Long before Nick Lizaso became CCP president and now NCCA chairman, he often sat down with me simply to shoot the breeze over cups of brewed coffee, and each time our talk would inevitably drift to a dream we shared, which essentially is about mainstreaming the works of our literary greats and masters on primetime TV, the same time slots now occupied by top-rating teleseryes.Â
The other day, Joe Lad Santos, former chairman of Komisyon ng Wikang Filipino, a Tagalog novelist and a lifelong avid admirer of Philippine literature, casually revealed to me about his project of editing and publishing an anthology of short stories of local writers. My interest was piqued and on a whim told him: “Why not adapt them for TV on a one-hour program so more people will get to learn about them?”
Joe Lad and I were then having lunch in a cafeteria in Intramuros and, a short while later, we found out that the place is being managed by a niece of one of the writers we were just talking about: the late Rogelio Sikat. I took it as an omen that the heavens are with us on this venture.Â
My proposal is simple: without doing away with the networks’ current fare of teleseryes, which command high ratings, can they possibly collaborate with the CCP or NCCA in the production of adaptations of the works of Filipino literary masters using the teledrama format?
Maybe we can dramatize each story to run for a few weeks or months, but let the program be flexible, basing it on the natural and logical progress of the adapted story.
By employing the elements and storytelling techniques of popular tele-dramas and casting our present crop of acting talents who have a captive following, we can make these great works appealing, entertaining and accessible to the TV mass audience and break down the reflexive resistance of the ordinary Pinoy to literary works. The trick, Nick keeps saying to me, is not to present them as literary masterpieces and to be treated with awe and reverence. Rather, let’s focus on the stories. That is the key. Forget for a while they were written by literary masters. Just zero in on the fact that these works have the elements of great and compelling storytelling. Isn’t that what makes any work appealing?Â
If one patiently peruses through these library-confined literary pieces, one can immediately see that they have all the elements and gamut of emotions that make for highly appealing drama: love, intrigue, social divide, envy, pride, sex, betrayal, loyalty, hatred, revenge, extreme fear and admirable courage, perseverance, hope in the face of suffering and everything that one thinks of as only in the movies and telenovelas. More important, their works portray the positives about the Filipino way of life and help create in us a native sense of self. Â
Filipino televiewers, I am sure, will be entranced by such works as The Pretenders, Villa Magdalena, The Rosales Saga, The Woman Who Had Two Navels, The Bamboo Dancers, Without Seeing The Dawn, Ilaw sa Hilaga, Ang Mundong Ito sa Ibabaw, and Galaw ng Asoge just to mention a few from the unlimited smorgasbord of neglected masterworks. We can even include a selection of classic plays or Palanca and CCP Virgin Labfest award-winning plays.Â
These works are not contrived on a whim, or kathang hangin or plucked from thin air but wrested from the artist’s heart and mind, mirroring the universal human condition that similarly characterizes the works by Tolstoy, Chekhov, Flaubert, Victor Hugo and other great masters. Hindi lang pang intellectual or academic elite, pang ordinaryong tao din!
And then why stop there? Why confine the airing to just the local TV networks? Why not venture further? Why not negotiate with Netflix or iflix, or other streaming service providers and pay-per-view platforms so these adaptations can be shown to a global audience? Filipino movie titles are now available on Netflix and iflix. Korean, Turkish, as well as Indian, Egyptian and even Nigerian drama series can be accessed on Netflix. Just recently I watched an anthology of films adapted from stories of Rabindranath Tagore, one of India’s literary masters.Â
It’s a long shot, some will say. But if there’s any one who can do it and has the will to do it, it’s Nick Lizaso. He didn’t acquire a reputation as a live wire for nothing.Â
Nick should also know what he’s talking about because he used to be a director of Balintataw with Cecil Guidote-Alvarez. That award-winning drama program used to adapt serious works by literary masters for television.Â
Decades ago, at ABS-CBN during the old pre-martial law days, Nick directed a program called Obra Maestra, which served as a vehicle for world masterpieces and Filipino literary classics adapted and made accessible to Filipino TV viewers. Among them: Rashomon, Wuthering Heights, The Visit by Durrenmatt, and Medea. The said program, as he recalls, enjoyed high audience ratings.Â
I’ve always maintained that the Filipino audience is not intelligence-challenged. It’s time to raise the ante by offering them films and TV dramas that engage them emotionally and intelligently. I am sure with the mainstreaming of these literary works to a wider audience, young audiences may start thinking and making decisions with greater discernment, such as in selecting our future leaders. It could be the key to the enlightened society we’ve all been wishing for.