Raelene Elaine Ebaler Villanía (born June 29, 1986 in Australia), better known with her nickname as Iya Villania, is a Filipina-Australian actress, host, singer and model. Mostly credited for being one of Philippines television's most visible and prominent personalities, she shares hosting roles for notable TV shows like ASAP '08, Us Girls and as a VJ for MYX music channel.Villania’s first TV appearance was via IBC-13’s Game Channel, an interactive texting game show. While hosting for the show, she was offered to join the cast of GMA 7’s youth-oriented hit program “Click” as Syd. As Game Channel grew in popularity, it was later transferred to ABC-5 and given a new format as “Game Channel Extreme”. GMA 7, afterward, included her in its afternoon drama project “Walang Hanggan” along with Oyo Boy Sotto and Valerie Concepcion. In 2004, she transferred to GMA 7’s rival network, ABS-CBN, to accept a VJ job offered by its music channel subsidiary, MYX, and an acting role for another youth-oriented show, “Seasons of Love”. In 2005, she was chosen to co-host the daily noontime show, Wowowee, and the variety show, ASAP Mania. In 2006, Iya Villania had to give up her hosting job for Wowowee to accommodate her two new ventures; a lifestyle show, Us Girls, for Studio 23 and a reality-dance show, U Can Dance. In 2007, she again hosted for the season 2 of U Can Dance and was paired with Vhong Navarro in the fantaserye Lastikman. In between, Villania was given numerous TV guestings for shows like Komiks, Love Spell and Your Song. She was also given the opportunity to play in Deal or No Deal and Wheel of Fortune. Currently, she is still with ASAP Mania, US Girls and a VJ for Myx. Presently is one of the host of Palmolive Shining Circle of 10 still on ABS-CBN and Mysmatch a reality dating game show on the new TV5 (Formerly ABC5).
Iya Villania was signed up by Regal Films’ owner, Lily Monteverde, to be one of the front liners for the latest batch of Regal actors. Her debut movie, “A Beautiful Life,” released in 2004, was directed by multi-award winning director, Gil Portes; where she starred opposite stellar actresses: Dina Bonnevie, Amy Austria and Gloria Romero. In the same year, she was nominated for best supporting actress in the 2004 Metro Manila Film Festival for the war drama movie “Aishite Imasu 1941” under award winning director, Joel Lamangan. In 2005, she played an all-powerful nature fairy for Imus Productions’ “Exodus: Tales of the Enchanted Kingdom” opposite Sen. Ramon ‘Bong’ Revilla Jr. In the summer of 2006, Iya Villania acted her first horror-flick with Dennis Trillo and Marian Rivera for the movie “Pamahiin”. The following year, she played a cameo role as the wife of Piolo Pascual in the romantic movie “Paano Kita Iibigin.”