Khalil Ramos has fun playing Basilio in Maria Clara at Ibarra
Taking a breather from his loveteam with Gabbi Garcia is Khalil Ramos, who breathes life into the teenage Basilio character in the GMA Telebabad primetime hit Maria Clara at Ibarra.
It’s a delight to see actors like Khalil essay and commit to never-before-done roles. Like what he said in a previous article, Khalil finds joy in experiencing new roles and projects and is in love with the art of storytelling through portraying characters.
“Yes, this is my first time to be part of an adaptation of a novel,” said Khalil in a virtual one-on-one with The STAR of the GMA 7 historical portal fantasy series, based on Philippine National Hero Jose Rizal’s novels, Noli Me Tangere (Touch Me Not) and El Filibusterismo (The Reign of Greed), which airs weeknights after 24 Oras, “two of the most important novels in Philippine (literary) history. It’s kind of a huge thing for me.”
Khalil recalled that his high school student self had read the novels, along with other literary works like Ibong Adarna and Florante at Laura, and as part of the Filipino subject curriculum, if one may add. He shared that students were asked to choose a novel and make it into a play.
“I was not into acting in high school, I was just always behind the scenes,” said he. “I was part of the tech(nical) team or (the group in charge of props and) materials. It never crossed my mind to even, you know, be part of something like this.” Khalil was referring to become the grown-up Basilio on the small screen and that was even a remote possibility when he entered show business. It’s his love for singing and performing that motivated him to foray into this creative industry.
“Thankfully, I was given opportunities when I was starting out in showbiz. I never also really thought that I would have future in acting until they told me, ‘Uy, ano, may potential ka (Hey, you have the potential to become an actor),’” said he. “It was just realized through the work that I did.”
As an actor, Khalil has developed his own way to interpret a role and a character. But for his Basilio, the approach was “slightly different,” as Khalil put it, “because I was entering in the middle of a show, where a character has already been portrayed by (child actor) Stanley (Abuloc), (he’s the) young Basilio. Kumbaga may na establish na, may launching pad na yung character ko.”
“I needed to firstly watch episodes of Maria Clara at Ibarra. I’ve only seen clips of some of the iconic scenes they did, but I haven’t really watched and paid attention to the nuances of the character. That’s one thing that I had to do, to study the reference material, see where I could kind of give my own personal interpretation (of) the character, while still holding on to the young Basilio’s nuance (like) his charm and of course, what the character has gone through.”
Khalil had to make sense of character continuity and bring his own stamp to it. He studied how other El Fili adaptations either on stage or film presented “the much older Basilio,” and chanced upon YouTube clips and videos about the character. From there, Khalil was able to figure out the Basilio he would eventually play on TV.
“I had to keep a lot of things in mind (for this role),” said he. “On the surface level, it’s a period (TV series). The nuance, the mannerism, the actions (of the characters) were somewhat different to what a person would do now, (as compared to) the century the novel was written in. The manner of speaking was something that I had to pick up early on. When I arrived on set, I was already given a brief on the world that they had already built, the style of speaking, yung pakikitungo sa mga señor and señorita.”
Aside from doing a mental mapping, Khalil had to be comfortable with every aspect of his character such as personal effects, from clothes to cane, and consider each second nature to him. With that, “I was able to focus on the scene objectives,” he added.
Seeing him embark on a solo acting and in ensemble projects like Maria Clara at Ibarra should not surprise followers because, according to Khalil, “this has been my chosen path, (which) is to breathe life into different characters. I would consider myself mainly as an actor who would most often choose these types of roles and characters, hindi naman siya surprise, but then, siyempre, the past two projects I was working with Gabbi, which (were) something we both loved doing together.”
“But after the second one, it was also in mind for the both of us to do projects separately ‘coz we didn’t really wanna box ourselves just working with each other. Personally, mahilig ako talaga mag-explore at mag-experiment. This role is something of a first for me and I had so much fun doing it,” added he. The GabLil team-up was previously seen in Stories From the Heart: Love on Air and Love You Stranger.
Since the primetime series is now on its final leg, everyone is curious about the next acting assignment of Khalil.
“I hopefully in the coming months will go back to acting in film. So, it’s something I’m looking forward to, and then, yun pa lang,” said the actor, who intends to be more active in creating content for his photography and filmmaking ventures.
Speaking of which, Khalil shared that becoming a film director is among his dreams or future prospects, “but it’s something that I don’t wanna rush ‘coz I still consider myself in the learning process, pati sa acting, ang dami ko pang gustong pagdaanan (there’s so much I want to experience) before I even attempt to make a film, mainly because I don’t want it to be half-baked or I don’t want it to be raw.”
Following his line of thought, Khalil seemed to believe that there’s a right time and process for artistic endeavors like scoring his debut feature film. “I want it to be personal, I want it to be a film that is very meaningful to me, very important,” he concluded.
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