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[av_heading heading=’ MY LIFE AS ART ‘ tag=’h3′ style=’blockquote modern-quote’ size=” subheading_active=’subheading_below’ subheading_size=’15’ padding=’10’ color=” custom_font=”]
BY PETER SOLIS NERY
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A stable of actors
I CAN WORK perfectly well with almost everyone. I mean, I’ve worked in many international settings and communities. I like working with different, and all kinds of people. But I also like working with the same kinds of people all the time. That’s why I stayed married for eight years; and before retirement from Nursing, I stayed with my first hospital even when I found better offers.
To make a film on a tight schedule and an even tighter budget, I like working with people I know, and people who have worked with me before. That’s why at least three actors in my latest film, Ikapito nga Adlaw, have previously appeared in my movies: Lilibeth Laraño, Efren Bustamante Jr., and Regor Decolongon. All three have appeared in my full-length feature Gugma sa Panahon sang Bakunawa; and Regor has even appeared way back in my very first short, the YouTube sensation Dabadaba: Dumangas 2010.
It’s quite logical to maintain a stable of actors, and use them every time. First, they already know that I’m a brilliant director so they understand that whatever crazy thing I ask them to do, it is purely for some artistic vision. They understand that if I ask them to get naked and bend over, it is for something else. Haha!
Second, they also know that I’m a generous person who, within reason, compensates their time and talent. Of course, they know they are not Anne Curtis or Piolo Pascual, so they could not really expect to be paid millions. And even if they were Angel Locsin or Derek Ramsey, they know my films do not have the budget of even just a tenth of a million pesos.
Third, my actors kind of like working with me even if they see me as a different kind of animal during the shoot. All of them think I’m a monster during the shoot. But when they see the final movie, they kind of forgive me, and love me, for being such a thoughtful monster.
How does this happen? Well, I only become a monster when I do not get what I want. I’m pretty sure I cannot be a monster to Vilma Santos or Anita Linda. But amateurs? You have to squeeze them, kick them, wring them like wet towels to mine some kind of acting buried deep in their humdrum, ordinary lives.
And so, I squeeze, I kick, and I wring them until I get what I want. When I’m finally able to draw some acting talents from these ordinary folks, and they see their rare glimmer of talent on the screen, they get fired up, and begin to ask, “When do we make another movie, Direk?”
I like that more and more people trust me now with their showbiz aspirations. I also like that I have a growing stable of actors that I can always count on. And I am very proud that my reputation as a filmmaker is getting somewhere. Since the release of our trailer for Ikapito nga Adlaw on Facebook, I have been barraged with messages from wannabes requesting for an audition. I’m really flattered by that.
For the role of the aged Juliet in Ikapito nga Adlaw, I have considered two Bakunawa alums: Lilibeth “Lilet” Laraño and Melba Docdocil. But Melba was indisposed. She was also busy with her pangkabuhayan projects especially that, in late September, we were preparing for the Octoberian Dumangas Haw-as Festival.
Lilet is our local zapatera, or shoe repair woman. She inherited the business from her dad, and at least two of her children are also into it now. She became a first-time actress in Bakunawa playing a support role as the mother of the lead character Dulce Amor. In Ikapito nga Adlaw, she’s now playing the lead role as the older Juliet in a May-December love story. The shoot was just for a day, but it boosted Lilet’s fame as “an actress in Peter Solis Nery’s stable of actors.”
How good is Lilet as an actress? During the shoot, she’s a zero. She absolutely fumbles her lines. She fumbled in Bakunawa, she fumbled in Ikapito nga Adlaw. But by some miracle of editing, she looks really amazing on screen; and her acting, pretty moving, in both films. Will I want her again in my next movies? Definitely, yes. Will I deal with her movie star attitude? No. I will always be there to remind her that she can only deliver such great screen talent when I am the patient and sympathetic director.
Regor has done three movies with me now. And in all three, he plays the contravida. So convincing as contravida he was in the two previous films that he has been cast as a drug dealer in the local police anti-drug infomercial: a buy-bust short film.
Regor started as one of the young tambays I sometimes hang around with before I went to America. There was an internet station called Gamers’ Venue across the street from my PRIMA City Building in the early years of the new millennium. I sometimes would cross the street for a bottle of beer then, often talking to the owner, but sometimes talking to the boys.
After immigrating to America, I would hire Regor as a driver when I visit the country; so it was only logical that on my first venture into filmmaking, I would ask Regor to play a role. After Dabadaba catapulted Regor to local celebrity status in our hometown, he would bug me every year I’m home for a follow-up film. That’s how he ended up in Bakunawa. For Ikapito nga Adlaw, he just said to me, “P’re, I heard you are making a film, what’s my role in it?”
In all honesty, I wasn’t so sold on Regor and Efren “Toto” Bustamante, Jr. as goons in Ikapito nga Adlaw. I was hoping I could convince a much younger crowd from the local college to try acting for my film. I was thinking, if I decide on a rape scene, and the victim is 21 years old, she would want to be raped by someone closer to her age than by 30-somethings. That’s a little creepy, I understand. But the younger boys are either stupid, or just cannot believe their luck to be asked to act for my film. They bailed out on the day of shoot. So I called Regor and begged Toto to complete the cast.
Efren, a.k.a. Toto, is part of Group One Media and his primary involvement in Ikapito nga Adlaw was supposedly just to help behind the camera. Unlucky for me, but lucky for him, my new talents had cold feet and went chicken on the day of shoot. Being a Bakunawa alumnus himself, it didn’t take much to ask Efren to go in front of the camera. Today, Efren enjoys his own Facebook show called “Efren and Friends” created by my Ikapito nga Adlaw DOP and editor Joey Rap Decolongon.
Paul Michael Mahinay is an HRM student at ISCOF-Dumangas. He had no plans being an actor. He was just trying to watch the shoot in his neighborhood in Sapao one afternoon, but since I was near tears because I badly needed another goon for my movie, I managed to convince him to help out. (I’m really a great actor, I tell you. I really am!) Of course, he didn’t know then that I would need him for two more days of shoot.
And what do you know, it turned out Paul Michael is actually the son of my great beadworker-friend Merlie, who did the amazing Swarovski-encrusted suit I wore at the Palanca Awards this year. Paul was in Aklan or Capiz for some baking competition when I called for this article’s photoshoot, so I’m pretty sure he’s kicking himself reading this story without his photo.
I met Menzie Jun Diamante at last year’s Haw-as Festival. I’m always on the lookout for beautiful faces in the crowd. His wasn’t at all outstanding. It was his friend’s face that first attracted me. But his friend turned out to be a jerk, so I ended up talking to him instead. He was nice, and legal, despite his very pubescent look. I hanged out with his group on and off. Then, when I needed a younger Romeo for my May-December love story, Menzie volunteered.
I really don’t like Menzie’s high pitched voice. It’s almost like a falsetto. But it rings very true in a character who is barely legal, and yet so passionately in love with a Juliet that is almost his mother, if not grandmother.
Our small filmmaking family find Menzie’s voice funny; and therefore his acting, a little problematic; but with subtitles, and the movie playing in foreign festivals, Menzie’s acting can be quite moving. I think you’ll appreciate his acting if you forget he’s really 18, and think that he’s just 14.
I am happy with my latest movie. I love my support actors from Dumangas. They’re a joy to behold in the movie Ikapito nga Adlaw. But don’t just take my word for it, watch the movie!/PN
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