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Yahoo
17 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
In 'Freakier Friday,' Manny Jacinto plays Lindsay Lohan's love interest. Why his leading man status is a big deal.
Jacinto hive, rejoice: Our boy's a romantic lead. At this point, it's an undeniable fact: Manny Jacinto is in his leading man era. It's been a whirlwind few years for Jacinto, who is currently on the press tour for Freakier Friday, the Freaky Friday sequel out Aug. 8. A follow-up to its 2003 predecessor, Freakier Friday sees Lindsay Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis reprise their roles as body-swapping mother-daughter duo Anna and Tess Coleman, who find themselves in familiar territory two decades later, only this time, Anna's daughter and stepdaughter-to-be are thrown into the mix. Jacinto plays Eric Davies, Anna's husband-to-be, who's completely unaware that his fiancée has swapped places with his stepdaughter-to-be, and that his daughter has traded places with his soon-to-be mother-in-law. The 37-year-old actor is aware of how big this opportunity is. 'It's wild that I get to do this. I never would have thought I'd play the love interest to Lindsay Lohan; I watched Lindsay Lohan as a kid,' he told InStyle in an interview published Tuesday morning. 'It's wild what you can do if you put your mind to it.' More than starring opposite Lohan, Jacinto was mostly drawn to the role because of its significance to the Asian American community. It's not often we see a man who looks like Jacinto in such a mainstream role — and he knows that. 'I mean, you don't get to see a lot of Asian American males as a love interest, or as a solid father figure, and that was definitely the part that enticed me about it,' Jacinto told Deadline last week. With Freakier Friday, Jacinto fully seizes his leading man potential. For fans who have been following him since The Good Place, his rise to fame — and newly minted heartthrob status — is a point of pride. 'Without giving the algebra of representation too much credit, there's something pleasurable about seeing an Asian man romancing anyone and getting a break from the more familiar interracial combo of white man/AAPI woman,' Veronica Fitzpatrick, a Filipino American adjunct assistant professor of modern culture and media at Brown University, told Yahoo. 'That we're seeing it in a mainstream film like Freakier Friday … helps further normalize the very normal, very not-novel idea that AAPI men have sex appeal and romantic currency.' Raised in Vancouver, British Columbia, the Filipino Canadian actor nabbed his breakthrough role on NBC's The Good Place, where he charmed audiences as the often aloof but well-intentioned Floridian Jason Mendoza. From there, Jacinto landed a starring role on the Nicole Kidman-led series Nine Perfect Strangers before appearing in her ex-husband's blockbuster hit Top Gun: Maverick a year later, despite all his lines famously being cut. Jacinto's rise to the top has been slow and steady, though his portrayal of brooding Sith Lord the Stranger on Disney+'s The Acolyte triggered a shift in how Hollywood perceives him: as an Asian male worthy of a lead role. Jacinto has even received the TikTok treatment: He was the subject of several shirtless, lustful edits on the app that had loyal Acolyte fans rethinking their allegiances. 'The Stranger flips classic gender tropes of hypersexualization,' Leslye Headland, The Acolyte's creator and showrunner, previously told GQ. 'But a true sex symbol is someone who resonates emotionally with fans. Manny's magnetism is rooted in his acting, not just his physique. His ability to access vulnerability, empathy and longing is very compelling.' Women, it seems, have played a crucial part in Jacinto's continued success and rise to stardom. His female fans are plentiful, but Jacinto is especially moved by the championing that women behind the scenes are doing for him. Without them, he told InStyle, his career wouldn't have gone in the direction that it has. 'Women have been a huge champion for me. It's always been women who have been able to look past what I have done and see the potential of what I can do,' he said, naming Kidman, Headland and Freakier Friday's Nisha Ganatra. 'Thank God I get to do this during this day and age when there are so many women at the top … who see my potential and are not afraid to explore that.' Solve the daily Crossword
Gizmodo
20 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Gizmodo
Heaven Sure Feels Like Hell in Afterlife Dramedy ‘Eternity'
Quirky depictions of the afterlife have been well-explored by movies and TV; think Albert Brooks' film Defending Your Life or Kristen Bell's series The Good Place. But the quandary introduced in Eternity is a particularly prickly one, as a woman who's lived a long life that encompassed two happy marriages crosses over… into a fantastical but weirdly bureaucratic version of purgatory, where she's informed she must pick between her loves to decide her eternal partner. The new trailer for Eternity dropped today, and if that premise makes you want to scream, at least the cast has a lot of appeal: Elizabeth Olsen, Callum Turner, Miles Teller, John Early, and Da'Vine Joy Randolph. Who else muttered 'Oh, she's in the Bad Place' to themselves while watching that? Here's the official plot description, which doesn't really elaborate more on what the trailer shows: 'In an afterlife where souls have one week to decide where to spend eternity, Joan (Elizabeth Olsen) is faced with the impossible choice between the man she spent her life with (Miles Teller) and her first love (Callum Turner), who died young and has waited decades for her to arrive.' It's the afterlife. It's a magical realm. They don't say 'heaven,' but it looks pretty dreamy aside from all that ridiculous romantic drama. Why can't Joan have it both ways? Who made up these rules? ONE WEEK?? Is there any room to negotiate? All will be revealed when Eternity, which was written by David Freyne (The Cured), hits theaters in November. Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what's next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.
