The Teresa Herrera project
On the set of Gen-Y Cops, one of Teresa Herrera’s first ventures into cinema, the model-actress turned TV host thought that her life was about to reach its tragic denouement. She had been working on the film in Hong Kong in 2000 when, in a freak accident, a bomb exploded nearby and collapsed an entire viewing window near the actress’s head. At that moment, glimpses of a life she had yet to live cascaded around her. “You know how they say your life flashes in front of you when you’re about to die? For me, the opposite happened. It’s like all these things I’ve never even dreamed of just suddenly flashed in front of me,” reveals the charming host of Project Runway Philippines — a vision that transported her to Africa and saw her having two kids of her own. While she has yet to play the role of a mother in real life, she has since booked two modeling jobs in that continent. Then again, who would have thought that a lab technician in the sequel to Gen-X Cops would end up becoming one of the Philippines’ most sought-after models, relishing a star turn in Atlantis’s previous staging of Dogeaters and hosting the Filipino outfit to Bravo TV’s hit reality show? Other than that, the Pisces-born stage siren may have just as well been another plaything for gods who play tricks on fascinating mortals at the onset of their blossoming careers.
The incident with Gen-Y Cops was not Teresa’s first brush with a near-death experience. On a previous trip to Baguio City, the Kiss Kiss Bang Bang alumna had fallen asleep in the family car before waking up to see her family from across the road. They were getting ready to go horseback riding. Not one to miss out on the action, she opened the car door and rushed towards them yelling, “Wait for me! I’m coming!” As she was crossing the road, Teresa felt an invisible pull that paralyzed her on the stone pavement. A bus was speeding by at that moment; she saw terror register on her mom’s face at the prospect of losing the eldest of her five children. “I was very reckless and accident-prone,” quips Teresa, adding, “I was actually a bit of a devil child.” Although the firecracker seems to have been watered down with age and maturity, the culinary aficionado has never once lost her thirst for adventure.
Born Maria Teresa Trinidad Paredes Herrera (or “T” as she is more fondly known), Teresa was very active in her youth and was always involved in an “interest class” of sorts. She was a swimmer, accordion player, cake decorator, and took up ballet since age five. “When my parents couldn’t afford to put me and my sisters through ballet class anymore, I learned how to dance on my own,” reveals Teresa, stressing that she had always wanted to become a dancer since she was little. She was also into baking and helped out in their home-style bakery in the States.
During her high school years, Teresa had an opportunity to strut down the halls of Long Beach Poly, a school that produced the likes of Snoop Dogg and Cameron Diaz. Armed with a candor and beauty that was second nature to every member of the Herrera clan, Teresa was a surprisingly low-key gal who didn’t thrive on popularity. She was into visual arts, sort of like Laney Boggs in the ‘90s teenybopper flick She’s All That. “During lunches, I’d hang out with my art teacher,” relates the yoga enthusiast whose admitted introversion didn’t take her as far as eating lunch in a bathroom cubicle à la Lindsay Lohan in Mean Girls. “People weren’t really mean to me,” says the self-confessed sweet tooth. She was more of the free-spirited bohemian who’d fashion different sets of friends. “I have my acting friends, my high school friends, and since entering the modeling scene, my fabulously gay friends,” jests Teresa who believes that these groups represent the different sides of her that complete her as a person.
It wasn’t until after high school that Teresa decided to try her luck in Metropolitan Manila. “I came to the Philippines and was discovered by Joey Espino, my agent to this day,” says the fan of Kate Moss. Joey Espino is one of the organizers of Philippine Fashion Week and has been Teresa’s agent for over a decade. “It’s kind of like a relationship. If it works, it works,” relates Teresa, adding, “I’m very loyal.” Under Calcarrie’s International Models Philippines, Teresa was able to book numerous jobs in the Asian modeling circuit and was able to travel the world and fuel her flair for culture and adventure.
