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Giving voice to the immigrant struggle

Executive Producer Ted Benito has a very personal link with The Romance of Magno Rubio, the opening play in this year’s the [Inside] the Ford season. His father was part of the Manong Generation: Filipino immigrant laborers who worked the fields in California in the 1920s and 30s. Magno gives voice to the immigrant struggle in America - a topic relevant in its early 20th Century setting and just as crucial in our country today. Ted kindly shared his dad's story with me:

"Maximiano Ablan Benito hopped on a frigate bound for the U.S. in 1930. The youngest of a family of nine siblings, he was joining his only and oldest brother, Lambert, in seeking a new life in a new country. He went to work alongside his fellow "kababayans" (countrymen) as a migrant farmworker doing seasonal agricultural work up and down the California central coast -- Delano, Watsonville, Bakersfield, etc. He picked everything from grapes to asparagus, lettuce to tomatoes, cabbage to garlic..."

Obie Award-winning playwright Lonnie Carter's stage adaption of Carlos Bulosan's short story captures this experience in a compelling combination of dialogue, song and movement.
This generation of Filipinos came to the U.S. in search of the so-called "American Dream" - education and a better life for their families back home and for future generations. Instead, they met with harsh working conditions and racial discrimination.

Magno Rubio dark as a coconut ball

Now picking peas in the San Jose hills

A quarter an hour don't pay our bills

In rain, shine or mudslide he's always stooped

Pagod na pagod, palaging pooped.

As the white population saw their jobs vanish during the Great Depression, racist attitudes toward the Filipino population escalated. Many businesses put up signs saying, “No Filipinos Allowed.”. Adding to the tension, many Filipino workers fell in love with and married local white women. While there were thousands of Filipino men in California, there were few Filipina women.

MAGNO RUBIO

She’s white, she’s blonde, she’s like the sun

I’m right, I’m right, she is the one

Despite all of these obstacles, Filipino workers rose up and voiced their frustration, primarily through union organization. Self-educated writer and activist Carlos Bulosan fought for the rights of Filipinos in America through his pen.

Benito comments, “My dad actually met author Carlos Bulosan on a train in California's central valley one day. They were riding together to a new job site. So for me, bringing ‘The Romance of Magno Rubio’ to life on stage is a full circle of my dad’s life and the life he gave me.”

Unfortunately, the fight for equality is far from over. In an interview with Ruben Nepales, acclaimed Director Bernardo Bernardo explains the production’s significance today: “Magno Rubio lives even now. The beat and the lyrics may sound different. But it’s the same song. They’re rapping the second verse. ‘How can the wars, the political and social problems, and the plight of migrant workers change and yet remain the same?’ Evolution is such an achingly slow process.”

- Molly

(Photo: Dorothea Lange's "Lettuce Pickers" Source: Library of Congress.)

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Featured Stories from our 2011 Summer Season:

[image: Garry George]