Quinn of beautiful memories

Even as his present preoccupation is the painter's paraphernalia, director Al Quinn has a roomful of memories on how he started in showbiz.

He entered the movies in the time of Gerry de Leon, Efren Reyes and Josefino Cenizal, among others and commuting between the LVN and the Premiere studios.

Direk Al Quinn reminisces.

"I did a costume picture with Gerry de Leon, I also worked with Cirio Santiago and over at the Manila Grand Opera House, I met Lou Salvador Jr., who asked me to take over when he saw what I did with some musical production numbers," he recalls.

Before he got to direct his first picture, he was already behind the camera assisting the director compose shots for musical sequences.

"When I got involved with musicals, I was already given a free hand by the director what to do with those production numbers," he says. "Because I meticulously plan my shots even before the actual shooting, ako na mismo ang sumisilip sa camera and decide what will work for those sequences. I considered this a very good training for me at that phase of my showbiz life."

Another memorable time in his showbiz past was working with Steve Parker (husband of actress Shirley Maclaine) in one live show in Las Vegas where he worked with Pilita Corrales and Shirley Gorospe.

"Those were the good times indeed," he sighs.

Born Alcuin Pastrano in Jaro, Iloilo (he was given the showbiz name Al Quinn when he worked with the late Pancho Magalona), Direk Al's first love was dancing but he also loved to sketch.

Moreover, his varied interests in the arts were not unusual.

His brother was a good tap dancer and he learned to tap dance early in their teen days when they would imitate Gene Kelly. It was a matter of time before they found a kindred spirit in another dancing idol, Fred Astaire.

Like it or not, Direk Al probably got his visual arts genes from his grandfather who was a painter.

When he was seven years old, he sketched his father and he didn't know his father kept it until it was shown to him many years later. "That made me realize I had some talent in the visual arts," he recalls.

So he took up fine arts at the University of Santo Tomas and found ballet also irresistible. At daytime, he was at UST while in the evening, he took up ballet classes.

Before showbiz, Direk Al was hobnobbing with the pioneers of Philippine ballet namely Inday Gaston Mañosa, Joji Felix Velarde, Maribel Aboitiz, Eddie Elejar and Benny Villanueva, among others.

What he found out later was that the sister of dramatic actress Marlene Dauden, Cecile, was a ballet dancer and they were partners in Swan Lake.

In time, he found ballet too soft an art for him and founded a jazz dance group.

Pancho Magalona saw the group perform once and they were asked to do a musical number in one Magalona-starrer. The actor liked what he saw. When another Pancho Magalona-and-Tita Duran movie was being cooked up, he became Al Quinn.

There was no turning back on showbiz.

He was busy with his showbiz commitments when his wife, Beth, bought him a complete painting paraphernalia and the urge to paint once again seized him. "My wife Beth was another turning point in my life," he says. She was very encouraging and was doing the job of curator although she was busy enough as housewife and mother to our three kids, Dino, Nicole and Noel."

His present connection with showbiz and dance is through the TV show Eezy Dancing and the comic sitcom Ispup.

But of late, the call of the painter's brush is too strong to resist and after his first one-man exhibit last year, Take 1, Al Quinn turned recluse and finished his latest collection of works in pen and ink including charcoal.

One of the models who willingly disrobed for the sake of art was Giselle Toengi with whom he has worked in Eezy Dancing. "Giselle really surprised me because she was every inch a professional model," he says. "She had no inhibitions whatsoever and naturally I was very inspired."

On the whole, Al Quinn likes to think he lives two lives.

"I can actually be engrossed in showbiz and painting all at the same time," he says. "When I am on the set, I am very well focused on the camera and what it should capture. I love to compose shots for the camera but then of course there is very little time for that if it's a live show. Come to think of it, it was while seeing through the camera that I learned to compose through the painter's brush. When I am into painting, I am really engrossed."

When Al Quinn's one man show, Shadows of Black and White opens on May 28 at the Ayala Center of the Glorietta, he will have realized that in some ways that showbiz and fine arts actually complement each other. Al Quinn's Shadows of Black and White will run until June 1. Beneficiary is Value Life Foundation.