out because none of it came out straight at the ends (of course) so I asked her to finish off what I had started.

“Relax, hair will grow back,” I said. And that was the exact same reply I gave to everyone when I shaved a portion of my head in 2014. It was something I really wanted to do, but naturally didn’t go out of my way for until the opportunity presented itself.

There is a saying in Italian which I love and try to remind myself of all the time, “i problemi sono altri,” which means in its whole sense, “Problems are other things, but not this.” In many ways, I live by this reminder.

I would have told my younger self that she made such a huge fuss about things in the past that just bothered her so much, which today, I would consider useless and a walk in the park. Things like, this person said this and that, someone took things from my room without permission, a friend who said she would call but didn’t, an opinion expressed to me which I’d taken as an insult (hey, we are all different, and may have different opinions about certain things), or even the times I should have said something but didn’t, and I allowed this to nag at me for months.

Some of those things caused me so much unnecessary stress and unhappiness. I wish I had known better, and when to let go.

Yes, at 40, I am a better version of myself.

And you, Younger Mai, would not only have been pleased with yourself, but also quite shocked at how your life has turned out.

But I say this to you: you needed to be the way you were in the past. This is our story, and because of this, you have paved the road for me to become a truer version of myself, which in turn, has been a reflection of all the choices I have made until today. The path I walk would not have been made possible if you had been different, and for this I thank you for everything as I have become wiser and even more determined to work towards my goals and the things I would still like to achieve.

So, 20 years from now, when I am 60, if I were asked again to write another letter to myself, not only would I look forward to it, but it would surely be even longer.

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THE

RIGHT HAND

“Easy is not a word I would associate with working in government,” says Finance Secretary Carlos “Sonny” Dominguez. One of President Duterte’s oldest friends and the man who helped spearhead one of the most historic presidential campaigns ever, Dominguez now has his sights on the administration’s controversial tax reform.

Claire Jiao spends a holiday afternoon with the Secretary and learns that while far from easy, for Dominguez, the hunt is indeed on.

P H O T O G R A P H E D

B Y

T A M M Y

D A V I D

This is how it all began.

Carlos “Sonny” Dominguez III remembers it was late in 2014, and all was well in Davao. So well, in fact, that when former President Fidel V. Ramos visited, he asked then-Mayor Rodrigo Duterte if he would consider running for higher office.

Duterte wouldn’t, but Dominguez thought the idea wasn’t too far-fetched. A man for numbers, he could see the odds were in their favor. At the start of 2015, Liberal Party standard-bearer Mar Roxas was cornering just 3% of the national vote; in a private survey Dominguez helped conduct, Duterte was hitting 4%.

“So I said, ‘You know, this guy, Roxas, has been running for the past five years, and he’s only at 3%. You haven’t been running, and you’re at 4%,’” Dominguez recounts telling Duterte. “Why don’t we just see?”

The two men grew up together in Davao City, living on the same street, sharing the same school bus, and attending the same classes.

When Dominguez talks, Duterte listens.

The proposal was a trial run. Duterte would go around Mindanao for 90 days—just 90 days—making public appearances and meeting supporters. Then they would see how it would affect his numbers. He polled at 10% right after.

They did another 90-day stint, this time travelling across the Bicol Region. Duterte went up to 15%.

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Another 90-day run, another jump in ratings, that was how they went. Little by little, until they were convinced they had enough to mount a full-fledged campaign.

After five decades in business, running and turning around as many as 20 companies during his career, Dominguez was nothing if not a calculated risk-taker.

He went on to become the campaign’s treasurer. But with limited funding and a long road ahead, Dominguez wasn’t so much managing the money as he was setting down strategy.

They ran a targeted campaign, focusing only on critical voting blocs where they felt they could build grassroots support: Mindanao, Central and Eastern Visayas, and Mega Manila.

Dominguez crunched the numbers. Mindanao was 23% of the vote, and they should be able to get about 65% of that through their strongholds. Visayas accounted for 21% of the vote. They could win over the 65% of them who spoke Bisaya, just like Duterte. And in Mega Manila, worth 23% of the vote and the battleground of all the presidential candidates, even just 40% would do.

“So, that’s where we campaigned,” Dominguez says. “First of all, we didn’t have enough money to do it. But by concentrating, that’s how we won.”

Whether it was a strategy made by choice or forced by circumstance, it was the one best placed to win a presidential election where the spoils had to be split five ways.

The voting results show that where Duterte won, he won big.

In Mindanao, 23 of 27 provinces supported their local hero. While most of Visayas turned out for Capiz-born Roxas, the provinces he didn’t win all went to Duterte, such as Cebu, Bohol, Southern Leyte, Leyte, and Biliran. And in Metro Manila? All but one local government unit voted for Duterte. Only Makati went for its former Mayor Jejomar Binay.

THE NUMBERS WERE just part of the story. While Duterte was going around the country to shore up the numbers for his presidential run, a tragedy hit close to home. A botched police operation in Mamasapano,

IN THE BEGINNING

Dominguez’s first forray into politics was under the cabinet of President Corazon C. Aquino. It was a cabinet full of intrigue, egos, and one-upmanship.

Dominguez says of his time then. “I made a lot of mistakes then, okay? You sort of don’t want to make the same ones again.”

Right: Dominguez taking his oath from President Aquino in 1987. Also in attendance were his wife, Cynthia, and children, Rafael, Mary Edwina, Ignacio, and Xavier.

Maguindanao led 44 Special Action Force (SAF) troopers to their deaths. What was supposed to be the swift extermination of a terror target became the single deadliest raid in the history of the Philippine National Police (PNP).

Worse, the operation was fraught with irregularity. Then-President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III let PNP Chief Alan Purisima handle the Mamasapano operation even though he was suspended at the time.

The acting police chief was kept out of the loop, along with Roxas, the Interior and Local Government Secretary at the time. And perhaps most damning of all, the SAF failed to coordinate with the military so reinforcements never came.

Dominguez believes this was the turning point, both for Duterte and the many Mindanaoans who backed his campaign. “That kind of event should not have occurred. Certainly the reaction of the government of that time was not adequate,” he says.

Even when their campaign was just getting underway, the Mamasapano massacre gave them the resolve to try anyway.

They wanted to make sure nothing like that would happen again under their watch.

Dominguez says Duterte didn’t have to win to do that. He just had to run. “I said this to him… ‘Why don’t we just establish the fact that you are the leader of Mindanao and the Cebuano-speaking people? If you achieve that, no president can do anything in the south without asking your permission.’”

King of the South, that was the original goal. But by the time May 2016 rolled around, even the North had come to bend the knee.

I ask Dominguez if he ever imagined they would get this far. He says, “You know, [Duterte’s] just an ordinary guy. All he wanted to be was the city prosecutor of Davao.” He stops and breaks into a laugh, “He never made it, actually. He was only assistant prosecutor!”

Duterte likes to dig into Dominguez too: like how the businessman always got the 95s while he barely scraped through with 75s. He eventually got kicked out of high school, and Dominguez went on to become valedictorian. He jokes now, “O, tingnan mo nga naman ang buhay. Trabahante ko ngayon!”

They’ve come a long way from childhood antics, though.

Dominguez turns serious and it’s clear to see how strongly he believes in his friend.

There is a reason why Duterte has never lost an election in his life, he explains. The President is single-minded in his work, and that makes him effective—lethally ff so. In many ways, it is similar to how Dominguez shaped their campaign strategy. The Duterte administration focuses on areas where they know they can deliver the most results: poverty reduction, law and order, peace and conflict resolution.

As Dominguez puts it, “If you try to be all things to all men, you will not succeed.”

IT’S A RARE breed of politico who can plainly say they cannot give you the world and will not bother to try.

But Dominguez isn’t a stranger to politics, much less high-stakes politics. He has been around long enough to see presidents come and go faster than their ambitious platforms can take root.

Today, he heads Duterte’s economic team as the Secretary of the Department of Finance. His career in government, though, started 30 years ago, sitting as one of the key members of President Cory Aquino’s Cabinet.

Dominguez was the head of the BPI Agricultural Development Bank then, but he accepted Cory’s offer ff to helm the Department of Environment and Natural Resources and later on, the Department of Agriculture.

The country had suffered ff decades of environmental ruin under the Marcos dictatorship. Loggers ran amok and trees were cut down at an alarming rate. Immediately, Dominguez put a stop to logging: forests were put under government protection, log exports were banned, and sawmills suspended or closed.

Dominguez recalls the pains of the job. “You were like a policeman.

You’re stopping people from cutting illegal logs… You’re fighting everybody, including the military.”

But under his leadership, deforestation slowed from a high of

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“I’m always getting sick now because I don’t smell enough gunpowder.”

210,000 hectares per year in 1969-1988 to just 88,000 hectares per year in 1991.

Agriculture was another matter altogether. Cory envisioned agriculture to be a lifeline to the bleeding economy. But the industry was all but paralyzed, with cartels managing everything from sugar to coconut, fertilizer to cargo.

However, if that situation was painful, the remedies were much more so. The journey towards a market-oriented industry eventually raised farm gate prices and farmer incomes. But to get there, the government had to remove price caps, privatize harvest facilities, and allow imports to compete with local produce—all highly unpopular measures at the time.

Dominguez did what he could to ease transition pains. He established a loan fund so farmers could get access to financing.

Livelihood programs trained farmers’ organizations in management and marketing. Councils were also set up in the municipal, provincial, and regional levels so farmers could have their say in major policy decisions.

Cory made these successes possible, Dominguez says. They wouldn’t have survived the pushback if it weren’t for her steely commitment to the reforms—not just in the Agriculture and Environment departments, but all across the new government. She knew she had to right the ship after Martial Law, bar none.

Dominguez points out that in many ways, Cory is similar to Duterte.

An intriguing comparison since the President and the Aquinos have been repeatedly pit against each other since the toxic 2016 elections.

“Cory was very single-minded as well. She had one goal. She wanted to restore the institutions in the Philippines which were totally destroyed, and she did it,” he says.

“She did not say she would make us prosperous. She did not say that she would put chicken in every pot or increase people’s incomes.

She never said that. She said, ‘I will reintroduce democracy in this country,’ and she did.”

I suppose for people who have seen up close the inner workings of government—its great potential and its even greater pitfalls—respect, once given, will always cut across party lines and personal allegiances.

“Cory was really unique in our history, and we are so fortunate that we had her as President,” Dominguez says.

“She sacrificed the life of her husband—and her own. I mean, she could have just said, ‘What the hell. I’ll just go live in the States.’ She liked it there, didn’t she? I believe she really liked it. Nice life, nothing to worry about. But she chose not to do that.”

It’s National Heroes’ Day when we talk. He says, “That’s what heroes are made of. We should remember that.”

THE TASK DOMINGUEZ faces today is no less daunting. The Department of Finance wants to overhaul the tax system on a scale that hasn’t been seen in this country since 1997.

The system has long been ripe for reform. Filipinos pay some of the highest income taxes in Asia, with the government collecting as much as a third of our salary. Dominguez wants this brought down to 25% and the first P250,000 of salaries exempt from taxation.

“Automatically, that puts P20,000 in your pocket. Automatically.

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That is what we estimate people pay for the first P250,000,” he says.

The income tax cut will be a huge loss to government revenue. To offset this, taxes will be raised elsewhere, particularly on fuel, cars, and sugary drinks. Some value-added tax (VAT) exemptions will also be revoked.

“But you know,” Dominguez is quick to remind, “you get P20,000 in your pocket! So that should cover expenses like that.”

The expectation is that the income tax cut will increase take-home pay for all Filipinos across the board. Raising other taxes then shifts the burden on those who tend to consume more, presumably the wealthy.

However, the poor will still take a hit in one way or another: jeepney drivers who use diesel for their vehicles, families that use kerosene at home to cook, laborers who substitute energy drinks for meals to get by at work. Socialized housing and cooperatives are also among those that will lose their VAT perks.

Worse, there is no additional P20,000 for the poor; they’re already exempt from income taxes as they earn minimum wages.

