NATIONAL ARTIST FOR

THEATER AND FILM

Lamberto Avellana- 1976
Lamberto V. Avellana, director for
theater and film, has the distinction of
being called “The Boy Wonder of
Philippine Movies” as early as 1939. He
was the first to use the motion picture
camera to establish a point-of-view, a
move that revolutionized the techniques
of film narration.
Avellana, who at 20 portrayed Joan of Arc in time for
Ateneo’s diamond jubilee, initially set out to establish a
Filipino theater. Together with Daisy Hontiveros, star of
many UP plays and his future wife, he formed the Barangay
Theater Guild which had, among others, Leon
Ma .Guerrero and Raul Manglapus as members. It was
after seeing such plays that Carlos P. Romulo, then
president of Philippine Films, encouraged him to try his
hand at directing films.
In his first film Sakay, Avellana demonstrated a
kind of visual rhythm that established a new
filmic language. Sakay was declared the best
picture of 1939 by critics and journalists alike
and set the tone for Avellana’s career in film that
would be capped by such distinctive
achievements as the Grand Prix at the Asian
Film Festival in Hong Kong for Anak Dalita
(1956);
Best Director of Asia award in Tokyo for
Badjao, among others. Avellana was also
the first filmmaker to have his film
Kandelerong Pilak shown at the Cannes
International Film Festival. Among the
films he directed for worldwide release
were Sergeant Hasan (1967), Destination
Vietnam (1969), and The Evil Within
Honorata “Atang” Dela Rama -
1987
Honorata “Atang” Dela Rama was formally honored
as the Queen of Kundiman in 1979, then already 74
years old singing the same song (“Nabasag na Banga”)
that she sang as a 15-year old girl in the sarsuela
Dalagang Bukid. Atang became the very first actress in
the very first locally produced Filipino film when she
essayed the same role in the sarsuela’s film version.
As early as age seven, Atang was already being cast in
Spanish zarzuelas such as Mascota, Sueño de un Vals,
and Marina. She counts the role though of an orphan
in Pangarap ni Rosa as her most rewarding and
satisfying role that she played with realism, the stage
sparkling with silver coins tossed by a teary-eyed
audience.
Atang firmly believes that the sarswela and
the kundiman expresses best the Filipino
soul, and even performed kundiman and
other Filipino songs for the Aetas or
Negritos of Zambales and the Sierra
Madre, the Bagobos of Davao and other
Lumad of Mindanao.
Atang firmly believed that the sarswela
and the kundiman express best the Filipino
soul, and had even performed kundiman
and other Filipino songs for the Aetas or
Negritos of Zambales and the Sierra
Madre, the Bagobos of Davao and other
Lumad of Mindanao.
Among the kundiman and the other songs she
premiered or popularized were Pakiusap, Ay, Ay
Kalisud, Kung Iibig Ka and Madaling Araw by
Jose Corazon de Jesus, and Mutya ng Pasig by
Deogracias Rosario and Nicanor Abelardo. She
also wrote her own sarswelas: Anak ni Eba,
Aking Ina, and Puri at Buhay.
Thank You
for
listening!!!