Girl power is best served brash and proud, and this theater group knows how to pack a punch. PMSTA (Pinays Maintaining Sisterhood Through Art) is a Filipina American women’s theater group and performed the closing night of its latest production, “Death of a Player,” this past Saturday at Bindlestiff Studio. The show was a hodgepodge of short pieces both comedic and tragic, live indie music and song-and-dance numbers, loosely strung around the theme of dying in order to live life to its fullest.
Womanhood in its different stages and crises was the rallying cry throughout “Death of a Player.” A matronly emcee of sorts (Rosita Almario) gave words of wisdom on female sensuality and screamed in Tagalog. The younger women tackled romantic problems: a Pinay mail-order bride in a game show, a murderess of her cheating boyfriend, and a heartbroken lover (an affecting, poetic performance by Tonilyn Sideco). Strong women united by passion and empowerment dissolved ethnic boundaries, even including a Chinese-American monologue (performed by Annie Wang) on voyeurism and family struggles in the mix.
Audience reaction was a huge component of PMSTA’s energy, as friends and fans of the cast cheered and roared. Likewise, PMSTA and Bindlestiff Studio (a non-profit, community-based performing arts venue) is very much involved in the Filipino American community, as a support network and foundation for emerging Filipino American artists in San Francisco and the East Bay. The mission of PMSTA, founded in 2007, was to foster the creative work of Filipino American women in theater.
The unique quality of PMSTA is that it functions as a writing workshop, as actors often collaborate from the conception of a piece to its end product. A family atmosphere breeds PMSTA’s candid approach to social issues and quirky humor. This is most apparent in the final piece of “Death of a Player,” as three armed women in the midst of a zombie apocalypse realize interconnected cheated hearts to hilarious consequences. Three strong women with big personalities balance the stage dynamics fairly evenly, a sisterhood in script, direction, and acting.
For future endeavors, PMSTA looks to possibly expanding in YouTube videos, short sketches and films. In any case, PMSTA will continue their efforts in theater and the Filipino American community, as an outlet for brave and fierce ladies of the stage.