That’s My Amboy Premieres Tonight

The AnBie love team takes its act to primetime.

Fresh from a successful run on ‘The Half-Sisters’, Andre Paras and Barbie Forteza now gear themselves up for their first lead role in a primetime series. The duo star in ‘That’s My Amboy’, a light-hearted series that airs starting tonight.

‘That’s My Amboy’ tells the story of Maru (Barbie), a young but determined girl, and Bryan (Andre), a rising actor. Their story began when Bryan was blamed for the accident that involved Maru’s stepfather, and in order to pay for the damages, Maru was hired as his personal assistant.

At first, Maru and Bryan’s relationship was tense and jittery. But an incident that affected Bryan soon brought the two together, and the once distant relationship turned into a friendly, and eventually, lovely one.

Also starring in the series are Tonton Gutierrez, John Arcilla, Donita Rose, Kiko Estrada, Jazz Ocampo, Matet de Leon, Meryll Soriano, Maritoni Fernandez, Jerald Napoles, Pam Prinster, Jan Manual, Philip Lazaro, Pauline Mendoza, Kryshee Grengia, and Rob Walcher. It will be directed by Bb. Joyce Bernal, with the help of Dominic Zapata.

‘That’s My Amboy’ was slated to replace ‘MariMar’ in the network’s Telebabad block (the latter ended January 8). However, the series premiere was delayed for two weeks due to a conflict of interest, since ‘The Half-Sisters’ was still ongoing at the time.

That led to a rather unusual programming lineup on Telebabad, where the block only had two teleseryes, a movie block, and a two Koreanovelas. This week, Telebabad will go back to its usual lineup of three teleseryes and two Koreanovelas, and thus, changes in schedule will be utilized.

‘That’s My Amboy’ will be placed opposite ABS-CBN’s ‘Pangako Sa ‘Yo’, which means that the KathNiel-starred series will have faced all three ongoing Telebabad dramas in a three-week span. Although ‘Pangako Sa ‘Yo’ will only have two more weeks in its run, it remains an imposing challenge to ‘That’s My Amboy’, considering the series has beaten ‘Little Nanay’ and ‘Because of You’ in those three weeks.

That said, the AnBie love team will have its work cut out for them. Although they’ve been successful in the afternoon, primetime is a very different animal, which only adds pressure to the duo.

‘That’s My Amboy’ premieres later tonight after ‘Little Nanay’ on GMA Telebabad.

A Fourth Opponent for Streaking ‘Forevermore’

There is no stopping ‘Forevermore’ as their run winds down.

The ABS-CBN drama series, starring Enrique Gil and Liza Soberano, has been on top of the primetime world ever since it debuted in October of last year. So far, ‘Forevermore’ overcame the challenges of ‘Hiram na Alaala’, ‘Strawberry Lane’ and ‘Once Upon a Kiss’ of rival station GMA, beating each series by a wide margin.

Now a fourth opponent awaits the streaking teleserye.

Starting this Monday, May 4, ‘Forevermore’ will go up against ‘Let the Love Begin’, the newest GMA teleserye starring Ruru Madrid and Gabbi Garcia. The upcoming series should not be confused with the movie of the same title, starring Richard Gutierrez and Angel Locsin, which was released a decade ago under the GMA Films banner.

‘Let the Love Begin’ will also mark the return of Ai-Ai Delas Alas to the GMA camp after over a decade with ABS-CBN. Joining her in various supporting roles will be Gardo Versoza, Donita Rose, Mark Anthony Fernandez, Neil Ryan Sese, Gladys Reyes, and Ms. Gina Pareño.

Other members of the cast include Noel Trinidad, Phytos Ramirez, Abel Estanislao, Ricardo Cepeda, Joko Diaz, Rita Daniela, Ar Angel Aviles, Nomer Limatog, Angeli Bayani, Sancho Delas Alas, Therese Malvar, and Ren Escano.

The series will revolve around the cordial friendship between Jeni (Ai-Ai) and Tony (Gardo), who work for a fictional radio program that focuses on love advice. A major problem would later shatter their friendship, but their paths would soon cross again thanks to a blooming relationship between their children Erick (Ruru) and Pia (Gabbi).

‘Let the Love Begin’ may have been scheduled to air on the vacated timeslot of ‘Once Upon a Kiss’, but the series’ first few weeks may come too late to prove its worth against ‘Forevermore’. As seen in the teaser below, ABS-CBN made it clear that ‘Forevermore”s run would end very soon in favor of a new drama.

Still, the prospect of ‘Forevermore’ taking on a new Kapuso love team is hard to resist. They have already overcome the duo of Miguel Tanfelix and Bianca Umali, and now it is up to Ruru and Gabbi to show their potential against LizQuen.

