ON ASSIGNMENT: Following Ethel Booba, the greatest philosopher of our time
THE WANDERING I
Ethel Booba arrives at Laffline comedy bar looking like a ballerina gone rogue. Her all-black ensemble for tonight’s gig is a one-piece swimsuit with strappy cutouts, worn underneath a short tutu skirt, finished off with knee-high gladiator heels. (Her friend/long-time co-comedian MC would later tease her about her footwear onstage. “Holy Week ba? Ba’t ang sandals mo pang-Sinakulo?”) Her ample cleavage is on full display, the twin peaks that put the “Boob” in “Booba.” The makeup is piled on thick — think heavy strips of falsies and fluorescent pink lips — and she’s rocking big hair; bottle blonde locks curled at the ends.
It’s almost show time for this show girl, and the place is full, a good turnout, considering Thursday night has already morphed into Friday. The clock reads 12:40 a.m. She leads us to a small dressing room to the side of the stage. It’s a little cramped and the walls could use a fresh coat of beige paint. Atop the dressing tables are bags, half-empty cigarette packs, a clothes steamer, an ashtray full of stubbed-out yosi, and lipstick-stained drinking glasses containing various beverages. (Ethel’s poison? Local brandy.) The singer-comedian starts chatting with MC, her “feeder.” (This means that he sets up a joke and she responds. This gets the unscripted banter going.) She’s asking him if he can join her for an upcoming US raket. MC turns to me and says this is one of the things he loves about his friend.“Sinasama niya kami sa raket, kami ni Lassy [another Laffline comedian]. Susuportahan ka niya.”
MC continues listing Ethel’s benevolent characteristics. She’s generous to newbies, preferring not to participate in “initiation rites.” (There’s no violence involved in these comedian initiations; just relentless teasing from a bunch of intimidating bekis who want to see if you can handle it. Ethel is the one who assures amateurs, “Ganyan lang talaga. Play time lang yan.”) And finally, MC says, despite being one of Laffline’s most famous headliners (Vice Ganda also started out in this club and still performs every now and then), Ethel shares the dressing room with a dozen other people, and doesn’t make a fuss.
It’s Show Time
The exhalations are interrupted when Ethel’s manager enters the room and says it’s time for her to go onstage. Ethel freaks out and asks for five more minutes. She still needs to write her kodigo, the lyrics of Rihanna’s This is What You Came for, one of the three songs she’s going to sing. MC comes to the rescue and offers to keep the audience entertained in the meantime. “Siya lagi ang kumakanta ng mga bagong kanta. Singer siya talaga,” he shares as he exits the room. Ethel grabs a pentel pen and a sheet of bond paper and quickly scribbles, “Lightning strikes every time she moves. And everybody’s watching her.” She’s humming the tune as we leave the room and return to our seats. Even we’re excited to see Ethel Booba go live onstage to sing pop hits and do what she does best: Make people laugh.
“Meron tayong audien,” Ethel begins.“Tama ba? Audien? Kasi isa lang eh,” she asks MC, who promptly chides her, “Tanga! Audience.” There it is: Ethel’s “boba” brand of comedy, what immediately set her apart when she entered the crowded ‘biz in 1999; the other pun in “Booba.” This branding has been crystal from the get go, and judging by the laughter she’s eliciting on stage, the act has not lost its appeal. In fact, you can say 2016 is her Renaissance Year.
Twitter Savant
Perhaps she has social media to thank. @IamEthylGabison joined Twitter in January 2012, but only started getting mass retweets late last year, when she live-tweeted during the Miss Universe pageant. Websites like Coconuts Manila quickly compiled her best 140-character reactions, including that “super on-point take down of Teddy Casiño’s tweet.” (He criticized Pia Wurtzbach for not addressing the problems re: US bases in the country during the tricky Q&A portion. Ethel’s viral response: “It’s your job in Congress and you have more than 30 seconds to do that. Charot!” #Burn.) Thousands click on the “Like” button when she posts her hilarious, spot-on musings on life, love, politics, showbiz, beauty—whatever hot topic Filipinos have in mind. (I.e., “Hindi ako pabor na ilibing si Marcos sa Libingan ng mga Bayani. Kahit natalo siya sa pagka Bise Presidente dapat hayaan siya mabuhay. Charot!”)
The jokey “Charot!” at the end of every tweet keeps things light. In the minefield that is social media, where people shove their opinions down your throat from atop their soapboxes or their high horses, she’s a refreshing presence. Her cleverly crafted tweets trigger laughter and oo-nga-ano realizations, not ad hominem attacks on the comments section. It’s hard not to like someone who doesn’t take herself and her opinions too seriously. Her being a Twitter savant has paved the way for a new label to be added to her CV: Book Author. (#Charotism, a compilation of some of her best tweets, is exclusively available at National Book Store for P195.) She tells tonight’s audience to buy her book, and her fellow comedians mock her in the way only friends can mock each other. “Ngayon libro, dati video,” says one, referencing Ethel’s leaked private video with her ex-boyfriend, basketball player Alex Crisano. “Sino mag-aakala na magkakalibro ‘to? Mag-text nga hirap ‘yan,” quips another, scoffing at Ethel’s inability to, you know, spell and string words together.