Time of India
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- Time of India
Who is Manny Jacinto? Filipino-Canadian star returning home to Manila for Freakier Friday premiere
Lights, camera, Manila! Manny Jacinto brings Hollywood heat to the Philippines with Freakier Friday. The Filipino-Canadian star Manny Jacinto is heading back to his roots - but this time, he's arriving in full blockbuster style. On August 5, the actor will walk the red carpet at the Philippine premiere of Freakier Friday, the highly anticipated sequel to the 2003 hit Freaky Friday. Set to take place at the Main Atrium of SM Mall of Asia in Pasay City, the event will see Jacinto making a special appearance that's sure to draw crowds and cameras alike. And for lucky fans? There's a chance to witness the spectacle in person - with details on how to attend expected to drop soon. But who exactly is Manny Jacinto? Born in Manila and raised in Canada, Jacinto rose to fame playing the lovable and clueless Jason Mendoza in the hit series The Good Place. He later took on more dramatic roles as Yao in Nine Perfect Strangers and Qimir in The Acolyte, further proving his range. His growing Hollywood résumé also includes Top Gun: Maverick, where he played pilot Fritz, and the English dub of Netflix's Trese, voicing Maliksi. Manny Jacinto role in Freakier Friday In Freakier Friday, Jacinto plays Eric, the fiancé of Anna Coleman (Lindsay Lohan), one of the film's central characters. The sequel brings back both Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis as the iconic mother-daughter duo, Tess and Anna Coleman, who once famously swapped bodies after a mysterious fortune cookie incident. Set years after the original, the new film explores yet another chaotic body-swap - this time involving four women: Anna, her daughter Harper (Julia Butters), her soon-to-be stepdaughter Lily (Sophia Hammons), and Tess. Directed by Nisha Ganatra, Freakier Friday also features returning cast members Chad Michael Murray (Jake) and Ryan Malgarini (Harry), along with new faces like Never Have I Ever star Maitreyi Ramakrishnan and The Parent Trap's Elaine Hendrix. With a fanbase growing across the globe and now a major Disney role under his belt, Jacinto's Manila visit is a full-circle moment - and Filipino fans will be watching.
