Yet Another Act Of Unprofessionalism: An Open Letter To The Producers Of ABS-CBN's Matanglawin

.:An Open Letter To The Producers Of ABS-CBN's Matanglawin...:.

Last Saturday, I was requested by your crew to be present in Makati for an interview for your episode involving magic and mentalism. Initially, this shoot was scheduled at 6PM, but the day before, it was moved to 1:30PM instead.

I understand that schedules are often subject to change when it comes to TV productions. As a former segment producer in another TV network, I know how difficult it is to get schedules in sync just to get a shoot right.

I suppose this explains why I am writing this to express my disappointment when despite being at the venue and despite the fact that the shoot was already being conducted, Jay Mata and I, who were designated as Escape Artists for this particular shoot, were asked to be rescheduled with another group of magicians instead of the group of mentalists we were with at the time.

Now, first of all, Jay Mata and I are both mentalists as well who only happen to have branched out in Escape Artistry. Secondly, we were specifically asked to be present for this shoot, and not this other shoot we have only heard about on the day itself. Thirdly, we were already at the venue, and the shoot was already in progress. Why would we have to reschedule ourselves when we were already at the venue while the shoot was already in progress? Would it have been too much effort to actually inform Jay and myself earlier on that our presence was not required?

You see, this other shoot was something we were completely uninformed about, and was scheduled at 9PM, a full seven and a half hours after the schedule agreed upon. Both Jay and I took the effort to free up our schedules for this shoot, in my case no mean feat considering I sacrificed sleep to make this commitment on time, having been up for the past thirty hours due to my work as a radio personality in Campus 99.5. If a distinction between magicians and mentalists exist, would there not be yet another distinction for escape artists? Unlike magicians, there is simply no "secret" to escape artistry, except pure skill and efficiency.

This abhorrently unprofessional display by your staff is a far cry from what I would expect from a program produced by one of the country's leading television networks. As professional performers, Jay Mata and I value our time and expect due respect as professionals who have taken time out to be present for this particular shoot. Furthermore, asking us to reschedule a full two days after this mishap only emboldens our opinion that your staff does not possess any amount of professional courtesy whatsoever: we categorically stated that given this mistreatment, we would rather not be featured on this particular episode anymore.

Did you honestly think that we merely said this for dramatic effect? We would rather sacrifice a chance for exposure if it means that we could preserve our integrity as professionals. We are hoping that if your staff is sincere in making up for their transgression, they would have a far more substantive effort than that, otherwise, it would be best not to extend anymore half-baked efforts at rectifying this mistake.

We are putting this grievance out in public as it is an affront to Jay Mata and myself. Given the effort we have extended to be present for this shoot, the least your staff could have done was to simply interview us since we were already there. Just because we do not appear to have the clout and influence to make threats does not give you the right to treat us unprofessionally.

Dear producers of Matanglawin, we hope this letter would allow you to rectify this issue in a timely manner. All we asked was some professional courtesy, which we were unfairly denied. Was this really too much to ask for?

Sincerely,
Kel Fabie