Juday has reached the point of no return

Judy Ann Santos is taking a big gamble. But she has reached the point of no return and there’s no turning back.

Fans who have known her as the meek, weepy Mara Clara may get the shock of their lives as she plays the title role in the movie Sabel where she has a love scene (with Wendell Ramos and Jeffrey Hidalgo). They may even balk some more when they learn that Judy Ann interacts with a lesbian (Sunshine Dizon, in a role much, much different from what she’s accustomed to playing).

But the title role of Sabel was too good to resist. It was something she hasn’t done since she was a child actress. So Judy Ann didn’t need a lot of convincing when Regal Entertainment’s producer Roselle Monteverde-Teo offered her the role.

"It’s a make-or-break situation for me," says Judy Ann. "But, if it doesn’t work, I’ll have no regrets. Mine is a once-in-a-lifetime role."

Regal Entertaiment searched far and wide for the actress who can swing from sunny and optimistic to anguished and emotionally-scared in the movie.

"Whoever plays Sabel had to be completely sympathetic to the viewers, most of whom will never experience the anguish she faces,"the film’s director Joel Lamangan states.

And Judy Ann fit the bill to a T.

"It’s Judy Ann at her finest and most accomplished. If she doesn’t win every Best Actress award our movie industry has to offer, walang hustisya sa mundo," direk Joel predicts.

Her director’s confidence overwhelms and makes Judy Ann feel nervous at the same time. You can’t blame her. After all, this means being pitted against the formidable Nora Aunor (star of Naglalayag) in the Manila Filmfest awards rites Best Actress category.

So the 26-year-old Judy Ann would rather keep her cool. "I won’t deny any actress looks forward to an award," she admits. "But I’m not expecting it."

What’s important is direk Joel brought out the best in Judy Ann.

"I trust him completely," she avers. She shed whatever inhibitions she had when he asked her to play aggressor in a love scene.

"I gave myself wholeheartedly to my director. I didn’t hold back, even in the difficult love scene," she says . "To do so would mean giving a half-baked performance."

But had it been another director, especially someone she has never worked with (direk Joel worked with Judy Ann in the recently-shown I Will Survive), the twentysomething actress admits she will think twice. After all, as she herself says, Sabel is her most daring, most controversial movie in terms of character and theme,

It’s not her first time to tackle a mature role, though. Moviegoers first saw Judy Ann veer from her goody-two-shoes roles when she played Sharon Cuneta’s rebel sister in Magkapatid, which Lamangan directed. The acclaimed film saw Judy Ann answering her older sister (Sharon) back, marrying her musician-boyfriend, getting heavy with his child and getting caught in the throes of childbirth.

If she survived this with her wholesome image untarnished, Judy Ann figures, why can’t she do it again for Sabel?

After all, Judy Ann is no longer the babe in the woods Gladys Reyes used to recue to tears in many hit soap operas of yore.

Sabel though, is worlds apart from the real Judy Ann. Unlike Sabel, who rebels against her mother (played by Rio Locsin), Judy Ann doesn’t lock horns with her Mommy Carol, whom she turns to for advice together with manager Alfie Lorenzo.

Mommy Carol didn’t object when Judy Ann showed her the script of Sabel. So the dutiful daughter went ahead with the project.

And, with Judy Ann getting to be more prolific this early in the year (with two movies for the first half of 2004: I Will Survive and Sabel ) Mommy Carol understands why her daughter deserves to reward herself with a break.

"I plan to take a vacation abroad after I finish my soap (ABS-CBN’s Basta’t Kasama Kita)," Judy Ann reveals. On the nonshowbiz side, Judy Ann seems to have learned a lot from business mistakes of years past. Her Quezon City restaurant, Caravana is doing well, thank you. Given better economic times, Judy Ann plans to expand into the café business in the same location.

Just like her flourishing career where the stakes are frighteningly high, Judy Ann will stick her neck out with only one goal in mind: winning – not only in monetary terms, but in the psychological meaning of the word.

We have yet to see if this not-so-secret formula will do wonders at the box office for Judy Ann’s latest project. But, if her track record is any indication, history might just repeat itself. Judy Ann can just as well bid those light-as-froth, boring-to-death roles good riddance.