MANILA, Philippines - I don’t want people to think that I keep getting things because of my last name, because it’s really not that,” says Julia Barretto. With fire in her eyes and a certain surge of defiance she adds, “They think it’s so much easier for me to get jobs. It’s not. You can see it in my career that your last name will not get you places; it’s your performance, it’s the way you deliver that’s going to take you places.”
What Barretto means when she speaks so candidly is the fact that her career trajectory has not been simple and straightforward. At the tender age of 19, Barretto already faced an uphill climb in the industry, with the simple matter of her last name. It’s not just belonging to a clan of women who’ve left indelible marks on the industry, but having a face that echoes some of their best features. To many, she is the ghost of the Barrettos’ past, making it more difficult to get away from her larger-than-life relations. “When I work, I really give 100 percent. But the credit always goes to my last name still; it’s as if I didn’t put hard work into it. So one day, I just want to be appreciated and recognized as Julia. Julia who gave it her all, and Julia who earned this project because she did well — not because she’s a Barretto.”
Aside from constant comparisons to her famous kin, Barretto also has to deal with being sized up against her peers. Her contemporaries include Kathryn Bernardo and Liza Soberano, who she is also consistently weighed against. She finds herself up for many similar roles, then being slammed with unkind headlines about her career not exactly taking off or being left in the dust by the other girls.
Barretto considers herself quite guarded and very careful about what she says, which one can tell straight off the bat when interviewing her, but in this case, she speaks frankly. “I’m so tired. I don’t want to deal with it anymore. I tell myself, ‘Get over it, stop looking at other people and look inside yourself. Everyone is so different, stop wasting your time comparing yourself to other people and being pressured by them.’” Barretto pauses thoughtfully. “I have this understanding and belief that it’s destiny. You can’t compare yourself to other people. Their path and your path are very different and you’re not going to end up in the same place as everybody. You have to focus on your path, because if you focus on what’s meant for other girls, you’re going to end up just like everybody else. That’s not what you want. You want to make something of yourself.”
SERIOUS ACTRESS
What she really wants to make of herself is to become a serious actress — not one who can simply cry on cue but someone who can tackle a myriad of genres with a wide range of skills. In the upcoming weeks, Barretto can be seen onscreen portraying the title role of Kath in Star Cinema’s 2016 MMFF entry Vince and Kath and James. Based on the viral online romance written by Jenny Ruth Almocera, the film is a romantic comedy about teenagers falling in love over text, and presents Barretto as having not only one leading man, but two.
The film also marks many firsts for Barretto, who considers herself a realist and non-romantic. She details a scene with Ronnie Alonte, who plays bad boy basketball jock James, where he shows up looking fresh, leaning against his car and flashing his pearly whites. “I was surprised by how kilig I got! Even all the way into dubbing, when I watched the scene again, it stayed with me! I don’t have that a lot in real life.” We took that to mean that there was no special someone in the picture, and Barretto gives us an adorably frustrated grimace. “I’m not even texting with anyone right now!” She laughs, a little embarrassed by her own reaction, and says, “Ugh, I’m being really frank.” Boys, let this be your cue.
GUSHING ABOUT ‘VINCE AND KATH’
Although she may not have many males trying to woo her over text, there is one full of praise regarding her abilities, and that is her director, Theodore Boborol. “She’s a ray of sunshine, and her cheerfulness was both infectious and energizing. There was even one time when she saw a huge spider on set. She bent over in different angles just to get a good photograph of it, and then she even asked to bring it home. We thought we were going to get the Julia that we read about in tabloid blind items, but she was very childlike. We were surprised by her.” Boborol adds, “I noticed that she was very guarded at the start and she had a lot of walls up. You could tell she was afraid and nervous, probably due to personal experiences and past work feedback. But she worked hard and opened up, and you can see how open and honest her portrayal of Kath is in this film.”
When Barretto gushes about the film Vince and Kath and James, it’s clear that she’s not doing it merely to pole-dance for her latest project. She genuinely seems to have found a certain amount of redemption in playing the role of Kath, and possibly finds solace in a working environment with a more comedic atmosphere. “I’m really just starting to figure out who I am and what really sets me apart. I used to be someone with so much fear. But in doing this project, I found that I didn’t have to look a certain way. My face could do whatever it wanted, I could react however I wanted, and it was all okay. When I saw the difference between being guarded and unguarded, I realized how much happier I am without walls.” She pauses and smiles. “I felt really free, like there was finally no filter. It’s like… I finally feel human.”
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Photo by SHAIRA LUNA
Produced by DAVID MILAN
Makeup by RB CHANCO