2005 Asian Television Awards

Through the years, Eat, Bulaga! has collected a total of 14 trophies for Best Variety Show from the two local award-giving bodies for television (the Philippine Movie Press Club and the Entertainment Press Society) – plus about a dozen more honors for Best Variety Show Hosts for Joey de Leon, Vic Sotto and recently, Pia Guanio. 

At the center of its crown of laurels, however, is the daily noontime show’s most treasured recognition – a precious nod from the very prestigious Asian Television Awards, which, only two weeks ago enthroned the program’s 25th anniversary celebration as the Best Entertainment Special of the year. 


Billed as Eat, Bulaga! Silver Special, the grand extravaganza held at the Clark Expo in Pampanga and aired over GMA 7 last month was staged by its production company, TAPE Inc., primarily to mark the show’s 25th year, but not necessarily to field as an entry in any awards competition either here or abroad.

Middle of this year, however, GMA 7 management, a consistent winner of local and international awards, encouraged the independent production TAPE Inc. to submit Eat, Bulaga!’s 25th anniversary show in one of the Asian Television Awards’ entertainment categories. 


GMA 7 brought home several trophies in the past from the Asian Television Awards and was hoping to win some more this year. (The network eventually snagged about half a dozen awards, including Terrestrial Channel of the Year, which is the top plum.) Maybe TAPE would want to do the same and enter the Eat, Bulaga! Silver Special in this international awards competition? 


TAPE Inc. followed the network’s suggestion and sent a DVD PAL copy to the Asian Television Awards on the last day of submission, July 29, 2005. While hoping to win in its category, the TAPE people didn’t exactly set their expectations too high because they knew the Asian Television Awards – now on its 10th year – had always been a tough contest among the very best in this continent. This year alone, there were more than 1,400 entries from the different TV stations all over Asia. Participating nations included Japan, China, Hong Kong, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Pakistan, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam and, of course, the Philippines. 


Tasked to trim down the entries and select the final winners via secret balloting was a panel of judges – actually TV industry professionals numbering 57 in all – from various Asian nations. From the Philippines, there were only two jurors: Evelyn Raymundo, ABS-CBN vice president for Programs Acquisition and Ma. Regina A. Magno, program manager of GMA 7. 

Hopes were raised for the TAPE people in September when they got word that the number of entries had already been trimmed down and that the Eat, Bulaga! Silver Special had entered what the awards organization calls the Short List. (One of the Philippine entries from the long list that was eventually dropped was a Ryan Cayabyab musical aired over ABS-CBN.) 


A month later, it became official: Eat, Bulaga! Silver Special was named finalist in its category and along with the announcement came an invitation for TAPE officials and Eat, Bulaga! stars to attend the 10th Asian Television Awards in Singapore last Dec. 1. 


TAPE Inc. organized a delegation of 30 people – probably the biggest after the host country – who were flown to Singapore in different batches last week of November. 


Upon reaching their foreign destination, anxiety attacks brought about by the Asian Television Awards competition were temporarily set aside as emotions were lost in the frenzy of Singaporean shopping. The contest at that point was focused on who got the best bargain. 


The Eat, Bulaga! cast and crew were actually entitled to that moment of fun because that trip to Singapore was also a treat from Mr. Tony Tuviera, TAPE president and CEO, who wanted to reward everyone with a few days of rest and relaxation abroad after working so hard to maintain the show’s position in the No. 1 slot. 


In time, however, reality set in and everyone was on pins and needles once again – unsure of their fate in that award race. 


Oh, it was emotional purgatory for the people of Eat, Bulaga! A part of them tells them they were going to win because why would the organizers bother to invite them and make them travel that distance if they will only go home empty-handed? 


At the same time, the triumvirate of Tito, Vic and Joey were also given a much-coveted spot as presenters in the awards presentation. Maybe that was going to be their consolation for having made the effort to come to Singapore. Filipinos have a Tagalog term for it:Pampalubag-loob. 


