La Vida Rosanna

Mistakes often turn out to be the best teachers. Rosanna Roces should know. When she and husband of seven years Tito Molina had parted ways for one-and-a-half months, showbiz’s Iron Lady softened like melted butter.

All too suddenly, the bed got too big for Rosanna’s voluptuous body. And, in a scene straight out of a Judy Ann Santos tearjerker, Rosanna would cry her heart out in her soulless mansion.

Rosanna swallowed her pride and decided to wave the white flag of surrender first.

"I got the phone and called Tito," Rosanna recalls at the presscon of her comeback film for Star Cinema, La Vida Rosa (yes, she plays the title role). When Tito finally got home, she apologized profusely. So all’s well that ends well.

Now she’s thinking of having a child – her first, if ever, by Tito, even if it means resorting to in-vitro fertilization. The hard-earned lesson of prioritizing the family must have struck doubly hard for Rosanna this time.

"I’m turning 30 next year," the sex symbol makes no bones about it. "I want to enjoy my children while I’m still young," she adds.

Her children, Grace and Onyok, aged 12 and 11 respectively, are approaching puberty. They are starting to shun any display of public affection from their mom. "Why, I can’t even embrace them anymore!" Rosanna says, a hint of frustration in her voice.

Grace, for instance, gives her mom a warning look whenever Rosanna puts her arm across her shoulder in a mall. Since Rosanna understands this show of independence is part of growing up, she longs for a child totally dependent on her, someone she and Tito can truly call their own (Grace and Onyok are Rosanna’s children from a previous relationship). Rosanna has this to say about today’s children: "Jiro (Manio, her son gone wild in La Vida Rosa) is just like my real-life kids. Look at the way they ask for money!"

The mother in Rosanna winced when the film’s director, Chito Roño, made her spank the erring Jiro in one of the highlight scenes.

"I don’t spank my children anymore," she says.

But spank Enteng (the child actor who plays Jiro) she must, even if something inside her rebelled. It’s a job. And this, together with another highlight scene where she confronted the award-winning Pen Medina (as Lupo, head of a robbery-kidnap syndicate) drained Osang of her energies at the end of the day.

"That confrontation with Pen was my hardest scene," relates Rosanna. It called for heavy drama, though she opted for less histrionics, more subtle acting this time.

She is mighty proud of her performance as the street-smart Rosa, a tough woman outside but a loving mother and daughter inside. This is one movie, Rosanna says, with a lot of heart. She assures the press that no one will leave the moviehouse without feeling a pinch in their hearts.

Other movies, she says, made her succumb to routine acting. Not so with La Vida Rosa, Rosanna’s homecoming film of sort for Star Cinema, which released Ang Lalaki sa Buhay ni Selya, her landmark project produced by Reyna Films.

La Vida Rosa sees Rosanna portraying a wide gamut of emotions – from the light (as in speaking in accented Chavacano) to the heavy (take note of all those confrontation scenes).

By a strange twist of fate, circumstances helped Rosanna fit into her heavy drama roles even more. It was while shooting the movie that she had one of the most trying moments in her life; her (temporary) separation from Tito and her falling out with erstwhile showbiz best friend Ai-Ai de las Alas.

Depressed, Rosanna threw herself to her work like never before.

"It turned down offers to do shows. I chose to keep quiet to avoid trouble," Rosanna clearly remembers how badly affected she was by her rift with her former best buddy. Rosanna refused to confide in anybody, afraid that she might drag other people down with her depression.

She also shunned forming new friendships in showbiz.

The wound obviously left a deep scar that has yet to heal with time.

That reaction, it turns out, is very Rosanna.

"When I’m depressed, I shut myself in my room for 10 days and mope."

But when she reported to the La Vida Rosa set, all her troubles disappeared. Work was smooth-sailing, the title role of the feisty, outspoken Rosa, engrossing.

It was a case of two artists speaking the same language Rosanna’s experience with Roño, who directed her in the unforgettable socio-political drama Curacha: Ang Babaeng Walang Pahinga, enriched her as an actress.

"Direk Chito doesn’t accept a project just for the sake of making money or for having something to do. He is no traditional filmmaker who depends on formulas. He has angst. He loves to experiment. These things make every Chito Roño film different," observes Rosanna.

Besides, she got royal treatment from Star Cinema. The giant film outfit topped her asking price for the Millennium Films project then being offered her. Star Cinema pampered her with a solo presscon in ABS-CBN’s spanking new building, a good script (by Armando ‘Bing’ Lao), the best catered food, etc.

How can anyone, even someone as choosy as Rosanna when it comes to film projects, refuse? She ended her two-year absence from the movie scene (her last starrer being Basta Ikaw, Nanginginig Pa with Vic Sotto) and jumped at the juicy offer. The single love scene (with Diether Ocampo as her partner in crime and in real life), assures Osang, is not as graphic as those she did before. This is why she is not afraid her efforts will be wasted once the Censors start reviewing her film (set for a Sept. 26 playdate in Metro theaters).

It’s a fitting comeback for someone who is turning out to be as interesting and as exciting an actress as her multi-checkered, rainbow-colored life is.