Ethel just laughs as they say these things. Because it’s all true. A woman who built a career out of being perceived as a busty ditz, a woman who didn’t finish high school, is the last person you’d expect to be, down the line, the subject of an appreciation tweet like this: “Remove the ‘Charot!’ in Ethel Booba’s tweets and she’s the greatest philosopher this country currently has.” — Simon Han (@smnhan) But that’s the thing about people — they keep surprising you. The night is getting raunchier. Ethel is playing a game onstage with four men and things are escalating pretty quickly. There’s a lap dance going on, and one of them just promised to f*ck her for 24 hours straight! And for that, he wins a kiss on the cheek and a bucket of beer. Time check: nearly 2:30 a.m. We say goodbye to a distracted Ethel backstage (she’s talking to friends) and agree to reconvene at her condo on Saturday.
The Thinking Woman
We are late for the interview but Ethel understands. Having just come from the airport herself (She just arrived from a casino gig in Cebu), she knows that EDSA on this particular Saturday is extra hellish. “Grabe no? Parang Mahal na Araw,” she says, comparing the commute to Jesus’ sufferings. Her condo is located on a quiet street near ABS-CBN; a modest two-level unit with warm yellow lights and wood furniture. Two of her brothers are here with her today. It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas here. There’s a wreath on the door, and beneath it, a handwritten note saying, “Remove your sleepers. Charot!” There are multi-colored string lights hanging on the kitchen window and bunched up around the religious figurines displayed in one corner. Our eyes zoom in on the reading material stacked on the center table: Pulp magazine featuring Gloc-9 on the cover, Star Studio magazine fronted by President Rodrigo Duterte, Mula sa Masa, Para sa Masa, the Malacañang-produced tabloid, and Preview magazine with Georgina Wilson on the cover. Interesting mix. Her brother apparently works for the President, by way of the government tabloid Mula sa Masa, Para sa Masa, while the other one is her constant companion. Ethel thoughtfully prepared iced tea and pizza for us, but those could wait. Right now, we want to talk Twitter.
“Lately lang,” she answers when we ask her about when exactly people officially took notice of her Twitter account. To be honest, Ethel wasn’t really surprised by the reception. “Kasi yung mga close friends ko, pag nag te-text ako sa kanila, ganun yung atake ko. Natatawa sila. Hindi na sila nakaka reply. Feeling ko nga ang corny ko eh.” Her tweets strike a nerve probably because they’re realities we tend to take for granted, like this one: “Minsan sa pakikipag text, di mo namamalayang napapamahal ka na pala. Lalo na kung DI KA UNLI. Charot!” But with her newfound fans — lovingly referred to by Ethel as her Boobarians—come the doubters; those who don’t believe she’s capable of wit and insight. “Maraming nagda-doubt na ako ba yun? Yung response ko kasi matagal,” she explains. Ethel says her observant nature is the reason it takes her a while to post. “Hindi naman ako nagtu-tweet ng gusto ko lang i-tweet. Lahat ng tina-tag, yung mga mine-mention, re-review ko muna lahat bago ako mag answer. Hindi naman pupwedeng agad-agad. Minsan, palilipasin ko muna, mag iisip muna ako ano bang magandang atake? Ino-observe ko muna lahat. Mapupuno muna ako bago ako magsalita.”
If it were up to her, she’d rather sew clothes (her secret passion) than spend time on social media, but sometimes, the fans can be relentless in their pursuit of Ethel’s POV. “Ang daming mga chu chu. ‘Ethel anong masasabi mo?’ Maraming ganun,” she deadpans. “Ako naman, ‘Ang kulit naman nito. Ano ba to? Ano bang problema dito?’ Kasi hindi ako mahilig sa chismis. Ayokong makialam. Pero yung Twitter na-obliga ako nang bongga. Kahit ayaw mo makialam, makikialam ka na lang din. Para manahimik lang, magkaroon ng peace. Kasi pag nagkaroon ako ng answer, tapos meron siyang twist na nakakatawa, tingnan mo, tahimik na sila. Okay na sila.”
She’s a savage who calls out people fearlessly, be they congressmen (Teddy Casino), acid-tongued veterans (Joey de Leon), or A-Listers with huge fan bases (Kim Chiu). “Hindi kasi ako nandidila ng pwet eh. Ganun talaga, totoo naman eh,” she shrugs. “Dapat sport ka lang.” This situation has done good things for her career. She has a book that’s selling well, invitations to perform abroad, and features, like this one. No one knows whether she’ll be able to sustain this Twitter-fueled renaissance, but that Ethel Booba is having a moment is a great thing. In this increasingly scary country where anything you post can and will be used as an excuse to bash you, here is Ethel, not so boba after all, showing us social media done right. Her friend MC said it best at the comedy bar the other night. “Matalino ka kaya marami kang pera!”
The “idiot” we laugh at is proving to be a savant, and that is no charot.
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Tweet the author @IrishDDizon.
