But in Subic, it turned out we were all staying in Forest Lawn villas. While we were having videoke on Sunday night, the “Extra Challenge” people were billeted in the villas right in front of us.
We personally like Richard Gutierrez. We think he’s one of the most polite, well behaved, humble young actors we have today, which is why we want to ask him if he’d really want to be better known now as a TV host than as an actor. No doubt that he’s doing a great job as host of the award-winning environmental docus he has done before and such shows as “Survivor” and “Pinoy Adventure”.
But overall, we think this has a downside and affects his stature as an actor quite negatively. No doubt the top actors today are John Lloyd Cruz and Coco Martin, both from ABS-CBN, and they are totally focused on acting. You don’t see them branching out into hosting. The public accept and adore them as very good actors so convincing in any role assigned to them, more than anything else. As a result, their stocks continue to soar and they have hit shows and so many endorsements.
It would be nice to be known as someone versatile, who can do both acting and hosting with equal ease. But maybe Richard should assess his priorities and determine once and for all if he really wants to be a more accomplished actor or a credible host. To begin with, he’s not really identified as a serious drama actor since he chose to do more action vehicles like “Captain Barbell”, “Kamandag”, “Lupin”. This has no doubt taken its toll on his stature as a real actor. When he went back to acting in “Makapiling Kang Muli”, he played the role of a young man who was oppressed and maltreated then returns rich to take revenge on the people who wronged him. It’s the same as Coco’s role in “Walang Hanggan” and even JC De Vera’s role in “Valiente”. For his next soap, he should try a truly good dramatic acting vehicle for viewers to take a more serious second look at him.
