Laughter is the best medicine for Eddie

As an icon in Philippine cinema, Eddie Garcia is in a league all his own. He started as a villain at Sampaguita Pictures in the early ’50s, making life miserable for the top leading ladies of that era, like Paraluman, Gloria Romero, Lolita Rodriguez, Rita Gomez and Marlene Dauden.

He won six FAMAS Best Supporting Actor awards playing a contravida in Taga sa Bato, Condenado, Tanikalang Apoy, Patria Adorada, Ito ang Pilipino and Nueva Vizcaya, elevating him to the FAMAS Hall of Fame. Later, she gained stardom doing the so-called bomba films like Batuta ni Drakula, Querida Mia and Erotica, where he was shown running in the nude. He also did tamer sex-comedies like Atsay Killer, May Daga sa Labas ng Lungga, and Public Enemy Number Two. He also did gay roles in Tubog sa Ginto and Paruparong Buking with equal ease.

As an action star, he ruled the box office in such solo starrers as Boyong Mañalac, Andres Manambit, Gen. Tomas Karingal and Mayor Cesar Climaco. And he shows no signs of slowing down. At the presscon of his latest movie, D’Uragons, someone asked Eddie Garcia if, at his age, his hair still real or is he now wearing a toupee?

"Why? Hindi ba halatang wig ‘yan?" Eddie counters with a laugh. "Hoy, totoo pa ‘yan." Then he pulls his hair to show he’s not just wearing a hairpiece. "But I admit I now dye it dahil salt and pepper na ang hair ko. I’m just lucky that at my age, I haven’t gone bald yet."

He also feels so blessed he remains in the pink of health even if he is already a septuagenarian, while former colleagues at Sampata Pictures, like Dolphy and Ramon Revilla, already had heart bypass operations. Some have even passed away.

What is the secret of his tiptop physical condition? "I don’t overindulge in anything," Eddie replies. I practise moderation. I exercise and more importantly, I don’t let myself get stressed unnecessarily. When there’s pressure, kino-comedy ko na lang. Once, on the set of Imortal, a movie I did with Vilma Santos and Christopher de Leon, we were doing a scene supposed to be shot in broad daylight but the sun was already setting and we haven’t completed it. Everyone was fretting and I told them to buy some long bamboos. Why? They asked. My reply was ‘Para tukuran natin ang araw at nang hindi lumubog’." Viva has paired him with young comedians, like Janno Gibbs, Bayani Agbayani and Blakdyak, but D’Uragons is the first time he gets to work with their resident funnyman, Andrew E.

"The last time I did an action-comedy was with Willie Revillame, Matalino Man ang Matsing, about two years ago. It’s fun doing this kind of movie so I really missed it. That’s why I welcome the opportunity of working with Andrew E. He has a totally different style, natural lang and not TH. He’s also a good rapper. He has good comic timing and we have a hilarious chemistry on screen. I play Sherlock, a private detective who becomes famous for saving a child from a kidnap-for-ransom gang. Andrew is Orot, a provinciano who idolizes me and follows me wherever I go. To get to work with me, he volunteers to be my personal servant. The villains here are Mystica as a social climber who heads a jewelry smuggling syndicate and Joko Diaz as her chief henchman." He is paired with Angelu de Leon while Andrew is paired with Patricia Javier.

Eddie has a kissing scene with Angelu. How does it feel? "It’s like kissing your apo sa tuhod," he quips. "I feel so lucky that at my age, ang babata pa ng mga nakakapareha ko."

Eddie himself made the word uragon popular in his past movies, the way he popularized Manoy. What exactly does uragon mean? "Andrew and I are both from Bicol. I’m from Juban, Sorsogon and he’s from Bula, Camarines Sur," he explains. "The word is now associated with being horny, but it does mean a lot of other things, like magaling ka, the champion in everything you do. I introduce another Bicolano word in D’Uragons. In a scene where a sexy foreign girl comes to my bedroom, I exclaim: ‘Karayusan na!’ You have to ask a Bicolano to find out what that word means."

He is a FAMAS Hall of Famer as Best Supporting Actor and Best Director. He has four Best Actor awards for De Colores, Tubog sa Ginto, Minsan Pa Nating Hagkan ang Nakaraan and Bakit May Kahapon Pa? Just one more award and he’ll be a Hall of Famer, too, in this category.

Now, Eddie is a shoo-in for the Best Drama Actor on TV with his powerful performance as a politician with several wives in GMA-7’s Kung Mawawala Ka. "I enjoy doing that soap," he says. "It‘s a new challenge for me even if it entails a lot of hard work dahil magdamagan ang taping namin. It also requires a lot of memory work because we have to memorize our lines for so many sequences we tape each day, which are usually shot nang tuhog or in one long take. And usually, we get our scripts just the night before the taping. I’m glad my memory is still good. I also enjoy working with Liza Lorena, Gloria Diaz and Hilda Koronel as my wives and Raymond Bagatsing, Princess Punzalan, Ara Mina, Sharmaine Arnaiz, Sunshine Dizon and Alessandra de Rossi as my children. We all enjoy working with our director, Joel Lamangan, who has given me Best Actor awards for Bakit May KahaponPa? and Deathrow. I started as a governor in the show and now, I’m shown running for the Senate. They tell me I will end up as president in the story."