The Finance department assures they will be given special assistance. It’s proposing as much as P2,400 a year in cash transfers to the poorest families to defray their costs.

Dominguez prefers this method because the government can be assured they go directly to beneficiaries. VAT exemptions were initially crafted to help shield vulnerable sectors from taxes, but he claims they have since been misused and abused.

For example, cooperatives were granted VAT perks precisely to help their poor members. Today, they’re being used by wily taxpayers to save their businesses a few bucks.

“Do you know there is a cooperative flying school? Have you ever heard of that?” Dominguez says, exasperated. “They just disguise themselves as a cooperative to escape the VAT. Some hospitals also—you go in a patient, you come out a member of the co-op of the hospital. Come on! That’s not really what it’s meant for.”

Still, the tax bill barely scraped through at the House of Representatives. It was approved by lawmakers on the very last day of Congress’ regular session—and only after President Rodrigo Duterte personally backed the bill. Deliberations are ongoing in the Senate, but Dominguez is optimistic the bill can still become law before the yearend.

DAYS LIKE THIS, Dominguez misses working in the private sector.

As chairman or CEO, whatever he says goes. This allows a company to jump at opportunities as quickly as possible.

“For instance, this tax reform. We have to do it now because we are in a Cinderella moment. Interest rates are low. Oil prices are low.

Inflation is very mild. So we might as well take advantage of the situation,” he says.

“If we don’t, it’s not going to be like this again. If there’s anything I know, it’s that things will change.”

Government, however, is far, far different from the private sector.

Dominguez admits learning this the hard way during his time as Agriculture Secretary.

“I made a lot of mistakes then, okay? You sort of don’t want to

BROTHERS IN ARMS

Beyond political allegiances, there is a unique kind of trust that can only come from childhood friendships. The bond that President Rodrigo Duterte and Sec. Sonny Dominguez share has led them from the playground to The Palace.

make the same ones again. I’ve realized that working in government is working as part of the team,” he says.

And “team” doesn’t just mean the Finance department, the economic cluster, or the Duterte administration. “As part of the Philippine team, you have to take the concerns of the legislature into consideration as well. There’s no such thing as free rein.”

Dominguez is convinced that if he can just make lawmakers see the end-goal of tax reform, they will pass it into law.

The tax measures are expected to raise roughly P250 billion in additional revenues for the government every year. This will go a long way in paying for much-needed infrastructure in the country.

The Duterte administration wants to complete up to 5,000 projects during its term, including roads and bridges, airports and seaports, an entire logistics network in Mindanao and even a possible subway in Metro Manila. However, this vision of a “golden age of Philippine infrastructure” will reportedly cost the government more than P8 trillion until 2022.

The pay-off may be far into the future, but Dominguez knows how to lie in wait. It’s a trait he gained from hunting, his favorite pastime.

Whether it’s out in the plains of Mongolia or deep in the forests of the United States, Dominguez can wait hours—even days—for a clean shot at prized game. For the deadliest animals, you only get one shot.

If you don’t bring them down first, they take you down with them.

“I find it very challenging,” Dominguez says of hunting. “It’s one activity that if you want to do it well, you have to clear your mind of everything else.”

It’s the same laser focus—the same single-mindedness—he tries to emulate as he pushes this game-changing tax package. He knows that if he succeeds here, all else will follow; and if he doesn’t, none of the other economic reforms will stick.

It’s been a while since he’s been able to go hunting, Dominguez rues. “I’m always getting sick now because I don’t smell enough gunpowder.”

He’s been hunting ever since he was a boy. As a child he would play around town with a BB gun in hand and, “By the time I was 12, I had a .22 caliber rifle!” But despite trips around the world hunting the wildest beasts, the Secretary recognizes that his game these days, while less dangerous, comes with a much greater cost.

The spotting scope he uses on his trips now just sits in his office. I ask him what he’s watching. He swings the scope toward the windows overlooking Manila Bay and points it toward the port area. Smiling, he answers, “Customs.”

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The Lo It Happened At

obby

Amidst changing times and competition, and through seven Philippine presidents, the Peninsula Manila lobby remains the beating heart of Manila society, a bastion of elegance in a rough and tumble nation. On the occasion of its 41st year this month, Jerome Gomez drops in to listen to its pioneers and gatekeepers tell the stories of illustrious guests, misbehaving visitors, coup attempts, and causes cÊlèbres

You would know what kind of money is fueling the economy just by looking at the Peninsula lobby.

“Now, it’s mining,” says the indomitable Evelyn Lim Forbes, sitting next to me at fine dining hub Old Manila. Having spotted familiar personages from the mining industry outside the glass doors, she concludes, “It’s back.” If we are to follow the textile magnate’s cue, treating the Pen lobby crowd as economic indicator, we might have reason to declare that the tita peso is good and strong, too. The entire Forbes-Dasma-SanLo contingent of women has turned up, exchaging besos before (or after) burning some cash at The Gallery, the hotel’s usually inaccessible third floor veranda, where the weekend bazaar MaArte Fair is holding court. “I just saw the entire Zobel clan come in,” Lim Forbes adds, espying Sofia and a gaggle of girls walking toward the hotel lift.

Ah, the Pen lobby. You can tell the state of society just by looking at it: the changing tastes and protocols, who’s seeing who and who’s making them jealous. Remember Coco Martin punching Matteo Guidicelli because of Maja Salvador after the 2011 Star Magic ball? How about Jeremy Renner’s brief stay, causing the orders of coffee to shoot up owing to the fans staging their personal vigils by the lobby? People watch people here, even if you’d like to think they’re only around for halo-halo or arroz caldo. You don’t show your face in these parts if you don’t want to be seen; some celebs would opt for the hotel’s secret back entrance. You can’t expect Lim Forbes and other highly opinionated habitues not to turn you into some sort of signifier for the state of the peso. Here, important deals have been sealed, weddings planned, and coups plotted. It is the enduring epicenter of Manila society, the Peninsula, and arguably Makati as a whole. “This is a place to see and

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be seen,” says Mila Magsaysay Valenzuela, or Mrs. V, daughter of a Philippine president, and the hotel’s first PR director.

“If there’s one word I could use to describe the lobby—for me, ha— magical,” says Rosary Ysmael, who worked under Mrs. V for many years as PR manager. “The minute you come in, you already feel the magic. You’re elevated!”

It’s certainly one of the city’s most pleasant-looking spots, to put it mildly: with its classical interiors, its dramatic staircase, the way natural light enters through its many glass windows, bathing the marble walls and floors in a kind of beatific glow. “It is architecturally perfect,” says Lim Forbes, daughter of the late Patricio Luis “PL” Lim, half the visionary duo that built the hotel—the second half being the industrialist Charlie Palanca. “Second, it has that architectural integrity—you built space without columns in the center. It has never been done!” Then there is the sunburst sculpture by National Artist Napoleon Abueva hanging from the ceiling, looking over the immense lobby space—perhaps the biggest in Asia—its tables and chairs, the potted palm trees elegantly towering above the day’s multitude. On a very good day, you can spot a maya perched on one of the high window ledges or tiptoeing on the lobby carpet.

It wasn’t always this way. When the hotel opened in 1976, around the same time its now-defunct neighbors the Intercontinental, the Mandarin Oriental, and the Manila Garden began operations, it was initially meant to service the many foreign delegates coming over for the International Monetary Fund conference (14 hotels opened that year for the same purpose), but not everyone was pleased with how

MAKING A SPLASH

The exterior of the Peninsula Manila, built quickly in 1976 to welcome the delegates of the International Monetary Fund conference. Below: the present look of the hotel, a commanding presence facing two major arteries of the Makati business district. Opposite: the Pen lobby of yore, with the chandelier insiders liked to call an upside down cake.

IN FULL SWING

The Pen lobby was as much about its welcoming ambience as it was about the people it welcomed. Clockwise, from top left: The first and only party that closed off the lobby was that of businessman Enrique Zobel on January 7, 1978; Pen founder Patricio Lim with then US Secretary of State Colin Powell, who received a standing ovation when he walked into the hotel lobby; Then First Lady Imelda Marocs, President Ferdinand Marcos and then GM George Fraschina entering The Peninsula; Zobel during his 50th birthday celebration, with then GM Giorgio Bongulielmi and family matriach Mercedes Zobel McMicking; a news clipping that announced the opening of the Peninsula in Manila despite bad times in mothership Peninsula Hong Kong; Lim in one of the hotel’s New Year’s Eve parties. Opposite: An exetrior photo of The Pen; a news clipping about then Makati Mayor Nemesio Yabut ordering the management to submit final construction plans or permit to construct would be cancelled; Bongulielmi and Zobel.

“The vision was that the lobby was going to be the place to meet, [where people go] to see and be seen,” the lobby looked. While the hotel was meant to echo the design and appeal of the lobby of the Peninsula in Hong Kong, Ysmael recalls, “Everybody called it the Grand Central Station. It was massive. It was so high, so bare, there was a lot of marble. Then we had those brown chandeliers. They call it the Egyptian tomb [an upturned one, because of its shape]. Very dark color. The furniture was green. It really looked dark and without character.”

But since it had just been built, a renovation was out of the question. What it needed, as the ladies of the PR department smartly decided, was a marketing and press relations intervention. Inspired by its counterpart in Hong Kong, the Manila office borrowed their mothership hotel’s tagline, “See you at the Pen,” which would appear in blue and silver bumper stickers around the city, as Valenzuela and company facilitated print features and fed the newspapers with press articles. “The vision was that the lobby was going to be the place to meet, [where people go] to see and be seen,” Valenzuela recalls.

The vision came true, of course, and over the years, owing to the people who would grace its halls, the Pen lobby would acquire a certain legendary quality. The first party to ever be held in the massive space was the 50th birthday celebration of Enrique Zobel, the esteemed businessman and polo player. Attended by everyone who mattered in Manila society, it was the only time the lobby was closed for an occasion—with the party area, as per Valenzuela, cordoned off ff by stretches of sampaguita.

The Pen’s early years were the Marcos years, and First Lady Imelda would arrive with her bus-full of Blue Ladies and walk into the lobby.

They would almost always proceed to the supper club Quimbaya and make their way to the lobby after, with Madame ordering another round of her drink of choice: a harmless calamansi soda. Because the country was under martial rule, and a 12 am to 4 am curfew had been imposed, the Pen lobby was a convenient nesting place for the city’s partyphiles wanting to dodge being questioned by the PC in the Manila streets. It was—and still is—after all, the only hotel restaurant establishment that offered ff 24-hour service.

Even moviefolk favored the place. Armida Siguion-Reyna used to hold court at the lobby every Wednesday. Richard Gomez was a regular. The actress Chanda Romero once told me she used to hang out here with director Mike de Leon and a few friends. Romero would

recite monologues from her younger days in Cebu, and this would inspire de Leon to use them as part of the actress’ character Jenny Estrada, a prostitute, in the classic film Batch ’81. Through the years, the lobby has become the preferred venue for post-awards celebrations. “Ate Vi,” HR manager Noel Silva says, referring to Vilma Santos, “every time she wins best actress, whether it’s MMFF or FAMAS, would even call—well, not her personally but her assistant—would alert us that her group will be coming.” And so a number of the square tables would be pulled together in anticipation of the party’s arrival.

There would be groups that would meet there regularly, for years, earning them the tag, “The Lobbyists.” A group of Swiss nationals, among them the jeweler Hans Brumann, would have its luncheon sessions every Thursday—no fail, up to this day. “There was this guy, the one with the fake MMDA ID—his son grew up here in the lobby,” off ff rs Silva, unwilling to divulge names. “He would bring his son here every day. From school, he picks him up, brings him here, in his school uniform—for years!”

“Until he became a binatilyo [and he stopped going],”” says Ysmael.

“Siguro nahiya na siya dito mag-homework.”

