Yasmien Kurdi expressed her excitement about her role in Start-Up Ph, the local adaptation of the hit Korean soap opera top-billed by Bea Alonzo and Alden Richards.
The role is something new for her, something that is out-of-the-box. She admitted that it’s her first time portraying a character that is different from the usual ones she does.
“In the past, I portrayed oppressed characters. This time, I’m given the chance to play someone who’s in the business world. It’s something fresh for me and I’m simply excited to work.”
Yasmien has watched the original version of the series a couple of times already. She studied the character played by Kang Han-na.
“In our version, I’m Katrina ‘Ina’ Diaz. I learned a lot while doing the research for the part. Of course, I have preparations. First of all, I had to lose weight so that the clothes I’ll wear in the show will perfectly fit,” she said.
“In the story, Ina is a fashionista. So, in most of the scenes, I’m seen wearing slick, sophisticated, and modern office attires. It goes with the character since she is very driven. I also made some adjustments in my voice,” she went on.
As part of her preparation, Yasmien went to a speech class. She also observed various online TED talks to learn how to speak and act in front of many people.
“It’s like making a huge office presentation. That’s what’s it like. I’ve learned so much especially when it comes to the appropriate posture, movements, and conversations.”
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In a recent media con, Gary Valenciano revealed that he’s very happy with his musical collaboration with Julie Anne San Jose via the song “Di Ka Akin,” which the latter composed. This became possible since both of them are part of Universal Records Philippines.
Mr. Pure Energy has only good words for his fellow artist who is serious with her craft.
“You know, when we talk about the artists at the level of Julie Anne, these are artists who don’t come up with songs just for the sake of coming up with ditties. They come up with something that stems from somewhere, and I found out that she’s going to write the song,” Gary said.
“When I heard of the song, it was just a matter of time, which was a problem because both of us have completely different schedules. I left for the US for my concert tour. On her part, she had the song ready but she was also busy with other stuff like her Limitless musical trilogy.
You can tell it’s an example of how much an artist like her put into what they believe in,” he carried on.
Gary didn’t want to say ‘Yes!’ just because it’s something new for him to do. After presenting the material to Mon Faustino who did an initial arrangement, he asked Julie to listen to the song if there’s anything she wanted.
“Again, being the artist that she is, she said what she wanted. So it went back to Mon and he redid it. And then the next thing I knew, I had the music in the music studio,” Gary ended.