Indie actor Allen Dizon comes to terms with public attention

Allen Dizon

“People who come up to me for photos now call me Doc Carlos,” said award-winning indie film actor Allen Dizon. who is now making waves on mainstream television as the scheming and obsessive Dr. Carlos Benitez in the GMA 7 soap series “Abot Kamay na Pangarap.”

While the actor is quite known in the international film festival circuit for starring in a number of critically acclaimed indie movies (“Magkakabaung,” “Bomba,” “Imbisibol”) and bagging the best actor honor for some of them, Allen admitted that it was only when he started getting more exposure on television that the Filipino audiences started showing more appreciation of him.

“I’m feeling the huge difference, even though I realized that accommodating all the requests for pictures can be quite tiring. Once I went to the cemetery in Pampanga to light candles by the graveside of my father. A crowd gathered there asking for photos. They got even more excited when they learned that I’m a Kapampangan like them,” Allen told Inquirer Entertainment in an interview.

“This lasted for three hours; no rest, just nonstop photo-taking. After that, I transferred to my grandmother’s grave and the same thing happened. The crowd was even bigger,” he recalled. “I’m pleased with all the attention. It’s just that it tires me to just keep smiling. My eyes also hurt because of all the camera flashes. I know people will take offense if I turn them down.”

‘More color’Allen explained that Doc Carlos started out in the series as “a nice guy that had a lot of red flags.” He explained: “I didn’t want him to end up being mean, but Direk (LA Madridejos) said Doc Carlos is too nice that this has become the natural role progression for him. He said we are allowing this to happen to the character to give it ‘more color.’ I have no problem with this. I was just more concerned with the fans. They would send me messages to say, ‘You’re a liar!’ or ‘Plastic!’”

“Abot Kamay na Pangarap,” also features Jillian Ward, Carmina Villarroel, Richard Yap, Dina Bonnevie, Dominic Ochoa, among others.