“If you pinpoint an age and you live here in Makati, everybody has a memory of this hotel. You came here for your Christening, you came here for your birthday, there were very few choices to go to at that time,” says Lim Forbes, who used to join her father when he did the rounds of the hotel premises, its kitchens and back offices. “This was my living room!” she says of the lobby.

The National Artist Federico Aguilar Alcuaz, who famously lived at the Manila Pavilion from 1968 to 2011, the year he passed on, would come late at night with his small keyboard and play the instrument from his chosen table, never mind that the Las Gitaras, or the Peninsula Strings, were still in the middle of their set at the mezzanine. “We would always tell him to stop if guests complain,” recalls Ysmael. If no one complained, they let the painter do as he wished, as long as the volume was somewhat controlled.

In the years to come, the Pen lobby would indeed become, as Lim Forbes suggests, a signifier of some sort: of what’s going on in the

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MEET ME AT THE PEN

“It was massive. It was so high, so bare, there was a lot of marble," recalls former PR Manager Rosary Ysmael of the old Pen lobby, shown here with a view of the musicians at the mezzanine.

Dulce had a concert here once pre-People Power. Without the hotel people knowing, she included "Bayan Ko" in her repertoire. The lobby audience stood up and raised their fists as soon as she sang the nationalistic song.

“It was a PR nightmare.”

Some of the writeups, [Silva] recalls, were “totally insulting but so well written, so witty, so funny!” country, of fads coming in and manners flying out the window, of one’s place in society. One of the more famous in-house adages that came to be during the early years of the Pen would spring from a group of writer-journalists who frequented the Makati wing to the right of the front office—the preferred side of the nation’s politicos. This group included Joe Guevarra, Max Soliven, Zacarias Nuguid, Ike Joaquin, sometimes Carmen Guerrero Nakpil, and Doroy Valencia, whose daughter was the in-house newsstand concessionaire. “I think it was Joe Guevarra who wrote,” Celis recounts, “‘If you’ve made it, you stay on the right side, the Makati wing. If you’re on the left side, the Ayala side, you’re still trying hard to get there.’”

IN OVER 40 years of the Pen’s existence, it hasn’t been all chirping

birds and marble walls bathed in light. The establishment has encountered all sorts of personalities: the stingy Argentinian, a regular customer, who insisted on being served only by one specific waiter and that waiter alone; the illegitimate son of a mayor who pointed a gun at Silva after the then-front desk officer asked him for a deposit.

And then there’s that one legendary exploit involving a popular figure of a famous 90s bar in the business district. The story goes that he came to the hotel happily intoxicated, and before entering the premises peed on one of the foo dogs that flank the hotel’s entrance doors. After making his way through security and into the lobby, the guest proceeded to give someone a quick blowjob under one of the

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tables. It became the loudest whisper in Manila society at the time.

What boggles the naughty partyphile’s mind up to this day, however, is that people were more concerned as to which foo dog he offended: the right or the left.

If the head-giving story was gossip fodder for weeks, a nighttime brawl involving some of the country’s esteemed opinion makers would be the subject of many an op-ed column for months, even making it to the tabloids. It happened in December 1996. Ysmael begins her account: “They had come from the launching of the Heritage Library across the street, and they were all enjoying themselves: Teddy Boy [Locsin], Joker Arroyo, Conrad de Quiros, Adrian Cristobal, the bigwigs!” The power group was having a few laughs, unmindful of their surroundings, when an American guest of imposing build stood up from a table across them, clutching his can of Diet Coke, and approached their party. Addressing Locsin and company, the American, after slamming the can on their table, blurted out, “What’s so funny, wiseguys?”

And a fistfight ensued, with a cast that featured what would turn out to be a Korean war veteran—the enraged American—and some of the country’s most influential thinkers, set in the classiest, most elegant real estate in town.

“I don’t know who started it,” Ysmael offers, running the scene in her mind and looking short of breath. “All of a sudden, Peter Schori, then F&B director, a big guy with a Saddam Hussein moustache, who was doing his rounds, sees the brawl, saw this guy under the table, on the floor, and tried to stop the fight.”

“How dare you! Don’t you know who I am?” the American, panting, asked Schori.

“No, I don’t know who you are,” the hotel personnel replied.

Depending on who you ask, the American either fled the scene after the encounter, or the F&B director made sure he was safely tucked into a taxi, conscious that the guy was still a hotel guest and deserved nothing but the most proper treatment. “Before you knew it, [police] picked up Mr. Schori and brought him to the Makati presinto,” continues Ysmael, who would follow Schori with another F&B staffer, Mark Montesa. As soon as they arrived at the precinct, the media was on site, ready to confront with their recorders and video cameras.

STEEPED IN HISTORY

The Pen’s former facade. “Our edge is history, emotion,” says Evelyn Lim Forbes, daughter of founder PL Lim. “The feng shui of the hotel was worked out by the Hong Kong people.

More than a luxury hotel, you did business here, you did serious things.”

TROUBLE AT THE PALACE

In 2007, the Antonio Trillanes-led Magdalo group trooped to the hotel to call for the stepping down of then Philippine President Gloria Arroyo. The rebel soldiers took control of the second floor lobby, while outside, by the entrance, a couple of tanks from the Philippine armed forces waited, the Philippine marines behind them. Opposite: the Pen lobby in its present form. The mayas are still around, and have never disturbed the guests, except at one point in the past when the GM put traps for the birds. “The GM was having breakfast, with a big papaya [on his table],” recalls former PR director Mila Valenzuela. “Guess what dropped on his papaya, a big drop of stone.”

“The press lambasted us for months,” recalls Magsaysay, who boasts a thick compilation of everything that was written about the incident.

“Anyone who could wield a pen ganged up on the Pen,” says current PR director Mariano Garchitorena.

“They said we were favoring the puti,”” Ysmael recalls. “Teddy Boy was so angry. They said, ‘Why didn’t [the hotel staff] even get his name?!’”

“Araw-araw nasa diyaryo kami,”” says Silva. “It was a PR nightmare.”

Some of the writeups, he recalls, were “totally insulting but so well written, so witty, so funny!”

“Sorry, Schori, you must go,” a headline in Max Soliven’s Philippine Star went, accompanied by a caricature of the F&B chief that made him resemble the famed Iraqi dictator.

“The guy was intimidated,” recalls Valenzuela. “He got threatening letters. He had a son in British school, and one day [Schori] just disappeared.” Arroyo, then Makati legislator, demanded Schori be deported.

The Swiss national would eventually turn up in Hong Kong as manager for a private club, and the writeups, in time, would come to a halt. “The late Art Borjal, sabi niya sa’kin, ‘You cannot win. That’s media.

Just let it quiet down and fade,’” says Valenzuela. “And it did, but we really got a lot of flak there.”

NO OTHER HOTEL lobby would be witness to the country’s political

upheavals the way the Pen lobby bore witness to them, and you can’t tell the history of the hotel itself without mentioning the two coup attempts that took over the establishment for two brief periods in the last two decades: the first one by the Reformed Armed Forces (RAM) in 1989, and the Antonio Trillanes-led mutiny in 2007. Recalling the events, Lim Forbes appears to have not, until now, fathomed the very reasons the Pen had to be the preferred setting for these events. “Some idiots that wore uniforms thought that taking over a hotel would be tantamount to asking a government to step down,” she says, wondering. “What is it about the Pen that equates it to the seat of power?”

In ’89, during the Cory Aquino administration, the hotel’s then general manager Nicklaus Leunberger got a call from one of the RAM members telling him to vacate the lobby of diners and that guests be sent to their rooms. The only ones ordered to stay were Leunberger himself and Director of Customer Service Montserrat “Monzie” Uy, who immediately called her friend from the military and asked for intervention. “Please do something, I’m gonna die here!” she remembers saying on the phone, amused now at the memory.

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“I’ll give them all the food they want, anything they want, just don’t make them come!”

But the rebels showed up and the hotel staff ff and guests would be holed up in the hotel for the next five days. There were tanks around Makati and snipers positioned in buildings. Inside the Pen, the Old Manila and Chesa became sleeping quarters. The lobby was a mess.

Everyone was told to keep away from the windows or they would be shot at by snipers. “Anything that moved, we will shoot,” went the warning. A guest who dared to part the blackout curtains was shot but survived. During one inspection, remembers Silva, he spotted a girl sobbing in a corner. “‘Yun pala anghelita dela noche [lady of the night],” says Silva. She was crying because, first, she couldn’t go outside, and second, because the hotel guest who had sought her services only booked her for one evening, and not the remaining four. “Lost revenue,” Silva adds, laughing at the memory.

During that difficult period, Uy and Silva would pray the rosary every night, with Uy intermittently dozing off ff from lack of sleep.

The staff ff would go on with their normal duties despite the unusual situation, looking out for the guests, serving food, even “ransacking” the hotel newsstand for those who had run out of cigarettes. Hence, when the government sent buses and the hotel guests were finally allowed to evacuate, they refused to leave. “They said, ‘No, we leave with the staff,’” Silva recalls, proud of the memory. It was then decided that for every couple of guests, a hotel staff ff could also be freed from the premises. “There were 650 guests and 250 employees,” remembers Valenzuela. “It happened on a weekend so we had a skeletal staff. We made it to the international news because of the way it was handled by the hotel.” The guests were so grateful to the hotel personnel that they passed a hat around the lobby. “Some of them had even come back on a sentimental journey,” says Valenzuela.

The hotel would make it to international news again in November 2007, this time on the front page of The New York Times, when Senator Trillanes and his Magdalo army, on trial for their taking over the Oakwood hotel in Makati in 2003, trooped to the Peninsula and led a

mutiny in a bid to oust then Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. Valenzuela, who had already retired from her PR tenure, would find out about the takeover through a call from then Inquirer editor-in-chief Letty Jimenez Magsanoc. “Hoy, may nangyayari sa hotel mo,”” Valenzuela remembers the late journalist saying. “So I called [the hotel] to talk to the PR.” That day, many of the hotel staff ff were in Tagaytay for a team-building seminar.

“What’s happening?” Mrs. V asked Garchitorena on the other line.

“They’re here in the lobby.”

“Do they have guns?”

“Yes.” “What do they want?”

“A function room.”

“Get them a function room and get them out of the lobby,” Valenzuela recalls saying.

The soldiers were given the Rizal function room, and they would soon take hold of the hotel’s second floor. The Philippine military would send their batallions to crush the mutiny. Armored vehicles would appear just outside the lobby, with a host of Philippine marines behind them. A quick gunfire exchange would take place. And before dusk had settled, it was over, with Trillanes and Lim surrendering to arresting officers, and the rest of the mutineers exiting the premises by 5:30 pm.

“They [mutineers] did not raid the bar, they did not take any silver.

They were very courteous,” Valenzuela recalls being told. Days later, it was business as usual for the hotel, the lobby bright and pleasant as if nothing had happened.

More than two decades before, the Peninsula had also been caught in the nation’s political fervor, though not in the same terrifying circumstances that involved tanks and high power rifles. In the few years before the Marcoses were kicked out by People Power, with the country in a political tempest, a small event in the lobby would paint a picture of how politically divided people were at that time. Doroy Valencia, the newspaperman very much associated with the Marcoses, was a regular at the lobby. But on one occasion, as he walked in to hold

court at one of the tables, he would feel very unwelcome.

Valenzuela recalls, “It was Martial Law, ‘di ba?? I don’t know what event that was. He came in with his friends, and everybody looked at him. And I don’t know who the culprit was but Efren Martin [who played strings] was playing upstairs and somebody went up there and asked him to play ‘(How Much Is) That Doggie in the Window,’” referring to the Patti Page ditty, an obvious move to taunt Valencia, who was known as tuta ni Marcos. A crowd would soon surround the newspaperman until someone would pluck him out of the scene and bring him to the Pen’s buffet ff restaurant La Bodega. “I think he was most embarassed,” recalls Valenzuela.

