Chef Florin Dumitrescu reacted for the first time to the Antena 1 scandal after he and his colleagues Sorin Bontea and Catalin Scarlatescu decided not to participate in the filming of the new season of the show “Chefi la Cuțite”. Dumitrescu talks about the messages he would receive from the trust’s lawyers and says he would lose his right to free expression, his right to be who he is and “every possible right” “just because he signed contract”.

Florin Dumitrescu says in a video message posted on Facebook that there are many things he cannot clarify at this time due to a confidentiality agreement with the trust.

• “There are many things that need to be clarified and there are many aspects that I cannot clarify without being accused of who knows why. In the conditions I am in now, with the lawsuit, with the threats from the lawyers, I don’t think I can even say threats, with the messages that I keep getting from the lawyers of the former trust that I worked with.

• History is sensitive. I don’t know how to relate all the negative press lately and all the TikTok accounts separating me from my family and all kinds of personal issues that aren’t even real to the situation we’re in.

• I don’t even know whether I’m allowed or not to make a connection, whether I’m allowed or not to publish this video,” Dumitrescu begins his Facebook message.

“It’s a bit dubious and a bit hard to carry”

He says he feels he has lost his right to free speech and his right to be who he is, explaining that he has ended up in two lawsuits with a media trust.

• “I feel like it’s a super gray area where I, as a human being, have lost my right to free expression, I’ve lost my right to be who I am, I’ve lost every possible right just because I signed a contract.

• It’s a bit dubious and a bit heavy to carry. To know, to understand the situation I am going through. I have two court cases. In civilian clothes. For, so to speak, the interpretation of some clauses of the contract. The explanation is that the judge will decide whose side is fair, the employer’s side or my side.

• The confidentiality I signed into this contract does not allow me to talk and say what it is about and how things are going. I can’t do that, I signed a confidentiality agreement, I have an NDA,” Dumitrescu explains.

The celebrity chef says he thought he was working in a “cool” place and talks about the compromises he may have had to make over time.

• “I can’t even publicly respond to the stick over the fence by different people or different articles. Well, this is starting to get a little annoying. And that’s why I say: God is above and sees. And all this evil, which some do incompetently and out of simple revenge, will turn against him.

• I do not wish this for them, I do not live in the hope that it will turn against them, but it is natural, such is life, karma. Do bad things, it will come back to you. I personally tell you honestly, for nine years I thought I was working in a cool place, and these last nine years I spent hoping that I was doing well.

• Well, they wiped it with a sponge. For nine years I did not exist from a professional point of view. And what should I do then? Am I not sitting quietly near my family? The time I actually wasted on them, with all the compromises I made over time?

• Compromises that none of you can imagine, what compromises I was “exposed” to, let’s say, just because I had a signed contract,” says Florin Dumitrescu.

“I don’t know how much it’s going to cost me, maybe another lawsuit”

Florin Dumitrescu says he does not know what the consequences will be after he decided to speak publicly about the situation with his former employer Antena 1.

“So, my good people, be careful who you let into your house and what house you enter. This is it! I cooled down. I don’t know how much this will cost me, maybe another lawsuit, but who knows, this freedom of expression seems to only belong to a certain camp, not all of us have it. And in any case, not everything is the same,” Dumitrescu asserts.

Antena Group, which owns Antena 1, sued three chefs it worked with for seven years – Florin Dumitrescu, Catalin Scarlatescu and Sorin Bontea.

According to Paginademedia.ro, on November 23, Antena Group filed a lawsuit against each of the bosses in the Bucharest court. The object of the process is the “obligation to fulfill the contract for artistic performance”, that is, to force them to return to the performance.

In October 2023, Antena 1 abandoned the three judges of the cooking show “Chefi la Cuțite” – Florin Dumitrescu, Catalin Scarletescu and Sorin Bontea, who for years managed one of the most popular shows on the station. According to Paginademedia.ro, the divorce announcement was made by Antena 1 itself through a press release on Thursday evening.

“The reason for the break is the refusal of 3 members of the jury to participate in the filming in October 2023, according to the filming calendar communicated to them in March 2023, the refusal was expressed shortly before the date set for the filming of season 13”, in the press release of the Antena TV channel 1 is shown.

In December 2023, Antena 1 announced that the new members of the jury of the show “Chefi la Cuțite” were Richard Abu Zaki, Alexandra Sautner, Stefan Popescu and Orlando Zacharia.

Read also:

• Shocking announcement on Antena 1: three members of the jury from “Chefi la Cuțite” – Bontea, Dumitrescu and Scarletascu – leave the show / Reason given

• Antena sued three jurors from “Chefi la Cuțite” – Bontea, Dumitrescu and Scarletescu

• Who are the new members of the jury from Chefi la cucite? There will be four of them instead of three