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It's amazing how someone who finds it hard to be the nice girl onscreen can be the exact opposite when the cameras aren't rolling.
It's amazing how someone who finds it hard to be the nice girl onscreen can be the exact opposite when the cameras aren't rolling. Bing Loyzaga gave us more than what we asked for, spilling juicy details about reinventing her role in "MariMar" as Esperanza, her supposed "feud" with Manilyn Reynes, and ultimately, her take on Bella's revenge. Text by Jillian Q. Gatcheco. Photos by Mitch S. Mauricio. Doing her homework It's a joke on the set that it's hard for Bing to act nice. "Because it is!" she exclaims. "Kasi sanay akong maging kontrabida. When they have scenes na nag-aaway, gusto ko nandoon ako, pero wala. So I would imagine myself dealing with it! I think it's because I'm so used to it; I could see myself doing it." On second thought, Bing says it's a good thing that she's not a kontrabida anymore. "Sa petite ni Marian at sa laki ko, kawawa naman si Marian, di ba? At saka feeling ko buong Pilipinas magagalit sa akin!" she says with a laugh. Esperanza, Bing's character, was introduced as a villain during the telenovela's first week. "I told them, 'Hindi ba pwedeng i-extend nang konti?' Mabilis kasi ang pace, so it's just for a week," Bing explains. "Pero I'm just so happy na whenever I see people who watch the show, they're all telling me na, 'Buti naman mabait ka!' I think it's something they accepted [already]." Eventually Bing's character became a nice person. But she kept the trademark red streaks that her former mean-spirited personality sported. Actually those streaks were Bing's idea! "Kasi di ba, all of them have long hair, all of them have curly hair, [so] nag-iisip ako, ano [ang] gimmick ko? Technicolor? Let's go! I'll just surprise everybody!" Bing believes in doing her homework with every role she portrays. For Esperanza, she researched on how the original character looked like, but she didn't forget to put her personal touch. "At this time and age, hip na and mga 'matured!' 'Matured women' nowadays are very well-dressed and hindi na yung like before na kailangan naka-ruffles! Pwedeng [nakiki]-uso rin siya! Pero of course, you still stick to the age." Esperanza in the original story looked older than what Bing looks like in the series, and this is because Bing insisted on making Esperanza look younger! "Hindi ako pumayag! Kasi originally, I'm supposed to be the ate of Jestoni (Alarcon). Sa pictorial pa lang, sabi ko na, 'Sige, try niyo [lang] akong gawing ate! I-try niyo lang! Haha!'" Why it clicked When asked why the series became a hit, Bing gives two reasons. "One, because the show itself was a phenomenon. I believe that the characters of MariMar and Sergio will be a tandem for life." "The nice thing, the bonus that they got from here is that http://www.igma.tv/profile/marian-rivera" target="blank">Marian (Rivera) and http://www.igma.tv/profile/dingdong-dantes" target="blank">Dingdong (Dantes) get along and have chemistry, which makes it better for that particular tandem. [The characters are] already made, [they] clicked already, so for sure [they] will click [again]. But apparently, the chemistry [of the actors] is there. http://www.igma.tv/marimar/article_view/1652" target="blank">The friendship is there. You can see a give and take relationship, especially when it comes to their acting. So ang point ko is, this is the bonus of it all. I believe the credit should go to the ones who chose [Dingdong and Marian]. They had the eye on who should be the right people to do it" she adds. Bing agrees that one of the good things about GMA is its willingness to experiment with love teams. "You cannot be typecast with one particular partner for the rest of your life. I never had a partner when I entered showbiz -- thank God! Kasi di ba, wherever you go, mayroon ka dapat kasama! So it's nice that they experiment. It's healthy for the artists - they get to work with other people, they get to have more friends, and at the same time, they will learn a different style of acting." On the set We asked Bing what it's like to work with Manilyn Reynes given that they used to be "frenemies" [or so the media reported] during their That's Entertainment days. Manilyn and http://www.igma.tv/profile/janno-gibbs" target="blank">Janno (Gibbs) were marketed as a love team, and when news came out that Janno was seeing Bing, everyone thought that the two girls were probably not getting along. "Ay, ang saya!" she replies with a grin. "Actually, that's one thing that people don't know. Noong That's Entertainment time na everybody was [looking] at us as magkaaway, we never fought. Not once! The people around us would fight with each other, at kaming dalawa yung 'Ah, nagsusuntukan sila, okay!' We'll just do our job." Bing adds "Nakakatawa lang kasi when people see us, even up to now, naaalala [nila yung issue before]. Actually, sa buong cast, I talk to her the most. Syempre, jino-joke ko si Janno [sa kanya], nagpu-punch line-an lang kami! Actually, she is one of the kindest people I've met in my whole life. [She's a] very caring person." She also has good things to say about direk Joyce Bernal. She explains, "Si http://www.igma.tv/marimar/article_view/1748" target="blank">direk Joyce kasi is the type of director na you [can] ask her anything, [and] she'll answer you properly naman. She always makes time for everybody." Bing-isms Bing imparts what she'd like people to realize when watching MariMar. "With that plot, my character would always advise MariMar - kaming dalawa ni Manilyn, especially; we'd advise against what she's doing. Which is I think the catch as to why people really watch." "Kahit na sinong bata, masarap yung bawal, di ba? Ganoon lang yun, e. I think it's human nature to do that. Kahit na sabihin pa natin na madre tayo at santo, somehow, mayroon kang ginawa na sinabihan ka na huwag pero ginawa mo pa rin. And since we are but human, we cannot take away yung babalikan mo ito. It may be na sasaktan mo [yung kaaway mo], or you may improve yourself, just to prove a point. So it's still getting back." She continues by saying "Hopefully, in the end, people will realize that the revenge that MariMar's really after is to improve and make a better person of herself than to just get back for the sake of revenge. So hopefully, at the end of everything, that's how people will see how they should be dealing with life, and how life really should be." Talk about Esperanza in the MariMar Forum Thread!