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| LOTLOT DE LEON signing contract with LEO V. DOMINGUEZ |
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| lotlot with writers ethel ramos, ricky lo, rommel gonzales, allan diones, moi and lolit solis |
LOTLOT DE LEON is now managed by Leo Dominguez as she just signed up with him for a three-year management contract. So she currently has the same manager as her eldest daughter, Janine Gutierrez.
Balot, as she is fondly called in the industry, has really come up quite a long way from her “Lotlot & Friends” days as a teen idol.
She’s now one of the country’s most reliable character actresses who has won an international best supporting actress award from the Houston World Filmfest in 2017 as the very supportive mother of a problematic college student in the CineFilipino indie filmfest entry, “First Sem”.
Previous to this, she also won Metro filmfest best supporting actress for the horror flick, “Kubot: Aswang Chronciles”.
She’s currently busy doing a new movie, “On The Job 2” with Director Erik Matti (who also helmed her in “Kubot”) where she plays a crusading journalist. And she’s also in two new mini-series.
One is an international project, “Almost Paradise”, shot in Cebu, with Dean Devlin, producer-director of “Independence Day”, “Godzilla” and “Midway”, as executive producer.
The lead actor is Christian Kane who did Holllywood films like “Just Married” with Ashton Kutcher and “Taxi” and TV series like “Angel” and “Into the West”.
“It’s about an American law enforcement agent in the Philippines. It has ten episodes and I appear in episode 6,” says Balot. “Nag-audition ako and sobrang kaba ko kasi it’s the very first time that I auditioned for anything.
" I shot for them for five days and I appear with other local actors like Angeli Bayani, Nonie Buencamino, Ces Quesada and Art Acuna. I really enjoyed the whole experience.”
The other show is for iWant streaming, “Beauty Queens”, where she gets to play the role of a lesbian for the first time.
“The script is beautiful, so I agreed to do it. Ako yung lover ni Ms. Gloria Diaz, who plays a former Miss Universe, which she is in real life.
"She used to be married to a man and they had two daughters, Maxine Medina and Winwyn Marquez and one son, Ross Pesigan, na puro naging beauty queen din kasi nanalo sa gay beauty pageant yung only son niya,” she says.
So how is it working with Gloria? “Lots of fun. She has an amazing passion for what she does and is very professional.”
Do they have a sex scene? “Not really a sex scene, but just intimate moments of being together. Very personal. Our director is Joel Lamangan so it’s very well done, hindi naman malaswa.”
Invited at the presscon was Lolit Solis, with whom her daughter Janine had a brush after Janine reacted to the news that Sen. Bong Revilla (one of Lolit’s wards) is back into acting with an: “Oh God”.
Lolit lambasted Janine in her column but Janine chose to keep quiet. It was Lotlot who made a reply defending her daughter without mentioning Lolit at all, but Lolit quickly backed off saying she understands Lotlot’s situation as the mom.
At Lotlot’s contract signing, all’s well that ends well for her and Lolit. They quickly buried the hatchet, but not in each other’s back.
Lolit even heartily ate a lot of the paella served for lunch and also brought home a whole kettle of elft over paella.
“They asked me kung okay lang sa’kin to invite Nanay Lolit in this presscon and I said yes,” says Balot. “I have so much respect for everyone.
"We have such a small industry at tayo rin ang magkikita-kita rito, so there’s no need to burn bridges.”
What did she tell Janine when it happened?
“Wala. I cannot dictate on her not to give her own opinion. She’s a grown woman and in this day and age of social media, everyone is entitled to express himself.
"Lahat naman ng mga anak ko, sinabihan kong before you say anything, pag-isipan nyo munang mabuti. And my daughter, matalino naman yan at mabait pa, so she knows to express herself on her own.”
Will Janine be willing to work with Sen. Bong, if ever, since they both belong to the Kapuso network? “”About that, you have to ask her herself. I don’t think it would be right for me to speak in her behalf as she has a voice of her own.”
Her only son, Diego, made quite an impression when he appeared recently as a guest in “All Out Sundays”.
Is he also joining showbiz? “Yes, but he’ll be into recording muna and endorsements. He is recording his first single then papunta na siya sa showbiz. But his priority is really playing basketball and right now, he is just so sad and grieving over the tragic death of his idol, Kobe Bryant.”
It’s an open book that she and her adoptive mom, Nora Aunor, are currently not in the best of terms.
How does she feel when Ate Guy tells some people that she is closer to Matet? “Okay lang naman. Basta alam ko, mahal pa rin niya ako.”
When the last time she saw Ate Guy? “Actually, I can’t remember. Matagal na.”
Well, then, we tell her that she must attend the presscon of Ate Guy’s newest show on GMA-7, “Bilangin ang Bituin sa Langit”. “Para magkita na kayo,” we add.