Boston Globe
22-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Boston Globe
A journey into hell with Williams's ‘Not About Nightingales'
The mystery of its meaning is not cleared up till late in the play. Let's just say you won't soon forget the moment when the purgatory of prison turns into hell. (Diggle, the scenic designer, does amazing work in that scene.) Advertisement O'Hara helmed the 2019 Broadway production of 'Slave Play,' by Jeremy O. Harris, who is currently Williamstown's creative director. O'Hara is also a playwright of note. His With its intermittent flights into melodrama, its homoerotic subtext, and its lyricism, 'Nightingales' is recognizably a Tennessee Williams play. (With Williams, even the script's stage directions possess a certain lyricism.) It is also recognizably a Tennessee Williams play in the concision and vividness of its character portraits. O'Hara keeps the story grounded, even gritty, with an intensity of focus that largely prevents any drift — an ever-present danger in a drama that features 16 characters. Advertisement Written in 1938 and inspired by a hunger strike by 650 inmates at a penitentiary in Holmesberg, Pa., 'Nightingales' was Williams's fourth full-length play. He considered 'Nightingales' the best play he had written up to that point in his career. He also thought it was one of the most wrenching. In a foreword to the publication of his 1957 'Orpheus Descending,' Williams wrote of 'Nightingales' that 'I have never written anything since then that could compete with it in violence and horror.' The Williamstown cast includes William Jackson Harper — who played the fretful ethicist Chidi Anagonye on NBC's 'The Good Place' — as a prisoner who was brutally treated by the prison's warden and now works for him. Jim is slowly drawn into a romance with Eva (Elizabeth Lail), the warden's new secretary. A haunting figure is Jack (Ben Getz), an inmate whose experiences in prison have led to the disintegration of his mind. Brian Geraghty is the Stanley Kowalski-like convict Butch, all alpha-male aggression and dominance. It is Butch who leads the hunger strike as a form of protest against the nearly inedible food they are served each day. Chris Messina is the creepy Warden Whelan, abusing power in every way he can, the most detestable warden since Bob Gunton's Warden Norton in 'The Shawshank Redemption.' Williams was only 27 when he wrote 'Nightingales,' finishing it in 1938 — two years before his 'Battle of Angels' became his first professionally produced play in a calamitous train-wreck of a production at Boston's Wilbur Theatre. Advertisement His emphasis in 'Nightingales' on social injustice and the politics undergirding that injustice is notable. He dedicated the play to the memory of Clarence Darrow, whom he called 'The Great Defender, whose mental frontiers were the four corners of the sky.' The play languished in obscurity until Vanessa Redgrave became its champion. It was presented in 1998 as a coproduction by the National Theater of London and the Alley Theater of Houston. The next year, 'Nightingales' moved to Broadway, where it had a short run but garnered half a dozen Tony Award nominations. 'Nightingales' was reportedly the first full-length play where Thomas Lanier Williams signed a script as 'Tennessee Williams.' Many impressive accomplishments would eventually be attached to that name, and 'Not About Nightingales' should be counted among them. NOT ABOUT NIGHTINGALES Play by Tennessee Williams. Directed by Robert O'Hara. Presented by Williamstown Theatre Festival. On the NikosStage, Williamstown. Through Aug. 3. Tickets $20-$100. 413-458-3253, Don Aucoin can be reached at
Time of India
17-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Time of India
From Manny Jacinto to Tom Rodriguez: Filipino actors redefining charm, talent, and star power
While Korean and Thai actors have been gaining prominence over the globe, there are also many talented stars from the Philippines. From powerful performances to unforgettable charm, these actors, singers, and media personalities have become icons in their own right. Here are some of the most charming and talented Filipino male stars who continue to steal the spotlight. Manny Jacinto The Filipino-Canadian actor, born August 19, 1987, first captured widespread attention with his breakout performance as Jason Mendoza in the critically acclaimed NBC comedy The Good Place (2016–2020). Before that, he built his career through small television roles that steadily showcased his range and charisma. His success on the small screen led to appearances in major films, including Bad Times at the El Royale (2018) and Top Gun: Maverick (2022). In 2024, Jacinto stepped into the Star Wars universe as the mysterious Stranger, also known as Qimir and in the Disney+ series The Acolyte, earning praise for his darker, more complex portrayal. Beyond live-action, Jacinto brought his voice talents to animation, playing Scott Denoga in Disney Channel's Hailey's On