My Duelo awards part 2 - I feel like being controversial!

OK, I've put this off for too long, so it's time for me to present my awards for best and worst "Duelo de Pasiones" actresses. I think my choices will be controversial, but here it goes:

BEST ACTRESS: Believe it or not, I'm going to give this award to Ludwika Paleta for her performance in the thankless role of Alina Montellano (or, as I liked to call her, Duhlina). This may seem like a strange choice since all Alina ever did was cry, act stupid, and moon over Emilio (in itself a stupid act), but I think it takes a good actress to pull off such a lame character without making me hate her, and Ludwika Paleta did that.

Now, if you watched this show, you're probably wondering why I didn't choose Ana Martin (as Luba) for best actress. Well, if it's any consolation to her, she gets my next award:

RUNNER-UP FOR BEST ACTRESS. Ana Martin was very good in the role of Luba. Despite her histrionics, she managed to make Luba a sympathetic character, even loveable. Her scenes with Gaspar were funny and touching and sometimes even scary.

If the show had ended a few months earlier, Ana Martin would have gotten my Best Actress award. But as the show dragged on and on, Luba's over-the-top screeching began to wear on me. I suspected that the actress knew she was trapped in a terrible show and was trying heroically to save it by giving an Oscar-worthy performance every single night.

But poor Gaspar, how exhausting to live with a mother like Luba. Can you imagine her asking him to pass the salt at the dinner table (assuming they had salt or a dinner table in their cave)? "GASPAR! PASS! THE!! SALT!!!!!!!!" screech screech stomp stomp etc. Except that would have been screeched and stomped in Spanish.

My point is that a little Luba went a long way, and six or nine months of her was, for me, too much. But she did a lot to breathe life into this ridiculous show, and I'm grateful for that.

Now it's time for another controversial choice: my pick for WORST ACTRESS... Erika Buenfil as Soledad.

Granted, like most of the actors on this show, she had a thankless role. Soledad was a well-dressed zombie who spent years sitting around in her prison-room all dolled up (how many bracelets does an imprisoned woman really need??) praying lethargically but doing nothing practical to help herself or her daughter, unless you count falling off the balcony in her half-baked escape attempt.

Soledad only came alive when she was squabbling with Alvaro, and even then she seemed half-hearted. As for her "romance" with Elias -- you could practically see her cringing away from him. Not very romantic.

I'm not blaming the actress for Soledad's behavior, but Soledad and Alina were in the same brain-dead boat, and I simply found Alina more likeable and believable than Soledad. I think a better actress could have done more with this character by at least making me understand Soledad. Instead I felt bored and exasperated by her.

RUNNER-UP FOR WORST ACTRESS: Ximena Herrera as Rosita. When she wasn't looking worried, she looked like she was planning to be worried again very soon. She was such a tepid character that I found it hard to believe Maximo would get so worked up over her. Even the death of her best friend Alina didn't seem to wake Rosita from her self-absorbed, bland-faced, mildly worried trance.

To me, Rosita was a big yawn, and when she and Santos disappeared from the storyline I didn't miss them one bit. The only reason she doesn't get Worst Actress is that Rosita was not as important a character as Soledad.

In my opinion, all the actresses on this show were OK, including the ladies who played Soledad and Rosita. They did the best they could with dismal material. Unfortunately, for me, their best wasn't good enough, because the material was just that bad.

I'll have a few more comments on this show in my next blog post(s). It may be a week or two before I write it up, but I'm not done trashing Duelo yet!