‘Let the Love Begin’ premieres this Monday after ‘Pari ‘Koy’ on GMA Telebabad. Good luck.

So Long, ‘Basta Every Day Happy’

‘Basta Every Day Happy’ officially bowed out yesterday morning. (Photo credit: GMA Network)

For the first time since December 30, 2011, Chef Boy Logro has no weekday program on the GMA Network.

‘Basta Every Day Happy’, the talk show hosted by Alessandra de Rossi, Gladys Reyes, Donita Rose and the aforementioned Chef Boy Logro, officially bowed out of the airwaves yesterday morning. As a result,  GMA replaced ‘Basta Every Day Happy’ with yet another rerun of ‘Slam Dunk’.

This left GMA without a local program in between ‘Unang Hirit’ and ‘The Ryzza Mae Show’. Considering their so-called ‘success’ with the ‘Astig Authority’ block, they may have made a wise decision, but rival ABS-CBN’s late morning programs like ‘The Singing Bee’ prove otherwise.

Debuting on May 12, 2014, ‘Basta Every Day Happy’ was GMA’s latest attempt at producing their own talk show (‘The Ryzza Mae Show’ doesn’t count since it is produced by blocktimer TAPE, Inc.).  However, it had consistently low ratings, leading to yet another short run for a post-‘SIS’ GMA talk show.

Worse, GMA placed ‘Basta Every Day Happy’ to an unfavorable timeslot (opposite Kapamilya shows like ‘The Singing Bee’), further accelerating its demise. Had it been placed opposite ABS-CBN’s equally low-rated morning show ‘Kris TV’, ‘Basta Every Day Happy’ would have fared much better.

Instead, GMA’s most recent morning talk show became an expected thumbs down, as previously predicted on From the Tube.

So what’s next for GMA after ‘Basta Every Day Happy’?

For now, they’ll live and die with the ‘Astig Authority’ block and their high propensity to re-air classic animes for ‘loyal’ audiences. But without the support of local programming, GMA will have a harder time competing against ABS-CBN’s programs, unless drastic things happen within the next few weeks.

As for Chef Boy Logro, he will still be a regular on the Kapuso network, as his other show, GMA News TV’s ‘Idol sa Kusina’, continues to air today. The future of his co-hosts, however, remain uncertain.

‘Basta Every Day Happy’ was a good show, had GMA made the right choices. But every misstep comes with a price, and in the end, it was GMA’s questionable decisions which cost another of their shows.

This is definitely not a good way to start 2015 for the embattled folks inside Timog Avenue, especially when it started with another programming casualty.

GMA’s New Morning Talk Show is a Thumbs Down

GMA is once again producing a morning talk show in ‘Basta Every Day Happy’, as they try to restore order in their morning lineup.

The last time GMA had a morning talk show, real-life married couple Zoren Legaspi and Carmina Villaroel were the hosts of a now-forgotten program called ‘Love ni Mister, Love ni Misis’. And now the Kapuso network is once again trying to resuscitate their already tattered morning lineup by introducing a new morning talk show.

‘Basta Every Day Happy’ is GMA’s latest attempt at a morning talk show. The upcoming program will be hosted by Chef Boy Logro, Gladys Reyes, Donita Rose and Alessandra de Rossi, and will begin its broadcast this Monday at 11:00 a.m., right before another talk show in ‘The Ryzza Mae Show’.

Ever since ‘SIS’ left the airwaves, GMA has attempted and failed to create their own highly-rated talk and variety shows in the morning slot. Anyone who remembers ‘Diz Iz It’ , ‘Nay-1-1’ and the aforementioned ‘Love ni Mister, Love ni Misis’ will be scratching their heads in disbelief.

And their most recent attempt, ‘Kusina Master’, was also a non-factor. As it turned out, Chef Boy Logro’s weekday program was supplanted by ‘The Ryzza Mae Show’, then moved to an earlier timeslot, before cutting its airtime to 15 minutes. Worse, the program that was once produced inside a studio to a live audience was demoted to producing taped broadcasts in various kitchen setups.

Which is why the pressure is definitely high for the hosts of ‘Basta Every Day Happy’. The thing is, GMA management would have done the right thing by placing the program opposite ‘Kris TV’, in order to downplay such expectations. Instead, the management decided to put the program against ‘The Singing Bee’, and based on ‘TSB”s recent ratings, it looks like ‘Basta Every Day Happy’ is poised for a disastrous start.

It remains to be seen whether or not ‘Basta Every Day Happy’ will prove doubters wrong. But as far as recent history goes, it looks like GMA has produced yet another short-lived morning talk show.