It! (2023–2024). Dennis Trillo Born on May 12, 1981, he is a multi-awarded Filipino actor known for his bold and versatile roles. He gained widespread recognition for playing Eric del Mundo in My Husband's Lover, the first gay-themed primetime series on Philippine TV. His critically acclaimed performances include Simoun in Maria Clara at Ibarra and Colonel Yuta Saitoh in Pulang Araw, both aired on GMA and streamed on Netflix. Trillo's breakout came in 2004 with Aishite Imasu 1941: Mahal Kita, earning him his first acting award. With over two decades at GMA Network, he's earned the title of "Drama King," proving his staying power in both drama and romance. Coco Martin Born Rodel Pacheco Nacianceno Jr. on November 1, 1981, he began his career in independent cinema before breaking into mainstream television - bringing an intensity and realism that set him apart. Known for his versatility, he has built a powerhouse career as an actor, director, producer, and screenwriter. From gritty action to emotional romantic dramas, his work has earned both critical and popular acclaim. His impressive list of accolades includes two FAMAS Awards, two Gawad Urian Awards, ten PMPC Star Awards for Television, eight Box Office Entertainment Awards, and recognition from the ASEAN International Film Festival. He is also among the highest-grossing Filipino stars of all time and his cultural impact extends far beyond the screen. Inigo Dominic Pascual He has proven he's more than just the son of Piolo Pascual. Born on September 14, 1997, he has steadily built a name of his own as a singer, songwriter, and actor in both local and international scenes. His breakthrough came in 2016 with the hit single Dahil Sa'yo - the first song to top Billboard Philippines' Top 20 chart and winner of "Song of the Year" at the Awit Awards. The track marked the start of his ascent as one of OPM's modern voices. On screen, Iñigo has taken on diverse roles in films like Relaks, It's Just Pag-ibig, Crazy Beautiful You, and For the Hopeless Romantic. In 2020, he starred in the coming-of-age film Boyette: Not a Girl Yet, and in 2022, expanded to Hollywood through the Fox musical drama series Monarch, showcasing his talent to a global audience. Tom Rodriguez Born Bartolome Alberto Mott on October 1, 1987, stepped into the spotlight after joining Pinoy Big Brother: Double Up. What began as a reality TV debut quickly turned into a full-fledged acting career. Over the years, he has taken on a wide range of roles - from romantic leads to complex characters. Some of his most notable performances include My Husband's Lover, where he portrayed one half of a groundbreaking same-sex love story, as well as key roles in Mulawin vs Ravena, Someone to Watch Over Me, and I Heart Davao. He also appeared in the hit comedy film Here Comes the Bride. As of 2025, he remains an exclusive talent under GMA Network and GMA Pictures, continuing to thrive as one of the network's most recognizable stars. Billy Crawford The Filipino actor and singer, born May 16, 1982, is known for his early success as a child performer on That's Entertainment and in films like Lost Command and Sandakot Na Bala. At 12, he moved to the U.S. to study performing arts and soon performed as a backup dancer for Michael Jackson at the 1995 MTV VMAs. Crawford has since earned accolades including a FAMAS Award, an NRJ Music Award, and the Ani ng Dangal Award from the NCCA, marking him as a standout talent in both local and international entertainment. Paulo Avelino The Filipino actor, singer, model, and film producer, born on May 13, 1988, rose to prominence through hit television dramas such as Walang Hanggan (2012), Bridges of Love (2015), and The General's Daughter (2019). On the big screen, Avelino is best known for portraying General Gregorio del Pilar in the acclaimed historical films Heneral Luna (2015) and its sequel Goyo: Ang Batang Heneral (2018), where he played the title role. His film credits also include the horror-thriller Pagpag: Siyam na Buhay, further showcasing his versatility as an actor. Joshua Garcia Born October 7, 1997, the actor first caught public attention as a contestant on Pinoy Big Brother: All In in 2015. Since then, he has steadily built a name for himself as a talented actor, dancer, and commercial model. He rose to fame with his breakout role in the 2016 MMFF box-office hit Vince and Kath and James, followed by his standout performance in the primetime drama The Good Son. Known for his emotional range, Garcia has become a staple in teleseryes like The Greatest Love, Ngayon at Kailanman, The Killer Bride, and Unbreak My Heart. On the big screen, he has taken on a variety of roles in films such as Love You to the Stars and Back (2017), I Love You, Hater (2018), the thriller Ang Mga Kaibigan Ni Mama Susan (2023), and the romantic drama Un/Happy For You (2024), showcasing his growth as one of his generation's most promising leading men. To stay updated on the stories that are going viral follow Indiatimes Trending.
