|
Watching
reruns or replays of old Filipino films on television
delights many of us. As a child, I remember enjoying the
slapstick antics of Dolphy and Panchito, being awed
byFernando Poe Jr.’s lightning fists and, in my teenage
years, laughed at Champoy, agonized with Bembol Roco and
had a terrible crush on Gina Alajar.
Old
performances, in film or on- stage, not only make us
laugh and cry, but also prick our conscience, giving us
a glimpse of what’s happening around us at different
periods of our history. They immortalize, in our eyes,
the actors or performers. They become legends.
But
backstage, it’s a different story for our country’s
performance artists, as I found out one rainy night in a
gathering of artists organized by the Performers Rights
Society of the Philippines (PRSP) at the Teatrino,
Greenhills. PRSP is a collection society created to
manage the copyright of performance artists, which
includes collecting royalties from subsequent broadcasts
of their performances.
Mitch
Valdez, PRSP president, explained, in her hilarious way,
how PRSP came to be. She was watching television one
night when, lo and behold, she saw her naked self on the
screen in a replay of the classic Oro Plata Mata. She
was paid P2,000 at that time to bare herself on-screen
and here is a “television network making millions of
pesos on replays over my P2, 000 body! Shouldn’t I get
something for that?”
Laughter
and applause from an appreciative audience of directors
and actors on stage and film filled the room. Among them
were Freddie Santos, Bembol Roco, Rez Cortes, Noel
Trinidad, Jaime Fabregas, German Moreno, Cherry Pie
Picache, Joel Torre and Gina Alajar.
Indeed,
Mitch is right. Performance artists do enjoy copyright
protection under the Intellectual Property Code (RA
8293), which took effect in 1998. The Code defines
“performers” as “actors, singers, musicians, dancers and
other persons who act, sing, declaim, play in, interpret
or otherwise perform literary and artistic work.”
As
performers, they enjoy exclusive rights over their
performances. They have the right to authorize putting
their performances in a “fixed” form capable of being
reproduced or distributed or replayed, as in a recording
on whatever means. Once in a “fixed” form, performers
have the right to authorize the direct or indirect
reproduction of their performance.
Performers also have the right to authorize the first
public distribution of the original and copies of their
performance fixed in the recording through sale or
rental or other forms of transfer of ownership. And even
after they have authorized the first public
distribution, performers have the right to authorize the
commercial rental to the public of the original and
copies of their performances fixed in recordings.
As for
the broadcasting of their performances or communicating
to the public in whatever form, performers have the
right to authorize this, too. Moreover, in every
communication to the public or broadcast of a
performance after the first communication or broadcast
thereof by the broadcasting organization, the performer
shall be entitled to additional remuneration equivalent
to at least 5 percent of the original compensation he or
she received for the first communication or broadcast.
Finally,
performers have the right to authorize making available
to the public of their performances fixed in sound
recordings, by wired or wireless means, in such a way
that members of the public may access them from a place
and time individually chosen by them. The only
limitations on their exclusive rights are the provisions
on “fair use” in the IP Code.
As
artists, performers have intellectual property rights.
But for one reason or another, these rights were rarely
respected. Blinded by the glitter and the glamour, we
tend to forget that most of these artists are just
honest and hard-working people trying to earn a living
from what they do best—perform for an audience.
Thus,
PRSP’s goal to organize performance artists so they can
“reap the fruits of their creative labor” deserves our
full support.
The author is the director general of the Intellectual
Property Office of the Philippines. Comments may be sent
to e-mail address: dg_asc@ipophil.gov.ph. |
