Tanghalang Ateneo

Tanghalang Ateneo (also known as TA) is one of the pioneer theater groups of the Ateneo de Manila University in the Philippines.

History of Tanghalang Ateneo

Tanghalang Ateneo descends from a long line of Ateneo theater companies-The Ateneo Dramatics Society and the Ateneo Experimental Theater, among others-which flourished in the college campus since its prewar days at Padre Faura. It started out in 1974 as a group of friends who wished to stage plays, and having no theater to speak of on the Loyola Heights campus, scheduled performances at the college cafeteria. The group pressed the administration for a more suitable venue, and by 1978, a large classroom, seating about 80 people, was converted to a theater of sorts (since 1989 however, Tanghalang Ateneo has been staging plays in a 250-seater theater called the Rizal Mini-theater). In the old classroom-theater, the group constructed wooden grids, light boxes, transformed a huge piece **of canvass into a cyclorama, built an enclosed control booth, and draped windows with dark curtains.

The officers drafted a constitution, got recognized as a co-curricular organization in college, and recruited Ricardo Saludo, a faculty member of the Department of Communications, to serve as moderator. In 1979, under Saludo, Tanghalang Ateneo’s first repertory season began. The repertory season of Filipino plays, original or in translation continued until Saludo left to join Asiaweek.

He was succeeded by Dr. Ricardo Abad, the current artistic director, who retained the repertory program but added English plays as part of it’s annual fare. Tanghalang Ateneo productions have also been seen off campus: over the last nine years, the company has performed in the Cultural Center of the Philippines, the Metropolitan Theater, the Puerto Real Gardens, the Ninoy Aquino Park, the British Council, the Alliance Francaise, Vigan, Iloilo, and only recently Nueva Ecija.

As a college theater company, Tanghalang Ateneo’s primary mission is educational: It seeks to supplement the liberal arts program of the Ateneo de Manila University by exposing students to dramatic masterpieces, both classical and modern, and by instilling in company members the lessons of theater work-cooperation, responsibility, discipline, generosity and truth. Several criteria it’s selection of plays. One of these, as gleaned from the season’s repertoire, is a preference for plays that will enjoin audiences to reflect more about their own private worlds and the relationship of these worlds to the larger society.

