I went to Halxyon Club in Poblacion on August 27 for the press conference of Last Dance: Hubo’t Hubad , and the obvious thing to talk about would be the bodies. The production makes no effort to hide them. Five attractive men, shirtless key visuals, harnesses, a male revue bar, an 18+ advisory, and partial and full nudity are all part of what is being sold. Even the title tells you exactly where your eyes are supposed to go first. But after listening to the cast together and then speaking with each of them more closely, I came away thinking the bodies may actually be the easiest part of this show to understand. Written and directed by Jojo Urquico, Last Dance follows five performers inside the dressing room of a struggling male revue bar on what may be their final night. There is a storm outside, the possibility of a police raid, and five men carrying their own dreams, relationships, fears and compromises into one room. It also opens the door to som...

Photo by Saul de Jesus. I went into the Pinocchio press con at Ayala Malls Feliz on August 22 already knowing the story, or at least the version of it most of us carry around in our heads. There is Geppetto, a wooden puppet who wants to become a real boy, a nose that refuses to cooperate with lies, and one bad decision after another until Pinocchio finally learns what becoming "real" is supposed to mean. What I did not expect was to leave thinking less about the puppet and more about the young company Ephesus Teatron Group is putting around her. Brie Mosquito plays Pinocchio when the musical runs October 9 to 11 at the Activity Center of Ayala Malls Feliz in Pasig, and what stood out to me was how present she remained throughout the afternoon. She performed, stayed for the conversation and answered for herself when the microphone reached her while the adults around her listened. Later, Brie stood as the discussion continued. Nobody made a grand point out ...

Production images from the Ambon, Ulan, Baha media release. No photographer credit appears in the available materials. Ambon, Ulan, Baha was already talking about deforestation, flooding, and the cost of unchecked development in the 1970s. Almost 50 years later, it is heading back to the Metropolitan Theater. Frank G. Rivera's ethno-pop-rock zarzuela will be staged at the MET in Manila on September 26 and 27, 2026. CJ Navato and Thea Astley play Nonoy and Inday, with Anton Juan, Rendell Sanchez, Nazer Salcedo, Onyl Torres, Shermaine Santiago, and Sweet Buchanan also in the cast. The 2026 staging is presented by the National Commission for Culture and the Arts and the Metropolitan Theater, and produced by Pixel Art Media Production Co. This is not a newly written environmental story borrowing an old setting. The material itself goes back nearly five decades. The problem at its center never really left. The work started as Kaingin in 1976, part of MSU...

Disney’s Frozen The Broadway Musical will make its Philippine premiere in April 2027 at the Proscenium Theater in Rockwell, Makati. Official logos courtesy of 9 Works Theatrical. Manila theater already has one of its biggest 2027 titles, and we do not even have a cast yet. 9 Works Theatrical is bringing Disney’s Frozen The Broadway Musical to Manila for its Philippine premiere in April 2027 at the Proscenium Theater in Rockwell, Makati. Yes, Manila is going to Arendelle. The musical is based on Disney’s 2013 animated film, with music and lyrics by Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Filipino-American composer Robert Lopez, and a book by Jennifer Lee. It also arrives with a built-in problem for whoever stages it: almost everyone already knows what Frozen is supposed to look, sound, and feel like. Frozen Manila 2027: what has been announced Production: Disney’s Frozen The Broadway Musical Producer: 9 Works Theatrical Venue: Proscenium Theater, Rockwel...

Bela Padilla as Emma in People, Places and Things . Photo by Loreta Arroyo, courtesy of The Sandbox Collective. Review note: I watched The Sandbox Collective's technical dress rehearsal of People, Places and Things on August 14, 2026. As with any TDR, some technical details may still change before the public performances. Update, August 17, 2026: Official production photographs supplied by The Sandbox Collective were added after publication. At one point in People, Places and Things , addiction is likened to a parasite, something that fights for its own survival even as it destroys the person carrying it. That image followed me out of The Black Box last night. Duncan Macmillan's play is about addiction, but the parts that hit me hardest had very little to do with drugs. As someone who understands what it means to carry trauma that begins at home, there were moments in People, Places and Things that felt almost uncomfortably familiar. The subs...

Puregold CinePanalo Film Festival 2026 is expanding to six Ayala Malls Cinemas across Metro Manila, with all seven original full-length films and 20 student-made shorts screening at the participating locations for the duration of the festival. That's a pretty significant expansion for CinePanalo. More cinemas don't just mean more screenings. They make it considerably easier for someone who's curious about one of these films to actually go and see it. With locations in Taguig, Makati, Pasig, Parañaque, and Quezon City, the Ayala Malls partnership gives CinePanalo a much wider footprint across Metro Manila and puts both its feature films and student shorts in front of audiences well beyond a single festival crowd. Which Ayala Malls Cinemas are screening CinePanalo 2026? CinePanalo 2026 will screen at these six Ayala Malls locations: Market! Market! in Taguig TriNoma in Quezon City Fairview Terraces in Quezon City Ayala Malls Feliz in Pasig Ayala Mall...

Image supplied by Puregold. There are plenty of calls for scripts. There are fewer that say, plainly, what happens if your script is chosen. Puregold Teatro Panalo has laid out its offer: 12 original Filipino one-act plays and musicals will be selected for production, with each playwright receiving Php 100,000. The writers will also enter a development program led by Wishbone Collective, Inc., with dramaturgical guidance, production support, and a live staging. For playwrights, that is the detail worth pausing over. A script can be finished and still remain stuck in the folder where it was saved. A festival cannot solve every problem surrounding new writing, but a production commitment, a paid development process, and an audience give a writer more to work with than exposure alone. What Puregold Teatro Panalo is offering Presented by Puregold and produced and organized by Wishbone Collective, Teatro Panalo is an inaugural festival for original one-act straight plays an...

Official Tops ArtFest 2026 artwork. Courtesy of Tops ArtFest. There is a lazy way to cover art outside Metro Manila: add a scenic adjective, call it a discovery, then wait for it to receive a Manila co-sign. Tops ArtFest 2026 gives that habit very little to work with. From October 22 to 25, more than 300 artists are set to gather at TOPS in Cebu City for four days of exhibitions, installations, performances, and other art experiences under the theme “Building and Breaking Norms.” Junyee and Nune Alvarado are the festival’s main artists, joined by Ronald Ventura, Romulo Galicano, Demi Padua, Charlie Co, Randalf Dilla, Dino Gabito, and other participating artists. The point is not that Cebu is producing an art event worthy of attention from elsewhere. A major Philippine art event is happening in Cebu. The rest of the country should learn to read the map properly. A festival with enough artists to make the curatorial question unavoidable “More than 300 ...