A test of endurance

It is the house that reality TV has built. The newest TV reality show in Philippine TV will debut on its spanking new home built in a record-breaking 79 days by a 50-man crew working almost 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The Pinoy Big Brother house sits on a 1,400-sq. m. ground with 26 cameras located in every nook and cranny meant to give viewers an intimate view of the newest domestic drama on air when 12 housemates selected from a pool of 25,000 hopefuls all over the country live together for 100 days without TV, cellphones and newspaper, totally cut off from the outside world. Except that they are being watched by the millions of people on their TV screen.

The Pinoy Big Brother will be launched on Aug. 21. Viewers will witness how 12 housemates – six men and six women – compete with each other through various household chores and tests of skills as ordered by one unseen "Big Brother." The tasks are designed to assess their resiliency, teamwork and leadership capabilities. The housemates have a weekly allowance with which they can buy food and other essentials. However, to get a greater allowance, they may gamble some of their initial amount on a task at hand. If they lose, their allowance is lessened.

The drama is heightened by the elimination process which takes the cue from the housemates themselves who each week will nominate certain people who they wish to see removed from the house. Once the top two or three housemates are chosen from elimination, then the viewers will decide, through text votes or a special hotline, who will stay to continue and still be a part of the game. The eliminations will be aired live. The winner is the last person remaining as voted by the viewers themselves.

The house, which the 12 housemates will call home for 100 days, would be entirely air-conditioned, fully-equipped and with a swimming pool. These are the facts and figures that ABS-CBN executives Linggit Tan and Lauren Dyogi revealed to the select members of the press when asked about the house that is being constructed for the network’s newest reality-based program.

"An old house across the street from ABS-CBN was demolished to give way to this new edifice," says direk Lauren, the director of the show, as he leads the group inside the unfinished residence. "It has all the required technical specification of a studio, including an editing room so there will probably be around 100 crew and staff who will work in this house alone," continues Tan.

"The casting call for the first batch of housemates yielded 25,000 applications nationwide which were carefully and tediously trimmed down to 1,000, then 700 until we were able to come up with 30 housemates," explains Tan. From these 30, 12 housemates will be chosen with eight as back-up. "Just in case one of the housemates decides not to continue or breaks a house rule, then we choose from the eight back-ups."

The process of choosing was done by a panel of judges, that includes direk Lauren. "I spent almost an hour with each of the contestants trying to extricate their stories." And according to the young-looking director, each has a story to tell worth airing in Maalaala Mo Kaya.

But Tan stresses that "they have to ensure the right mix of housemates in order to make the show more interesting." The housemates were made to go through a battery of tests which includes psychological, physical and behavioral challenges. Of course, part of the criteria was that they should have a pleasant and interesting personality. The participants had more chances if they were articulate.

Big Brother is owned by the production company Endemol. It has been successfully running for the past six years in the UK, Brazil, Spain, Germany and the Philippines is the 31st country to host this show and is the second in East Asia with Thailand being the first.

Though the program is aired across the world, the Philippine version would have its distinct Filipino flavor. For instance, according to Tan, "Ours is the only house that will have an altar and will allow the housemates to hear Mass, either through TV or inviting a priest on a Sunday."

"This is something new to the Filipinos because unlike the soaps and canned telenovelas that we air, we are witnessing a real drama before our very eyes," says direk Lauren. And nothing could be as real as the P1 million in cash prize, a house and lot and a car for the lone survivor of this controversial reality game show that will hit your TV screens starting Aug. 21.