If you like “West Side Story,” “Les Miserables,” “Hamilton” and other Broadway musicals, so did our Kapampangan ancestors—except that they weren’t called Broadway musicals. After centuries of moro-moros, comedias and straight dramas, Kapampangans saw their first sung plays--the equivalent of the Broadway musical--in 1900, when the three famous dramatists of Bacolor, namely, Juan Crisostomo Soto, Felix Galura and Mariano Proceso Pabalan y Byron met, and decided to incorporate songs into their plays. They derived inspiration from the zarzuela, an imported art form from Spain. The Bacolor trio asked Amado Gutierrez y David to be their composer, and after several weeks, Pabalan y Byron came up with two original works, "Ing Managpe" and "Magparigaldigal." Juan Crisostomo “Crissot” C. Soto, on the other hand, finished a script entitled "Paninap nang Don Roque."
Rehearsals for "Ing Managpe" were held in the Gutierrez mansion in barrio Sta. Ines in Bacolor, using a small stage that the mansion's owner, Don Mateo Gutierrez y Ubaldo, had built for family presentations.
When the musical play was ready, it was brought to the Teatro Sabina (owned by Don Ceferino Joven, governor of Pampanga). "Ing Managpe" premiered on September 13, 1900--the Philippines' first zarzuela using a native language (ahead of the Tagalog zarzuela "Walang Sugat" which was first performed in 1902 at Teatro Libertad).
The ticket prices at Teatro Sabina ranged from 20 centavos (orchestra back), 60 centavos (orchestra middle), one peso (orchestra front), and two pesos (balcony). Rates were lower during repeat performances.
The actors, on the other hand, were paid between P4 and P15 per show; the playwright, P100 per season (plus royalties). Costumes were provided by actors, who also performed gratis during town fiestas.
Theatre "season" was in the dry months of November to May, with break in March-April to give way to the Lenten cenaculo. The rainy months of June-October were for writing and rehearsing.
The success of "Ing Managpe" inspired others across the country to write more zarzuelas in the vernacular. In Pampanga, hundreds of zarzuelas were presented in Bacolor alone in the next three decades, which came to be known as the Golden Age of Kapampangan Literature. Among the biggest names in Kapampangan zarzuela, aside from Soto, Galura and Pabalan Byron, were Felino Simpao, the brothers Aurelio and Jacinto Tolentino, Monico Mercado, Jose Gutierrez y David, Edilberto Joven, Zoilo Hilario, Sergio Navarro, Victor Lumanug, Urbano Macapagal (Diosdado's father), Isaac Gomez, and Roman Reyes. The Tolentino brothers managed a rival theatre in the next town, Teatro Trining of Guagua.
During their heyday in the American colonial period, Kapampangan zarzuela companies toured towns in Pampanga, Tarlac and Manila. Among them were Compania Sabina and Compania Dramatica (Bacolor), Compania Trining (Guagua), Compania Ocampo and Compania Paz (Candaba), Compania Reyes (San Fernando), Compania Lubena (Lubao), and Compania Trinidad (Macabebe).
Zarzuela declined after the Americans introduced Hollywood movies in 1912, followed by Tagalog movies, vaudevilles and amateur singing contests. Stage theatres were converted into movie houses; at one point zarzuela tickets were being peddled on credit just to attract viewers, but even those remained unsold or unpaid. This worsened in World War II, when curfews prevented evening performances.
After the war, there was an exodus of Kapampangan zarzuelistas to Manila where they switched to writing Tagalog radio skits.
Despite the valiant efforts of latter-day zarzuelistas like Rogelio de la Rosa, Diosdado Macapagal, and Jose Gallardo, the Kapampangan zarzuela eventually faded away. The last nail on the coffin was the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in 1991, which buried practically all the remaining original zarzuela scripts.