They would have been more confident about winning had it not been for another nominee in their category: The 2005 MTV Asia Aid. How in heaven’s name could they win over a show chronicling and even raising funds for the global disaster that was the great tsunami last year? But they went to the awards show in high spirits anyway and hoped for the best. 


On the day of the Asian TV Awards, the organizers dispatched a car to ferry Tito, Vic and Joey to the show venue – The National Cultural Center Hall of the National University of Singapore. The rest took an air-conditioned bus TAPE hired for the occasion. 


At 6:15 p.m., cocktails were served and by 7:30, the show was already rolling. One of the hosts was Jay-R and among the performers was Rachelle Ann Go. 


Thirty-three awards were to be presented that evening and the winner in the category for Best Entertainment Special was going to be announced in the middle of the program. 


When the moment finally came, the presenter – a comedian from Singapore who was assigned to read the result prolonged the agony of the Eat, Bulaga! delegation even further by going on and on with his spiels. Tension was building up. And then, the moment of truth: The Best Entertainment Special – Eat, Bulaga! Silver Special, TAPE Inc. for GMA Network, Channel 7, Philippines. 


The Eat, Bulaga! gang went wild. Tito, Vic and Joey, Mr. Tony Tuviera and Ms. Malou Choa-Fagar, TAPE senior vice president, all went on stage to accept the trophy. Everyone got the chance to acknowledge the award, but it was Mr. Tuviera’s speech that thanked everyone "for sharing your lunch and noontime viewing with us for the past 25 years" which got the most thunderous applause. 


After the show, the Eat, Bulaga! delegation skipped the official post-awards dinner given by the organizers because Mr. Tuviera had earlier reserved a function room at the Meritus Mandarin Hotel (where they were billeted) for their private celebration – win or lose. 


Everyone flew back to Manila the following day feeling victorious. Their award – a handsome trophy of glass and metal – now sits proudly at the TAPE office in Xavierville Avenue, Quezon City. It is a beautiful work of art. But more than that, it has come to symbolize what Eat, Bulaga! has achieved through the years. 

What was once dismissed as just some mindless and senseless noontime program is now one of Asia’s best.

Eat, Bulaga! silver special

It was the greatest show on earth — at least, on this side of the world.

Held at the expansive Clark Centennial Expo in Angeles City, Pampanga province on Nov. 18, 2004, the Eat Bulaga! Silver Special was the result of a whole year’s planning and conceptualization, three months of preparation and several weeks of rehearsals involving the biggest cast (by the thousands) ever assembled on Philippine television.

The show’s opening segment alone could rival some of the best production numbers of the annual Academy Awards in Hollywood. It began with 2,000 costumed school children from different public educational institutions singing in unison the Eat Bulaga! theme song — segueing to Tito, Vic & Joey aboard a mock space capsule that brought them on a time travel back to 1979 — the year the show was launched.

Then came a flashback of the various events that coincided with the birth of the program: From global news like Margaret Thatcher’s installation as Britain’s first woman Prime Minister and Saddam Hussein getting elected as Iraqi president, sports triumphs like Bong Coo’s being a bowling world champion, trends in music (John Travolta and Donna Summer’s disco hits) to trivialities — Melanie Marquez getting crowned Miss International.

After that rundown of recent history, the space capsule flew across the audience area, landed on stage and out popped Tito, Vic & Joey who were visibly overwhelmed by the size of the crowd (estimated at more than 60,000) who showed up at the Clark Expo that day to celebrate with them Eat Bulaga!’s 25th year on television.

The succeeding segments proved to be an emotional walk down memory lane as the show paid tribute to the men and women who lent face to this noontime treat through those 25 years: From Tito, Vic & Joey to all the former co-hosts who contributed their time and talent to the program and even those were not necessarily regular emcees then, but helped out pinch-hit for other Eat Bulaga! family members, among them, Helen Gamboa and Lani Mercado.