20 Seasons of Tanghalang Ateneo

*First Season (1979-1980)
**Maibigan Mo Sana ang Sauna
**Ramona Reyes ng Forbes Park
*Second Season (1980-1981)
**Kilabot ng Makiling
**Isa Pang Bayani
**Taong Pang Habang Panahon
*Third Season (1981-1982)
**Ang Inspektor
**Eksena!
**Adriano VII
**Ang Katubusan
*Fourth Season (1982-1983)
**Maibigan Mo Sana ang Sauna
**Sigwa!
**Kiko Kulang-Kulang
*Fifth Season (1983-1984)
**1+1=3/Two Act Plays
**Paraisong Parisukat
**Angel sa Impiyerno
**Kilabot ng Makiling
*Sixth Season (1984-1985)
**A Man for All Seasons
**Ang Kuripot
**Artenista: A trilogy of plays
**Ang Paglilitis ni Mang Serapio
**Orinola
**Ligawan
**The Good Woman of Setzuan
*Seventh Season (1985-1986)
**Becket or The Honor of God
**Ang Inspektor
**Tatsulok
**The Ugly Duckling
**Angela
**Usok, Ulap, Ibon, Kulisap
*Eighth Season (1986-1987)
**Pagsabog ng Liwanag
**Antigone
**Two Plays/Benefit Show
**Taong Grasa
**Orinola
**Tatlong Katuwaang Tig-iisang Yugto
**Ang Pamamanhikan
**The Boor
**Ang Anibersaryo
*Ninth Season (1987-1988)
**Paghihintay kay Godo
**The Importance of Being Earnest
**Tasulok II
**Gabun
**Alex Antiporda
**Ang Sopranong Kalbo
*Tenth Season (1988-1989)
**Felipe de las Casas
*Eleventh Season (1989-1990)
**Bb. Julie
**Sr. Mary Ignatius Explains It All For You
**Doon Po sa Amin
*Twelfth Season (1990-1991)
**Pangarap sa Gabi ng Gitnang Tag-Araw
**Immortal Diamond
*Thirteenth Season (1990-1991)
**Filibustero
**Pagkahaba-haba Man ng Prusisyon sa Simbahan Din ang Tuloy
**Murder in the Cathedral
*Fourteenth Season (1991-1993)
**Ang Trahedya ni Romeo at Julieta
**Tatsulok
**Cafe Apollo
**Mother's Day
**Balasa
**Waiting for Godot
*Fifteenth Season (1993-1994)
**Antigone (in English and Filipino)
**The Importance of Being Earnest(Filipino)
**Hamlet, Prinsipe ng Dramatika
*Sixteenth Season (1994-1995)
**Oedipus Rex
**Glass Menagerie
**Cyrano de Bergerac
*Seventeenth Season (1995-1996)
**Isang Pangyayari sa Planas Site
**Tuwaang
**Doon Po sa Amin
**2Bayani
*Eighteenth Season (1996-1997)
**Dalawang Sulok:
**Freshman
**Mga Kahon
**Lysistrata
**2Bayani
**Ang Apologia ni Sokrates
**Ang Mabuting Tao ng Setsuan
**Ang Kambal
**Makbet
*Nineteenth Season (1997-1997)
**Tartuffe
**Equus
**Therese ng Lisieux
**Ang Mabuting Tao ng Setsuan
**Ang Kambal
**Pangarap sa Gabi ng Gitnang Tag-Araw
*Twentieth Season (1998-1999)
**Marisol
**Paghihintay kay Godo
**TALAB I
**Ang Punong Inspektor
**Kahapon Ngayon at Bukas
**TALAB II
*Twenty-first Season (1999-2000)
**Merchant of Venice
**TALAB III
*Twenty Second (2000-2001)
*Twenty Third (2001-2002)
*Twenty Fourth (2002-2003)
*Twenty Fifth (2003-2004)
**Ang Palilitis ni Mang Serapio
**Don Juan
*Twenty Sixth (2004-2005) The Fighting Season
**Enemy of the People
**Re-Isyu: Santuario & Linya
**Lam-ang
**3PO (Three Penny Opera)
*Twenty Seventh (2005-2006) The Season of Flight
**Bayan-Bayanan: Pinoy sa Diaspora
**NSK (Nasaan si Kaliwete?)
**Ang Nilalang ni Viktor Frankenstein
*Twenty Eighth: (2006-2007) The Season of Awakening
**Ang Aksidenteng Kamatayan ng Isang Anarkista
**PATATAS
**Middle Finger Po
**The Glass Menagerie
*Twenty Ninth: (2007-2008) The Season of Truth
**Ang Litisang Bilog ng Caucasus
**TABAKADA
**The Death of Memory
**Measure for Measure

About Tanghalang Ateneo

Tanghalang Ateneo, the theatre company of the Loyola Schools, Ateneo de Manila University, is an amalgam of its theatrical tradition that descended from the Spanish times: the devotion of the salon de actos at the Escuela Municipal in Intramuros, the eloquence of the pre-war Ateneo Dramatics Guild, the joie de vivre of the post-war Ateneo Players Theatre, and the aesthetic sensibility of the Ateneo Experimental Theatre during the revolutionary 1960's. Like these companies of Ateneo's past, Tanghalang Ateneo employs the theatre to foster eloquentia, sapientia, and humanitas - the ideals of Jesuit pedagogy laid down in the Ratio Studiorum. It sees itself as a theater company in the service of the student formation.

Since its founding 26 years ago, in 1979, Tanghalang Ateneo has shaped itself from a fledging band of student players to one of the country's leading school-based theatre companies. Its repertoire of plays covers world classics, with a special affection for Shakespeare, Filipino originals, and documentary texts turned into theatre pieces. Its lingua franca on stage is Filipino and English. And its audience base, mostly students, extends beyond the campus in Loyola Heights to embrace young people in schools within and outside the National Capital Region.

