Happy New Year! Happy New Year! (I think I’ve lived long enough to know that a new year doesn’t really change a person since that person can “change” at ANY point during the year.) But with that being said, HAPPY 525,600 MINUTES (exact is 525948.766 min.) of EARTH’S ROTATION!
2013 has been a pretty good year! Of course there has been bumps along the road, but of course there will be, and will continue to be, but it’s not fun looking back on what coulda shoulda wouldas, deebs? But what is fun is to see what this year has brought! So with the help of my trusty email account, let’s go back to the past!
- AGENT KILIKILI’S MOM AND HIS MALE ORDER BRIDE was produced for My Asian Mom 2.0.1.3 by A-Squared Theatre Workshop in Chicago, IL. Many thanks to everyone there for making this dream come true!
- Partnered with Drew Stephens and Emmanuel Romero on the screenplay of Drew’s story, PRINSESA. They did an amazing job from something I started with Drew at the beginning of 2013! They are the BOMB artists supreme and everyone connected with the film are AMAZING!!! Definite Highlight!
- I left my full-time job to be a full-time MFA student. I’ll rank this as a highlight because I had to decide what was best for me at the time. Looking back at the decision is another story, but this list isn’t about looking back.
- Saw PENTATONIX for the second time, which was awesome since they’ve only performed here in the Bay Area twice. My favorite group!
- Was on a Fil-Am Lit Panel for a class taught by Barbara Jane Reyes at USF with Tina Bartolome, Edwin Lozada, and Anthem Salgado. Had a blast talking about writing and being a playwright.
- Got a part-time gig as the Webmaster at SFSU with the Dean of Student’s Student Life Marketing Team. Still pushing pixels around using HTML, CSS, and Javascript. I’ve been doing it professionally for almost 15 years and it pays the bills. PLUS, I still have fun doing it! Helps when I work with awesome peeps, and there have been many of them throughout my career.
- Joined the Katipunan Marching Band! It’s a marching band put together by my Ate Dee up in Sacramento and we’ve had 3 performances this year. It’s been fun playing the trumpet again, although my lips are SO out of shape from playing! Chops are gone, but with a little bit more practice and more gigs, I’ll be able to play like I did when I was in High School.
- Got to Direct a play on the Bindlestiff Stage!!! During March through I don’t remember, I learned how to Direct a play from one of the best mentors one could ever hope to have, Marissa Niles! This was for Stories High XIII and I got the fortune of directing Cristal Fiel’s play RALLY FIGHTS THE MAN. It was fun to go from the workshop to casting to the actual production of the play. Oh, it was fun to act in it as well. I’d have to say the MOST STRESSFUL part about the whole thing is the scheduling of rehearsals! But everyone got through it well and had an awesome run of sold-out shows! Def highlight is being able to say that I’ve written, acted, and directed a play for Bindlestiff Studio’s STORIES HIGH!!! plus, I got to share the stage with my lil sis, Krystle Piamonte Jong (She KILLED IT!). It’s always nice to perform in front of an audience with someone I’ve performed with since 2003!
- While going through the Directing Workshop, I also got to act in a stage reading of Russell Horvath’s play THE SEARCH FOR THE SPRINGSTEEN HIGHWAY, directed by the incomparable Terry Boreo at the Exit Theater in SF. This was a highlight because I got to act with some AMAZING actors not from Bindlestiff. I love my Bindlepeeps (and always will) but this was a step out of my comfort level and that’s important to do every once in a while!
- Acted in another staged reading: AURORA by Jeannie Barroga. Even though this was only a one-day event, again, it was an amazing experience to share the stage with amazing actors. I love Actors!!!
- Another acting Highlight: did a table read with Esperanza Catubig, Lily Trung Crystal, and Bonnie Akimoto for a Dorinne Kondo Play. (Since it’s in development, I don’t want to give the title just yet, but IT WAS AMAMZING!!!). Again, I love actors and just being in their presence makes this playwright giddy!
- My play, THE BARBARY CAPER, and along with Peter Hsieh’s A ROOM WITH MODERN FURNITURE, were finalists of the Playwright’s CageMatch Script Writing Competition produced by the Douglass Morrisson Theatre Company from Hayward, CA. Happy that one of my oldest friends and one of the most amazing actors EVER, Brian Rivera, was able to come down and check it out! Love the Theater!
- Speaking of Brian Rivera, I had the fortune of seeing him in the Califas plays, THE RIVER, AMERICAN NIGHT, and ALLELUIA produced by Intersection for the Arts and Cal Shakes (forgive me if I’m wrong w/ titles and producers). I was just so inspired by the productions and so proud of him and the road he’s on and the work he’s been doing. Highlight.
- Seeing one of my friends, Lorraine De Arco’s band play, COVER ME BADD, on several occasions. It’s a highlight because there’s nothing better than seeing the friends you’ve been with for almost 20 years doing what they love to do.
- Anytime I get together with the TROPAS. They’re my barkada and my rock. I’m like the shyest and oddest person and because they know that, I could be me with them.
- Pushing an electric car up a hill on Angel Island. SMH, Ben!
- Being a twitter fiend on the Big Brother #bb15 feed! I got addicted to this show a couple of years ago and it rules my days and nights during the summer.
- Having Marissa notice this little acting thing I did as I portrayed the stoned uncle in RALLY FIGHTS THE MAN.
- Surviving Allyson Titiangco-Cubales’s Asian American Studies 352 Filipina/o American Literature, Art, and Culture class. HELLA WORK!!! I thought, sure this is gonna be good for my writing cuz if I’m going to be a Filipino American Writer, I BETTER know some of the works written by other Filipina/o American Writers! I got to do that and THEN SOME. Not only did we have to read and write, but we also had to write a short skit, write a Bulosanan, make Kare-Kare, write a Pantoume, write a children’s book, teach a First Grade class at Longfellow Elementary School, CO-write a play, teach non-theatre people how to operate the Bindlestiff Studio lights and sound system (THANK YOU TO DARIUS FOR TEACHING ME), and how to write a killer essay! Good times good times.
- Participated and completed 31 Plays in 31 Days for the second year in a row!
- Participated in Destination Delano. First off, MAN, that’s a long drive! But honestly, well worth it. I took over 14 pages of handwritten notes for the play I’m still working on and more so, met some really great people whom share the same passion for keeping the memory of the Delano Manong’s still alive. To put the cherry on top of this is the passing of AB123 by California’s Legislature and with the Governor’s signature making the knowledge of the work that Filipino Americans, like Philip Vera Cruz and Larry Itliong, be taught to California children grades 7-12. Yay!
- I have the opportunity to be a part of a Literary Panel for the Asian American Studies Conference to be held in April 2014. It’s a highlight because it’s something I’ve never had the opportunity to do before and cheers to new experiences, deebs?
- My play, INAY’S WEDDING DRESS (written as a class assignment) is a Runner-up for the James Milton Highsmith Drama Award. The award included at $200 cash prize, by way of a scholarship so that was a great highlight. Oh, on top of that, I found out that a really awesome playwright (whom I don’t know if I’m at liberty to say so I won’t chance it) was part of the selection committee! OMG!!! I love his work. OH, AND ON TOP OF THAT, the play was selected to be a part of San Francisco State University’s Fringe Festival which will be seen in May!!!
Whew! I think that’s all for now. Call me mad, but part of me wishes that there were more to report on. But I think putting this list together is the push I need to help me submit more to make the 2014 list even longer!!!
Happy New Year Everyone!!!