Award

There is no such thing as an “awards season” in the Philippines, where major award-giving bodies have annually been quite sporadic in scheduling their events.

It’s not because of fickleness, however, but usually has something to do with costs or funding. Like movie production (which we hear requires about P8 million for a decent output), putting up a glamorous awards event costs money.

This year, the first to roll out has been the Filipino Academy of Movie Arts and Sciences (FAMAS), held last 26 May. The FAMAS is currently the oldest award-giving body in the Philippines, established in 1952 by a group of writers. The first one ever was the defunct Maria Clara Awards, created in 1950 by the old Manila Times.

Regarded among the most prestigious, the FAMAS has, however, over the past years been tinged with controversy, mainly over the fund-raising aspect of the whole venture.

Consider the latest controversy to crop up — the ill-considered, thoroughly embarrassing snub of character actor Eve Darren who, by the way, was a FAMAS awardee at a time, as the outspoken Divina Valencia cheekily put it, “when FAMAS was FAMAS”

For the details of what happened that night and the resulting fallout, do check out our SHOW pages today, where two columnists talk in detail about the entertainment world’s reaction to the brouhaha, and one writer narrates the Darren side of the story along with FAMAS’ public apology.

It’s all there — various viewpoints that mainly crack down (or quarter and chew) on FAMAS’s ill treatment of a well-respected denizen of Tinseltown.

Most people like to refer to it still as “tinsel” because it is, as they say, mostly plastic — not gold — although if one were to see the latest incident in a certain light, one could say it is a gold mine for some quarters.

Some wags who would rather not be named say the FAMAS way of selling P5,000 per plate to attend the awards show is part of the effort to raise funds presumably to mount the show.

This column also heard it on good authority that in recent times, films that wish to be considered for awards are required to pay a registration fee. Some of the big winners are actually getting the side eye for allegedly having paid for whole tables at the show.

A showbiz insider revealed that Best Actress winner Kathryn Bernardo refused to buy plates, which is why she had to come from backstage when her name was called to receive the trophy.

What’s sad about all this is that the local film industry is still in the throes of difficulty, no matter that the last Metro Manila Film Festival yielded over a billion pesos at the box office.

The fact remains that streaming has shrunk the market for cinemas, leading some malls to transform their spaces into something more profitable. Executive producers still struggle to get funding for these creative outputs which, as other countries have shown, are a significant cultural driver for a nation.

It takes more creativity nowadays to survive, and perhaps the recent spate of revelations from the award-giving body is another telltale sign that government should pay more attention to the industry.

The FAMAS, as far as we know, is the only award-giving body to charge fees. Somehow, this diminishes the credibility of the awards, although other bodies remain determined to support and nurture the industry that gives us more than simple entertainment. It is the livelihood and art of so much talent that we have in the Philippines, whether in front of the camera or behind it.

Let’s support our film industry. Let’s watch the awards shows, upcoming ones of which are the Gawad Urian by the Manunuri ng Pelikulang Pilipino or Filipino Film Critics; Luna Awards by the Film Academy of the Philippines; Star Awards for Movies by the Philippine Movie Press Club; and The Eddys or The Entertainment Editors’ Choice Awards by the Society of Philippines Entertainment Editors or SPEEd.

In the end, with a robust industry that could bring out stories around the world, we are all the winners.