ericflo.com

Manual Magazine, October 2004

To amuse the crew at a movie shoot, Judy Ann Santos supposedly once brought a bowl of rice over to a sleeping Piolo, and, never taking her gaze off him, wolfed the rice down without any viand whatsoever.

But Piolo isn’t just eye candy. He’s one of the few local artists who’ve achieved this level of both critical acclaim and commercial success, and his credibility cuts across age groups, gender lines, cultural boundaries, and socio-economic strata.

As a model, he can do both print and ramp (he’s 5’11”). He’s endorsed everything from diamonds to doughnuts, plus everything else in between: watches, eyeglasses, shoes, colognes, shirts, phone cards, soda, jeans, toothpaste, candies, pagers, cheese curls, and fried chicken, all successfully. His recent three-part ad campaign for Max’s Fried Chicken, for example, was rumored to increase sales by almost 15%, despite the Bird Flu scare and the comatose economy.

As a singer, his concerts with pop act The Hunks consistently jam-packed theaters here and abroad. On his own, his debut album went Gold, and his single Kailangan Kita twice became a finalist in the 2003 Awit Awards. His debut solo concert even filled over 20,000 seats at the Araneta Coliseum last April.

As an actor, his performance in Dekada ’70 earned him simultaneous Best Supporting Actor trophies from the 2003 Famas, Urian, PMPC/Star Awards, the Film Academy of the Philippines, and even the infamously nitpicky Young Critics’ Circle. But his awards don’t seem to have alienated finicky teenyboppers. His telenovelas are consistent top raters, and rumors have it that his 11 movies have grossed almost P900 million pesos combined, with the last one alone (Milan, opposite Claudine Baretto) supposedly grossing P120 million so far.

He’s had his share of bad publicity, of course, most of it about his personal life. But advertisers aren’t alarmed, because whatever Piolo’s fans couldn’t deny, they seem to have forgiven. Like Teflon, dirt simply doesn’t stick to him.

Hey, DuPont, are you listening?