To be ‘bongga’ is to belong
If Annie Batungbakal came of age in this generation, her yearning for validation would probably be catered to by social media. But in the late 1970s, all she had was the disco. And for a few precious minutes under the glitter ball of the famed Coco Banana, she took to the dance floor, hoping that all eyes would be on her.
But what is she left with after the lights go out and she sheds her sparkly jumpsuit for another workday as a dispatsadora? That’s the question “Bongga Ka ‘Day!: The Annie Batungbakal Musical” asks—all while the music of Hotdog, that era’s soundtrack, pulses in the background.
“What does it cost to be visible? I think that’s something many people today can relate to. They want to feel seen on social media, and they’re defined by how many likes and views their posts have. Only back then, that was the disco,” director Chris Millado tells Lifestyle Inquirer.
The life she covets
Annie, played by Atasha Muhlach, is a spirited, if naive, fashion designer at House of Pasion. She’s desperate to be part of the elite circle at Coco Banana, but—as it once was in real life—revelers who weren’t dressed fittingly or simply didn’t have “it” couldn’t get as much as a foot in the door. A curator manning the entrance saw to that.
Coco Banana held the promise of liberation. It was a rare place where people could express their individuality, so much so that the dance floor was often a riot because even in dance, no one bothered following a single trend. The irony is that Annie finds herself contorting her persona every which way just to get in.
Annie, therefore, becomes “an avatar” for people caught between “performing for adoration and keeping up a facade.”
“Someone will look at you from head to foot. Hindi ka papapasukin dahil lang mayaman o maganda ka. You have to have something different. ‘Yun ang wala sa kanya, so Annie puts on a pile of things,” Millado says. “She eventually enters that world, and becomes a star, but she ends up losing herself.”
Adapting to survive
If this quandary is something the audience can resonate with, what more the actors who play it out onstage? There’s a bit of a meta quality to the show because no matter how much they want to say that they do what they do for the sake of art, the need for validation is something you can’t completely take away.
“That’s something I experience until now,” says Anthony Rosaldo, who portrays the worldly flight attendant Romer Pasion, one of Annie’s love interests. “We want people to enjoy and appreciate what we do, and I think that’s part of our nature as artists. Frankly, masarap din being rewarded.”
Sam Concepcion, who alternates as Romer, has been performing almost all his life. And in juggling theater, television, and the mainstream music scene, he’s compelled to adapt to different cultures or even “somehow change my personality and who I am to fit in.” Because that’s just how you survive in showbiz.
“I have done a lot of work everywhere, and I feel like at times, nawawala ako. And then I come back, and it’s new again,” says Concepcion, who finds a great deal of Annie in Romer.
“We all just want to be part of something bigger than us,” he adds. “In doing so, we hope we can reflect on ourselves, find ourselves, and find a sense of belonging and community. That happens to be wherever space I go.”
Strip away the glitz and glam
For the rest of us, that doesn’t have to be onstage. The spotlight no longer belongs to an exclusive few, Rosaldo points out. “Everyone has the platform now to be seen. People want to be influencers, social media stars. Annie resonates with anyone who wants to know themselves.”
So while the show might start with the standard definition of “bongga,” the musical tries to turn it on its head by stripping away the glitz and the glam. “It’s really about where your heart is—being you,” says Muhlach, who believes that Annie is a representation of Filipino dreams. “You don’t have to change yourself to be successful and accepted.”
Indeed, “bongga,” Millado says, isn’t about splashy, sparkly things. “The real bongga comes from within.”
“Bongga Ka, ’Day!: The Annie Batungbakal Musical” runs from Sept. 18 to Oct. 24 at the Newport Performing Arts Theater. It’s presented by Newport World Resorts in association with Viva Communications and staged with PETA Plus
