Any formula for live entertainment and pleasure is as crucial as having considered the time duration of the performance. While the Greeks mount their three-act tragedies written by eminent playwrights like Sophocles or Aeschylus during their City Dionysia festival in honor of their god Dionysus in Athens, William Shakespeare’s five-act comedies would satisfy Queen Elizabeth I and other paying audience members in their pleasurable form of entertainment at the Swan Theatre during the English renaissance. The usual number of hours used by these periods would take three to five hours long per play. Fast forward to the present time, musicals for contemporary theater would always run at a minimum of two hours or even lesser since the attention span of the audience nowadays seems to be cut-off due to other technological advancements such as the growth of television, movies, internet activities among other alternative forms of entertainment.
Theater Down South’s second production offering is the musical Rapunzel, a story of a cobbler and his wife who steals vegetables from the garden of the witch and promises to give the first born child (Rapunzel) to the witch three years later. The child grows up into a beautiful lady with her longest hair and meets Prince Brian and their adventures in the forest together follow soon after. A happy resolution finally ends the play.
Books and lyrics were written by David Crane and Marta Kauffman. Michael Skloff did the music with ten songs in it. It was under the direction of Theater Down South artistic director Michael Williams, a seasoned theater actor who performed in the original Miss Saigon ensemble at the Drury Lane Theatre in London. Deana Aquino did the choreography. Martin Esteva took in charge of the lighting design while Niki Delos Reyes-Torres supervised the production design. Other collaborating artists include actors Mika Margolles (Rapunzel), Daryl Zarraga (Prince Brian), Ria Quintos-Ortega (The witch / wigmaker), Chino Veguillas (Simon the valet), Joey Torres (King) and Micko Yabut (storyteller). It was held at the interesting theater of Insular Life in Alabang.
Surprisingly, the play only lasted for an hour and fifteen minutes including the musical numbers. The decision to make this deliberately short as a performance is not an indication of worthwhile theater experience for audience members who would attend all the way from the northern part of Metro Manila. Aside from the ordinary and boring artistic embellishments of choreography and production design, the staging did not value proximity in the tested formula of a children’s musical where unpredictability, magic, excitement and precision instantly vanished and even made it the production’s loopholes. Veering away from the traditional route of elitist’s concept of a musical theater is a suggested answer to a supposedly interesting idea of community theater gathering in a given time and place. The Greek and the Elizabethan audiences might wonder and ask: “Isn’t that theater is a shared artistry? How come we did not experience it?”
Theater Down South’s second production offering is the musical Rapunzel, a story of a cobbler and his wife who steals vegetables from the garden of the witch and promises to give the first born child (Rapunzel) to the witch three years later. The child grows up into a beautiful lady with her longest hair and meets Prince Brian and their adventures in the forest together follow soon after. A happy resolution finally ends the play.
Books and lyrics were written by David Crane and Marta Kauffman. Michael Skloff did the music with ten songs in it. It was under the direction of Theater Down South artistic director Michael Williams, a seasoned theater actor who performed in the original Miss Saigon ensemble at the Drury Lane Theatre in London. Deana Aquino did the choreography. Martin Esteva took in charge of the lighting design while Niki Delos Reyes-Torres supervised the production design. Other collaborating artists include actors Mika Margolles (Rapunzel), Daryl Zarraga (Prince Brian), Ria Quintos-Ortega (The witch / wigmaker), Chino Veguillas (Simon the valet), Joey Torres (King) and Micko Yabut (storyteller). It was held at the interesting theater of Insular Life in Alabang.
Surprisingly, the play only lasted for an hour and fifteen minutes including the musical numbers. The decision to make this deliberately short as a performance is not an indication of worthwhile theater experience for audience members who would attend all the way from the northern part of Metro Manila. Aside from the ordinary and boring artistic embellishments of choreography and production design, the staging did not value proximity in the tested formula of a children’s musical where unpredictability, magic, excitement and precision instantly vanished and even made it the production’s loopholes. Veering away from the traditional route of elitist’s concept of a musical theater is a suggested answer to a supposedly interesting idea of community theater gathering in a given time and place. The Greek and the Elizabethan audiences might wonder and ask: “Isn’t that theater is a shared artistry? How come we did not experience it?”
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