Jean Garcia slaps Juancho Triviño during a scene for the TV adaptation of “Maging Sino Ka Man.” Screenshots: Instagram/@joycepring and @juanchotrivino
Updated 8:30 P.M.
Kapuso actor Juancho Triviño marked the first slaps he took from veteran actress Jean Garcia with a post on social media of a behind-the-scenes clip from their upcoming series “Maging Sino Ka Man.”
The highly anticipated TV adaptation of the 1991 film of the same title will be topbilled by his “Maria Clara at Ibarra” co-stars David Licauco and Barbie Forteza, who will reprise the roles of Carding and Monique, originally played by now senator Robin Padilla and Sharon Cuneta, respectively.
The video uploaded by Triviño showed his character, Gilbert, getting comically slapped, first on the right cheek by Garcia, who plays the role of the wheelchair-bound Belinda. The first slap, which made a solid, crispy sound, would be replayed in slow motion with the text “ouch” converted to speech.
As Gilbert expressed his confusion over Belinda’s anger, the 30-year-old actor’s other cheek would also take a relatively softer hit. But then someone from behind the camera informed the director of an audio problem, and they had to retake the scene.
“Isa pa [na take], direk (Let’s do another take, direk),” the filming technician said, with Triviño appearing somewhat distressed as he contemplated how many times they had to retake the slapping scene.
In his Instagram post, the actor mentioned the “urban legend” about Garcia’s strong onscreen slaps, as he recalled clarifying with the veteran actress how her sick character would go about expressing her anger toward Gilbert.
“Isang urban legend daw na malakas mana[m]pal sa eksena si Ms. Jean, at dumating na ang araw na ito ay aking hinarap. Pero bago ang eksena kinakausap ko sya, sabe ko, ‘Ms. Jean, di ba may sakit [ang] character mo, ibig sabihin di masyado malakas yan no? Gawa kasi ng story, no?” Triviño shared.
(They say it’s an urban legend that Ms. Jean slaps hard during scenes, and the day had come that I took it on. But before our scene, I was speaking to her and I said, “Ms. Jean, your character has a sickness right, so that means the slap won’t be so strong, right? Based on the story, right?)
“Pero ayan na nga ba ang pang 100x na sampal na natang[g]ap ko onscreen (But that’s what I thought, after getting 100x slaps onscreen). I still cannot believe that this is my job,” he further said in his caption with laughing emojis.
Although at the receiving end of multiple slaps in that scene, his character is actually that of an antagonist in the series. The role of Gilbert was originally portrayed by Edu Manzano, who in the 90s feature was on the hunt for Cuneta’s character.
Meanwhile, in the comments section of Triviño‘s post, some users couldn’t help but still refer to the longtime GMA talent as Padre Salvi, his despicable character in “Maria Clara at Ibarra.”
Witnessing the actor take those hits, one after another, one @mgraxa quipped that the show’s fans finally got their revenge on Padre Salvi.
Screenshot from Juancho Triviño’s Instagram page
Aside from Triviño, Garcia, and the pairing of Licauco and Forteza, the TV remake will also feature Faith Da Silva, Rain Matienzo, and Mikoy Morales, among others. Morales, who is set to reprise the role of Dennis Padilla as Libag, was named best actor in the recently concluded 19th Cinemalaya Philippine Independent Film Festival. EDV