PEOPLE say she took a hiatus during the late 1960s and early 1970s. But if you look into her filmography, Anita Linda was in films opposite Fernando Poe Jr., and Joseph Estrada, to name just a few of her sterling list of leading men.
Anita Linda was a star of the late 1940s and 1950s. That afternoon, as we began the interview for the project of the Manunuri ng Pelikulang Pilipino, called “Living Voices and Moving Images”, funded by the National Commission for Culture and the Arts, it was a grace to see her able to recall those years, that splendid age when her magic began.
The project aims to document the many actors, directors and other individuals involved in filmmaking, with the hope of capturing the Filipino-ness of Philippine cinema at its inception and during its early growth. Anita Linda was the second person scheduled for an interview that quiet Palm Sunday. Earlier on Saturday, Beni Santos, poet and academic, talked with Delia Razon.
Anita Linda was my lovely, enchanting afternoon.
What an afternoon! What grand memories!
She was complaining of vertigo as we walked down the flight of stairs leading to the center of the studio. Two black sofas were huddled, flanked by potted plants. Agnes Mejia, special assistant to Gigi Alfonso, present chairman of Manunuri and director of the project, was on one side and I on the other. Anita Linda was gripping hard our hands that it wasn’t clear who was holding on and who was struggling to move. By the time we settled on the sofa, she sounded tired. It was s short respite because, after a sip from the bottled water, she looked at me with those light blue eyes, young and beautiful at 90 years old.
She turned toward Gigi and asked where her camera was. I began with the classic question on how she was discovered. She was watching a stage play and Lopito, the comedian, kept looking at her direction and tossing to her the jokes. The great Leopoldo Salcedo noticed the comedian and turned to the light man: “Lentehan mo nga ’yan! [Put the spotlight on her].” Anita Linda recalled how she was fond of wearing a red bandana then and felt she made quite a sight. Lamberto Avellana would make the formal offer and Daisy Hontiveros would give to Alice Lake that name, Anita Linda. The name now means brilliant acting that borders always on the grand and the bravura. That name means longevity and professionalism.
The name Anita Linda meant Filipino cinema history. And she remembered all that afternoon.
The memories came flooding back, rushing out, threatening to overpower us both. But the forces of the universe are always sweet and gentle to artists.
The year 1951 was a remarkable era for Anita Linda. She was Sisa in the film of the same name made by Gerardo de Leon. She would win the Maria Clara Award for Best Actress. It was the last time the award would be given; the next year, Famas took over the task of recognizing excellence in cinema.
What made your Sisa extraordinary? I had always wanted to ask her this question given how the role has become one of the most abused character in stage plays, TV shows and films. Beauty queens use, much to our embarrassment and glee, the Mad Scene—where Sisa looks for her two children. For those who have seen the film (presently made accessible by curators and government film programmers), they know that the real deal is Anita Linda as Sisa.
Anita Linda talked of one instruction given by de Leon: Luka-loka ka dito. Pero ayoko ng luka-loka na pinagtatawanan. Ikaw ang luka-lokang kinakaawaan (You are a madwoman here. But I do not like a madwoman that is laughed at or made fun of. I want a madwoman who is pitied.) It was a simple instruction but, Anita Linda said, that guided her in the interpretation of one of must iconic characters in a Filipino novel.
De Leon was into details, Anita Linda smiled as she recalled this trait of the great film director. Imprisoned by the authorities, Sisa as played by Anita Linda had one scene where she was sprawled, her legs prominent before the camera. De Leon would go up to her and hoist her skirt higher. When the director turned around, she would cover her legs again. Then the director would go back and raise the skirt again to display those gams.
The fickle movie audience would forget about
Anita Linda, the major star, in the coming years. She would play character roles in films that were not considered significant.
In 1974 Anita Linda appeared once more in what turned out to be a major role. The film was Tatlo, Dalawa, Isa. “The director was Lino Brocka,” I declared and the episode was “Hello Soldier”, the title Anita Linda and I said in unison.
“Writers and your public all agreed, you came back with a vengeance,” I told her. Visibly elated, she put her hand on my arm. We talked about the tour-de-force role and the big performance she delivered. The story is about a woman whose daughter was awaiting for the visit of her father, an American serviceman. Anita Linda played the woman who gave birth to an Amerasian, whose father was this American G.I. The daughter was dreaming the huge American dream, that of leaving for the US and living a happy, rich life.
Two memorable scenes come to mind, I reminded Anita Linda. The first is when she comes out of a room very drunk and—initially sweetly, shyly—approaches the man who fathered her child. The soft sensuality soon gives way to violence as she starts to hit the American in front of her. The other scene is when she wakes up to a very quiet house. She is no longer drunk. Did her daughter leave her? At this point, Anita Linda began talking about how Lino Brocka instructed her what would happen. She would go out of the house and she would look at the camera. She then shows a mixture of shock, fear, happiness, relief and joy while her throat gurgles with laughter because at the other end is her daughter, played by an ethereal Hilda Koronel, on the way home. As Anita Linda reenacted the scene, she brought her hands to her head a she cupped that face now old, now young, bringing forth in seconds a jumble of emotions.
I was in awe. I was starstruck. I told her I was starstruck and, once more, she gently placed her hand on my arm.
More memories came back. The war was on. The Japanese had confiscated the 10-hectare farm her father
built for her mother and their many siblings. One day, the assistant director of Avellana came to ask her to be a film actress. She turned to her father and introduced properly the visitor. What should I say, Papa? She remembered her father telling her: “Go Alice. We need the money.”
In a sense, Alice Lake did it for the money. In the end, we got Anita Linda, an actress in the grand tradition of Filipino cinema who lived in an era when actresses were chaperoned, dressed and made to pose in certain ways, because there were no managers then, only a public that believed in the illusion of cinema.
Anita Linda, like many great actors, went further and took on the realities of the world and bore them with her in front of the camera in that style that was both wondrous and wild and reckless and charming all at the same time.