Stage trilogy seeks to ‘ignite a revolution’
The 2025-2026 season of Tanghalang Pilipino, the resident drama group of the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP), offers a trilogy of plays celebrating revolutionary heroes and throbbing with the music of the young generation: “Pingkian” (about Emilio Jacinto), “Gregoria Lakambini” (Gregoria de Jesus), and “Mabining Mandirigma” (Apolinario Mabini).
‘Brains of the Katipunan’
“Pingkian: Isang Musikal” will run from Sept. 12 to Oct. 12 and Jacinto will be portrayed again by Vic Robinson, whose star-making performance in 2024 earned him the Gawad Buhay for Best Actor in a Musical.
“Pingkian” was Jacinto’s nomme de guerre in the Katipunan. The show’s music is by Ejay Yatco, with Juan Ekis as playwright and Jenny Jamora as director.
Gab Pangilinan plays Catalina, love interest of “the brains of the Katipunan.”
The play focuses on Jacinto’s leadership in the final years of the Philippine revolution against Spain and the beginning of the Philippine-American War.
One of the inspirations of the production is the “Kartilya ng Katipunan,” the organization’s guidebook for new members.
How lofty was the young Jacinto’s mind when he wrote the “Kartilya” at likely 19 or 20 years old?
Here are the first four entries of the guidebook (translated from Tagalog) to give us a clue: “The life that is not concentrated on a lofty and reasonable purpose is a tree without a shade, if not a poisonous weed.”
“To do good for personal gain and not for its own sake is no virtue.”
“Whether our skin be black or white, we are all born equal.”
“The honorable man prefers honor to personal gain; the scoundrel, gain to honor.”
‘Pinay pop’
Meanwhile, “Gregoria Lakambini, a Pinay Pop Musical” runs from Nov. 14 to Dec. 14 and is the only new play in the trilogy. The playwrights are Nicanor G. Tiongson and Eljay Castro Deldoc, with music by Nica del Rosario and Matthew Chang and direction by Delphine Buencamino.
It is an all-female show, as befits the trailblazing story of Oryang, Bonifacio’s wife, which is told through song and dance a la Bini, the P-Pop girl group now hugely popular with young audiences.
The musical will follow Oryang’s transformation from a spirited girl to the “lakambini of the Katipunan.” Marynor Madamesila plays Gregoria, with Flip Music supplying the musical arrangements.
‘Steampunk musical’
Then there’s the return of “Mabining Mandirigma, a Steampunk Musical,” which runs from March 6 to March 29, 2026 and is written by Nicanor G. Tiongson, with music by Joed Balsamo and direction by Chris Millado.
“Mabining Mandirigma” is one of TP’s most celebrated contemporary productions, winning 12 Gawad Buhay awards when it debuted in 2015.
It retains its novel twist: for the fourth time, Mabini is cast as a woman, this time to be played by Shaira Opsimar. (Previous Mabinis were played by Delphine Buencamino, Liesl Bátucan, Monique Wilson, and Hazel Maranan, an actual descendant of Mabini).
The three plays will be performed at the Black Box Theater (Tanghalang Ignacio Gimenez), CCP Complex, as part of TP’s new season called “Ignite.”
Revolution of the spirit
“We are [hoping to] ignite something, ignite a revolution, but this time it is a revolution of the spirit,” said Fernando “Nanding” Josef, TP artistic director.
“There seems to be a different kind of revolution needed now, and that revolution is in ourselves, in our own being—a change of the self,” he added, citing some lines from “Pingkian”: “Ang tunay na himagsikan ay sa loob nagsisimula” (The true revolution starts from within).
But, he stressed, “this is actually followed by ‘hindi pa tapos ang laban,’ or the fight is not yet over. Because there is so much that we need to change.”