The story doesn’t end there. Martin, the musician, reeling from the stress that playing “The Doggie Song” created, decided to play an antidote: the classic “Dahil Sa Iyo” by Mike Velarde, famously the favorite song of Imelda Marcos. Suddenly, there was the clanging of glasses and utensils from the tables. It became so loud that Valenzuela had to intervene. “Please stop that!” Mrs. V admonished, her voice halting the noise. “Aren’t we living in a democracy?” Of course, during that period, the answer was no.

Up to this day, the mezzanine musicians still whip out Imelda’s signature song on occasion, and it usually indicates that the grande dame has arrived in the building. “It still amazes me that the musicians automatically play her song when she walks in the lobby,” says Lim Forbes.

Not that it’s a hotel directive.

“They can feel it. I will turn around and she’s there.”

She was a fan of the hotel, Mrs. Marcos. She would bring the tall and elegant American pianist Van Cliburn to the Peninsula and introduce him to Valenzuela. She was in Chesa, one of the hotel restaurants way back, the day Ninoy Aquino was assassinated, the ex PR offers.

Valenzuela vividly remembers, on one occasion, the First Lady telling her, “Mila, I like your hotel because with one sweep of the eyes, you can see everybody.”

“And I thought,” says Mrs. V, perhaps knowing full well the image of the Ostentatious One, “‘Everybody sees you, too.’”

73

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“I’m going to have cake later,” Iza Calzado says.

It is 11 AM on August 12. It is Iza Calzado’s birthday. She is at Elev8 Lagree Fitness Studio, a new gym inside a building in BGC that is still technically under construction.

Iza has just recently started working out at this gym, which specializes in Lagree, an exercise routine that might be accurately described as “really intense pilates.”

“I’m going to have cake,” she says, while stretching out on one of the machines.

“Yes, you are,” says Janie, the trainer.

“You deserve it.”

Iza has taken to Lagree because it just takes 45 minutes, and in spite of its intensity, it’s a pretty low impact workout. She used to do Crossfit, but she’s found that those workouts don’t fit well with her current schedule, which involves shooting four days out of a week, with shoots lasting well into the night.

“Sometimes a shoot lasts until 3 AM. When I was younger, I could stay up and then do my workouts. But now, it isn’t the same.”

Apart from Lagree, Iza has recently started doing Zumba. She’s tried hot yoga. She talks enthusiastically about all the different kinds of exercise that she’s tried, about how great they make her feel. But there is no mistaking the change in tone when she talks about the possibility of having cake for once.

The last time Iza Calzado had cake was in March. She was about to go on another diet, and she let herself indulge a little bit before the next few months of carb austerity. Some time between then and now, she had some gluten free banana bread, but no one thinks that counts.

The workout is as intense as advertised.

Lagree is 45 minutes of physical torture that involves holding a lot of positions that most human bodies don’t seem to be designed to hold. It is the kind of workout that elicits sounds from people that don’t seem entirely civilized.

At the end of the workout, Janie, the trainer, puts on The Beatles’ “Birthday.” Prem, another one of the trainers, prances into the room with a cupcake. There’s a candle on it.

The class gathers around Iza, who then blows out the candle. Pictures are taken. Hugs are received. It is a happy occasion.

But Iza does not take a bite of the cupcake.

It isn’t time for cake, yet.

“I’VE ALWAYS WANTED to have a kiddie

party,” she says. “I never had parties when I was a kid.”

She says that with just a tinge of resigned sadness. She mentions offhand the kind of childhood she had, but doesn’t really elaborate. This is not the day for that. She talks instead about all the other plans she had for celebrating her 35th. She wanted to go to Hong Kong to have dim sum, but she wanted to bring her younger stepbrother along, and he doesn’t have a passport yet. She talks about friends wanting to drink, but how she doesn’t really drink much herself. She knew she wanted to celebrate somehow, but plans weren’t really coming together. This party almost didn’t happen. It’s something that was just thrown together a week before, with a close friend promising to help organize the whole event.

Iza Calzado is the type of person who actually likes to make a big deal out of her birthdays. She openly admits to getting a little miffed when people she’s close to don’t match her enthusiasm. The other night, she apparently got a bit mad at her boyfriend Ben for not showing up on set of the TV show she’s on.

She explains to several people throughout the day that this might be her last chance to have a party like this for herself. When she becomes a mother, she feels, it would be a little strange to throw a children’s

party for herself.

It’s quite the production. Iza ended up inviting too many people. There will be lechon, and sorbetes, and cotton candy, and several cakes. There will be live music. There will be a professional photographer covering the whole party. There will be a swimming pool, and all manner of inflatable objects inside said pool.

“Yes, it’s stressful,” she admits. “But it really makes me happy to have all these people around. I really wanted to invite everyone.”

“I can’t imagine what my wedding will be like,” she later says.

When Iza gets home to her Makati condo, there are balloons festooned around the kitchen. Ben is there, with food bought from the nearby Salcedo weekend market. It’s some of Iza’s favorite foods: some chicken tapenade, some poke, and waffles. One might interpret this as Ben trying to make up for not showing up on set the other day. And one might even be right.

“I forgive you,” Iza says a little later, when Ben says that he’s going to skip playing tennis today. She tells him to go have fun while she sets up for the party. Ben, for a moment, looks unsure if this is what she really wants.

WHEN IZA GETS to the venue, her friend Candy is there with her kids, setting things up. Austin, the 20-year-old boyfriend of one of Candy’s daughters, is blowing up an absurdly large unicorn pool toy. There is talk of getting a pump, but the young man seems to have already fully committed to the challenge of using only his lungs to inflate this unicorn.

It is raining lightly. Iza speaks directly to a higher power, asking for some consideration on her big day.

There is a lot to do. She has to figure out

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where to put everything. There’s going to be a sorbetes cart serving ice cream. She’s brought in a crew from Fatburger to serve onion rings and fries. There’s going to be a cotton candy vendor, and a cart that will serve up cold brew coffee and iced tea. This is all apart from the real food of the party, which will all be kept in the air-conditioned clubhouse of the venue. There will be pasta and pandesal and a station where you can mix up your own polvoron concoction.

For now, the clubhouse is where they’re preparing the games that will be played later.

There are palayoks, most of them filled with candy, one of them filled with powder. The one with powder is meant for Ben, a little prank from Iza. There is pasabit. One of them is going to be for the men at the party, another for the women. There are shaving razors and deodorant along with the standard snacks on the men’s pasabit. On the women’s one, a roll

IZA RETURNS HOME to take a shower and get

all dressed up. Her regular hair and makeup people are there waiting when she arrives.

There is also a lady there to do her nails. It’s a whole thing.

There is a small room in the condo that is basically just Iza’s closet. There’s a full vanity in there as well, in front of which Iza has spent countless hours being made to look like the artista that she is.

“This is my room,” she says.

Recently, Iza has gotten into promoting body positivity. She’s working with a group that organizes talks, trying to get into high schools with events that will hopefully teach young people to appreciate their own bodies.

“It’s really around that age that it all starts.

It’s better to talk to them while they’re young.

“I’ve been wanting to get back into doing things like this. I was actually depressed for a while after winning the award in Osaka.

I started wondering what I was doing all

sure she looks good before she steps out.

“I can’t change the entire industry,” she says. “But I can talk to students. And I can tell them how their words affect others.

“I believe body positivity is also about making choices that are healthy for you.

That’s part of loving your body.”

It’s not hard to tell just how much this issue has affected her throughout her career.

As the pedicurist scrubs the calluses off of Iza’s feet, she talks about how she decided to just stop thinking about them. “I already have so many issues with my body. It’s one less thing to think about.

“If I didn’t have to think about money, my ideal scenario would be just doing films and plays, and the occasional guesting on soaps,” she says. As much as she still enjoys the work, she struggles with the schedules of a regular TV show. It’s a common refrain in the industry, and even with recent progress made in keeping to reasonable hours, the demands

of cotton hangs alongside a can of Pringles.

There’s one for the kids, too. That one just has the snacks.

Later, a piñata arrives. Inside is what appears to be a box for a computer case.

A long golden horn sticks out of the cardboard on one of the sides, indicating the whimsy inside.

A foot pump eventually arrives to help inflate the rest of the pool toys. Austin tries to use it at first, but then goes back to blowing things up on his own. Without the aid of tools, he ends up inflating a doughnut, an ice cream cone, and a rainbow. These items are then brought out to the pool, adding a touch of whimsy to this high-end Makati condo pool area.

Iza surveys the pool, and worries that there are enough things floating around. “With me kasi,” she says, “I believe that more is more.”

She pauses. “With Ben, it’s less is more.”

“It can be a problem,” she admits.

But the rain has stopped. The sun comes out. Iza does a little dance, unable to contain her happiness. This is turning out to be her day, after all.

88

of this for. Is it to win awards? Or could I be doing more?”

She’s already been meeting with brands, hoping to get them to sponsor this initiative. In her dream scenario, she’ll be able to organize events for at least three schools.

The irony of her situation is not lost on Iza. She works in an industry that has done plenty to foster negative attitudes regarding body issues. One need only watch any local comedy for a few minutes before a person is derided for being fat, or too thin, or too tall, or too short. The industry as a whole has contributed to a toxic culture that places pressure on women to look a certain way.

And as an artista, Iza is deeply aware of this.

She is part of the industry, but also a victim of that culture. Being in the public eye means her every weight fluctuation is subject to scrutiny. And there are always detractors who seem determined to let her know every time she looks puffy or gained a little bit of weight.

Bliss, the movie that she did that won her that award in Osaka, is so much about that.

And here she is, on a day of celebration, spending some time in a tiny room, making

of TV production continue to take their toll.

“But this is the gift I was given,” she says.

“And I really like acting. I don’t think I want to do anything else.”

A little later, Ben arrives. He’s just played tennis, and it seems to have done him some good. Iza tells him to start bringing the wine to the venue. It is already past 4 o’clock, and some guests have already arrived. Ben is going to have to entertain people while Iza finishes getting ready.

Just before he leaves, some flowers arrive.

“Is this from Mabolo?” Ben asks the deliveryman. He’s a little confused, because there are two flower arrangements being delivered.

“I got these for her from Mabolo,” Ben says.

He gestures toward another basket of flowers.

“Those are from Leni Robredo.”

“Now I don’t think she’ll even notice mine,” he says jokingly.

IT ISN’T RAINING, but it’s gotten pretty hot. The invitations told the guests to bring swimming clothes, but no one’s in a hurry to jump into the pool. It’s mostly the kids who are out there. It’s a kiddie party, after

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“I started wondering what I was doing all this for. Or could I be doing more?”

all. The adults wearing swimwear look a little uncomfortable.

Most of the adults are hanging around the air-conditioned clubhouse, chatting idly while they wait for Iza. The Fatburger stall is already serving onion rings and French fries, so people are munching on those for the meantime. Everyone, particularly the kids, is already eyeing the table of cakes. Ben is telling everyone that Iza will be down soon.

The guests are a pretty eclectic mix. Iza travels in a lot of circles, and they’re all represented here. There are showbiz people and press and fashion designers and musicians.

And of course, there’s family and friends.

Janie, the trainer from Elev8, is there as well.

Iza arrives in a white, polka-dotted party dress. Her next hour is spent floating from guest to guest, thanking them for coming and chatting with them about all manner of things. Iza seems to genuinely enjoy this part.

She seems so happy to just see people show up for this party. She revels in the company of others, lighting up with every greeting and every hug, the love and the attention the real birthday gift.

The food is eventually served, and people are forced to go to the tables outside. There, they are serenaded by an acoustic combo, singing covers of pop songs. Iza isn’t eating quite yet. She’s picked up some onion rings, but she’s still busy entertaining. She is asked more than once when she and Ben are going to get married, because this is what happens at parties. Later, when it becomes time to play the games, she’ll be holding the microphone, directing all the action. She has to coerce the men in the party to take part in the kiddie

games. She tells them that there’s real money in the pasabit. Amidst snacks and men’s toiletries, there is a one-thousand-peso bill.

The pasabit goes about as well as one would expect. As soon as the men get their hands on the frame, they basically tear it apart. The women do the same. The kids don’t quite have the same arm strength, but they pull it off eventually.

