deserving ate guy
ayon sa fb the grapevine, linaglag ng palasyo si nora aunor bilang national artist upon the request of a prominent vilmanian na bff daw ni executive sec medialdea; tila ni hindi daw nakarating kay presidente ang dokumento ni nora. hindi ko alam kung matatawa ako o maiiyak. talaga ba? hanggang ngayon, pati ito, nasa level pa rin ng nora – vilma war?
say it isn’t so, ralph. come on, vilmanians. huwag nang mag-ilusyon. vilma had her moments but none so iconic or memorable that it has become part of public consciousness, as in “MY BROTHER IS NOT A PIG!” and what about “WALANG HIMALA!” — significant mantras in the nation’s drama.
mas gusto kong maniwala na di totoo ang chismis. na ralph and vilma are big enough to see, and acknowledge, that nora has long outstripped vilma, that nora is in a different league altogether in the performing arts, in body of work, and scholarship on that body of work, even going beyond current national artist levels kung ikokompara sa output ng ilang nagawaran na na masyado lang sinusuwerte.
sabi nga ni joel david, film scholar and critic:
Time to take a cold hard look at this cycle’s batch of performing-arts winners. Not one of them matches the achievements – in multiple media, formats, genres, and creative functions, as well as impact on pop-culture history – as the only official loser in their midst. Did any of them bother to point out this shameful anomaly? Did their alma mater (the national university, no less) keep tactfully silent over their comparatively undeserving win?
I for one have no intention of looking more closely at their output beyond what I’ve already seen. They’re all grandiose, well-intended, hard-working – yet unfortunately for them, even as a collective they do not measure up to the Guy’s record of accomplishments. They had the opportunity of doing the honorable thing – pointing out what was wrong about the process – but they were too eager for that title, that first million, and that attention. All of which they could still have gotten while doing the right thing. What a sorry bunch of cultural losers.
and what about national artist virgilio almario aka rio alma? why is he so quiet na naman about ate guy’s exclusion pero ang ingay ingay niya tungkol sa inclusion ni carlo caparas nung 2013? hindi ba mas nakakagalit pa itong tahasang pang-iisnab at pambabastos kay ate guy at sa inampalan? not once but twice.
is nora aunor not worth fighting for? then maybe we don’t deserve her? she with the golden voice, the perfect diction, the total performer as it turned out, across media, across genres. read nick joaquin’s “The Golden Girl” (1970) on joel david’s website.
Her starters for Tower Productions, smash hits at the box-office, have turned Nora into a superstar, the superstar of the moment. She has broken the color line in Philippine movies, where the rule used to be that heroines must be fair of skin and chiseled of profile. Though neither fair nor statuesque, Nora has bloomed into a beauty all the more fascinating because it’s not standard. Seen close up, the complexion shows fine gold tints, her speaking voice is soft but always sounds full of emotion, even if she’s only asking you to sit down. Nobody who has been watching the local trend towards sexy and ever sexier stars would have predicted that the next pop goddess to dominate the scene would be a simple demure country girl.
Under the tutelage of director Artemio Marquez, Nora is also developing into quite an actress. She has poise, she moves naturally, she underplays rather than mugs. Best of all, she’s one local performer who knows how to react. A person present is mentioned in the dialogue and her eyes automatically turn towards that person; or the ghost of a smile will flicker on her lips at certain words of somebody else’s lines. She seems to be really listening to the dialogue, to be paying attention to what’s happening on-scene. Good acting is fifty per cent reactions. It seems to be instinctive in Nora. The stories she appears in are mostly foolish and fantastic, but hers is always a real presence, the impact of a live person. In one movie that had elves in it, she played a cripple hobbling about on a crutch, and because you could believe she was really a cripple you could almost believe in the elves too. [Nora Aunor and Other Profiles by Quijano de Manila copyright 1977 by Nick Joaquin pp 1-16]
in 2013 robby tantingco wrote:
Those who belittle her dedication to her craft and her self-discipline should have seen her in the play “DH (Domestic Helper),” shown at the Dulaang Rajah Sulayman in Fort Santiago in 1992, where she portrayed not one, not two, but four different characters without ever leaving the stage (she changed costumes right there!). Even National Artists for Theatre like Atang de la Rama, Wilfrido Ma. Guerrero and Rolando Tinio would give her a standing ovation.
in 2017 it is said, the president promised that he would do justice to ate guy. paulit-ulit pa daw sinabi.
Danilo P. Delfin April 29, 2017
Sabi ni PRRD, “She deserves it! I do not want any INJUSTICE to Nora Aunor. I will sign the documents once it reaches the Office of the President.” Nagpalakpakan pa kami and it was almost midnight sa bahay po nila. He was very sincere and he was repeating his statements about his approval.
ano kayang nangyari between then and now? can it be that someone (maybe the vilmanian’s bff) convinced the president that doing justice to nora, that is, setting aside the imputed drugs case, would undermine his own war on drugs? but that’s about as lame as pNoy saying no to nora because BAD ang drugs, period. duterte’s war on drugs is so rife with controversy and inconsistency anyway, what is one more, in an exceptional moment of grace, rising above the fray to right a wrong, honoring nora aunor once and for all? it would have been so presidential, for a change. and we would all have loved him if only for that one moment in time.
Choosing National Artists entails the involvement of artists, cultural workers, and government representatives in a lengthy, multi-tiered process that, whatever its flaws, aims to produce a consensus on the basis of judgments that are as sound as its participants can muster. That the consensus around Aunor has now been dismissed twice over through the exercise of presidential prerogative, premised on reasons poorly conceived and ill-articulated, can only register as sheer waste, as wanton abuse, no matter how ostensibly legal. Aunor herself has said, “Bakit pa nila ako isinali rito kung hindi naman pala ako karapat-dapat?”
nora is a national treasure. that she has yet again been denied national artist status by the state is a mean blow not just to nora but to nation. nakaka-demoralize (as if things weren’t bad enough), this latest snub to our superstar, our vicarious thrill, our elsa.
maybe it’s time to make panalangin to santo rodrigo himself, for presidential discretion, or indiscretion, as the case may be. please, undo the injustice. pagpalain si ate guy. she deserves it more than any one so honored. siya nawa.
*
Statement of the Film Desk of the Young Critics Circle on the 2018 Order of National Artists