There’s something about theater that cuts closer to the bone than most art forms. It doesn’t just reflect society—it mirrors us, sometimes more honestly than we’d like. Dedma, Theatre Titas’ recently concluded twin-bill production written by co-founder Chesie Galvez-Cariño, does just that. With sharp humor and a charged emotional rhythm, the show unpacks the performances we give offstage—the ones we slip into every day.
Staged during the first half of April at the intimate Mirror Studio Theater in Poblacion, Makati, Dedmadraws audiences into a space where appearances are tested and facades begin to fray.
The first play, Let’s Do Lunch, directed with crisp control by Maribel Legarda, opens with what seems like a cordial catch-up between longtime friends: Val, played by Naths Everett, and Issa, played by Issa Litton. On the surface, it’s tea and cakes. But beneath the smiles, tensions brew. Metaphorical knives are drawn as pride, power, and the fragility of status begin to surface. With Issa reeling from her husband’s financial scandal, the encounter shifts into thinly veiled accusations and class warfare dressed up as friendship.
Ash Nicanor, as Bebang the househelp, cuts through the tension with deadpan delivery and keen instinct. She watches, listens, and occasionally interjects—but her role is far from just comic relief. Her lines carry a quiet clarity. She sees through the layers of performance, reminding us that in any hierarchy, someone always has a clearer view of what’s real.
The second play, The Foxtrot, directed by Paul Alexander Morales, shifts the tone—slower, more deliberate, yet equally intense. JC Santos plays Diego, a ballroom instructor. Jackie Lou Blanco is Anna, a fading socialite determined to compete in one last dance competition. The foxtrot isn’t just choreography; it becomes the language they share.
Their rehearsals unfold in halting steps—at times graceful, at times uncertain. Diego demands structure; Anna wavers between defiance and surrender. The dance blurs the lines between teacher and student, control and vulnerability. Santos and Blanco bring depth to each movement, letting silence and distance carry as much meaning as words. Under Morales’ direction, the choreography becomes the conversation.
Together, the two plays explore privilege not with condemnation but with precision. Galvez-Cariño doesn’t write symbols—she writes people. Characters stuck in roles they can’t quite abandon, maintaining appearances even when the script no longer fits. Dedma doesn’t lecture; it observes. And in watching, it invites us to do the same.
In a theater landscape full of spectacle and adaptations, Dedma is a quiet rebellion. It’s intimate, unsettling, and often uncomfortably close to home. It asks what we’re really saying behind our polite laughter—and what’s left when we finally stop performing.
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At the April 12 performance of The Foxtrot, Jackie Lou Blanco dedicated her role to her late mother, Pilita Corrales, Asia’s Queen of Songs. Holding a rose to her chest during curtain call, she marked the day of her mother’s passing with a heartfelt tribute.
