The name of the stellar game

Liza Soberano (left) and Enrique Gil

Competition is the name of the stellar game in show business, so quite a number of luminaries are rivals in the biz.

This sounds like an excessively inimical state of affairs—but, there’s method to this industry reality and practice: A star can make it on his own but, if he intends to remain for long as a busy and popular stellar player, he needs an equally popular personality to compete against.

This is the odd lay of La-La-Land, because fans appear to need it to be at their most active and supportive, not really the star himself.

When an idol is competing against another star with a similar image, the rivalry energizes his fans and supporters to generate more buzz and visibility for him, to trounce the similarly active and het-up competition.

The rival stars themselves may like each other a whole lot, but their fans are fit to go to war for them—and in decades past, some of them really did!

If a star had a new movie opening, his fans would see it three or more times to increase its total gross figures—while the rival’s fans would not just snub but also heckle it—

prompting the first star’s incensed followers to engage in shouting matches with their similarly “palaban” opponents!

Things are less hectic and violent now, thank goodness.

These days, fans of rival stars generally support their idols without dissing and demeaning their rivals.

Fans get most energized in support of their faves when a competition is held for King and Queen, or Prince and Princess, of Philippine Show Biz, and other ersatz “royal” titles.

If the choice is via popular acclaim, that means “votes,” so you can expect rival nominees’ fans to spend their allowance or meal money to boost their idols’ respective vote counts!

Even when stars belong to the same studio, like Sampaguita Pictures’ Susan Roces and Amalia Fuentes way when show biz publications would still make them compete for “queendom” along with their “signature” male consorts.

But, the biggest show biz rivalry was between Vilma Santos and Nora Aunor, who sometimes had to chide their respective armies of fans to tone their ongoing battle down!

Nora and Vilma were actually friends and mutually admired each other’s personas and achievements. They even acted together, in a film by Ishmael Bernal, and another by Danny Zialcita, acquitting themselves well in their memorable coportrayals.

These days, the intense rivalry is between teen love teams. Daniel Padilla and Kathryn Bernardo (“KathNiel”) are supposed to be leading, but “JaDine” (James Reid and Nadine Lustre’s) fans beg to disagree, and make sure that everybody hears them and listens—to KathNiel loyalists’ chagrin!

Then, there’s the “LizQuen” tandem (Liza Soberano and Enrique Gil), whose many supporters insist that their faves have leapfrogged over everyone else!

If the love teams’ respective legions of followers weren’t so committedly supportive, fewer people would know that there’s a “war” going on for top spot—and the love teams’ TV-film projects may consequently not do as well financially as they’re faring now.

So, raging rivalry, whether real or concocted, can be a star’s best friend!