(From left) Ogie Diaz, Ivana Alawi, Jojo Saguin. Images: Facebook/Ogie Diaz, Instagram/@ivanaalawi, Instagram/@jojosaguin
When Liza Soberano revealed that the 2019 film “Hello, Love, Goodbye” was first offered to her, talent manager Ogie Diaz and TV director Jojo Saguin weighed in on an industry practice of offering roles to second-choice artists who were able to deliver and made their projects a commercial success.
Soberano, during a vlog interview with Bea Alonzo, said that the movie was initially offered to her and boyfriend Enrique Gil. The Star Cinema film eventually went to Kathryn Bernardo and Alden Richards, and was named the “highest-grossing Filipino film of all time” by the production company.
Saguin, without directly addressing the “Forevermore” actress, made a parallelism to the ABS-CBN teleserye “La Vida Lena,” which was originally pitched to Ivana Alawi, but was eventually offered to Erich Gonzales.
“Yung ‘La Vida Lena’ originally was for Ivana Alawi. Naiba ng naiba ang story tapos hindi ready si ivana to do lock in tapings. Kasagsagan kase ng pandemic nun. Tapos we presented the story to Erich [Gonzales] and she said yes. Ayun nag swak naman ang lahat. Pak,” she said.
(“La Vida Lena” was originally written for Ivana Alawi. However, the storyline kept on changing, and Ivana was not available to do lock-in tapings since it was during the height of the pandemic. Then, we presented the story to Erich Gonzales and she said yes. Things worked out in the end.)
Yung “la vida lena” originally was for ivana alawi. Naiba ng naiba ang story tapos hindi ready si ivana to do lock in tapinngs. Kasagsagan kase ng pandemic nun. Tapos we presented the story to erich and she said yes. Ayun nag swak naman ang lahat. Pak!!!!
— Jojo Saguin (@jojosaguin) March 6, 2023
Diaz retweeted Saguin’s post, adding that if a film project is not meant for the artist, then it would not fit.
“Ako talaga, naniniwala na kung hindi ukol, hindi bubukol, direk. Pag pinilit, pwedeng ibigay, pero me consequence yon,” Soberano’s erstwhile manager said, ending his tweet with a hashtag, #generallyspeaking, as a caveat.
Ako talaga, naniniwala na kung hindi ukol, hindi bubukol, direk. Pag pinilit, pwedeng ibigay, pero me consequence yon. #generallyspeaking https://t.co/ISNcVA3fvp
— ogie diaz (@ogiediaz) March 6, 2023
The TV personality has yet to issue a statement regarding Soberano’s statements about “Hello, Love, Goodbye,” as of this writing.
During the interview with Alonzo, the “Bagani” star said the film offer fizzled out because the network supposedly had other plans for her and Gil at that time, which was to film fantaserye “Bagani.” The offer still stood for Gil; however, the female lead role was then pitched to Bernardo which she eventually accepted.
“I wanted to do that movie so bad, but then they were like, ‘There’s another project lined up for you.’ Tapos while we were doing ‘Bagani,’ nabalitaan ko (I found out) that they offered it to Kathryn and Quen,” she added.
“That scared the sh*t out of me. I was like, ‘Why did they do that?’ I asked them to save the project for me and Quen. Kasi they told us noong pitching na hindi pwedeng gawin agad kasi they have to develop it more. Then we said, ‘Okay, we’ll hold it. Please wait for us.’ And then nalaman ko that they were offering it to Quen still, but with Kathryn,” the actress further added.
It can be recalled that Diaz wished the actress luck after her controversial “life update” vlog, however, he appeared to remind her that her screen name, Liza, was given to her by Star Cinema’s Malou Santos and it helped her provide for her family. EDV