ENPRESS defends Sharon Cuneta and the Golden Screen Awards

We would have certainly dismissed the email sent by a Vilma Santos fan to our colleague Mario Bautista, who writes a column for a tabloid. But then, we could not help but react as we feel bad for Sharon Cuneta, whose name was dragged into the malicious email.

We got wind of the email last Tuesday when we were busy doing our review for the Golden Screen Awards to be held at Music 21 Plaza in Timog Avenue, Quezon City.

We felt we ought to defend ENPRESS, the Golden Screen Awards, and most especially, Sharon, who was dragged into the malicious email just because the Megastar was chosen to be the inducting officer of ENPRESS.

The email sent by a certain Vilmanian by the name of Eduardo ([email protected]) said in Filipino that Vilma Santos’ chances of making a grandslam or a sweep of this year’s acting awards from different award-giving bodies are dim because “sinisimulan na ang panggagapang ni Sharon sa induction ng Enpress. Buti na lang hindi credible ang Enpress na iyan. Please read below.” What followed in his email was the press release sent out by ENPRESS regarding Sharon’s acceptance to be the inducting officer of the club.

First of all, it was grossly unfair for this Vilmanian to insinuate that Sharon is making furtive moves to make sure that she’s going to win as Best Actress at the Golden Screen Awards and that’s by accepting the offer to be the inducting officer of ENPRESS.

It was truly unfair because she graciously and readily accepted the request of ENPRESS despite her busy schedule. When we made the request last January 14, right after the ENPRESS election, she said she would double-check her schedule, but would do everything to make time for it.

Mind you, we didn’t mention anything about the Golden Screen Awards when we texted Sharon regarding our request. We simply sent her a formal letter informing her of the desire of ENPRESS to be its inducting officer. Even if it was just a text message, Sharon was very excited to accept the request of ENPRESS.

Besides, when we contacted Sharon about the induction, ENPRESS has yet to start the review of movies shown in 2009 for the annual Golden Screen Awards. So we wonder how this Vilmanian would go to the extent of insinuating that Sharon accepted the offer to be inducting officer just to ensure that she’d win.

The said Vilmanian also tried to put down that the Golden Screen Awards by saying that it is not a credible award-giving body. If he really believes so, why is he affected that Vilma might not win?

So if Vilma wins as Best Actress then this Vilmanian would eat his words and say that the Golden Screen Awards is credible? What if Vilma fails to win, let’s say, at the Urian Awards, would this Vilmanian say that Urian is not credible?

It is grossly unfair for this Vilmanian to discredit Sharon just because the Megastar agreed to induct the officers of ENPRESS who are behind the Golden Screen Awards. We also invited Governor Vi to be the inducting officer of ENPRESS some years ago but no fan of Sharon raised a howl that Vilma did that to ensure that she’d win as best actress at the Golden Screen Awards.

We hope that before any fan of the Star for All Seasons would dare insinuate something like “gapangan ng award” or anything for that matter, be sure he can validate his statement. We value our credibility as an award-giving body and we take our job of giving awards seriously. We would not, in anyway, compromise it because we want to continue to hold to the respect that the film industry people had given the Golden Screen Awards even if we were just a new award-giving body.

We take a conscious effort in making sure that our choices are credible and beyond reproach. We cannot be swayed or influenced because we vote according to our conscience after a thorough deliberation. In the six years of handing out the Golden Screen Awards, we are proud to say that we have a good track record as far as our winners are concerned. We always come up with a credible list of winners. The public and the industry alike salute our choices.

If ever Vilma Santos loses, this should not be taken to mean that the Star for All Seasons lost just because ENPRESS favored Sharon over her. In fact, we still have to finish our review for the awards. So why jump into conclusion as to who is going to win or going to lose? We don’t even have nominees yet.

So, why is this fan of Governor Vi trying to discredit Sharon? Is it because he feels that Sharon gave a better performance in “Mano Po 6” (for which the Megastar won the filmfest best actress award) over that of Vilma in “In My Life?”

Besides, does this fan of Governor Vi think he is doing his idol a favor by trying to lift up Governor Vi at the expense of the Megastar? We don’t think the Governor would laud him for what he’s doing.