Make way for new TV faves

Ken Chan

The show biz industry has an ever-voracious hunger for new talents, the better to delight and sate the millions of young viewers who now comprise the majority of the TV audience.

A newly relevant factor is viewers’ perceived shorter attention span, which means that they constantly need fresh faves to adulate each season.

For 2015-2016, the promising young comers include child starlets John Steven de Guzman as MacMac on “Ningning,” Simon Pineda on “Ang Probinsyano,” and new teen stars, Ken Chan on “Destiny Rose” and Miggy Jimenez on “Princess in the Palace” More:

Zeus Collins, former “Pinoy Big Brother” housemate, is now being showcased on “It’s Showtime” as a featured male dance soloist. His combination of dancing ability and hunky good looks should serve him in good stead in his promising performing career, since ABS-CBN could use a new male dance divo.

Strangely enough, recent “PBB” winner Jimboy Martin is now being built up, not as a solo performer, but as a member of the newly formed male singing-dancing group, the “Hashtags.” Isn’t this a step down instead of up? Perhaps it’s felt by some TV execs that Jimboy needs more time to find his intended place under the show biz sun as a solo star? —They could be right…

For her part, “PBB’s” other winner, Miho Nishida, is now being built up on “It’s Showtime” as half of the new love team, ToMiho, along with cohousemate Tommy Esguerra.

The tandem now appears regularly on the noontime show as a romantic pair, in the hope of becoming popular, and joining the network’s other fave love teams, like Daniel Padilla and Kathryn Bernardo, James Reid and Nadine Lustre, and Enrique Gil and Liza Soberano.

In our view, however, the more promising tandem of “PBB” graduates is the one made up by Bailey May and Ylona Garcia. They’re just in their tweens, but the “romance” field is getting younger each season, so they could click with the ever-youthening “crushable” crowd!

Sam on ‘Doble Kara’

The latest wrinkle on “Doble Kara” is the entrance of a new character played by Sam Milby, who’s bent on serving God for the rest of his life. As fate would have it, however, he crosses paths with Kara (Julia Montes) in a hospital where his spiritual mission is to help relieve the sadness and pain felt by juvenile cancer patients.

Milby’s inclusion in the long-running soap suggests that the series will be extended further, hence the need for new subplots and complications.

Like many people in teleseryes, Sam and Julia’s character literally bump into each other—a dismayingly predictable start for their relationship, which could eventually take a romantic turn.

Are our TV scriptwriters really unable to think of less tired and tattered ways to get characters to “fatedly” meet—or is the “bumping” cliché thought to be a “lucky” portent for a show’s success in the teleserye field?

In any case, Sam and Julia’s first scenes together were generally unremarkable—except for Sam’s more earnest efforts to speak longer dialogue in Tagalog, instead of his usual career-limiting “Fil-Am” approach.

Well, after almost a decade in the local biz, it really is about time! But, he isn’t quite there yet, and needs to exert about 20 percent more effort to come across truly comfortably as a Tagalog speaker.

While he’s at it, Milby needs to know that he isn’t all that believable in his role as a seminarian. Aside from coming across as more “serious” and “kind,” he evinces scant spirituality, and his dashing good looks get in the way.

Now, many handsome actors have played men of the cloth, but they have been convincing and even moving. So, Milby’s perceived inability is a limitation only on his part, and the sooner he can “fill the thespic blanks,” the better.

As for Julia, her own inability to dynamically delineate the two (twin) roles she’s playing is a continuing concern and limitation all its own.

It’s really a disappointment to see, this late in the show’s storytelling, that she still fails to see why this is an important requirement, instead of just relying on superficial factors like differing wardrobes and hairstyles to do the work for her.

Another cast member who needs to get his act together is Edgar Allan Guzman, who plays Sarah’s ex-boyfriend, who now realizes that he’s in love with Kara. It’s a potentially complex thespic challenge that’s full of irony and complications, but the actor can’t come up with the emotional “contradictions” required, and just tries to get by playing it troubled—and drunk!