Showbiz features

Richard Gomez and Dawn Zulueta reunite in 'Filipinas'

Dawn Zulueta

Former reel and real love team Dawn Zulueta and Richard Gomez are reunited in the movie "Filipinas." They play siblings of the Filipinas family that include Maricel Soriano, Aiko Melendrez, and Victor Neri.

“I play a caregiver in Israel,” Dawn explains. “I left behind a husband and a child.” Written by Roi Iglesias and directed by Joel Lamangan, Filipinas chronicles the story of a Filipino family headed by a widow, played by Armida Siguion Reyna, a retired principal. Her five natural-born children, while they love and care for one another, are divided by clashing egos, beliefs, ambitions, and interests, as well as geography.

Dawn when not appearing in movies is happily settled in Davao with her husband Anton Lagdameo. Aside from being a housewife there, she attends to her small business, making herbal-based soaps and potpourri, and tends a garden on the side.

Marvin Agustin’s New Year’s wish

Actor Marvin Agustin has one New Year’s wish for the last seven years, the release of his father from prison. His father, Danilo Cuyugan, 49, has been languishing in jail for drug-related charges.

Marvin was only 12 when he learned his father was into drugs. “My mom talked to me about it,” he recalls. “She never kept anything from me and my two sisters. It came to a point where we had to sell a lot of our stuff, down to the rice cooker.”

The financial reverses compelled him and his family to start working at a young age, and that made them strong and determined.

Marvin says he, his mother, and his sisters all worked just to survive. “I helped my mom sell stuff. Tocino, longanisa, torotot, paputok, you name it, I sold it.”

It is the experience that helps him become a successful businessman, apart from his work in the movies. He invests in a restaurant, which he runs with one of his sisters. He has also bought a five-hectare farm in Baguio City.

The young actor was discovered by ABS-CBN in 1996, while working as part of the marketing staff of Tia Maria Bar and Restaurant. He became a contract star of the network.

At first he did it for the money. After taking up a course in Management of the Arts at the Asian Institute of Management, he realized there were a lot of things to learn and explore as an actor, and that exactly what he has been doing since.

Although chance plays a role in his life, Marvin believes it is how one looks at it that determines the outcome. As an actor he chooses to be a professional, and he is proud of the fact.

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