Unsolicited Review of “Rebulto”: Sculpting Mental Health Awareness in Theater
Madrigal, once again, made his point artistically louder and palatably relevant in his latest screenplay “Rebulto”, still bearing his unique writing and directing style with an unconventional yet familiar manner of teaching valuable life lessons similarly present in his earlier works such as “Si Dr. Kwago, Si Kosmeng Kuba at ang Mamaw” and “Ward 13”.
Adamson University’s Tinik ng Teatro, in its 10th season, premiered Rebulto in the Adamson Theater with two shows booked for the whole afternoon of March 18, 2019. The one-hour and half cocktail of all possible modes of expressiveness-slash-monologue-type back-reading of a life-thread centers on the life of Lion, a sculptor on the verge of retirement and is on full-mode preparing for his much-awaited final exhibit. His lifelong interest in sculpture has grown over the years, and at this time, he is on his final showcase which includes his last sculpture named Thea, which he has been working on enthusiastically and lovingly.
The play starts with a serious-toned interpretative choreography only to be cut-off with a funny intro, paving a reassuring note that this isn’t a typical play, rather an unconventional and modern one which deemed as a strategy to make the younger audience tuned in and interested. The long paragraph below would be an attempt to summarize everything I have witnessed before providing the hopeful criticism of it.
The flow of the story, as Lion reminisces his past, showed his childhood with a dysfunctional family – a loving mother who had a past of ballooned depression and a drunkard father who can be tagged as “nakakarimarim” or despicable (you’ll find out why later in this essay).
His interest in the human body and the influence of his mother to Greek studies inspired him to pursue the art of sculpture but in some way had affected him to act femininely which was apparent in how he plays with dolls, and this motivated his father, coming home one night heavily intoxicated and angry, to sexually abuse him at such young age.
Living in an inharmonious home with his mother being subjected to verbal and physical abuse, Lion opted to live normally, still pursuing his interest in sculpture, but self-harmed himself at times when he cannot carry through with his memories of abuse from his father. His mother, upon learning this and what his father did to him, tried to handle what has happened to her family unsuccessfully – mounting to a regressive depression and overdosing while his father ran off to escape such accusation only to be killed off in the streets in what can be assumed a result of his substance abuse (and by substance, and by assuming, it has something to do with the local war on substance, ehem, drugs, or so why would he be running all over the place and get shot down from nowhere, right?).
With all these, Lion still went through victoriously and kept living his life, following suit with his early adulthood years. Lion’s youth, which depicts common phases of friendship and love, has awarded him this time with both aspects happier and wonderful, unlike his childhood struggle, only to end up being betrayed by both friend and lover. Failing to find a similar envisioned future with the love of his life - Ersa and being rejected and left behind for an unclear reason as he proposed for them to get married, Lion gets accidentally hit as he mindlessly crossed the road, providing an explanation to why the reminiscing older Lion had a cane, limping as he told his story to the crowd.
Bearing a train of pains and gaining depression from his younger years, which is by the way can be assumed hereditary due to his mother’s condition, frustrated and hopeless Lion was further put into more anguish upon learning that Ersa’s rejection was caused by her unknown affair with none other than Lion’s childhood best friend Hamil. This anguish awakened the only sturdy and reliable thing in his life – his sculpture Thea – magnificent and dainty in her casted movement and being. Understanding that Lion’s anguish is unbearable already, Thea stood out to give Lion the refuge he needs and reaches out to him warmly, encouraging him to take revenge at the world by giving up and quitting the unfair life he is living.
Hinting the climax of Lion’s battle with himself, another interpretative choreography was rendered by the cast featuring an exhausted and confused Lion being influenced by an antagonizing Thea. The dance seemed to be Lion’s sanity battle, staging an internal fight to keep on breathing or take flight, away from all his despair, and into the loving embrace of Thea which signified Thea’s encouraged choice, a choice to end his life. Stage black.
And for its finale, an unexpected twist of event – or rather, mindset – portrayed Lion’s triumphant final exhibit show with an emcee about to reveal the much-awaited final sculpture created by Lion. Upon the taking off of the cloth covering his final piece, the expected lone-standing beautiful Thea was turned into a couple sculpture showing Thea embracing a self-sculpture of Lion, symbolized by his cane, both with smiling faces. This take off was ended with Lion coming out of the stage to give his ending remarks, in which he provided his imaginary audience with a brief backgrounder on his final piece – the very symbol of his victory against the battle he had with himself – bottling the event with his encouraging words to “speak up, seek help, keep on.”
