It was surreal. Karylle in her mid-twenties was in front of me on The Buzz to answer The Buzz Tough Ten Questions. I would often see Karylle when she was not even in her teens. She was a shy, pretty girl with her lovely curly locks. She’d smile and would politely acknowledge my presence and then she would retreat to her own wonderland. I was Zsa Zsa Padilla’s publicist who was then called “The Fabulous One.”
Life took on a dizzying pace and I rarely saw the girl until she started to make her way into the business. I bumped into her once when I did a story on Onstage, a bar-restaurant in Quezon City which according to the news, she and Dingdong are part owners. But that was it. So much has changed. And so much has happened. The little girl I often saw was now a statuesque beauty — still a bit shy but had a presence that was incandescent. She was in love.
Her break-up with Dingdong Dantes was so public that it became a national biz issue. It still reverberates up to now especially because people are still left hanging as to why they decided to split up. And the nagging question is “Did Marian Rivera cause the break-up?”
And we asked this question (and nine more) on The Buzz Tough Ten Questions Portion. She said “No, she had nothing to do with the separation.” In their three-year relationship, was Dingdong a faithful boyfriend? She believed Dingdong. He obviously told her that he was faithful. And she believed no one but him.
Talks about a big confrontation with Marian that supposedly happened in some backstage, the alleged dare during the Marian-Dingdong birthday concert at the Araneta Coliseum that if he kissed her she was going to break-off from the relationship — all these are not true. Yes, she did request Dingdong not to kiss Marian during the concert. So did he kiss Marian? I probed. “Yes, he did,” she shot back.
Karylle was stunning when she appeared on The Buzz. By the looks of it, she is on her way to recovery. She’s trying to move on. There’s still a tinge of pain in her smile but she’s coping well.
And that last controversial question: “Sa iyong pagkakalam, buntis ba si Marian?” This rumor started as a blind item until Marian’s name cropped up. I repeated the question wanting to give her a chance to answer. On both instances, Karylle answered with a smile.
And I understood. I understood that any answer would have been misconstrued to mean anything depending on who’s talking. If she said no, how does she know? If she said, I don’t know, she could sound bitchy and if she said pakialam ko, some would accuse her of being bitter. She chose to be silent and hoped to deliver the message that the question was not for her to answer. That’s how I saw it.
By the way, this question I was told by The Buzz staff had already been asked of Karylle the night before The Buzz, during her launch as Human model, and she was consistent. Asked about the rumor, she simply smiled.
And when has a smile become a crime? Pray, tell me!