Dance, as the city comes undone
Electric pink light fills the parking garage at NBS Park in Pasig City. At the center sits a red-hot, box-type Mitsubishi Lancer. On a nearby screen, fragments of Ishmael Bernal’s “Manila by Night” (1980) flicker into view. The turbulent lives of Manila’s city slickers intertwine as they wander and cruise through the city’s gritty nocturnal underbelly at Martial Law’s height.
Then, the lights dim.
Inside the Lancer a couple now sits, exchanging sweet gestures. They begin to dance and are soon joined by a troupe, climbing, circling one another, and eventually pile into the vehicle filled with smoke, their faces a spectrum of anguish, elation, anger, and ecstasy.
Around them, visual artist James Clar, who conceived the “Manila After Dark” project, and cinematographer Quintin P. Cu-Unjieng act like meta-cinematographers—operating live cameras that project footage of the performers onto the screen. At intervals, Clar’s lighting installation pulses around the car, making landscapes of color and shadow.
Presented on Oct. 22 and 24 as part of Fifth Wall’s seventh festival edition “Gigil,” “Manila After Dark” brought together archival cinema, stunning choreography, and multimedia art in a collaboration between Clar, choreographer and Fifth Wall founder Madge Reyes, and Cu-Unjieng, with dancers KJ Canata, Ramona Yusay, Lex, Gaby Chavez, Jenris Garcia, and Paulline Angeles.
We spoke with Clar and Reyes about translating Bernal’s cinematic portrait of Manila into a live performance and the relationship between movement and freedom.
What drew you to Ishmael Bernal’s “Manila by Night?”
James Clar (JC): It was really about trying to tie together these two formats, film and performance. “Manila by Night” became the perfect content for multiple layered reasons, socially and politically, but also because of its depiction of nightlife and Manila itself.
It made me think about the city through time, how much it has evolved, changed, or hasn’t changed. Film has a narrative structure with a lot of editing and cutting involved to tell a story. Real life doesn’t have edits. You have to experience it, and that’s what performances are, too. By fading in the film and then fading in the live cinematography that Quintin was doing, we were able to insert our contemporary time into the film’s world.
There’s definitely an emotional arc to the live performance through the music, movement, and lighting. There are different chapters, and by bookending the work with the film clips at the beginning and end, you’re taking the audience from our time to their time and back again. You start thinking about Manila then versus Manila now.
How did you approach the choreography, particularly given the film’s Martial Law context?
Madge Reyes (MR): The Martial Law context was important in understanding the world of “Manila by Night.” I was interested in how that atmosphere of restriction could manifest through the body, and how this desire for freedom could persist even within those limitations.
The choreography was informed by this tension between containment and the desire for excess. I was also interested in the little intimate experiences: how political forces find their way into our everyday lives, [and] how we move through the world and relate to one another while still seeking pleasure and negotiating our own freedom.
I love how you used the box-type Mitsubishi Lancer, one of the few cars civilians could buy during the Martial Law era, because it was made domestically and therefore cheaper than imported cars. The vehicle was such a main part of the performance. What was its function?
JC: It’s a mode of transport, but it’s also the character seeking themselves or exploring the city through the car. We wanted an older, box-type car that would feel visually connected to the film. We needed something red, too, so we reached out through different networks to find one.
Ayni Nuyda’s brother collects old cars, and he managed to find one that had been sitting in someone’s yard for about a decade. Once we found it, I thought, “Okay, this is great. Let’s roll with this.”
Dance is inherently ephemeral. How do you think about preserving a work like this, particularly when so much of its impact comes from experiencing it live?
MR: I think that’s what makes dance special: its ephemerality. A performance like this exists in a particular time and place, and no two people can experience the same thing. You can document it and record it all you want, but to fully capture what it feels like to be in the same room is something you can’t really do. The energy between bodies, the space, the experience of that moment—it can’t be repeated.
For me, it’s about presenting it again, hopefully sometime soon. Remembering a work like this goes beyond documentation. It’s also about the conversations that it leaves behind. That’s how I want it to continue: through more conversations around it and hopefully another new run.
Fifth Wall has been exploring dance beyond the traditional stage since 2012. What does this seventh edition mean to you?
MR: I’m proud of what we’ve been able to do in bringing together all the artists, audiences, and everyone who put their trust in us. More than anything, I’m reminded that Fifth Wall is not just about the festival itself, but about building this sort of community and creating space for dance to keep evolving.
I’m still processing everything. Mounting a festival is more of a sprint than a marathon. It always feels like I’m giving birth to something every year. But I’m grateful to everyone who made this edition happen. And now, I’m allowing myself to rest and sit with everything that just happened. But I’m also already thinking about next year.
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