She’s dealt with superstardom, heartbreak, single motherhood, and bad habits. Now, Sharon is a student again-and welcomes the challenge with characteristic openness By Ramil Gulle

MEGASTAR and celebrity endorser Sharon Cuneta is the last person in the world you’d expect to admit to having been a chain-smoker. But there she was, sitting for this interview, face scrunching up in pain as the hair extensions were being pulled out, recalling the days early in her career, when she reduced to ash a seemingly endless chain of cigarettes and was downing 10-15 cups of brewed coffee a day.

Make no mistake: her hair is fine, fabulous the way it is, but it seems that some length in the locks was called for during this day’s shoot.

I missed a chance to join a group interview with the Megastar many years ago for a newspaper. It was a blessing, in retrospect, because this time I could experience the Megastar presence alone, and realize the refreshing truth behind the gloss and glamour of the three decades of celebrity surrounding her.

Sharon Cuneta is, indeed, a beautiful woman. The troop of makeup and hair artists engaged in quiet yet serious work in preparation for the shoot only needed to polish up the gem that was already there. And if the beauty outside is simply the aura of a person’s inner loveliness, then Sharon proves that theory, as well. At 41, after her own admissions regarding her ongoing struggles with her weight, her smoking, her failed marriage, her travails as a single mom and working mother, Sharon Cuneta is, simply, a sweet gal.

When she was younger and still new in the business, Sharon was puzzled by how many people reacted with hostility to her sweet disposition. “I was shocked at how some people were convinced it was all just an act. It was then that I decided that I should not change who I am simply because other people had a hard time believing it.”

And that characteristic sweetness simply radiates from her. It’s in the sing-song intonation of her voice, the smile that breaks out when she sees a friend, her laughter when she cracks a joke, the way she touches the person she’s talking to. She loves to connect with other people, and when Sharon talks, you can’t help but notice her. She likes to share - her memories, her passions, her pain, and her insights.

If her sweetness is a put-on, then Sharon deserves another grand slam of acting awards for it, having displayed unflagging sweetness during the entire shoot and this interview, which lasted all of six hours.

“I’m sweet and nice but I’m not an idiot,” she qualifies. “I can be very bitchy if the situation calls for it!”

It’s in this vein that she shares her “secret” chain-smoking, which she only reined in four years ago. But you can see what a struggle it was for her from the pained expression on her face, as if even thinking about smoking brought that specter of a habit back. “That’s why when a script was given to me and I saw that my character was a smoker, and would have to smoke onscreen, I couldn’t help but ask the director if it was necessary. I told her it was so difficult for me to give it up, and I didn’t want to risk anything by smoking again, even for a movie.”

The director (apparently not a smoker) asked her, “Really? Hindi ba pwedeng manigarilyo ka, tapos pag-uwi mo kalimutan mo na?” “I said, ‘No. It doesn’t work that way,” says Sharon.

She hid that habit from the public, for fear of setting a bad example. “But you know, I got into the business at a young age. I was 12 years old, and smoking and all those cups of coffee were my way of coping with the stress, the tension, the times when I was working for days without sleeping. It’s only now that I’ve become open because attitudes have changed, and people now know how bad it is for your health.”

Sharon also talked about her failed marriage to actor Gabby Concepcion, keeping things off the record. I was struck by the lack of bitterness. Still, one could sense that the end of that marriage forever changed her, and made her into what she is today. That marriage meant the world to her, and when it ended, that world was reduced to rubble, and Sharon had to rise from its ruins, eventually becoming one of the most iconic figures in Philippine cinema and show business.

“Few people know how hard I worked to get to where I am now,” says Sharon, who belies any impression that everything was handed to her on a silver platter. She talks about her experiences as a single mother, having to work long hours, sacrificing sleep and comfort to raise a daughter, and one realizes that in her heart of hearts, she really went through the same difficulties that many single parents do. In other words, her celebrity status didn’t protect her.

“I worked so hard because after my marriage failed, I didn’t want to fail again as a mother. I also didn’t want to have to depend on my father (the late Pasay City mayor Pablo Cuneta). So I had no choice.”
Having gone through the grind as a single parent, Sharon is more than qualified to play the lead role in her next film for Star Cinema. It’s about an English teacher whose husband goes to London for employment. It’s the beginning of their dream to build a better life for their family. They have a son, played by child star Makisig Morales.

After a few years, Sharon’s character follows her husband to London, where she works as a caregiver. Conflicts arise when she discovers that her husband has not exactly followed up on their plans. She is excited about beginning the shoot for the movie, which will be filmed in the Philippines, London, and Prague.

Now that 21-year-old KC, already a celebrity herself, has finished her studies in France, Sharon is thankful that her eldest child turned out so well. “When KC came back from France, she said, ‘Okay mom, I didn’t do drugs, I didn’t do any of the things you were afraid of while I was there.’ And bless her, it’s true.”

“It even made KC more sure of herself and more independent. She was living there for four years and taking care of herself, away from all the ‘yes’ men around her.

“Now that she’s back home, I like how she takes charge of a lot of things. She even checks what’s in the fridge and gets rid of the stuff that’s already expired. And when she got back, she asked if she could stay in the guest room near the pool. She got so used to living on her own that she wanted to still somehow feel that she had her own space,” says Sharon.

Sharon has so much confidence in KC that she’s letting her daughter pursue her own happiness. “She’s thinking of living part of the year in New York and part of the year here, or maybe somewhere else. But I trust her so much that she’s free to do what she sees is best for her.”

Part of the reason that KC turned out so well, Sharon feels, is because she never allowed her daughter to develop negative feelings toward her biological father. “God help me, if I wanted to, I could have done it. But I refused to do it. What happened between me and her dad is between us.”

KC recently spent a vacation with her papa Gabby Concepcion in the United States. “When the two of them met, it was like all those years they spent apart disappeared. It’s like they’d been together all their lives,” Sharon marvels. “And one of the best things was, her father called me up afterwards and said ‘Thank you.’ That was the only thing he said, but it said everything.”

As a child, Sharon recalls how she liked to lock herself in her room and read. Her appetite for learning new things, interrupted only by her early marriage (she was only 18 years old when she married Gabby), has been given new strength and expression after she was accepted in the University of the Philippines’ (UP) Open University Program.

Sharon, who is now taking up a two year Associate in Arts Degree (and plans to eventually earn a full Bachelor’s Degree), is on an academic high. “You know what, for the longest time I dreaded taking a University entrance exam. And when I took the exam for this school, I placed second! Thank God there wasn’t a lot of Math!”

A lot of people have expressed admiration for Sharon’s decision to go back to school. Her commercial for Havitall highlights how Sharon now “has it all” with her goal to get a college education. Others also say it is remarkable that Sharon has lasted in the business for three decades, with no signs of losing her luster. Is it reinvention? Or simply savvy career strategy? Somehow, one suspects that reinvention is not possible if the original material lacks quality and endurance.

Sharon shows us that reinvention is no mere career move, but part of the self’s constant need for growth and expression, and its participation in the fullness of life.