Misters of Filipinas reinvents itself
Now that all the noise from the country’s major women’s pageants have started simmering down, it’s now the turn of the men to take the spotlight with the staging of Philippines’ most prestigious male pageant search. Now on its
Ith year, Misters of Filipinas (MOF) is back with what it calls an “elevated, upgraded and totally different” version of itself.
“It will shy away from the usual template of a male pageant. After I years, we figured that we don’t want to get stuck in a “been there, done that” formula that other pageants are now just trying to pattern their competitions from,” said Carlo Morris Galang, President of the Prime Events Productions Philippines, organizer of the yearly MOF competition.
The public competitions of this year’s MOF will start with the final call back of auditionees, which will happen on Sunday, August 28 at the Winford Hotel in Manila.
“Hundreds of good-looking men auditioned online from different parts of the country and from three Filipino communities abroad. From these online applicants, we managed to gather some 450 aspirants, who have been pruned down further to the top 100. From there, only 50 will make it to the Winford event, only to be trimmed down further to more or less 20 candidates,” Galang revealed.
Those who will make it to the final shortlist will then be joined by 12 candidates from MOF’s accredited franchise areas making the official roster of official candidates to total 35. The call back will be staged and streamed as a show in itself, a first in the male pageant set-up. This will only be one of the many changes that fans can expect from what Galang calls “MOF 2.0.”
Galang stressed: “We want this year’s competition to be more interactive. There will be many different social mediabased challenges. We will also be more selective in choosing who our eventual winners will be. Focus will not only be on looks, physique and personality. We want someone who is talented. Someone who can sing, dance, act, host will surely have an advantage. We want our winner to be more than just a model or a king. We want him to eventually be a star, a celebrity, an influencer.” He added: “We want our winners to be marketable even after their reign is over.”
A total of five titles will be awarded this year. Top plum will still be MOF-Man of the World. The other titles to be given out this year will be MOF-Mr. Model WorldWide; MOF-Tourism Culture Universe plus two other new franchises under the PEPP’s belt. Last year’s MOF winners did well in their respective international assignments. MOF-Man of the World Nadim El Zein emerged as second runner up in his international pageant, while Cebu’s Junichi Yabushita won the top prize in the Mr. Runway Model Universe competition.
According to Galang: “Our second prince, Derick Lauchengco will still compete in the Mr. Model WorldWide competition later this year.”
So, is the MOF changing formats in response to the recent mounting of other male pageants which, fans say, are also good productions that can potentially outshine them in the future?
“No, we are already confident with our brand. We’ve always been known to be the trend-setter in male pageantry. Nine years na rin naman ito. We just need to do something new kasi pare-parehas na lahat, templated na lahat ng pageants,” Galang said.
The Ith MOF will hold its coronation night at the Newport World Resorts’ Newport Performing Arts Theatre this October.