Mayor Herbert still part of MMFF entry with Kris

The members of the entertainment media had a fun time talking with Quezon City Mayor Herbert Bautista who treated the group to a birthday blowout last Saturday.

We were curious to ask the good mayor about his Metro Manila Film Festival movie with Kris Aquino. At the recent presscon of “Etiquette for Mistresses,” Kris mentioned there was a change in the movie’s casting, as Derek Ramsay is now part of the cast.

Mayor Bautista said that when Kris was busy shooting “Etiquette for Mistresses,” she became quite sickly so he thought that the filmfest movie is no longer pushing through. Besides, Kris was bent on finishing the Chito Roño film first before thinking of the movie with the QC Mayor.

But when Kris mentioned a change in casting, many press members were curious if Mayor Herbert had been taken out of the cast.

According to the mayor, he and Ms. Malou Santos of Star Cinema had talked last week and he was assured that he is still part of the movie. He is the original cast member so he will still be part of it even if the film title had been changed and even if Derek will be added to the cast.

The movie is set to resume filming by October 9 and Mayor Herbert, who already shot for one day, joked that it was a good thing to know that he is still part of the cast. But he is still waiting for advice when he will report back for filming.

“I am happy to still be a part of the movie. At least, I have something to do for the festival,” he said. But the good mayor declined to answer questions if he and Kris have rekindled their “romance.”

Mayor Herbert also said he finished an episode of a trilogy for the Viva Films flick titled “Lumayo Ka Nga Sa Akin” which co-stars him with Maricel Soriano. The movie is directed by Chris Martinez.

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Asia’s Songbird Regine Velasquez-Alcasid will have a four-night concert titled Regine at the Theatre at Solaire on November 6, 7, 20 and 21, with PLDT Home as sponsor. It was also PLDT Home who sponsored Regine’s series of mall shows in June and July.

Regine said she truly enjoyed doing the mall shows because she could just sing to her heart’s content. But even if it was a mall show, she had a live band to back her up, with back-up singers to boot. And since it was a free show, it helped boost the sales of the Regine Series of phones which she was endorsing for PLDT Home.

Regine was also at PLDT’s Gabay Guro event last Sunday held at the Mall of Asia Arena where she performed for free.

Regine’s concert in Solaire is also sponsored by PLDT Home who put up her series of mall concerts last May and June to promote their Regine Series of landline phones.

“It was very successful,” says PLDT marketing executive Gary Dujali. “All the venues were jampacked and the sales of PLDT Home telephone sets were unprecedented. The units were sold out. The people were looking for the Regine series, paired with the best and cheapest NDD and IDD plans ever. All units went out of stock and we had to order again to meet the demand. We really love having Regine with us as she’s so easy to work with.”

Regine is glad she is having a concert at Solaire, the concept of which is a tribute to musical theatre. She will not only be singing songs from Broadway but even from local musical plays like Rak of Aegis. She said they are still preparing the repertoire. “We are still thinking if we will include songs from Broadway hits like Phantom of the Opera and Les Miserable since I’ve been singing them before. We will try to give new arrangements so that they will sound different,” she said.

Lucky PLDT Home subscribers got free concert tickets from Regine in a meet and greet session. More free tickets for the November 20 playdate will be raffled off to PLDT Landline subscribers who will upgrade to one of the Regine Series Telsets from October 1 to November 9. So upgrade now and get free tickets to Regine’s concert at Solaire Theatre. For more information, visitpldthome.com/landline.