Virgin Labfest 2021: Yakap

November 24 – December 5, 2021

Cultural Center of the Philippines
CCP Complex, Roxas Boulevard, 1300 Pasay City, Philippines

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The Virgin Labfest (VLF) is the country’s premier festival of untried, untested and unstaged works. Established in 2005, it is known for programming and providing support for the development of plays that dare define and defy the times. In 2020, in response to the global pandemic, the VLF community of performance-makers took a leap of faith and brought the annual festival on a virtual stage with its “lockdown edition,” presenting performances for audiences across the Philippines and the World.

For 2021, the festival continues on the digital platform and takes YAKAP (embrace) as its catchphrase. The VLF focuses on continuing education, performance development, and nurturing community, with its components Fair, Fellowship and Flashback (FFF). This year, the festival embraces the new narratives shaped by our present realities; embraces the artistic community as it strives to survive the terrible pandemic; embraces the audience with works that have provided comfort and enjoyment in the past; and dreams of a better future.

The Virgin Labfest is co-presented by the Cultural Center of the Philippines, the Manila-based playwrights group Writer’s Bloc, Inc., and CCP’s resident theater company Tanghalang Pilipino.

Playwrights’ Fair

The VLF Playwrights’ Fair commemorate the best works and the lives of the playwrights that we lost during the pandemic It will also showcase panel discussions on the representation of different sectors in the field of theater and the effects of the current pandemic situation on the craft of playwriting.