★★★ Last Sunday, involuntarily, Telefe’s night screen showed two contrasting realities on Argentine open television in recent decades. Early in the first “gala” of the culinary reality show “Masterchef”, its brand new host, the charismatic businesswoman Wanda Nara, again exhibited the ease and comfort that characterized her auspicious performance since the daily began to be broadcast. popular shipping. Let’s remember, that it is recorded and edited weeks in advance.
Earlier, the always exalted Santiago del Moro, dined live with the three finalists of the last successful edition of “Big Brother”, and he looked uncomfortable, too verbose, somewhat scattered, exposing his preferences among the youthful participants and insistent to force his emotions. At this point, it should be noted that, in the difficult task of conducting live, with several interlocutors and attentive to production indications or the unforeseen events of a live broadcast, the legendary Mirtha Legrand has not yet been equalled.
It is in this duality that the television medium is debated today: drivers who seem to want to be the protagonists or who, like the newcomer Nara, choose a measured role and choose to empathize spontaneously and genuinely with the unknown people who want to compete. It is no coincidence that in the various initial casting stages that amateur chefs, women and men of all ages, professions and trades went through, called her “Wanda” and gladly accepted her hugs.
Hence, the warning given to him by the pastry chef Damián Betular, when with total impudence he asked him to “contain” the last eager applicants for the gastronomic contest, was strange and unnecessary. He had done it from the first moment, without clashing with an already installed format.
Although, unlike other editions, on this occasion, the contest showcased the selection that 53 chefs had to face who passed the first calls. Among them, 24 were selected so that after three days of challenges, the 16 that will compete will finally be left. Since 2014, the program has its own formula, in which the jury made up of Betular, Donato de Santis and Germán Martitegui (wouldn’t it be time to renew them too?), with their returns, are the routine stars and the contenders seek, with each preparation, advance in the competition, while revealing their life stories. This aspect is the most interesting, knowing what motivates them to cook in public. And the spontaneity of Wanda Nara.
