'Firefly': A mother’s love letter to her son
How can you measure the immensity of a mother’s love for her child?
For Angeli Atienza, her devotion to her 15-year-old son Andre is shared to the public by writing a screenplay, her first time to do so. In her heart, she knew she was writing her son a love letter, a long one, a letter that would simply and sincerely explain to Andre the complexities of life, the bittersweet beauty of death, and the joy and pain in the journey between first and last breath.
In this love letter, albeit simplified, Angeli prepared her son’s young mind for man’s mortality—ensconced in its fragility and fleetingness, joy, and survival. It was both a love letter and a manual about life.
She entitled her love letter Firefly. It was turned into a film and won for Angeli her first ever Best Screenplay award and the Best Picture trophy for GMA Pictures at the now extended Metro Manila Film Festival.
“When Andre was about seven or eight, he had a moment of ‘existential crisis’ when he realized the truth about mortality. That was the time when my uncle who was very close to me passed away. My son was worried when he asked me: ‘So all people will die one day?’” said Angeli, a writer-producer of documentaries (I-Witness, Reporter’s Notebook and other specials) for GMA Public Affairs for 20 years now. She finished a degree in Communication at the Ateneo and worked for a year in an advertising agency before finding her second home at GMA.
She recalled that when she was a kid, she had the same question, the same worry, the same fear about the certainty of people dying. And from her own experience, she educated her son about the Ecclesiastes of life—a time to be born and a time to die.
“I remember having the same experience with my mom when I was a kid. I also panicked when I realized I wouldn’t be with my mom forever on Earth,” she recalled, noting that when she was 15, she lost her dad to cancer.
“I knew where Andre was coming from when he asked me that question. I did not know how to assure him that we would still see each other in the afterlife. So, I thought of explaining to him, in a way that a child could understand, that though death is certain, what is important is the story that we have today, right now. I told him that what we have now is important because it colors our life, what we have now gives meaning to our life. It was my way of telling his young mind: ‘Don’t be fearful of what will happen.’”
Andre learned Mortality 101 right away from his mother. In the same experience, Angeli also learned all the more about the beauty and fragility of life. The writer in her kept the experience in one corner of her mind. It was just there for quite some time.
She recalled that in 2018, when GMA wanted to produce more films for GMA Pictures, she was asked by Nessa Valdellon, head of GMA Public Affairs and SVP for GMA Pictures, “May kwento ka ba d’yan sa baul mo?”
She told Nessa she had a coming-of-age short story. Angeli sent her the synopsis of Firefly. Next thing she knew, Nessa had already asked Rody Vera (a veteran scriptwriter) for screenplay consultancy. Angeli finished the script of Firefly in 2019. (She only started taking scriptwriting workshops with National Artist Ricky Lee after she wrote the screenplay of Firefly). And when they were ready to shoot in 2020, the pandemic lockdown came. The rest is MMFF history as Firefly was adjudged the Best Screenplay and Best Picture out of 10 competing films at the film festival. It also won for Euwenn Mikaell Aleta the Best Child Actor trophy.
Though Firefly is Angeli’s love letter to her son Andre, the story is also for her mom Angie. Albeit she has whispered many times to Andre that Firefly is her answer to him when he was seven years old, she also said she wrote Firefly for her mom. “To honor her.”
What the butterfly is to the firefly in her script—or what Elay is to her son Tonton in Firefly—Mommy Angie is to her daughter Angeli in real life.
“My mom, a former longtime banker, was my first storyteller. She bought me my little Golden Classics books. She also bought me A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens,” she said.
“From my dad, a businessman, I learned from him about curiosity… curiosity of the world. His death changed me. Death has a way of making our life different. Thinking about it is not morbid for me. It’s more of cherishing memories. It’s more about the nostalgia of it,” she added.
Her 72-year-old mom has been her hero since her father passed on. She is the Elay in her story. She is also the inspiration for the butterfly character in Firefly, where Angeli was also the creative producer.
I thought of explaining to (my son) in a way that a child could understand, that though death is certain, what is important is the story that we have today, right now. I told him that what we have now is important because it colors our life, what we have now gives meaning to our life.
Angeli knows her characters so well in Firefly. Tonton, the kid, spoke really like a kid. Even the nuances of his character is that of a child. Angeli’s being an award-winning documentary producer for GMA has truly helped her develop her characters in her script “because I met and interviewed many kids in my job—in Payatas, in Baseco, in Bacolod, everywhere.” Even the island of Ticao in Bicolandia, the island of fireflies featured in Firefly, is not a figment of imagination because it’s a real place, “a favorite destination when we were doing the travel documentary show Born to be Wild.”
“I had a wonderful childhood. (And I want to revisit that childhood again.) I was an only child for nine years before my mom gave birth to my little sister. Yet I always had ‘siblings’ in my cousins; we have a large extended family, and we are all very close to each other. We played outdoors a lot and had many impromptu trips to the beach courtesy of my parents who loved road trips, which is probably why I love the sea and feel nostalgic about it,” she said.
How much of her childhood is in Firefly?
“The main similarity is that my mom and I loved sharing bedtime stories. As I said earlier, books were some of her favorite gifts to me when I was young. I also experienced bullying for a time in grade school—though I don’t bear grudges anymore because some of the bullies became my friends—but I remember how my mom defended me and helped me face my fear of going to school back then. I adjusted well and made friends because of her encouragement. Very Elay to my Tonton in Firefly,” Angeli said.
Firefly is an endearing sketch of kindness and fortitude. It mirrors the same kindness and fortitude in the character of Angeli—because her humanity is continuously shaped by benevolence and courage around her. She sees this kindness in her husband Sunny. The sixteen years of their married life is bliss. Courage stepped in when her father passed away, the same time Angeli’s strength was born to be able to help her family.
“I wish my father were alive. In a way, ginagawa ko ‘yung things that would have made my dad proud. I took care of my mother and sister. I am sure my father would have been proud,” she said in between tears.
Firefly evokes much sincerity because Angeli is exposed to the generosity of the spirit at home.
“Every day, I see how my loving and giving mom takes care of my 95-year-old lola. So every day, ‘yun ‘yung heroism na nakikita ko. Kapag nakikita ko sila ng lola ko, ‘yun yung definition ng love eh. My lola is bedridden; she has Alzheimer's. Without fail, my mom takes care of her every day. Sila ang magkasama sa buhay. I can't imagine where my mother gets her energy and stamina to do it. She becomes a strong human being when she takes care of my grandmother. That is love,” she said.
Love, indeed, is the cohesive theme of Firefly. And like all forms of love, fear, as symbolized by a black wild dog in the magical realism part of the film, is factored in. The ability of Tonton in Firefly to conquer fear results in celebrating love pure and eternal.
It is the same love that Angeli Atienza gives her son Andre. And the light of her love letter to him will be shared by many—in Firefly.