INSIDE SUPREME
The conscious coupling of Coco and Sarah
I n the latest product of the ABS-CB -Star Cinema movie machine, a young girl from the city falls in love with a simple boy from the province, yet circumstances around them prevent the two from coming together. It’s got all the hallmarks of the big studio’s formula — a popular lead actress in Sarah eronimo, a strapping leading man in Coco Martin, a pesky third-party in uffa utierre , and a title lifted straight from the lyrics of a .araoke staple (it’s
H K PH — upon reading that, I bet the song started playing in your head).
Star Cinema, of course, churns out movies of this kind with the regularity of a woman’s period. It seems that every month, there is a new love team to peddle and a different set of cheesy lyrics to sing — so much so, that even ABS-CB ’s own reporters have to ask the actors what makes their movie different from previous films. “ K P
,” they all answer. “(insert actor’s name) P .”
But there is a tacit agreement between Star Cinema and its audience that what the studio offers is not new experiences, but familiar feelings — love, sadness, hope, . People keep lining up for these movies in droves because they know exactly what they’re going to get
from it — a filmmaking formula as over-used and yet as satisfying as the formula for CocaCola.
he main ingredient of that recipe is a conscious coupling, when the studio’s powersthat-be play matchmaker and cast two actors with the hopes of igniting a spark. )or H
, , the pairing of Sarah eronimo and Coco Martin was field tested four years ago, in the H H H H . (Yes, that’s a number one in place of an “I.”)
“I think the management of Star Cinema and iva saw good potential in our pairing, so the creative team of Star Cinema made a concept for us,” Coco reveals, as he and Sarah sit across from me inside a conference room at the ABS-CB compound. It’s a familiar setting for us, having come here before to interview other pairings to talk about other films. But something here was different.
Perhaps it’s the way Sarah hit Coco on the shoulder when he confessed how intimidated he was by her at the start of his career. Perhaps it’s the way Coco covered his face in a look of “What the f***?” when we asked him to lie beside Sarah and rest his head on hers. But while we’re used to seeing love teams act like people in an arranged marriage (they act in love when the cameras are on, and act like strangers as
soon as the studio lights come off), with Coco and Sarah, there is sincerity in their conscious coupling. hey’re actors doing their jobs, of course, and there is nothing more to their relationship than a set of scripted dialogue — but in a weird twist, they struck me as being real.
ow, how could something real emerge from a formulaic movie machine?
he trailer for H , begins with a beautiful shot of a beach in Bataan — we see crystal blue waters, glistening sand. So, I ask Sarah and Coco what their favorite beaches are.
“Hawaii,” Sarah answers. “Last year, I got to go to Hawaii with friends. Before, I used to go to Hawaii to play a concert, then I’d leave right away. So, I couldn’t appreciate the beauty of the place. his time, I got to spend my birthday there, and I fell in love with Hawaii.” “How about in the Philippines?” I ask. She pauses. “I got to go to Boracay but just for work,” she says. “I haven’t been able to appreciate the beach.”
his is the sad shadow of mega celebrity. It’s a gilded cage, where one isn’t free enough to enjoy even the simple pleasures a Philippine shore can bring. And yet we get the impression that celebrities live sweet lives, traveling for work, with a team to answer to their every whim. Are they ever able to smell the flowers?
K HK Coco tells me. “It’s only when we’re on set and we’re in character that we appreciate the beauty of our surroundings, but in real life, we’re on location from morning to night, it’s all work. It’s only when we’re in character that we allow ourselves to feel. I don’t really rest from work. In real life, I don’t really live. When I act, I experience life.”
As we wrap up our interview, I ask Sarah and Coco about their acting process. How do they get the feelings of love, hope, up on screen — feelings that their audiences expect from their films; feelings that should jump from script to camera to their audiences’ hearts?
“If you ask me, I don’t really know how to ‘act.’” Coco answers. “I have to feel what my character is feeling. If my co-actor doesn’t let me feel the scene, I can’t deliver. o portray
, I have to be .” “(It’s called) honesty. You become the character,” Sarah continues. “When I see Coco, I see onyo (his character in H K PH).” Does life imitate art, or does art imitate life? In
H K PH, a young girl from the city falls in love with a simple boy from the province, yet circumstances around them prevent the two from coming together. It’s got all the hallmarks of the big studio’s over-used film formula — but for two people at least, it’s their reality.