At last, South African viewers will have access to their own version of the entertainment worlds’ most exciting guessing game. The Masked Singer South Africa is all set and ready to enchant young and old, dreamer and sceptic.
The Masked Singer South Africa launches in the second quarter of 2023 as a weekly show on SABC 3 and on SABC1.
The Masked Singer franchise is broadcasted in over 50 countries and is top of pops for audiences across the globe. In the United States, it is one of the most-watched reality competition shows.
How this show works is, celebrated personalities and entertainment superstars sing well known songs while dressed in full body costumes and masks, to hide their identities. The flamboyant masks and costumes have a personality of their own and invite as much commentary as the performances themselves do. A celebrity panel of detectives must guess who is behind the mask. The detectives will be Somizi, Skhumba, Sithelo and J’Something.
The studio audience is a rich component of the show, voting together with the celebrity detectives for their favourite performance.
The least popular performers are eliminated, but not before she or he removes costume and mask to reveal their true identity. “Take it off”, “Take it off”, roars the audience, along with the judges, in an electric atmosphere, followed by shrieks of surprise and delight as the celebrity is unmasked.
The SABC Head of Local Productions, Lala Tuku says they have wanting to offer this kind of show to their audience as it is one of the hottest reality shows in the world.
“For years now, we have been wanting to offer this show to our audiences – it is one of the hottest reality show properties in the world and now at last South Africa will have its very own version. This thanks to the collaboration of SABC, Primedia and Rose and Oaks Media. Our audiences are in for a real treat. The show is an entertainment festival, with its magical music, wizardly of masks, and splendour of costumes. This is the biggest musical mystery show on the planet and for our local audiences,” Lala said.
Anele Mdoda, the producer of the show and her partners, Paul Buys and Frankie Du Toit, are ready to fire up the media and entertainment industry as their production company, Rose and Oaks, sets its sights on licensing top international programming for local audiences, and on creating new formats that can be sold internationally.
Speaking about the show Anele says “The Masked Singer is the new wave of music shows that has had viewers across the world enthralled for the last three decades. We remember how The Shell Road To Fame show in South Africa many years ago got families sitting together to back their favourites. The Masked Singer is the new generation of singing shows and I am certain South African audiences will embrace this show with the same passion and intensity that they did the earlier generation singing competition shows.”
