Vancouver: Sylvester Stallone was here earlier this year with Detox. Now the other action heroes are scouting Vancouver for the next big features.

Arnold Schwarzenegger and his team are considering Vancouver for Sixth Day, a story about cloning in the future. It’s being produced by Phoenix Entertainment, which also made Lake Placid in Vancouver last year.

And Bruce Willis is the star of Ace in the Hole, by Outland Productions. He plays an ex-con in Las Vegas.

With green lights, the features could go in the fall.

* Docudrama for Paperny

Busy Vancouver documentary producer David Paperny took his first foray into dramatic reenactment in the waning days of July for the two-hour documentary Murder in Normandy.

The three-day dramatic shoot – which will be woven into the documentary as black-and-white footage – involved two days in the old courtroom at the Vancouver Art Gallery and a day on a Langley farm. It cost $100,000 of the project’s $530,000 production budget.

Airing on History Television during Remembrance Day week, Murder in Normandy recounts the murder of seven Canadian prisoners of war during wwii and the trial of the Nazi commander charged with the war crime.

The cast of 20 ss officers, judges and doomed pows is led by veteran Vancouver actors Robert Wisden as Nazi Commander Kurt Meyer and Kevin McNulty as prosecutor Bruce MacDonald. The Art Gallery passes for a courtroom in Aurich, Germany and the Langley farm has been transformed into the Abbaye D’ardenne in Normandy, the scene of the murders.

While the experience has whetted Paperny’s appetite for doing a dramatic project, says associate producer Stacey Offman, no drama projects are being considered. Instead, the year’s production slate has been filled with a cbc Life & Times special on Henry Morgentaler, a cbc special about Canadians living in the u.s. called True South Strong and Free and a 13-part docusoap called Salon.

Picked up by distributor Salter Street, Salon will chronicle the people of a two-man hair salon in East Vancouver. Paperny Film’s first attempt at docusoaps was the six-part Brewery Creek – about the people in an East Van co-op – which ran as five-minute segments on CBC Vancouver’s Broadcast One newscast.

* Canadians in the wake

Southern Cross, a smaller Canadian feature, is trying to anchor in a sea of u.s. production in Vancouver. Produced by Vancouverites Vicki Sotheran and Greg Malcolm, the thriller involves a romantic triangle, murder and boat building.

No cast was set at press time, but the director is Ruben Preuss. Production runs Aug. 3-22.

On another set, meanwhile, Vancouver producer Kimberley Wakefield is busy with Karaoke Queen, a feature about a heavy-set woman who conspires to direct and cast herself in her own karaoke video.

Starring Irene Karas and Bob Frazier (formerly Cold Squad), the production has funding from ctv, wtn and the ctf. Production was scheduled for Aug. 4-10.

* Calling 818 North

The Americans are here in force for the summertime. Here’s a rundown of what’s on the production schedule:

*Ice Angel is Shavick Entertainment’s latest mow project for Fox Family Channel. At press time, the cast and director were not finalized. However, the story revolves around the soul of a rough-and-tumble hockey player who is transformed to a 17-year-old female figure skater. He (as she) has to learn how to jump and spin in order to realize his Olympic dreams. Production runs Aug. 16 to Sept. 11.

*Lou Gossett Jr. is back as a postal service inspector for the sequel of a movie produced by New City Productions. This time the service producer for Inspectors ii is Dufferin Gate. The Showtime sequel – with costars Jonathan Silverman and Michael Madsen – is about a mail fraud scheme involving credit cards. Production runs Aug. 16 to Sept. 3.

*Vancouver producer Larry Sugar has taken time away from his regular Peace Arch Entertainment projects to oversee Showtime’s mow Out of Time. James McDaniel (NYPD Blue) and Canadian actor August Schellenberg star in the modern retelling of Rip Van Winkle. In this environmental story about urban development and its effects on the surrounding forest, an activist is put to sleep for 20 years by arboreal spirits who need him to protect the woods.

Oscar-winning screenwriter Ernest Thompson (On Golden Pond) directs the project that shoots Aug. 3-30.

*Kyle MacLachlan (Twin Peaks) and Alison Eastwood (Breakfast of Champions) star in The Spring, an nbc mow based on the Clifford Irving novel of the same name. In the story, a town tries to keep secret its fountain of youth. Production runs July 29 to Aug. 26

* Comedy crucible

The Comedy Network has made itself an important benefactor of new comedic talent in Vancouver this production season. Not only is it backing Skullduggery, a new six-part series by writer/directors Ken Hegan and Kellie Benz, the network will also air Slightly Bent tv this fall.

A Vancouver-based sketch-comedy series, Slightly Bent stars Roman Danylo, Diana Frances, Doug Funk and Pierce Visser. The series is produced by Glen Lougheed, Edward Peghin and Kelsey Kirvan, and executive produced by Alex Tkach of Northwest Communications.

‘We wanted to see each sketch shot as a short film,’ says Lougheed.

Six episodes will be shot on location throughout Vancouver’s Lower Mainland by the end of August.