Curtain-raisers:
• Fresh from the success of their latest movie team-up, GMA Films/Regal Films’ One True Love (which reportedly grossed P10-M on opening day), Dingdong Dantes and Marian Rivera will soon star in the GMA TV drama Ang Babaing Hinugot sa Aking Tadyang, another high-drama masterpiece by Carlo J. Caparas. After this their third TV team-up (after Marimar and Dyesebel), Dingdong said that he and Marian won’t do any other TV starrer together. Meanwhile, they are having a show in L.A. on Dec. 5, after which Dingdong and his father will go to Las Vegas hopefully (“Kasi hindi ko pa hawak ang tiket,” said Dingdong) to watch the Pacquiao-dela Hoya bout in which his ex-girlfriend Karylle will sing the National Anthem. Will Marian go with father and son? Who’s asking?
• Congratulations to Raymond Bagatsing who, according to Funfare’s L.A. DPA, married L.A.-based movie writer Cora Pastrana at a Wilshire hotel the other night. It’s Raymond’s second marriage; his first, to Lara Fabregas (now happily married to a foreigner) was annulled.
• No, said Miriam Quiambao, there’s no truth to the rumor that she’s in love with a foreigner she was reported to be dating. “My priorities now are God and my career,” said Miriam who was previously married to another foreigner, Italian businessman Claudio Rondinelli.
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Eat, Bulaga! guys Jose Manalo and Wally Bayola, who are topbilled in their first solo movie starrer, APT Entertainment and M-Zet Productions’ horror-comedy Scaregivers, are often mistaken for twins, or one for the other, when in fact they are not even related (not by blood) to each other.
“It happens all the time,” said Jose. “Sabi ng ilang tao, ‘Uy, ang pogi-pogi mo, Wally, ang cute mo!’ Okay lang sa akin.”
“Karangalan kong mapagkamalan akong si Jose,” said Wally.
“It’s because we are like married couples,” added Jose, “palaging magkasama kaya napagkakamalan kaming kambal. Just like the Reycards, in the beginning I was confused who was Rey and who was Carding.”
“Even Richard (Gomez), nalito when we guested on Family Feud,” laughed Wally. “Hawak-hawak niya ako and he was asking, ‘Okay, ‘yan ang sagot mo, Jose?’”
“Nadi-develop na tuloy kami sa isa’t-isa,” joked Jose.
Like two peas in a pod, Jose and Wally are “scared” not by the box-office fate of their movie but of them being touted as the future Dolphy and Panchito.
“Nakakatuwa,” said Jose, “pero hindi kayang tapatan kahit sino sina Dolphy at Panchito. People compare us more to the Reycards than to Dolphy and Panchito. Sabi ng iba, may pagka-Porkchop pa nga daw kami, eh.”
“Marami pa kaming kakaining bigas,” said Wally. “Not only that, magtatanim pa muna kami ng palay bago maging bigas na kakainin namin.”
Well, who knows, who can tell?
Contrary to suspicions, Scaregivers is not a spoof of the recent Sharon Cuneta starrer, Caregiver.
“Nagkataon lang,” said Jose.
Directed by Uro dela Cruz from a screenplay by Jourdan Sebastian, Scaregivers is the story of two convicted petty thieves (played by Jose and Wally) who enter a plea of insanity and are committed, instead of to prison, to the mental hospital where they scare the wits out of the patients with crazy antics.
A native of Naga City, Wally is an only child who grew up with church people (priest and the cantoras) after his parents went abroad to work. He wanted to be a priest but was disqualified because his parents were separated.
“So I ended up a comedian,” said Wally who has been with Eat, Bulaga! for 10 years. “But before that, I worked as a stand-up comedian.”
A nephew of character actor Nanding Manalo (who used to appear in Joseph Estrada movies), Jose was encouraged to sing by his mother at wakes in Tondo where he grew up. At the Perfecto High School, he was a basketball player, a dancer, a choir member — a Jack-of-all-trades.
“I was a member of Caloy Atayde’s Boyoyong Clowns before I started on TV,” said Jose who joined Bulaga in 2000. “We usually performed in kiddie parties. Kami ni Wally, we develop our jokes from situations in real life. Nagmamasid-masid kami at, hayun, nakakabuo kami ng jokes.”
Besides Tito, Vic & Joey whom they consider their mentors, Jose and Wally look up to other comedians as role-models.
“I like the style of Pugak and Tugak, Cachupoy, Babalu, at sina Dolphy and Panchito,” said Wally.
“I like the old veterans, like Chiquito who was my childhood idol,” said Jose. “Sabi nila, parang Chiquito daw ang style ko.”
(E-mail reactions at rickylo@philstar.net.ph or at entphilstar@yahoo.com)