Lion was able to overcome his depression. His pursuit to finish his final masterpiece passed by hand in hand with his journey through the series of downfalls in his life which all ended up in a happy note – a finished sculpture equal to an end of his own struggles.
Still, it had very specific scenes which were dark and deep and, as cautioned prior its beginning, can be triggering for certain people or would seem inappropriate. But the way the cast had carried such scenes were remarkable enough, balancing its darkness but easiness of being performed on stage. Masked with Greek-influenced theme and mix of current trends, overall, Rebulto tried to give its audience an easy-to-digest sandwich tackling the darker side of mental health.
But it was too easy, as an audience, to watch Lion’s time of struggling to his time of overcoming - - - with him ending the show with words of encouragement to the audience of his exhibit vis-à-vis the actual audience of the Madrigal’s play. Lion’s story might have tried to sell the “this-too-shall-pass” concept – that no matter how dark a person’s past has been better days will still come just as long as he or she chooses to not give up. The story’s resounding ending lesson of retaining a positive outlook in life is good and helpful, and could even be linked to Pygmalion Effect, perhaps, because generally, having better expectations also aid in actually achieving better situations. The fast-paced scenes from Lion and Thea’s thrilling dance-off, a quick lights off, and then a sudden happy twist of Lion still keeping up and breathing can be deemed exciting and supportive of the perceived general message of the play that life will still be good. And of course, going back to the essence of the play to still remain amusing to the crowd because of the slight plot twist, these scenes were necessary. For a normal viewer, this brought out the element of thrill and suspense because we really can’t tell if Lion’s going to let Thea totally win over and give up or if not. Fortunately, he didn’t. But for some who might still be dwelling in their dark days, it would have been more helpful if the play showed clear-cut solutions that could possibly help strike out the stigma on mental health. Offering an actual or visible portrayal of time-based solutions on overcoming depression, a possibly step-by-step guide or available solutions some of us could take, such as engaging with a mental health professional, bravely joining support groups, observing proper food intake and sleep, doing mindfulness activities or even doing recreational and even creative activities – like how Lion immersed himself with creating sculpture – a clearer picture showing that these things are doable, would have been beneficial for viewers, especially those with still limited knowledge on mental health or general psychology, to clearly understand how one can really win over mental health problems.
The play also touched issues on child-rearing and showed how critical it is to parent a child; after all, a damaged childhood is usually the root why people are experiencing mental health problems. Partly, it was a saddening realization that both Lion’s parents had horrible effects in the course of his lifetime and their part in the play had unpleasant endings. Rebulto, also, subtly communicated how the younger generation treats relationships – with the heightened trend of fearing commitment, tendencies of false love that also leads to infidelity, and how friendships are overtaken by self-serving decisions – and God, how we hope these aren’t true but all these are happening in our current society, and specifically, among the youth. And what’s greatly compromised is everyone’s mental health. Here we see how parenting should be taken seriously and that we should actually start working together for preventive measures. (*again, I shout with my typing, “moral recovery!”)
Largely, Rebulto was worthy to watch and I hope it could be shown again with larger crowds that can witness it, just as how much I would want to re-watch the rest of Madrigal’s earlier works. For someone who’s not directly practicing psychology-related tasks, the play, other than being a delight, also served as a breather and refresher on suppressed issues about mental health. With how the world is rushing all of us now, it’s always a good option to take a step back and relearn things – even the most basic ones we can consider – such as talking out with friends, doing things we like regardless if it seems uninteresting to others, being kind, being optimistic – and to remember that there’s always help available if we also make ourselves available to help ourselves and others.
And just as Lion’s positivity drew out overflowing-ly in the end of the play, may we also find ourselves the same, hopeful for what’s better ahead and fearless in speaking out, seeking help and keeping on.
Still, I would like to express my awe and appreciation to the cast, director, writer and the technical people behind this play. Mind you, these people are college ones yet they have performed exceedingly and surely has made the play’s impact felt by the audience. Long live AdU’s Tinik ng Teatro!
(Note: All photos taken by the reviewer.)
^ took me almost 3 months to finish this review piece (even had it lost along the hundred GB files I lost in space from 2 weeks ago, good thing I had it in a separate flash drive, huhuhu), at least I finished it as promised. ^_^
