Akda: The Asian Journal of Literature, Culture, Performance
Pages 1-13 | Vol. 1 No. 2 | 2021
“Thrilla in Manila”: Troubling Theatricality and Uneasy Spectator Affects Surrounding the Ringside Bar Midget Boxing and Wrestling
Neslie Carol Tan
University of Melbourne, Australia
[email protected]
Abstract: This paper illustrates how performance and affect inform disability politics in the case of Filipino Little People wrestlers and boxers at the Ringside Bar along a red-light district in Makati City, Philippines. The archive of the study focuses on the reception of its primarily foreign visitors as manifested online, including the bar’s unofficial Facebook account, review-based websites, and select travel and expatriate blogs/vlogs where reviews of these attractions most actively circulate. First, I map out the troubling theatricality of midget wrestling and boxing, identifying their cast, choreographies, and designs, to reveal traces of freak show traditions. Second, I unpack the uneasy affects of the (activated) spectators generated by the performances. I argue that, amidst the façade of “intense crazy action” promoting these attractions, there are palpable cracks of apprehension that expose guilty tensions of complicity with disablist attitudes and, at the same time, reveal embarrassed resistance against a perceived tourist scam. The implications of these precarious performances and confused affects on disability politics, specifically on the already tenuous relationship between exploitation and agency among the Little People in the Philippines, are discussed.
Keywords: midget wrestling and boxing, Little People, freak show, confused affects, activated spectators
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