Monday, June 29, 2009

diether was a no-show; claudine, a class act

the talented bunch of star magic artists held a succesful show at the citizens bank arena in ontario, california saturday night minus diether ocampo. it was reported that the actor was rushed to the hospital after suffering from exhaustion during the rehearsal for the show. fellow star magic artist piolo pascual mentioned that diet has something like a congenital heart condition. sunday night, the actor still was a no-show at the san francisco leg of the show. here's hoping he's okay...

i wasn't really planning on watching it. i thought it was gonna be in the afternoon similar to the "ok, kapamilya go" show last year. on friday afternoon, however, my friend from the filipino channel, nerissa, who is always sweet and nice, gave me a call and told me that she set aside two tickets for me for the show. i work saturdays these days and was thinking i couldn't do it. when she told me the show starts at 7 in the evening, that's when i realized i could make it after all. but, i know myself, i'll surely be late --- and i was! blame the three separate car accidents on the 605 freeway for that, hmp! :)

the show was already underway when we got inside the venue at about 730pm. filipino actors piolo pascual, john lloyd cruz (the current box office king and the buzz host ruffa gutierrez' rumored boyfriend), bea alonzo, and sam milby were at the stage introducing the next performers when we found our seats. the venue was filled to near-capacity and we were seated in the lower box section - which was a good thing because our view was not hampered by those who keep on running to the stage to take endless pictures of the stars --- excuse me, i was actually one of those - haha!

the show was very entertaining in an ASAP-esque way. it features a lot of dancing and singing, as well as briliant stand-up comic banter between the talented duo of pokwang and chokoleit (which, incidentally, will be featured in their own show called "chokwang" sometime next month - those interested may call tita jackie regala at 562.219.7235 or 562.787.9030 for more details...)

the sexy and alluring duo of angelika panganiban and roxanne guinoo provided two sultry dance numbers and pumped up the male hormones in the audience. the coverboys provided the same to women. while the gigger boys and girls took care of the teens.

veteran actress bella flores stole the limelight for a little bit when she joined the coverboys number. tita annabelle and tito eddie gutierrez graced the show and watched from their 2nd row VIP seats as well as director michael de mesa who just had a successful father's day show himself at california wok last week.

one of the nicest things about the show was the energetic dance moves of the perrenially chubby mickey perz, who, despite his apparent biggie size, could jump, roll, and sway unlike those who seems more physically fit than him.

ms. claudine barretto (i reserved this specially for you, ati!) took the high road and sat with the audience during the entire show and still came out the biggest star among the 40+ who performed saturday night. she can't sing and dance - and she was wise about it (am not gonna single out those few who dared and failed - hi bea! - but kristine hermosa was also wise and sensible and limited herself to hosting - kudos!).

claudine didn't mount the stage but her 10-second wave to the crowd from her seat provided a glimpse of a real star - the definitive star - in my book.

click here for pictures http://raymond-reviews.blogspot.com/2009/06/star-magic-gallery.html

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

We went to the concert Saturday and the meet and greet on Friday but I’m a bit disappointed cuz we were grouped w/ people we don’t know for the meet and greet and we didnt get to talk to the stars as well as we would have liked. Well the stars were set up by groups and once we entered the area to take pictures w/ the stars, it was like we were being herded like sheep to the next group. I didn’t even know who we were taking pictures with. It was so disappointing for a so called "VIP" cost that we paid to meet and greet the stars kuno, very very disappointing

I will post pix when I can and I will tag u so u will see what I mean. We were grouped w/ 4 other people we didn’t even know.

Do the Coverboys still remember her son? “Yeah, Rafael and Victor...he was able to shake hands with and Rafael said from last year right? We hung out and Victor too. But other than that...wala sandali lang ang mga iba, last group we saw was Piolo, Kristine and Diether. I was standing next to Diether to take a picture and one of the lola's pushed in front of me so i had to move to take the picture and then after that picture wala next...i only briefly shook hands with the ones I really wanted to shake hands with.

“I mean honestly if I were to pay $125 i would have least expected a little bit socializing but we didn’t even get that...I mean I paid for 3 tickets at $125 each, I'm sure the fans in Pinas get better social time with them than we do here. It was very disappointing, wala din autograph signing, I know they were trying to do the best they can to accommodate all but at the end cuz we were one of the last groups in the end i just felt we were rushed even more

Her son even got a better treatment during the coverboys tour when they had a luncheon last year at the Max’s Puente Hills Mall. “Yeah, he was treated better there than what I paid for VIP status. I should have just paid $85. I mean concert was great but I expected more.”

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