With substance to back her Grecian-like qualities, Teresa soon took a sabbatical from the modeling industry and moved back to LA to pursue a career in acting. Studying with the likes of Patsy Rodenburg and Larry Moss who had personally coached Hilary Swank in Boys Don’t Cry and Leonardo DiCaprio in The Aviator, she spent a huge chunk of her modeling savings to invest in dance, movement and voice classes, and everything else she needed to become a good actress. “I couldn’t do a university program because that would mean I had to be in school the whole day. Truth of the matter is, I had to survive and I needed to work,” relates Teresa who happens to be a huge fan of Nobel Peace Prize laureates Wangari Maathai and Nelson Mandela. Between class hours, she would go on auditions and work as a hostess at a restaurant. “It started me off in LA,” says Teresa, adding, “I met a lot of great people and within six months, I could get into any club I wanted.”
When asked who her role models are, the flamenco dancer of late ticks off Cate Blanchett and Meryl Streep. “Theirs is the kind of career I want — where movie executives can’t afford not to hire you.” But for Teresa, fame was never really the raison d’être of her theatrical poison. She recalls some wisdom passed along by acting coach Larry Moss who said if an actress gets by on looks alone, she could easily become the flavor of the month. But Hollywood is not about that and can just as easily spit you out. “It’s the discipline and the craft that’s most important,” says the model-actress who believes that acting represents the human condition truthfully from the highest to the lowest form.
In August of 2007, on a casual visit to Manila, Teresa was granted the opportunity to do in her hometown what she loved most. She had planned to work on Love’s Labours Lost, a Shakespearean classic under Repertory Philippines, but her involvement in the production didn’t pan out due to some schedule conflicts. Subsequently, another play, the critically acclaimed Dogeaters by Jessica Hagedorn, was holding auditions. Teresa would go on to play the title role of Rio, a young Fil-Am writer who returns to her native land at the height of the socio-political psychosis that ensnared the Marcos regime. The role seemed tailor-made for Teresa who at the peak of her adventures in LA was a Filipina ready to go home. About the same time, she was setting up the Manila Chapter of the Global Mala Project, a worldwide collective of yoga instructors and practitioners that come together on UN’s International Peace Day.
Meanwhile, Teresa received a call from her agency, saying that they were holding a casting call for Project Runway Philippines. While there were four other girls in the room, she remarks, “I had been watching the show religiously in the States since the first season and told myself, ‘I know this.’” The judges were so impressed with T’s cool and engaging personality that two months later, she got called back to the studio, along with Rajo Laurel and Jojie Loren, a judge and a mentor to the design enthusiasts respectively. “Once they saw us all in a room together and how we interacted, there was that feeling. The creative energy was there and it was right.”
As to her own design philosophy, Teresa spells out clean, understated and chic as she, along with fellow judge Apples Aberin-Sahdwani, brings a woman’s point of view to the judges’ table. The homebody claims to hold no insecurity towards playing critic alongside such fashion doyens, adding, “Although I’ve been in front of the camera as a model for the most part, I’ve been in the business as long as they have. At the end of the day, I was a woman and I was the target market for the clothes.” The longtime fan of Nicolas Ghesquiere, creative director of the iconic house of Balenciaga recalls that she had previously watched an episode of the show with co-star Rajo Laurel to which the latter was full of praises: “Honey, that job was meant for you. No one else could’ve done it better.”
In some cosmic scheme, Teresa has always believed in the benefits of good karma. She was once told that she was a good person in her past life — which is the reason for all the extraordinary deeds and palpable rewards she is experiencing now. More striking is the fact that she didn’t plan for any of these to happen. “I go where the current takes me. The more I try to plan things, the more they explode in my face,” ends Teresa who believes in making the most of every opportunity that comes her way. A hit show, her own clothing line (Isla), a knack for theater, and a flourishing modeling career: T seems to be drawing in a lot of good karma in this lifetime.
* * *
For bookings, you may contact Teresa through Calcarries International Models at 844-0350.
Swing by http://chasingtoff.multiply.com or drop a comment at imcalledtoffee@mac.com.
