ENCHANTMENT  IN 'ENCANTADA'

MANILA, November 7, 2005 (STAR) SIZZLING HOT By Juliana Palermo - One of my most interesting and memorable tapings happened in Encantadia. In fact, only a few minutes have passed since I walked into my house from work.

I’m telling you, Encantadia has taken tapings to a whole new different level. The show is amazing and it really shows that a lot of work is done before they air an episode. At this point, I’ve experienced a number of different tapings, read many scripts, and have also worked with all kinds of people. But this taping really stood out.

The last interesting taping I had was with Hokus Pokus, where I played a witch and had to wear harness.

Wow! It’s really fun wearing a harness. That was when I learned about all the special effects they do, and it’s quite nice.

In Encantadia, however, I play the Volcano Fairy named Lavanea. The taping took place in a cave somewhere in Tanay, Rizal. This was actually my first time ever entering a cave. It was huge and very steep inside.

The main thing that worried me about my role is I would be having a fight scene with Pirena (Sunshine Dizon) and her sister Alena (Karylle).

I’m not athletic. Neither have I ever taken any classes that come close to doing the moves they do for fight scenes in this show. I was very nervous in doing my sword scenes and fight these fairies in my sexy outfit.

Good thing I was granted special powers with special effects and it didn’t require much movement. I was scheduled to do 13 sequences for this taping and the first in line was the one with the fight scene. I kind of had a hard time learning the routine since it would be my very first time ever doing anything like it. I was just so lucky to work with patient people.

Sunshine and Karylle constantly reassured me as well that I would do fine in our scene.

With eight sequences of fighting, I’ve learned quite a lot about using a sword. This was JuLiARA CROFT, the local version, in the making! Ha ha ha. It was H-O-T! I loved it.

I’ve always done mostly sexy or "pa-cute" roles, but this one I really enjoyed. Taping this reminded me of my mom’s all-time favorite TV show in the States Xena (the warrior princess).Now wasn’t she hot?

I think pretty girls who can fight are really sexy. Anyway, the costumes were also amazing. The costume I liked the most out of the ones I saw that day was Hagorn’s (Pen Medina). I couldn’t believe how much effort these people put in each and every one of their characters. The face and body paint alone takes a lot of time. But what impressed me most with this show is that everybody is really focused and dedicated in doing their job well.

The staff and crew really make sure all their artists are always comfortable even though there’s a lot of work to be done.

The director, Gil Tejada, was very easy to work with. He was very patient and nice to me, which gave me more confidence in doing what I had to do.

It’s just so hard to explain how much work these people put into their show. The working hours they put in the show is no joke.

It’s about three times a normal working day. But they still manage to smile 24 hours into their work. Isn’t that crazy?

And I don’t know what better reward they can get than being No. 1 on television. They deserve a lot more than that. This was probably the most tiring and most memorable taping I’ve ever done.

I’d like to congratulate Encantadia for its success and wish everybody in the show the best of luck for Book II.