‘Balay Dolor: A Live Draft’ Staged Reading by Exit Left Collective Coming This November
Faith, sin, and rebellion take center stage in Balay Dolor: A Live Draft, the debut production of Exit Left Collective, happening this November 8, 14–16, 2025, at Areté, Ateneo de Manila University.
Written by Iago Guballa, recipient of the Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Award for Literature (2024), and directed by Robert Bradly Hao, Balay Dolor tells the story of a secluded reformatory school for wayward boys, now reduced to a lone priest and three students. When the priest’s prodigal brother—a wanted criminal—returns unannounced, his arrival brings with it the ten plagues of Exodus. What begins as an uneasy reunion unravels into a reckoning between faith and sin, punishment and desire, salvation and ruin.
This Live Draft offers an intimate yet elevated script reading, where the writing itself takes center stage—brought to life by an ensemble of emerging artists and a growing vision of stage direction, movement, and design. Helmed by director Robert Bradly Hao, the production is supported by a creative team that includes Kat Batara as dramaturg, Tata Tuviera as set designer, Paul Adrian Martinez and Gwyn Zenarosa as costume designers, Rafa Sumilong as lighting designer, Carlos Hombrebueno as sound designer, Regina de Vera as intimacy consultant, Pat Ong as photographer, and Diandra Lee as graphic designer.
The cast features Arkel Mendoza as Mario, Tads Obach as Marco, André Miguel as Sebastian, Val Venezuela as Jude, and Zoë de Ocampo as Isaac.
Hao shares, “The unconventional space to tell the story. Trying to find the key points of believing something is there when it isn’t.” Meanwhile, Guballa reflects on his evolving creative process: “Balay Dolor 2025 has shown me that despite growing older and growing as an artist, the bedrock of my craft stays the same—in some ways, nothing ever changes.”
The show runs on November 8, 15, and 16 at 2 PM, and on November 8 and 14–16 at 7 PM, at the Joselito and Olivia Campos Interactive Teaching Lab, 3rd Floor, Vicente Tiu Lim Synergy Hub, Areté, Ateneo de Manila University. Tickets are P1,500 (Gold) and P1,000 (Silver), and are available for purchase via the group’s Google Form.
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