‘Beshies’ Paolo Ballesteros, Christian Bables win back-to-back

MANILA, Philippines — Paolo Ballesteros and Christian Bables of “Die Beautiful” won as Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor, respectively, at the 40th Gawad Urian held in ABS-CBN Thursday night.

Because of their back-to-back win, first, as Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor at the Metro Manila Film Festival (MMFF) last year, many have been arguing that because they won for transgender roles, their titles should be Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress, for “political” correctness.

Just like in MTV Movie Awards where Emma Watson was hailed as the first Best Actor for Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast,” there is a call among award-giving bodies all over the world, including the Philippines, to merge the Best Actor and Best Actress categories and make men and women compete in an equal playing field, like they do in real life.

Should award-giving bodies have genderless categories?

According to Nicanor Tiongson, they at the Manunuring Pilipino believe that gender is fluid, so he said, they could explore the possibility of merging the two categories.

John Lloyd Cruz, who was last year's Best Actor for "Honor Thy Father," said Christopher de Leon has the most Urian nominations for Best Actor with 13, but Albert Martinez and Richard Gomez have the most Best Actor awards.

This year, Ballesteros bested over fellow nominees Tommy Abuel for "Dagsin," Garry Cabalic for "Paglipay," "Ronwaldo Martin for "Pamilya Ordinaryo," "Khalil Ramos for "2 Cool 2 Be 4gotten," Bembol Roco for "Pauwi Na" and Pepe Smith for "Singing in Graveyards."

Though he did not win, Ramos told Philstar.com in an interview that to be included in this roster of great actors is "pure joy" and adds to his dreams and passion as an actor.

For Best Supporting Actor, Cruz, who was nominated for "Ang Babaeng Humayo," lost the trophy to Bables. Others who were also nominated were Cruz's co-star Nonie Buencamino, Taha Daranda for "Women of the Weeping River," Julio Diaz of "Ma'Rosa," and Jess Mendoza of "Hinulid."

Like in MMFF, Bables “babbled” for words as he received his first Urian.

Meanwhile, Paolo, who again impersonated Angelina Jolie in his makeup but was making funny “OMG” expressions channeling Kim Kardashian at Thursday night’s awards, bravely thanked his Kapuso “Dabarkads” and fellow hosts of noontime show “Eat Bulaga!” right on the stage of rival network, ABS-CBN.

Actually, all competing networks, including TV5 and CNN Philippines, were there to cover the Urian held at the Studio 10 of ABS-CBN, making some people wonder that just like gender, should network affiliations be fluid, too? Should there be no more distinction among the stars who are Kapamilya, Kapuso, or Kapatid? 

Perhaps, the industry should consider that, too.