The palayok is next. A succession of volunteers takes swings at a clay pot filled with candy. At a regular kiddie party, there would be a frenzy after the breaking of the pot, but adults aren’t about to go scrambling for candy. The kids, who are mostly busy swimming, eventually catch on that there’s candy to be had, but since they don’t have too much competition, it remains a pretty relaxed affair.

Ben is told to do the last palayok. It is filled with powder. This goes according to plan. He takes a mighty swing, and it gets all over him.

The last game is the piñata, and Iza does it herself. The piñata is shaped to look like a unicorn, and it is also filled with candy. Iza foregoes the blindfold, and just starts taking swings at the thing. It is a strange sight, a grown woman taking swings at a cardboard unicorn with a golden foil horn. The unicorn takes a few hits before breaking. Its point of failure is the neck, so people are treated with the visual of candy falling out of the decapitated head of a magical creature.

Soon, it is time for cake. Ben and Iza stand at the center of the clubhouse, surrounded by the attendees. The room sings “Happy Birthday” to Iza, and then she blows out the candles on one of her many cakes. Someone

yells “bend a knee,” at Ben, because this is also what happens at parties.

Iza takes her first bite of cake since March, and she actually does a little dance.

She will have more cake over the course of the night. There will actually be more cakes arriving. At 10 PM, she receives a giant tower of cupcakes from Vicki Belo. The stand is shaped like a giant cursive “B,” and will have to be picked up by Dr. Belo’s staff the next day. The cupcakes are chocolate, with a sweet sugar frosting.

Iza has carrot cake. And chocolate cake.

And rainbow cake. She has as much cake as she can have because tomorrow, she won’t be at a kiddie party, and there won’t be any cake. At best, there will be gluten-free banana bread, and nobody thinks that counts. Her trainers will tell her that she deserves to have cake every now and then, but Iza will likely choose to deprive herself for a while. And she will do this while trying to fight for kindness and consideration while working in an industry that seems to work actively against those things.

For now, however, she is with friends and family. They’re singing songs and playing games and talking about all the things that they love. The acoustic combo is taking requests, and her friends all take turns singing. Rajo Laurel kicks things off with Eraserheads’ “Magasin.” Later, Iza and Karylle Tatlonghari sing “California Gurls” together.

For the moment, at least, Iza Calzado is having the time of her life.

And there is cake. Lots of cake. It doesn’t matter what tomorrow will bring. For now, there is cake to eat, and that’s enough.

91

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are indulging Rogue in a bit of role-playing.

For the day’s shoot, they portray a couple of rowdy hotel guests preparing to crash a party.

The bed is in shambles. A trail of rejected outfits is strewn on the floor. An empty pizza box is left by the nightstand. The guys fake a pillow fight. They run through the corridors.

They take the fire exit instead of the lift.

Finally, they open the imposing doors of Salon de Ning, whose regular nightly crowd is a little older than Araullo and Collins, who, if you blink from a certain distance, could still pass for a couple of kids off to prom: she in her frothy, powder blue debutante dress, her hairstyle echoing the staple Pinoy grad perm; he in a tailored suit jacket, still giving off campus figure vibes despite the grown-man beard and his 34 years.

Together, they call to mind Joseph GordonLevitt and Zooey Deschanel in 500 Days of Summer, two geeky charmers headed for love’s adventures.

Except the day’s exploits—solely being played out for the lens of photographer Shaira Luna (another charming geek)—have nothing on the journey recently embarked on by the young actress and current affairs show anchor. The two star in the most-awaited film of the last 18 years, Citizen Jake, Mike de Leon’s return to cinema after his 1999 Rizal ouvre, Bayaning Third World.

The new film, expected to turn up in theaters within the year, inspired by the events and de Leon’s personal sentiments sparked by the results of the 2016 elections, is not a romantic comedy—no, not at all— although Araullo and Collins play a couple in it. There will be none of today’s pillowfighting or party-crashing shenanigans to look forward to. Attempting a gist of the plot, which up to now remains a puzzle to most, Araullo says, “It’s the story of a journalist who sets out to solve a crime and in the process, learns something dark about himself and his family.” If one were to base it on the early sneak peek that came out a few months back, Citizen Jake is one of those weighty dramas, and Araullo, alternately brooding and angry in it, is playing something close to home: a journalist, a hat he’s worn for years in ABS-CBN before bowing out of his news reporting duties late last year.

Call it an exceptional case of FOMO, how

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Araullo and Collins ended up saying yes to the highly intimidating but understandably beckoning prospect of working under the director de Leon, he with the reputation of untarnished brilliance and legendary artistic temper. All of de Leon’s feature films—with the exception of the komiks drama Hindi Nahahati Ang Langit (which is nonetheless held in high regard by critics for its deft approach to the melodrama)— consistently figure in every list of best films in local cinema. As Araullo puts it, de Leon’s “batting average is perfect.” Reason enough for the young man to take the huge and highly peculiar leap from being a news reporter on national TV to playing a news reporter in a movie.

“He doesn’t like it when we talk this way about him,” the debuting actor says, referring to de Leon, “like he’s some kind of genius or mythical beast, when I say that I accepted the project because it is Mike De Leon. He gets uncomfortable but it’s the truth. So sabi ko [when he offered it to me], ‘I’ll give it some serious thought,’ and I did. And even though it was kind of unorthodox for a media person or a reporter to act in a movie, I went for it.”

The decision was not easy. He had bowed out of his tasks in Bandila and TV Patrol when the call from de Leon’s camp came September last year. The offer caught Araullo off guard, to say the least.

“I never wanted to work with a professional actor in Citizen Jake, not even the best ones,” says de Leon in an email when asked about working with Araullo. “I was intrigued by Atom’s profession, his interests, impressed by his intelligence and keen mind—although I must admit that later, it became a cause of concern for both of us.”

De Leon in those early days had given up on another project, a family drama he was fleshing out with writer Sarge Lacuesta, which was getting too big in scale, and would therefore take up too much energy from the director, now 70. The videographer Jason Tan, who was originally part of the film’s creative team, gave Araullo a call, saying de Leon was working on a new film about “social media, journalism, with a touch of politics.”

De Leon was wondering if he could help out with the story, which was envisioned to shift back and forth from fiction to documentary.

“But Jason also mentioned that Mike was interested in exploring if I could be part of the cast. Medyo wild ‘yun,’” Araullo recalls, laughing. He agreed to meet with the reclusive director. They ended up talking for two hours.

To this day, it still boggles his mind how de Leon could be so cool about it. “It’s like picking a random person walking on the street and telling him, ‘You will be my star for my comeback movie,’” Araullo says. “At the back of my mind, iniisip ko, ‘Hindi ba tayo kailangan muna mag-audition?’ But he was sure so it was both surprising and flattering.

And also an opportunity that I couldn’t pass up, ‘di ba?”

UNLIKE HER CO-STAR, Collins, who before Citizen Jake had only done one film, went through an audition—but not without hesitation. “Because I didn’t think I would get it anyway. But when I read the piece, I really liked it,” she recalls, sitting beside Araullo at one of the plushly decorated booths at Salon de Ning, having a shot of happy hour whiskey like her co-actor, looking, as her director would say, luminous (“I don’t know why but she reminded me of Isabelle Adjani in The Story of Adele H,” says de Leon. “Of course she hadn’t heard of it but took the time to watch it.”)

“I was really worried because it was really intimidating working with them,” continues Collins. “I have a lot of respect for Atom and Direk Mike as well. I was not always sure of what I was doing [in the audition]. There was a lot of doubt for me during the process.”

“I was initially skeptical when she first auditioned because she looked very tisay— even Caucasian—and I remember thinking, she probably can’t even speak straight Tagalog,” de Leon recalls of meeting Collins.

“But she had obviously prepared for her reading. She read with Atom and spoke Tagalog with a slight accent but nothing that couldn’t be fixed in the shoot, and I was immediately very impressed. She came across as a very honest, sincere person and this was reflected in the genuineness of her reading and later in the honesty of her performance.”

By the time Collins walked in to audition, Araullo had been entrenched into de Leon’s writing team, and there was a clearer idea for the story’s direction. “We were really blown

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INSIDE THE PENINSULA’S ROOM 1107, ATOM ARAULLO AND MAX COLLINS

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away because of how good she was in the audition, we had to rewrite the character a bit to fit with Max,” says Araullo. Their vision of Mandy, Jake’s girlfriend, didn’t at all look like Collins, a Fil-Am whose father is an American of Irish-Italian descent. “Mandy in our heads was kind of homely, but if you have a person like Max….” he trails off, then says, “Actually that’s more a challenge for Max because she had to dress down a little.”

THE FILM WAS mostly shot in Baguio, a special locale for the director who owns a house in the City of Pines, famously the principal setting for de Leon’s Kung Mangarap Ka’t Magising (the room of Christopher de Leon’s character in the 1977 film is now the bedroom of Citizen Jake’s titular character).

While Araullo would spend an extended number of days in the mountain town, Collins had to make the uphill trip every other day because of commitments in Manila. It took a while before the two got comfortable in each other’s company, the way they are now, months after shooting has wrapped.

“I thought he was an asshole, parang masyadong feeling ‘I’m so smart, you’re not on my level,’” recalls Collins. “He will be really quiet in a corner and so I asked him, ‘Are you always this serious?’”

“I just thought you didn’t want to talk. I didn’t want to bother you,” he tells her.

“He’s actually really funny. He tells jokes but actually doesn’t hit the punchline—but he’s funny.”

They laugh.

“I kept getting into Max’s inner circle,” Araullo says. Whether it’s true or not, it’s enough to raise one of Collins’s perfectly shaped brows.

“They would go out and drink and wouldn’t invite me,” she says.

“As if you’d come,” he shoots back.

As the veteran of the two, Collins, who already has several TV dramas to her resume, is all praises for the performance of Araullo, who tends to be self-deprecating, considering his lack of experience in the acting game. (“Mike is highly selective with the people he works with,” I say. “Until I came along,” he replies.)

The Mike de Leon set is a famously quiet one, its staff kept to a minimum, a group composed of people who have earned the director’s trust over a number of projects. In Citizen Jake, however, he has chosen to work with a completely new staff, while keeping a couple of old hands like Cesar Hernando, his production designer for Kisapmata and Batch ’81, close by. The almost private atmosphere helps de Leon focus while keeping his surroundings manageable, and the intimacy was beneficial for his actors Araullo and Collins, whose first scene together, a kiss,

took several takes—but mostly because de Leon wanted to shoot it from many different angles.

“He was so private about his set, and passionate about his work,” observes Collins, shifting to a hushed, reverential tone when talk turns to de Leon. Even before meeting him for the first time, she made sure to familiarize herself with her director, reading up on his history and watching his movies.

“The whole set was really well thought out, he’s the one who designed everything, all the details were very intricate. Just to see him at work was an honor… He’s really a fearless director, everything that he wants to happen is what’s gonna happen. At the end of the day, he’s the lion of the jungle.”

DID THE FAMOUS temper show up on

the Citizen Jake set? Some people who have previously worked with de Leon acknowledge that he is not the easiest, most predictable person to work with. But they are also very careful—almost to the point of protectiveness—when it comes to talking about on-set episodes that may put the director in an unpleasant light.

“It comes from a place of respect,” explains Araullo. “Working with Mike is a unique experience, but everything considered, it’s still very positive. I’m sure Max feels the same way. We’re very lucky to have this opportunity, and most great things come out of a really strange and arduous experience. If it were a walk in the park, it won’t be that great. The fact that it’s such a struggle for Mike to make this film and for the other people around him…” He trails off again. “We all support him, of course.

I found out through making this film that it’s a very stressful environment, the movie set. I understand where [the temper is] coming from and you see the results. And it’s hard to focus on that part of his character without considering all that he’s done. And it’s overwhelmingly positive as far as his contributon to cinema is concerned.”

