Too many talent tilts on TV

MONTANO. Cohosts TV5’s “Artista Academy.”

All of a sudden, all three of local TV’s major networks are currently holding big-deal searches for new talents, the so-called Stars of Tomorrow they need to excite viewers.

The result is a glut of eagerly smiling—and singing—faces, all hoping to win jurors’ and viewer-voters’ nod, so they can stand out from the madding crowd and win the huge prizes being dangled in front of them.

First to come up with its 12 finalists is “X Factor Philippines,” specifically a search for singers and singing groups. We’ve already reacted adversely to its seeming preference for “unique, idiosyncratic appeal” over sheer singing excellence.

Premature exit

Last Sunday, however, another negative aspect to the show reared its pointy head, when the tilt’s viewer-voters gave the least number of votes to two of the tilt’s better female bets, resulting in the premature exit of Jerrianne Templo. Yes, the two chanteuses’ songs weren’t viewer- or listener-“friendly,” but they weren’t the worst performers in the lineup. —So, their poor showing suggests  that the tilt’s viewer-voters can’t be relied on to spot the best contenders—and that’s a real problem. (That’s why we no longer get “invested” in talent tilts whose outcome is decided by viewers’ votes.)

For its part, “Protege’s” focus is on young, goodlooking and talented tyros that GMA 7 can build up into tomorrow’s teen faves. It has a “regional” orientation, with four finalists coming from each geographical aggrupation.

The finalists look pretty or handsome enough, but our initial impression is that nobody in particular is a real standout in the looks and charisma departments. As for their talents, that’s even harder to vet right away, so we’ll have to bide our time before making any solid conclusions in that regard.

Finally, TV5’s “Artista Academy,”cohosted by Cesar Montano and Marvin Agustin, has just come up with its eight male and eight female best bets, and our first take on them is that the majority of them conform to the tisoy and tisay template for local show biz starlets.

A few  appear to be better looking than most of the youths on the other talent tilts, but “AA’s” preference for mestizos is too conformist a tack to take, and doesn’t encourage us to hope that its search will result in something truly fresh and new.

Then, there’s the additional factor of the three tilt’s jurors and mentors: Some of them are outstanding performers in their own right, so they could really help their young and still clueless discoveries eventually get their acts together.

However, there are other mentors or jurors who aren’t known for significant achievement, or are even notorious for “over the top” portrayals, so we worry about the “tips” for “outstanding” performance that they could be imparting to their clueless and hapless wards!

Well, it’s still early days for all three talent searches, so we should give them time to get their respective grooves going before comparing the quality of the talents they are discovering and developing to become tomorrow’s TV-film recording faves.

What will ultimately win the prize—exceptional talent, novelty, looks—or, in a perfect universe, all three combined?