November / 2009

In The News

NBC Universal Canadian Production

NBC Universal, one of the world's largest media and entertainment companies, wants to do more business in Canada, with an emphasis on racial and ethnic diversity. Diversity advocate Karen King of Productions Without Borders presented a round-table discussion at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Toronto on September 17, led by Kelly Edwards, VP of Talent Development for NBC Universal. The session was attended by representatives of various industry guilds, unions and associations, including CSC Executive Director Susan Saranchuk.

Edwards said NBC Universal in the U.S. is making Canada an important part of their business strategy. However, she stressed that diversity on and off camera are basic requirements that need to be met. NBC is calling upon the guilds and unions in Canada to help fulfill their needs.

A two-hour open discussion ensued with great enthusiasm from the Canadians at the prospect of more production coming here. Although some of the guilds already identify the diversity of their memberships, it is on a voluntary basis and of that only 25 per cent were willing to identify themselves by heritage. NBC is particularly interested in Toronto as 51 per cent of the population is of visible minority.

NBC Universal owns and operates a huge portfolio of news and entertainment networks, a motion picture company (Universal Studios), significant television production operations, a leading television stations group, and world-renowned theme parks.

Toronto-based Productions Without Borders is an initiative of television production executive Karen King, who says on the organization's website, its goal is to give "the entire production team the tools they need to be more competitive in a global economy and enhance their programs by creatively implementing diversity in every department, from the writer, director, casting director, production manager, publicist and the distributor." For more information about Productions Without Borders, visit www.productionswithoutborders.com.

Red Digital Cinema Selects Sim Video As Its Canadian Service Center

Respected rental house Sim Video has been hand selected to become the first Red Certified Service Center in Canada by Red Digital Cinema. With an expected launch date of November 2, 2009, Sim Video will be prepared to service all Canadian owned Red One cameras and LCDs and, perform full camera R3D data recovery services from their Toronto headquarters.

"This is an incredible opportunity for us to demonstrate our superior technical abilities. We have a team of highly skilled engineers and technicians who keep our inventory of cameras, lenses and accessories in optimal working condition so providing RED camera repair services will be a natural extension of what we already do on a daily basis," said Rob Sim, President and CEO of Sim Video International Inc.

Sim Video has always been a strong advocate for the advancement of digital technologies and in fact, was the first rental house in Canada to provide HD cameras in the late 90s. Since then, Sim's digital cinema inventory and technical proficiency has grown dramatically, making them experts in their field. The company is well known for providing Red-training seminars and has been recognized for its development of simplified workflow solutions.

In preparation of the November launch, Sim Video Toronto has renovated its main floor to accommodate the new Red service center and has already sent a second team of technicians to Red's facility in Lake Forest for comprehensive training and certification in Red product repair and service administration.

Quebec Comedy Tops $10 Million

For only the third time in the history of Canadian cinema, Emile Gaudreault's De père en flic surpassed the $10 million mark - $10.6 by October 15 - in domestic revenue. The Quebec comedy about a father-son dysfunctional relationship - both are cops - starring Michel Côté, Rémy Girard and Louis-José Houde, joins the rarified air of Bob Clark's Porky's ($11 million in 1981) and Éric Canuel's Bon Cop, Bad Cop ($11.9 in 2007) as one most successful Canadian films of all time.

What is more remarkable about the film is that, unlike Bon Cop, Bad Cop, which had a decent release in English Canada and made about $1 million outside of Quebec, De père en flic has not yet received distribution outside of the province. It could easily top $11 million by the end of its theatrical run, and producers Denise Robert and Daniel Louis are the hands-down winners of the Golden Reel Award in 2010.

Previously Gaudreault co-wrote Louis 19th: King of the Airwaves, which won the Golden Reel Award in 1994. In 2002, he wrote and directed Wedding Night, another Golden Reel winner for Robert and Louis, and he directed and wrote Mambo Italiano in 2003, which turned over $5 million at the box office, making him the most successful film director working in Canada today.

Men with Brooms Is Coming to the CBC As a Sitcom Pilot

The CBC has given the production order to E1 Television and Serendipity Point Films for a pilot episode to loosely follow Paul Gross's 2002 curling comedy and directorial debut, Men with Brooms. The film racked up $4.2 million on theatrical release, portraying a reunited curling team overcoming comic personal struggles to capture a national trophy for their late coach. The offbeat comedy starred Gross, Leslie Nielsen and Molly Parker.

Gross will share the executive production credit on the television version and occasional show up on screen. Paul Mather (Corner Gas, Little Mosque on the Prairie) will showrun the half-hour. This is the second curling pilot for the CBC in as many years, after Throwing Stones, which portrayed four working class women as friends in a Winnipeg curling club.

Pierre Falardeau Dies at 62

Pierre Falardeau, one of Quebec's most politically involved and controversial filmmakers, died in Montreal at the age of 62 of lung cancer. While studying ethnology at the University of Montreal, Falardeau made his first documentary, Continuons le combat in 1971. In 1973 he began a long and fruitful collaboration with actor Julien Poulin, which resulted in a series of political videos in the 1970s on the general theme of anti-oppression.

In 1981, the team made the jump to fiction with their first dramatic short Elvis Gratton, starring Poulin in a most unflattering parody of the culturally oppressed Québécois. They shot two more Elvis shorts, and then compiled all three into a feature-length video, Elvis Gratton, le king des kings. The success of the video put the duo in the limelight and encouraged them to make the follow-up features, Elvis Gratton, miracle à Memphis in 1999 and Elvis Gratton XXX in 2004. Falardeau also made three politically charged features: Le Party (1990), Octobre (1994) and 15 février 1839 (2001). Each of his films testified to his unwavering political and social commitment to the independence of Quebec from the rest of Canada.

Videoscope Announces a New General Manager

With the retirement of Michael Spear, Wes Kirkpatrick has accepted an offer to join the Videoscope team as general manager, effective October 14, 2009. Kirkpatrick is an energetic executive with over 25 years of increasing management experience in sales, marketing and general management in business equipment, wireless and printing and document management. He also has an extensive track record of successfully building and growing businesses of a similar size to Videoscope. The 40-year-old Toronto-based company provides top-of-the-line equipment, rentals, repair service, recording media and technical support. Spear had been with the company for11 years, and said in a press release: "My wife Liz and I are retiring to the Okanagan Valley in British Columbia to enjoy traveling and time with friends and relatives."

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