For his part, de Leon is not frugal with kind words for his actors. He’s admitted before that a big part of why his films were critical successes was because he had the great fortune of working with gifted thespians—among them, Charo Santos, Hilda Koronel, and the late Mark Gil and Jay Ilagan.

Of Collins, the director says, “On the set, she didn’t seem to mind or care about my ‘unapproachableness’ because we did have quite a few interesting conversations, mostly about her love of acting... I am really hoping that she gets bigger and better roles in film.

If I could still make another film, and there was a good part for her, I would not hesitate one bit in asking her to work with me again— assuming, of course, that she wants to work

with me again. And her performance in Citizen Jake is superb. Although a bit young for the role, she did justice to it, and even transcended the character as written and as I had envisioned it.”

As for Araullo, who played creative collaborator beyond his actor duties, de Leon sounds like both a peer and friend. “I got to understand him a little better and I guess he got to understand me better, too. We are perfect opposites: he is cerebral and guarded but I am a more emotional person. I think this worked to the film’s advantage as Jake is guarded and even forbidding in his portrayal, but the interior monologues that tell the story and even push it say otherwise.” De Leon says the neophyte did a good job in Citizen Jake, “and I won’t say the usual ‘in spite of…’”

Hitting all the right notes on his first acting try may be expecting too much.

“There were scenes that were acted unevenly but there were also scenes where he was terrific,” writes de Leon. “And he has a very strong screen presence. I must also confess at this juncture, that my uneven direction and the constantly changing screenplay also affected the outcome of certain scenes.

I know he is open to making films but he is also passionate about his journalism and the prospect of making more documentaries.

He is also passionate about photography and he’s quite good. I can’t say that if he did another film that it won’t affect his credibility as a journalist. But Atom is one person who won’t be stopped by limitations that he feels or knows he can surmount. And whether the viewers accept him in Citizen Jake or not, I feel he has done a wonderful job.”

As Araullo had mentioned, it wasn’t a walk in the park making the film. There was likely a heated argument here and there.

But even if de Leon considers the film to be his most personal, he feels Citizen Jake is a shared experience with the newbie actor— and screenwriter. “It’s a film Atom and myself made together, through thick and thin, through upheaval after upheaval. Like with Max, if I do get to make another film—which I highly doubt at the moment—I wouldn’t hesitate to work with Atom again (but I know he’s gonna think hard before working with me again). But he is one actor I think I can remain friends with even if we never make another movie again or never see each other again after it’s all over. I think, as he said once in jest, our lives have become inextricably linked because of Citizen Jake.

“I asked him once, ‘You really want to excel in everything you do?’ And he answered with a big smile, ‘Don’t we all? Isn’t that just normal?’ See what I mean? Right now, I only wish the best for him.”

Looks like Araullo and Collins won’t ever have to crash a party again.

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Isabella Montano doesn’t have time to enjoy the view.

Her city zips past her every morning through the windows of jeepneys and northbound trains, but she has other things on her mind: the stories she has to work on for the day, the people she has to reach out to for interviews, every little detail that has to be as close to perfect as possible by 3 p.m., in time for the primetime newscasts at 6 or 9.

Montano arrives at the offices of CNN Philippines at 8 or 9 in the morning, the clock seemingly ticking faster than it should be.

She does her hair and makeup, maybe she has a few minutes of spare time to have a cup of coffee, but on most days she is in and out.

No lunch break, no luxury of losing what little time she has, as she heads back out into her city. But that’s the nature of being a reporter, she says.

“It’s incredibly attractive that there’s so much going on in Manila, especially when you’re young,” Montano tells me, before adding with a tiny hint of hesitation, “I’m 30 years old. I think I’m young.” If youth is more than just a matter of numbers, Montano can rest easy knowing she hasn’t lost it yet. After five years in such a demanding industry—a three-year stint as an anchor at the government-run People’s Television Network (PTV-4) preceding her CNN gig— Montano has yet to show signs of fatigue or of proverbially being swallowed by the system.

She speaks confidently, rarely lapsing into prolonged silences or ums and ahs, somehow simultaneously letting her sentences flow naturally while weighing and considering every single word.

“You have to be concise and go straight to the point, and also in a way be entertaining,” she says. “You have to have a certain presence because people have to want to watch you and people have to want to listen to you.

Viewers remember mistakes, and that one mistake could mean you lose their trust.”

She’s had a lot of time to think this through,

to internalize all the rigorous demands of news reporting, but without losing herself along the way—without turning into some sort of automaton off-camera. When I ask if her work has taken over her life and her view of the city, Montano laughs. “No, I would lose my sanity if I didn’t have personal time,” she assures. “It’s still an incredible time to be in a place as vibrant and exciting as Manila, but it does take a toll on you how chaotic life can be.”

When Montano speaks about Manila’s chaos, she means it in relation to another home, another city—well, not a city exactly, but the quiet countryside of the region of Friuli, Italy. It’s here where she first developed a love for storytelling, manifesting itself in the art of photography. It’s also here where she continues to find the solace that not even her own personal corner of the CNN office can give her. Away from the bustle of the newsroom and the pollution of Manila, Montano has kept Italy work-free, savoring her personal time to her heart’s content— albeit with one finger on the pulse of daily news, just so she doesn’t miss out on anything when the time comes for her to get back on the field.

Still, as much as her hometown has become something of a sacred space for her, Montano can’t deny that returning to Italy after seeing life on the other side of the world has made her reevaluate the context she’s lived in. “It’s just a completely privileged upbringing,” she states. “When you go to developing countries like the Philippines, you realize how much you’ve taken for granted, and you can’t help but understand why people want to move to Western countries.” Immigration is a hot-button issue in Europe today, with the region receiving a large number of immigrants from Africa and the Middle East. But Montano says she’s stopped seeing these immigrants as people

who are simply running away, and more as people who are seeking opportunity.“In that sense, I’m becoming less intolerant of people who are intolerant,” she adds.

Cross-cultural exchange has grounded Montano since the day her photography brought her to Manila in 2012. She had only intended to stay for three months to finish a project about Filipino spirituality, but eventually found herself absorbed into the city. Her curiosity remains intact, be it while covering something as small as a human interest story, a New Year’s Eve celebration, or something as important as a press conference with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at the 2015 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit, the biggest story she’s covered so far. She clarifies that she didn’t actually get to shake Trudeau’s hand, but that simply being in a room with him was privilege enough. “You really feel like you’re in history as history is unfolding, with some of the history makers,” she recalls, before adding quickly, “Not that history isn’t also made by us normal people in our everyday life.”

While talking to Montano, you begin to notice these quick disclaimers she weaves into what she’s saying—making sure all sides of the topic of conversation are covered. She’s keenly aware of how nothing exists within a vacuum—not even her own opinions—and makes doubly sure that the people she speaks with don’t misinterpret anything she says. It’s bound to be second nature for any news journalist to uphold neutrality and fairness even in the most casual conversations, but given her articulate manner of speaking, it’s almost subliminal. In fact, so far into our conversation, there hasn’t been a single moment where it seemed like she was at a loss for words.

AND THEN SHE tells me about seeing death

on the streets.

I had asked her about other stories she’s

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covered that left an indelible impression.

She takes a moment in thought, then begins, “When the war on drugs started…” She narrates her experiences covering the killings that came as a result of the police’s buy-bust operations. She talks about how she and others on the night shift would drive around to various police stations spread throughout the city, and sit in media rooms, waiting for a story to break. When a report of a killing would come in, everyone would pull out at once, adrenaline levels suddenly skyrocketing at the idea of coming face to face with violence here, in her city. She makes another disclaimer: “I’m not saying Italy isn’t violent.

I’m not saying Europe isn’t violent.” She says this almost passively, her eyes elsewhere, thinking back to those long nights. She pauses to take a breath, and continues.

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“Dealing with death is not easy. You also don’t want to get to the point where you’ve seen it so much that you’re desensitized—because you’re doing a disservice to humanity if you become desensitized to these things; if you’re able to walk onto a crime scene and not feel that your heart breaks every time you see a body lying on the floor, and not want to ask the uncomfortable questions, seeing people die in circumstances that are unclear. Our job as journalists is to be there and hold the police accountable,” she says all this in one go, uninterrupted, as if live on camera, before making sure to balance her previous statement. “Respect them for the service they’re giving to the community.

But also make sure that they’re doing it to the highest possible standards and that they have the best interest of the citizens at heart.

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“I would lose my sanity if I didn’t have personal time.”

So we are there to bear witness in that sense.”

This is the part of the job that Montano knows is difficult. She knows that being in this line of work, especially now in the Philippines, is a constant risk. “You just deal with it,” she states. “You really don’t know how much you’re being affected by the violence you see at work. But what gets you going is definitely your passion for the job—the love for being in the moment as history is unfolding and bearing witness to all sorts of human stories.”

It’s a lot to ask from even the most seasoned journalists. You can’t blame a reporter for wanting to stop bearing witness after she’s gotten so close to the bad. But Montano maintains that Manila has not become any less of a home for all the ugliness it’s shown her—because she knows that you have to work extra hard to see past that ugliness.

“In a place like Manila, what I love and hate in a way is the fact that it’s not so easy to access a certain kind of culture,” she says.

Suddenly, her tone brightens, pivoting away from the seriousness of what we had just been talking about. “In Manila, you really have to get to know the people. You really have to do a lot of research.” What she means is, compared to cities like London, Milan, Paris, or Berlin—all of which have clearly defined cultural spaces—Manila is a place you have to fight for access to, if you truly want to see its colors. She tells me about the network of friends she’s established, who have let her know about gigs to see, galleries to visit, and fashion to find. “It’s mind-blowing how fast things are moving. I think it’s a very exciting time to be living in Manila, actually.”

It’s a statement you wouldn’t expect to hear from someone who’s been given every reason to think the opposite. Despite everything she’s seen on the job and despite growing up in the greener pastures of Italy, she bears no sense of privilege or entitlement when exploring Manila. For her, this isn’t a city that freely gives up its secrets; it’s a city you need to constantly choose, to constantly investigate (like the reporter she is) because there’s bound to be something more than what the headlines tell you.

When Montano gets back to the office from a day on the field, she still doesn’t have time to enjoy the view just yet. The office is abuzz after 3 p.m. People are running back and forth from the editing suites to the direction room.

On some days, Montano only has a packed sandwich for lunch. She hands off her script to the senior row editors for fact checking, then records her voiceover in the audio booth.

Then, and only then, comes relief. At least, until the next day.

Montano will take the same jeepney and train tomorrow and pursue another story out in the wilderness of Manila. But she’s gotten used to how the view blurs past her. “It’s a second home that I had to learn to become familiar with, that I had to learn to love for what it is,” she says. For Montano, Manila is the big story she’ll never stop telling.

Makeup by ANTHEA BUENO, LAURA MERCIER Hair by OGIE RAYEL Photographer Assisted by GIO CRUZ Stylist Assisted by ROD MALANAO Makeup Assisted by LUISA JARDINERO

“I know I will grow old. I know I will eventually be caught in a time warp,” Bernal once said. “I can accept it.

I’m not going to kill myself.” Left: The young Ishmael, student of Burgos Elementary School. He would spend his secondary school days in Mapa High School, finish his Bachelor of Arts in English at the University of the Philippines, and study film in India.

Unattended for an hour or so. It would not have surprised Ishmael. Story of his life. People took a while to rise to his occasion.

—Angela Stuart Santiago

The Dakota apartment was where I first met Jorge after I returned from the US in 1969. Everybody dropped by this commune, including Josie Darang who had a crush on Lori and brought bilao of pancit.

Marita would appear wearing a faux cowhide jumper.

Balthazar was already ongoing then.

—Evelynne Horrilleno What I recall most vividly about Ishma was coming into the Malate apartment where everyone hung out and finding him asleep in his pajama bottoms.

He got up and I said, “Ishma, you've got rashes.”

He peered at his back via the mirror, pulled out his pajama waist, peered down his pants and exclaimed: "I've been getting rashes ever since I became a loose woman."

