I am not used to watching Aljur Abrenica, a Kapuso artist, in a very serious mode, much less talking about how he immersed himself in the character he is playing in a movie to make sure he delivers a near perfect portrait of the person he is playing.
Abrenica is playing the historical personality from Lucban, Quezon, known among the Lucbanons as Hermano Puli in a film of the same title by filmmaker Gil Portes.
The film was originally intended for a Metro Manila Film Festival screening last year, but financial woes aborted the shooting, forcing Portes and the rest of the company to withdraw from the festival.
The film, however, T-Rex Films took the cudgels from the film’s former producers that left it in limbo, Portes announced that with the new producer and the principal photography over, the film could have a September screening.
At Limbaga 77 Café in Quezon City, Abrenica faced members of the press that were quite stunned at his demeanor. He is no longer playful, unlike the times after he won the Kapuso’s reality TV Starstruck in 2006, when members of the press, especially the gay scribes, would fawn over him and he would just good naturedly engage them in a banter. In fact, for a while he was the gay writers’ flavor of the season.
But, now, Abrenica was in a serious mode. His smile was prudent, in fact, rather circumspect. He seems to have matured and it gives him somewhat a new persona.
Why? I wonder, and so I asked. Abrenica answered, “I guess this is the only time I appreciated acting. In the past, I didn’t think of it seriously. I was just doing the things being asked of me. But this time, I know I want to do better, be appreciated as an actor by the audience and I want to give back with a satisfying performance.”
His metamorphosis was first noticed in Ato Bautista’s indie work title Expressway screened during the second Sinag Maynila Film Festival in April 21 in which he played a neophyte hired gun as partner to a retiring syndicate old time played by Alvin Anson. The audience was surprised to see Abrenica portray something out of the box and far from the characters the Kapuso network had assigned to him in previous drama series he starred in. Here he was a cussing, bad boy who was in earnest wanted to inherit the post his partner will leave when their mission is done.
After completing his work in Expressway, Abrenica jumped to the Hermano Puli set after Portes decided to cast him for the role. (Two other actors, the director said, was considered but in the end he and the rest of the production crew decided on Abrenica.)
But, Abrenica didn’t just jump onto the set, done a wig and costume, and faced the cameras. The actor decided to read the screenplay, study the character seriously and even did research on his own, this the director didn’t know until he was looking for him and the actor said he was in a barangay in Lucban, Quezon tracing the route Hermano Puli took when he was preaching the words of Jesus Christ as the founder of Cofradia de San Jose (Confraternity of Saint Joseph) after the Spaniard-dominated Catholic Church in Quezon denied him to study to be a priest.
“I did that to familiarize myself with Hermano Puli,” Abrenica told members of the press. “I don’t know him except for what was written on the script. So, on my own I tried to discover the person I’d be playing in the movie.”
That led him to Lucban and other places Hermano Puli went before he was executed by the Spaniards for heresy.
Hermano Puli also stars Louise Delos Reyes, Enzo Pineda, Menggie Cubarrubias, Kristoffer Martin, Arnold Reyes, Markki Stroem, Simon Ibarra, Vin Abrenica, Allen Abrenica, Sue Prado, Kiko Matos, Stella Canete, Diva Montelaba, Abel Estanislao, and Alvin Fortuna.
De los Reyes plays the love interest of Hermano Puli, but it was an unrequited love.
Who the hell is Hermano Puli? That is the familiar question most Filipinos will ask when the film starts its rounds in theaters in September.
Hermano Puli (also spelled as “Pule”) is Apolinario de la Cruz, a charismatic leader whose crusade for religious freedom turned into a major revolt against Spanish colonial rule in the Philippines in the early 19th century.
His religious martyrdom came three decades ahead of the execution of Filipino priests Mariano Gomez, Jose Rizal, and Andres Bonifacio.
Hermano Puli was born two centuries ago — on July 22, 1814 in Barrio Pandac in Lucban, Tayabas (now Quezon Province). As a boy, he dreamed of becoming a Catholic priest but realized early on that the religious orders at that time did not welcome Indios (native Filipinos).
At 18, he put up a religious confraternity called the Cofradia de San Jose. Under his passionate leadership, it grows steadily in its first few years, attracting hundreds of followers from nearby towns in Tayabas, Laguna and Batangas.
At 22, he left for Manila to pursue deeper spiritual enlightenment. He found work as an orderly at the San Juan de Dios Hospital and became a donado (lay brother) at the hospital’s own Cofradia while he continued to guide the Cofradia de San Jose through regular correspondence.
On his days-off, Puli preached the Bible around Manila and soon gathered more followers. The Cofradia’s continued growth over the next four years alarmed religious authorities, who eventually condemned them as heretics.
Puli sought official recognition from the government, but the governor general was outraged to discover that the Cofradia limited its membership to Indios. Instead, he excommunicated the Cofradia and ordered Puli’s arrest.
Puli left Manila and met his followers in Laguna. On Oct. 23, 1841, he rallied 4,000 followers in Barrio Isabang on the foot of Mount Banahaw and defeated an attack led by the Tayabas governor.
On Nov. 1, 1841, government forces overpowered the Cofradia militia and killed hundreds of Puli’s men. Puli fled but was captured the next day. He was tried and immediately executed by firing squad. His body was cut into pieces and his head was hung on a pole. He was only 27 years old.
Portes says that the audience will see not Aljur Abrenica but Hermano Puli in the movie. That was how serious the actor was in his study of the character that in front of the camera he became Hermano Puli, forgetting he was the guy many thought was no more than a wooden actor.