What if Heart were MHL wife Lally…?

During the commercial break in last Saturday’s edition of Startalk, I and some “kibitzers” engaged Heart Evangelista (who pinchhit for Lolit Solis who is in Paris) in a light banter about the hit GMA “bromance-soap” My Husband’s Lover (now simply known as MHL) in which Carla Abellana is cast as the fairly-suspicious Lally, wife of Tom Rodriguez who’s having a discreet affair with Dennis Trillo.

We asked Heart a hypothetical question, “How would she react if she found out that her boyfriend or her (future) husband was gay?”

Without batting an eyelash, Heart replied, “Mas tatanggapin ko ‘yon kaysa kapwa babae ang karibal ko. Kung ibang babae ‘yon, I would be asking myself, ‘What do I lack, where did I go wrong?’ If she can be sweet, I can be sweet as well; kung grabe siyang magmahal, mas grabe naman akong magmahal. So I wouldn’t understand if another woman were involved. But if it were another man, well, I couldn’t offer what he could, so walang competition dyan.”

What if the “other man” was all-out and not discreet like the characters of Tom and Dennis (who are effective in their portrayal because they are certified “straight;” otherwise, if closet or certified gay actors were cast, MHL wouldn’t be a soap but, to borrow Joey de Leon’s term, “reality TV”)?

“At the end of the day,” said Heart, “’yung mga cheating-cheating na ‘yan, at the end of the day, babae man o lalake, if my husband or boyfriend is not happy with me, hiwalay na lang kami para ako naman ay makahanap ng iba.”

Would she tell her children (if any) that her husband was gay?

“I wouldn’t hide things from them. I’d like to let them see the world as is, no pretension at walang pagkukunwari, and not ‘yung mabubulaga na lang sila one day and, my God…”

Heart was assigned to interview guests Tom and Dennis (with Carla in another segment) who were “game” in answering the “incisive/intrusive” questions, at one point daring the “loveteam” to kiss (which may never happen on their soap because the writer and director see to it that the presentation of the delicate subject is done with extreme caution so as not to hurt the sensibilities of televiewers). The “lovers” looked lovingly at each other and turned their faces closer toward each other while laughing at themselves, prompting “Ma’am Janine” and “Ma’am Mildred” to scream, “Bawal ‘yan, bawal ‘yan!”

Then, Heart put Tom and Dennis to a “test” and a highly-satisfied Heart “acquitted” them both, confirming that “Talagang tunay silang mga lalake.”

 Seeing a chance, Dennis turned the table on Heart and asked when she and her senator-boyfriend were getting married, especially now that Heart has moved to a spanking-new three-storey townhouse complete with a personal gym, a symbol she said of her new-found independence. “I’m 28,” said Heart (who denied that she and her boyfriend were now living-in…“walking in” is the more apt term, I guess), “but marriage hasn’t entered my mind yet.”

For a parting question, we asked Dennis if he wasn’t worried or afraid that he (or Tom) might get carried away and, you know, reverse his sexual preference (which seems to be a fad these days).

Sure of himself, Dennis, noted for being a ladies’ man, laughed.

“Ngayon pa!,” Dennis said. “I’ve done it before (as a cross-dresser in Aishite Imasu), so playing this kind of role is not new to me. I’m secure with myself. Babae pa rin ang gusto ko.”

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