—Ninotchka Rosca

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JORGE: When Ishmael Bernal died in 1996, his coffin had to wait an hour or so, unattended, back of the domed chapel of the University of the Philippines in Diliman.

A mutual friend of ours who happened by found the setting incongruous and fairly hilarious. “But what are you doing here?” he found himself asking incredulously.

Over a decade earlier, he had repaired with a heavy heart to a funeral parlor to assess his grandmother’s embalmment and for a full minute was paralyzed at the sight of a cadaver and cerements that bore no resemblance to anything he had seen before. It turned out that his clan’s dear departed matriarch had been dispatched by mistake to Cagayan Valley.

There was a little gang of friends huddled together in the mortuary chapel could do but convulse in furtive then uncontrolled laughter, bowed heads knocking one another like bump-cars crashing and uncrashing in a circus. But it was wayward laughter. It faded in and out of our lives. It animated an entire sequence in Manila by Night. It was grist for Bernal’s mill where all his friends worked at one point or another, as part of a chorus of laughter.

ISHMAEL: Of course, I got fired from my first directorial job for Virgo Production, a script I had written in India called Mainit ang Araw sa Maynila which the Virgo bosses Eddie Rodriguez and Liza Moreno changed to Ah, Ewan, Basta sa Maynila Pa Rin Ako. Fresh from Poona and my head reeling from Polanski, Fellini, etc.,

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MENOR DE EDAD

IT WAS IN 1992, a full 25 years ago, when filmmaker Ishmael Bernal appointed his bosom-buddy, the writer Jorge Arago, as his official biographer. Soon they were recording conversations on tape for the book that they would write together; on a trip to Nantes in 1994 Bernal started keeping a journal while Arago started putt tt ng aside books and magazines on the film industry and Bernal.

When Bernal died in 1996, Arago had more than enough material for a biography but he struggled with it, and in 2011 he would die with no manuscript in sight, leaving behind only what he said were a couple of chapters that, in 2010, he worked into a longish essay that he asked Angela StuartSantiago to post on her blog stuartsantiago.com. That piece was entitled ProBernal, AntiBio. Arago had long told his mother and some friends that in case of anything, she was to turn over all his files to Angela, and Nanay did. From Arago’s room in Binangonan, she left us free to find and take the journal, interview transcripts, a personal photo album of Bernal, clippings on his films, and still photos of movie sets. We took everything, including poems downloaded and printed out from the internet (Cesar Vallejo, their favorite), film books, and some copies of their independent magazine Balthazar.

In 2012, Stuart-Santiago started the slow, backbreaking work of going through all the materials, then transcribing Bernal’s handwritten tt journal and encoding film reviews and feature articles found clipped and bound in an album.

The first manuscript was a “talking heads” kind of thing, where StuartSantiago invents a dialogue between Bernal and Arago based on existing materials. Sought for advice, cultural studies scholar and critic Dr. Patrick Flores encouraged Stuart-Santiago to intervene in the narrative, which meant bringing in other voices as well, of film critics and friends and colleagues and artistas, who were a part of the life and times of Bernal and Arago. The goal was to be able to build context, historical and cultural, and to layer the conversation between the two intellectuals with the bigger picture they were working within and from.

The outcome is ProBernal, AntiBio, an anti-memoir as envisioned by intellectual equals, a biography that refuses tropes of hagiography and the cliches of self-aggrandizement, and instead finds freedom in coming clean and speaking candidly about gayness and rebellion, activism and filmmaking, cultural crises and political ferment across four decades.

It is Bernal, unexpurgated—a rarity in these shores and especially from our National Artists, but also it is Arago as his worthy Other, his biographer, co-writer, but most importantly comrade in guerrilla wars against “middle class totems and taboos, innocence and ignorance.” —Katrina Stuart Santiago

SEX, DRUGS, AND DRAMA

Bernal’s entrance into the movies took place at a time when film artists were finding new ways to tell stories. Clockwise, from top left: A scene from Manila By Night whose presentation of the city displeased then First Lady Imelda Marcos, who ordered the title of the film be changed to the less specific City After Dark; a page from the Bernal diary that would be the foundation of ProBernal, AntiBio; giving instructions to Rita Gomez and Vic Vargas in a scene in the 1971 movie Pagdating Sa Dulo, a film within a film, a satire Bernal himself wrote on the local movie industry; on the set of Working Girls, the 1984 ensemble comedy written by Amado Lacuesta about Makati’s corporate culture and the lengths people go to reach career highs; and a magazine article on 1971’s Pito Ang Asawa Ko: Huwag Tularan, Bernal’s third film for that year, starring Gloria Romero.

Ninotchka the journalist was hanging out u with Ishmael and Jorge in the later two yearss of Marcos’s first term. Jorge, who started out copywriting w for Ace-Compton in the mid-sixties, had moved o on to ABS-CBN News where began the team-up m with broadcast journalist Marita Manuel. By then he had passed civil service examinations for information o writer and also for cultural attaché.

—Stuart Santiago

In one especially droll scene, a vendor lugged g an entire aparadorr past the camera! In another, h the traffic jam took so long to unravel that, byy the time it flowed again, the little seedling a vendor had sold a customer had grown into—a tree! Reallyy outrageously funny stuff ff like that.

—Nestor Torre His first work was immediately controversial. a Unable to resolve his differences with the pr as replaced midway, although scraps o d story were retained.

—Petronilo Bn. Daroy

On his dismissal from the set, he ma singing: “Bakya mo, Neneng, luma a that is to say, that the notions conce producer’s films were things meant f .

What Bernal meant to be a serio s ork on Manila became a Jeanne Young musical. Although l his name was retained in the credits as director, e Bernal, on the first day of the showing of thee film, was compelled to disown it.

—Daroy

At the time, he was more associated literati and intellectuals. He was wo the magazine Balthazarr and staying in a rented e house off ff Remedios Street which was decorated o with European knick-knacks and Beardsley prints.

The incident did not bother him; he shared the t assurance of the artists, poets, and activists that frequented Los Indios Bravos concerning the future of art, literature, and society. And it was part of the ethos of that crowd to view rejection as a sure sign of annointment as an artist. One could always fall back on traditon: the modernists living in squalor and poverty in Paris; Sherwood Anderson walking out of a lucrative job in the middle of dictating a letter to work out his destiny as a writer; Villa rejecting his share of his father’s real estate in Ermita to starve and write poetry in New York; and the student activists, perceiving themselves the wave of the future, dropping out of their classes to work out their humanist schemes in DGs, Long Marches, and rallies.

—Daroy It wasn’t the most auspicious of beginnings.

Ishmael refused to acknowledge it as his first film. Only towards the end, with a tell-all bio in mind, did he find the words “fired from my first directorial job.”

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in early 1970 I was jobless. George took over my life. He and Lorry Purisima had found a lovely downstairs-only apartment in Dakota, Harrison. Lorry borrowed some money and we put up Balthazar, a pseudo-intellectual magazine that had a circulation of 24.

The rage then was the 14-year-old Nora Aunor, and Vilma Santos, and the love teams Guy and Pip, Vilma and Bobot. At the time, Nora was being dismissed as a passing phase. She was a Tawag ng Tanghalan champion and everyone was giving her a year. No one knew she was going to last forever and probably outlive all of us.

I became a film reviewer for the Manila Chronicle, my reviews appearing thrice a week. The other reviewers were Nestor Torre and Behn Cervantes—they eventually formed the nucleus of what would be “The Manunuri.” My sights were already on directing. I insulted Doc Perez, laughed at Armando Garces, quarrelled with Lino’s directorial style in Santiagoo (his second movie) and praised a harmless Virgo Production starring Eddie Rodriguez and Jeanne Young. Then I set up an interview with Eddie and Liza for them to be featured in Balthazarr and it worked, they gave me a job as director! The public machinery started to get busy. “Virgo’s answer to Lino Brocka!” was the general catchline.

First shooting day, I was terrified as hell. I didn’t know what to do with the damned camera. After I had done a master shot, I did not know how to follow it up with other angles to make the coverage interesting at least. I committed the usual mistake of new directors—the tuhog scene. The production staff ff and crew were already whispering; Mitos Villareal came to the set one day and planned a shot list for me right in front of everybody. Because of the tension and the sense of the oncoming tragedy, I plied myself with pills which only aggravated the situation because I became cantankerous.

JORGE: He had intended it to be a satire of life in Manila. The title of his brainchild: Mainit ang Araw sa Maynila. It was too profound, remonstrated the producers. Why not change it to Ah Ewan, Basta Sa Maynila Pa Rin Ako. A minor matter, Bernal thought, and gave in. The filming started. The scenes were too brief, too fast, exclaimed the veteran members of the shooting crew. Bernal stood his ground: what he wanted was a film, not a television production.

One scene showed the main character bathing in the water gushing out of a fire hydrant. It was a critical scene, thematically, for the character was a provinciano who had been compelled to confront the evils of the city and Bernal now wanted to show him passing on to another stage. The producer intervened, arguing that opening fire hydrants was punishable under the law, and surely Bernal did not want to encourage such violations?

The filming went on. One scene showed a newsboy marching up and down Luneta Park, shouting the most impossible headlines: “Congressman raped! Nora Aunor loses a molar! Bomba star enters the nunnery!” No objections from the producer.

As the filming progressed, however, it dawned upon the producers that the film would have absolutely not a single musical sequence!

What an anomalous circumstance, when one considered that the film’s two young stars were worshipped principally on account of their vocal chords. The proper sequence was hastily written in and, shortly afterwards, Bernal resigned.

ISHMAEL: Liza’s secretary came to Dakota with my walking papers.

The movie press had a field day making fun of me. Oden Amurao, a friend of the Rodriguezes, called me the laughingstock of the industry.

Mauro Gia Samonte called me almost an idiot. The world was whispering and having a laugh. I felt alone. Failure makes you feel that. I doubled my intake of valium. Nobody sympathized.

The generation of directors before me were doing karate movies with Eddie Fernandez, James Bond imitations with Tony Ferrer, and cowboy movies with horses, ranches, Bernard Belleza, Joseph Estrada, Jess Lapid, and, of course, the king of all this, Fernando Poe, Jr.

WITH RICKY LEE, ARCHIVE; FROM NOY LAUZON, UPFI FACEBOOK PAGE; COURTESY OF VIVA ENTERTAINMENT; MAG COVER FROM PROBERNAL ANTIBIO.

Ishmael complained about the difficulties he was having with the movie he was shooting, that the producer was angry over a long sequence involving Manila traffic – why was it so long? Ishma said, “I was going to put the credits there.” It was a scene where car riders stalled in traffic get out and begin picnicking on the hoods of cars, setting up an impromptu singing contest, etcetera.

—Rosca

That’s What He Said Known to never mince his words, Ishma was a fountain of delicious quotables

ON RELEVANCE.

"One does not say, I’m going to do a movie that has social relevance. One says, I’m going to do a movie about us, about Filipino society, as honestly and as truthfully as possible. I want to entertain, I want to move people, to persuade them and make them think."

ON HIS THEMES.

ALL MY CHILDREN

In his younger days, Bernal wore many hats: movie reviewer, scriptwriter, director, publisher, and even bar owner. Clockwise, from left: Actress Rita Gomez on the cover of Balthazar, the “pseudo-intellectual magazine that had a circulation of 24” he put up with friend Lorrie Purisima in 1970; with his writer for Himala, Ricky Lee; on the set of Himala, in Ilocos Norte; a poster of Manila

By Night, the ensemble film that painted a portrait of the titular city’s characters who live in its fringes; Bernardo Bernardo, Rio Locsin, and Sharon Manabat in Manila By Night.

"I always investigate, question, and unravel the hypocrisy of society, of established mores.

I consciously depart from stereotypes to show that people, whether prostitutes, drug addicts, philosophers, or professors, can behave unpredictably. I don’t dwell on the pagmumulat thing—poverty is caused by class contradictions, etc.—we know all that. What I do is I try to deconstruct the genres, to make them seem formless and amorphous. My themes are the decadence of urban life, human perversion, the demon in all of us, cynicism about life."

