INDIE MOVIES and TV drama series are being produced in such numbers these days that the industry is running out of talents who haven?t gotten overexposed on the big and small screens.

That?s why some talent scouts and casting directors have asked us for suggestions about good but relatively underutilized actors to cast in their productions. Always happy to oblige, some of our suggestions include:

Vivian Velez. She used to be a really popular sexy star and eventually became a good actress in a number of dramatic productions. But, it?s been years since she?s been given a good role in mainstream productions.

However, we?ve been fortunate to catch Vivian?s striking portrayals in a number of productions shot and screened at the Marilou Diaz-Abaya Film Institute in Antipolo, Rizal, and we can share that the now mature Vivian is a true talent just waiting to be rediscovered.

Ditto for Maribel Lopez, who came on with bittersweet grit and grace in the recent Cinemalaya feature, ?Halaw,? where she played a worldy-wise and weary character forever shuttling between the Philippines and neighboring Sabah, Malaysia.

In another Cinemalaya film, ?Vox Populi,? one of the most interesting character portrayals was turned in by Roeder Camañag as a young, hustling and bustling Chinoy businessman. Roeder didn?t at all look like the character, but he transformed himself through sheer dint of thespic insight and savvy.

Even more impressively, Roeder had only a few minutes of screen time, and yet he was able to come up with a crisp, lively and even memorable portrayal.

Spunk and savvy

Back to ?Halaw?: The grittiest performance in that textured drama was the portrayal of the only child actress in the cast of adult performers. She was really young, but she seemed to bear the weight of the world on her tiny shoulders. And yet, she neither expected nor demanded to be pitied, because she knew her spunk and savvy would see her through.

The little actress looked raw and untrained, but it was precisely this lack of art and artifice that made her stand out and hit viewers in the solar plexus with her portrayal of a girl who was always on ?survival? mode. It would be great to see her on the big and small screens again!