Most touching was the in memoriam portion in honor of two ladies who had moved on to a more fun place than the stage of Eat Bulaga!: Rio Diaz, an official Eat, Bulaga! host for half a decade, and Helen Vela, who was the eternal pinch-hitter for a period almost close to 10 years.

Helen’s stint with Eat Bulaga! began when she cheered on as part of the audience that day good friend Coney Reyes was launched as the new female co-host in May 1982. Also once part of Student Canteen, where she quit her former show under not very pleasant circumstances, she was later given an Eat Bulaga! satellite program, the Kilometrico Quiz, that she co-hosted with Tito Sotto. But Helen always made herself available to take over hosting chores from any Eat, Bulaga! member who was ill, abroad or tied up with other showbiz commitments.

With Aiza Seguerra and Pops Fernandez singing The Warrior is a Child, the tribute to Rio and Helen turned out to be more emotional than lachrymal. The concept and execution hit the right formula because the segment, which could have been morbid, blended harmoniously with the rest of the show that overflowed with so much joy and energy comparable to excitement everyone displayed when we welcomed the new millennium.

The other showstoppers were mostly the numbers that traced all the dance hits that became part of the daily contests in Eat Bulaga! in the past: The Village People’s Macho Man, Lambada, Thriller and other dance crazes that were made popular to the viewing public via this noontime program.

Later in the special, Jopay Paguia and the Sexbomb Dancers whipped up a storm of a performance when they were joined — via VTR — by the now-New York-based Gracia in a terpsichorean showdown that went back to the days when the dance hit was Manila Girl and went all the way to the then still sizzling hot Spaghetti.

An interesting trivia was the Arnold Clavio segment (with puppet Arn-Arn), wherein the award-winning broadcaster revealed that in 1983, he joined along with his gang an Eat Bulaga! competition where he was a drummer in their Beatles-inspired entry. They lost in that one. Undeterred by their defeat, Arnold returned to audition for the Footloose dance contest, but was booted out as early as the audition round.

The special actually tried to feature everyone who had been part of the program up to that time either via clips or numbers and in the process we were reminded of the celebrities who once graced the show — from major local celebrities like Sharon Cuneta and Maricel Soriano to big foreign artists the likes of John Denver, Brian McKnight, Michael Bublé and the Menudo.

And then there was a throwback to the different periods when Eat Bulaga! became the launching pad for some of today’s young talents who joined the show’s various contests — from Little Miss Philippines to Mr. Pogi that gave us Jericho Rosales.

Eat Bulaga! Silver Special also showed another facet of Tito, Vic & Joey not generally known to the public — as composers and lyricists of Original Pilipino Music (Balat-kayo, Swing, Ipagpatawad Mo, etc.).

The biggest tribute, however, was given to the King of Comedy, Dolphy, who joined Tito, Vic & Joey in a medley of foreign classics that led to the comic geniuses doing on-air banter.

At the finale, the special ended literally with a bang as a series of fireworks enveloped the skies above the venue site. It was one moment that could choke with tears and emotions even those watching at home — as cast, crew and those in the live audience celebrated that important occasion that marked this favorite noontime fare’s turning silver.

Eat Bulaga! 33 Years

A FIRST IN PHILIPPINE TV HISTORY...

FIRST INTERNATIONAL FRANCHISE OF A 

FILIPINO TV SHOW...

EAT BULAGA INDONESIA!

Ang isang libo't isang tuwa na hatid ng Pinoy Henyo, Juan for All, All for Juan, Pambato ng Videoke, Bulagaan at marami pang ibang original 100% EAT BULAGA-made TV segments ay natitikman na ng milyon-milyong manonood ng SCTV, ang number one TV network sa INDONESIA!

Alay namin ang tagumpay na ito sa lahat ng Filipino, mula Batanes hanggang Jolo!

Isang libo't isang tuwa... Eat Bulaga!