ON FILM IN THE TIME OF IMELDA.

“There was a lot of complaint about the Marcoses’ attitude towards the arts but, compared to the following administration, it was more supportive. Imelda Marcos had some eccentric attitudes, but in the long term at least there were some concrete initiatives. Whatever their objectives and political corruption, they had a more understanding attitude towards the Censors, the Film Centre, and a respect for the Experimental Cinema of the Philippines which produced Oro, Plata, Mata and Himala. The institute held two international film festivals which were eye openers for the Filipino public. They were windows to world cinema and the international film scene.”

ON CENSORSHIP.

“I do not agree with Mrs. Katigbak when she says that the Board of Censors is just there to implement the law and that they do not care about the artistic side of the movie. She is absolutely wrong there. The minute that you censor a film, which is a work of art, you are forced to consider it as a work of art, and you are forced to consider the artistic intentions and the artistic qualities of the film.

You cannot say it is the Film Ratings Board that will consider the film as a work of art.

I think they have to realize that different films have different artistic qualities. The artistic quality is inherent in film-making, so that it should also be inherent in their job to consider the artistic quality of a scene.

The board should leave enough room for the artist to interpret life and society with some of its foibles along with what is good. Censorship prevents society from confronting its own face: its own sickness and its own mistakes.”

ON WRITING SCRIPTS. "The way I go about it, the script goes through many, many hands. I believe in a series of revisions. Mads Lacuesta almost went crazy over Working Girls because we were up to the eighth revision. It is standard for me to have five to six revisions, and I’ve driven many scriptwriters up the wall with this.”

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May ginawa kami ni Bibot Amador na pelikula na dinirek ni Ishma. Mag-asawa (magsyota) na Eddie Rodriguez at Liza Moreno ang producer.

Naka-2 days shooting lang ako. Hindi ko alam kung ipinalabas.

—Leo Martinez

The decade of the 1960s was characterized by an impressive, pioneering, taboo-breaking, politically charged vulgarity, of a sort never seen before or since in the country, and that would be essential to explaining why the Second Golden Age held far more promise and managed to meet more expectations than the first.

—Joel David

The director, presumably patterned by Bernal after legendary filmmaker Lamberto Avellana, becomes Bernal’s mouthpiece for his aches and hopes for Philippine cinema.

—Oggs Cruz It was his directorial debut, there was a long lull on the set. After a time, Bernie asked the cameraman, “Anong inaantay natin?” The cameraman answered: “Kayo po, Direk.”

—Ronaldo Valdez The movie was not a commercial success, as they usually put it in the movie industry. However, it established Bernal as a serious director and, further, as a real artist in the medium of cinema with something to say.

—Daroy

Flashback 1970. Marsha, The Erotic Housewife screened at a downtown Manila moviehouse and it became the biggest thing that ever happened to local cinema bugs since The Ten Commandments. For demo-weary Manilans whose previous encounters with sex on film had been mainly through antiseptic sex-ed films, the American soft porn flick opened the erotic floodgates.

—Randy V. Urland and A.C. Lee A few months later came the first bomba film, Uhaw, that had Merle Fernandez running naked in Avenida, and it broke box-office records. Not a peep from the censors when more of the same, with quite intense titles and weak storylines but lots of lusty lovemaking, flooded theaters in the two years leading up to martial law. Some dared say that it was Marcos’s way of distracting the public from issues raised by student activists. Besides, it was a worldwide theme, the sexual liberation.

—Stuart Santiago

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Then right after, pumasok ‘yung bomba films—Uhaw, Hayok, Dayukdok, Erotika.

The country was in chaos. It was the time of the First Quarter Storm. Everyone thought the Marcoses were encouraging the bomba craze to dampen the unrest in the streets.

Lino Brocka was the rage when I arrived from India.

His Wanted: Perfect Mother was a hit and he was doing one hit after another and the other studios were looking for another Lino Brocka. Behn Cervantes had quarrelled with Lino and they did not speak to each other for 10 years. I think—and this is a secret—to spite Lino Brocka, Behn Cervantes decided to push Ishmael Bernal’s career.

[Laughs] He took me around, peddling me like kalamay to every producer in town. We ran into an old, rich friend from U.P., George Sison, who got his other rich friends—Elvira Manahan, Johnny Litton, Manolito de Leon of LVN, and Lani Bernardo, the husband of Conchitina Sevilla—to put their money together and produce a script I had written, which was Pagdating sa Dulo. A story I wrote overnight. I was living then in Dakota and I was alone at home. There was a storm, it was baha, I couldn’t leave the house so I told myself, I’ll write a story. Basta. I consider Pagdating as my debut. It’s my first finished work.

JORGE: Pagdating sa Dulo, a film about the film world, the dark negotiations, the fatuity and the fakeness, was a critical success. Co-produced with some of his friends, it earned Bernal a FAMAS award. It did not do too well at the boxoffice, however.

ISHMAEL: It was a big flop. It has a single bomba scene which is not as graphic as those in Uhaw or Hayok. Uhaw is one bomba scene after another.

Pagdating is also a serious study of the film industry, which spelled certain death at the box office. It has a cynical attitude toward the movie industry. The producers didn’t know how to market the film. The ending leaves the audience wondering what has happened to the protagonists. The audience was used to escapist films with happy endings.

You are always optimistic that your film will be a creative as well as box-office success. I was elated that all my friends liked it and that it had gotten good reviews. I think it was pretty good for a beginner. The fact that it did not become a box-office hit did not really depress me. One week into the showing of the film, I had my second offer. The producers were going to save me from becoming an “artistic” director—a tag that would kill my career. Daluyong was an out-and-out commercial movie about family squabbles, about rich people confronting each other, sisters falling in love with the same man.

I was in the news a lot as—I don’t want to say it—the threat to Lino Brocka (the competition between me and Lino Brocka was always friendly). Considering that I had just had a box-office flop that was dubbed “artistic” or “serious,” I think the producers took a gamble. I could have given them another flop, but I didn’t.

Daluyong was a big hit because it starred big bomba stars of the period: Alona Alegre, Rosanna Ortiz, Ronaldo Valdez, Eddie Garcia. It had enough sex, enough quotable quotes, enough long confrontation scenes and sampalan and iyakan.

It also had lots of beautiful clothes and jewelry, beautiful cars, swimming pools, chandeliers, mansions.

The first level of compromise is accepting the subject matter, which is a glossy melodrama. At that time, I needed to keep my head above water. I needed a hit. Not that badly. I was new to the industry. Even if my career had died at the time, no big deal. I could always go back to writing for Graphic.

PROBERNAL, ANTIBIO, BY ISHMAEL BERNAL, JORGE ARAGO, ANGELA STUART-SANTIAGO WILL BE PUBLISHED BY ABS-CBN PUBLISHING. BOOK PRODUCTION: KATRINA STUART SANTIAGO

WORKING GIRLS BTS FROM VIVA FILMS; AD FROM PRIVATE COLLECTION OF ISHMAEL BERNAL ; PAGDATING BTS FROM THE PERSONAL COLLECTION OF CESAR HERNANDO; URIAN PIC FROM THE URIAN ANTHOLOGY 1980-1989 EDITED BY NICK TIONGSON; WITH VILMA AND NORA , FROM NCCA FACEBOOK PAGE.

Looking back, however, it is possible to say that the first work of Bernal suffered from intellectual elitism. He felt he had no need in it for known actors/actresses; rather, it had the more prestigious thespians in important roles.

Secondly, while it was, on the whole, eloquently comprehensible, its narrative and ironies were quite of a high level. The complaint of the producer, as a matter of fact, was that she could not understand it. (I am not arguing that a film should be judged by the level of comprehension of a producer; this is merely saying that it should be understood by, as Russell said, “any school girl with an average stupidity.”) All this he was to dramatize, with his usual humor and irony, in Pagdating Sa Dulo.

—Daroy

ON COMMUNISTS.

“Dolores Feria, Mr. Lansang, Josefina and Buddy Lava... Aida Lava, daughter of Josefina, is heading some Women’s Desk. I saw her in the meeting of PSSC in Commonwealth, her voice was very very loud. ‘Ay naku! Paano tayo mananalo, tayong mga communists, we don’t arrive on time!’ She was screaming to me in the lobby. ‘We cannot organize a simple meeting, nobody will come, how are we communists going to win anything?’”

ON ACTIVISM.

“Directing has given me a chance to be a filmmaker activist. It’s given me a chance to express myself, to introduce new ideas, to show the people the truth behind the veneer of establishment propaganda.”

ON DRUGS.

“And so, like all of showbiz anywhere in the world—Judy Garland, Monty Clift, Marilyn Monroe—we take drugs. Downers to make us fall asleep, uppers to keep us awake. When you have to shoot for one whole week without sleep, trying to catch up with the playdate, what else can you do? The pressure is even bigger on the stars because the drugs make them look ugly, and so if they are, they don’t come to the shooting at all.”

ON BEING EXPLOITED.

MASTER SHOWMAN

Bernal is known to demonstrate to his actors the kind of movements he wanted done in a scene.

Clockwise, from top: Subbing for Maria Isabel Lopez’s character in the rape scene in Working Girls, opposite Orestes Ojeda; the newspaper ad for Daluyong, his more commercial follow-up to Pagdating Sa Dulo; directing Nora Aunor as the miracle worker Elsa in Himala; Zeneida “Bibot” Amador (leftmost) as the producer in Pagdating Sa Dulo; with his co-awardees at the 1981 Gawad Urian where he won Best Director for Manila By Night; and with Nora Aunor and Vilma Santos, the stars of his movie Ikaw Ay Akin.

“The problem is endemic in a society that allows itself to be exploited. A society that refuses to recognize human values and human rights and the limitless boundaries of the mind. We should always be testing the infinite potentials of the mind. But the establishment wants us to remain at silt level, the establishment—government, churches, censors, theater owners, capitalists, politicians—that makes the rules and does not pass or push bills that will help the movie industry, press people who do not give importance to valuable work, or give merit where merit is due.”

ON GROWING OLD.

“But in a philosophical context, I know I will grow old, I know that I will eventually be caught in a time warp. It will happen. I hope it does not.

But if it does happen, I can accept it. I’m not going to kill myself. I read constantly. I never stop studying. I constantly watch other people’s films. My curiosity is as relentless as ever.”

ON FILIPINO HUSBANDS.

“Filipino husbands call their wives ‘Kumander.’

Ronnie calls Susan ‘Kumander.’ JE calls all his wives ‘Kumander.’ From the Madjapahit Empire, the women held the money, demanded their men to return at nightfall. Took showers at night before going to bed to get fucked, and generally conducted the aff irs of the house and the business. Men had mistresses and gay lovers—but they feared their wives who screamed, cajoled, and ordered their men around.”

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ISSUE 113

FAMOUS ROGUE September 2017

LOUIE CRUZ, partymeister THE BEST OF the bullish FVR years were kicking in by the time

that Louie Cruz turned a fine dining restaurant into a scintillating new nightspot in stuffy old Makati, of all places. Son of JV, the former Philippine ambassador to Britain, he of the off-the-shoulder blouses was then best remembered for his Halakhakan parties, a series of soirees he organized after the Aquino assassination in ‘83 to cool off the heightening tension between the Marcos and Aquino camps. When the veteran party creature and lifestyle columnist of the Lopez-era Manila Chronicle took over Giraffe as its PR director,

he would hypnotize the city with the bar’s sexy, cosmopolitan vibe—a posh setting for many a high-profile catfight and headlinemaking brawl, romantic dalliance and sexual tryst, and some of the most unforgettable Saturday nights that this city has ever known.

Cruz would be the silent witness to the nightly hunter-and-hunted goings-on, watching the proceedings from his elevated corner by the kitchen, his bottle of Fundador conveniently at arm’s reach. “I taught Makati how to loosen up,” he declared. “I got rid of its constipated and stuffy air.”