Three principles govern Tanghalang Ateneo's production style over the last decade. These principles, in practice often help each other:

The first revolves around the local-global nexus. TA productions seek to fuse local, including Asian elements with Western forms, particularly in productions of Western text. This aesthetic principle is evident in the contemporary treatment of Ang Apologia ni Socrates (The Apology of Socrates, 1996), the bilingualism of The Merchant of Venice (1999), the Southeast Asian ethos of several productions Pangarap sa Isang Gabi ng Gitnang Tag-araw (A Midsummer Night's Dream, 1998), Ika-Labindalawang Gabi (Twelfth Night, 2000), and Ang Bagong Damit ng Dakilang BahagHari (The Emperor's New Clothes, 2002), the exploration of Filipino Baroque in Mirandolina (2001), the postcolonial Ang Pagpapaamo sa Maldita (The Taming of the Shrew, 2002), and the multicultural Rhinoceros (2003).

The second principle is the society-individual nexus. TA productions take the position that people act, think, and feel in a social context that often dominate lives. The power of social systems, and the need for people to break through these hegemonic structures, underlie productions like Antigone (1994), Lysistrata (1996), Tartuffe (1997), Paghihintay kay Godo (Waiting for Godot, 1998), Santa Juana ng mga Kural (St. Joan of Stockyards, 2001), La Vida Es Sueño / Ang Buhay ay Isang Panaginip (Life is a Dream, 2001), Isang Buhay sa Tambakan (2002), Don Juan: Ang Babaero ng Sevilla (El Burlador de Seville, 2003), and Lam-ang (2004).

The third principle is the nexus of tradition-change. TA productions work on the premise of society in flux where the forces of tradition battle with the winds of change, where the face of the other shifts, and where the act of transformation is in itself fraught with new dilemmas. Such is the anchoring point of productions like TA's two rock operas 2Bayani (1996) and The Kahapon, Ngayon, at Bukas Seditions Love Musical (1999), Marisol (1998), the satirical Ang Punong Inspector (The Government Inspector, 1998), the gut-wrenching Ningning sa Silangan (Light in the Village, 1999), the hip-hop when the purple settles (2002), the fiery An Enemy of the People (2004), and 3PO (The Three Penny Opera, 2005).

These achievements have earned numerous awards and grants for Tanghalang Ateneo and for its performers and production teams. They have also attracted invitations to perform in campuses and venues across the country. They have also lead to the formation of an alumni theater company, Bulwagang Bughaw, to enable company members to continue serving the theater after college. These achievements have also helped in the creation, in School Year 2000-2001, of a Theater Arts Program within the Fine Arts Program of the Ateneo de Manila University -- a link that allows Tanghalang Ateneo to become a formal part of an academic course of studies.

TA productions entertain and delight, but they also stimulate the imagination and provoke thought. Jesuit pedagogy fuses with the theatre to interrogate the Filipino social world, often in the national language, so that students can invent themselves as critical Filipinos - sharp in thought, expressive in action, deep in faith, and attune with others, fellow players and audiences in the many worlds that intersect with their own. The plays of Tanghalang Ateneo's 28th Season pit two kinds of truth -- the official view, upheld by power or convention, and the unofficial view, resisted by convention and restrained by authority. In each clash of truths, the unofficial view seeps out from the cracks of the official façade, leading the characters to experience a tumultuous awakening, a discovery of new truths, the beginnings of change.

Share these plays with us. Join us in the Season of Awakening! Tanghalang Ateneo (TA)

Theater excellence derived from deeply-rooted tradition and the fundamentals of eloquentia, sapientia and humanitas. This is Tanghalang Ateneo.

For twenty-seven years, TA has entertained and delighted the many audiences inside and outside the Ateneo with its productions ranging from Shakespearean classics to Filipino originals. But what sets TA apart is its holistic approach to theater. It has its members undertake tasks beyond performing like stage management, stage execution, sponsorship and publicity that requires discipline, hard work and devotion. Members are given the opportunity to work with successful TA alumni and other esteemed individuals in the theater community like Salvador Bernal and Ricky Abad. TA is also family. Late nights, hours of production work and the same passion for theater, help foster amongst members a bond that goes beyond the theater.

This year, come aboard and join us in A Season In Flight and be part of Tanghalang Ateneo’s long-standing theater tradition.