next feature, The Michelle Apts.

Vancouver director John Pozer, who received the first Claude Jutra Award for direction of a first feature film (The Grocer’s Wife) at last year’s Genie Awards, is prepping for his next feature, The Michelle Apts., which begins principal photography at the end of the month in Toronto.

Produced by Stavros Stavrides (H, On My Own), The Michelle Apts. tells the story of a government tax auditor ‘who is plunged into a world of sexual menace and anxiety during a stay at the Michelle Apts.’ Stavrides says he immediately ‘recognized a real talent’ when he and Pozer met after the festival screening of The Grocer’s Wife.

This is Pozer’s first Toronto filming experience, although he posted The Grocer’s Wife out here. He says he’s looking forward to working with the city’s film community, and adds there is a certain look, a type of antiquity in Toronto that is difficult to get out West.

Pozer has also recruited a few names from his last film. The script is written by Ross Weber, who did all the location sound recording on The Grocer’s Wife, and, in fact, did all the sound cutting in Pozer’s apartment in Montreal (the joys of ‘efficiently budgeted’ films). After lots of work in very close quarters, the two managed to stay friends, and the script was, according to Pozer, ‘a very fun, creative collaboration.’

As well, Alberta-based cinematographer Peter Wunstorf, who shot The Grocer’s Wife in b.c., will work on Pozer’s new project.

No place like home

ottawa’s Bryan Michael Stoller, who gained adolescent fame as host of the cbc series Film Fun in the early ’70s and went on to study as a director/fellow at the American Film Institute, is pining for his native land.

Stoller is known for his comedy shorts (many of which still run on The Movie Network), which he parlayed into the comedy feature Undershorts: A Brief Movie for Paramount Pictures Home Video. He’s also had a steady stream of gigs with Dick Clark Productions, hbo, nbc, abc, the American Comedy Awards, and Tales from the Darkside.

Now mainly based in l.a. (although his office was destroyed in January’s devastating quake), Stoller quietly returned to Ottawa late last year to shoot Turn of the Blade, a $1.2 million privately financed thriller which premiered in l.a. in April. Since then, the flick has been nabbed by Showcase Entertainment and the founders of Curb/Esquire (sex, lies and videotape) for foreign distribution. No Canadian distributor yet.

Stoller will be back in Ottawa June 9-15 teaching at Algonquin College’s Summer Institute of Film and Television and hopes to schedule the Canadian premiere of Turn of the Blade around that time.

He says he’s eager to shoot his next feature in Canada as well. Chances are the project will be The Random Factor, a sci-fi comedy adventure that he has written. If all goes well, his company, Northstar Entertainment, will be doing a lot more up north in the future.

Full slate at Rhombus

rhombus Media has a full year coming up. The company is currently wrapping Speak Low: The Songs of Kurt Weill (formerly Lost in the Stars), a tribute to the German composer, and The Planets, a skating/synchronized swimming/ dancing and music extravaganza for the cbc, a&e, bbc-1, Holland’s nos and Portugal’s rtp. Polygram will put out the laser disc.

Rhomboids can also look forward to a new crop of productions.

Going into production over the summer and fall are six one-hour specials on the Bach Suites for nos, rtp and Sony.

Also on the boards is a series with cellist Yo-Yo Ma about creativity which will feature a different discipline of the arts in each episode – from Kabuki to architecture to ice dancing – and explore how they are influenced by music.

The Velvet Gentleman, a tv special for Radio-Canada, cbc, a&e, rtp, Avro in Holland and Philips (laser disc) is scheduled to shoot in the fall. The special is based on the music of Erik Satie and will feature dancer Veronica Tennant and the Gemini-winning contortionist team from the Cirque du Soleil.

A number of additional projects are in various stages of development.

And while we’re on the subject of Rhombus, congratulations on the nomination of Shadows and Light – Joaquin Rodrigo at 90 for a Rockie award.

Dudley’s special guests

breakthrough Films’ children’s series Dudley the Dragon is in production on its second season – 13 French- and English-language programs. Breakthrough is also taking the program south. American Program Services will market it to pbs stations, and Good Times Home Video will distribute a home video version. In this next season, look for cameos by John Neville, Jackie Burroughs and Graham Greene.

Heading our way

native son Dan Aykroyd along with Lily Tomlin and Jack Lemmon will be working on a new feature in Toronto starting at the end of the month. Getting Away with Murder, written and directed by Harvey Miller (who cowrote Private Benjamin and Protocol and wrote and directed Bad Medicine) is being produced by Price Entertainment and Penny Marshall’s Parkway Productions. Savoy Pictures is distributing. The distinguished trio of actors will be in town until the beginning of August.

Medical practitioners

the cbc has announced the cast for its new one-hour drama series, Side Effects. The all-Canadian cast includes Nadia Capone (Guiding Light), Anna Pappas, Albert Schultz (Street Legal), Jovanni Sy and Joseph Ziegler (Gross Misconduct) as doctors and Barbara Harris (Guilty as Sin) as a hospital administrator in an inner-city Toronto health clinic.

The series, produced by Helen Kafka and Doug Wilkinson and executive produced by Brenda Greenberg, begins principal photography in Toronto May 16.

New reporter on the Scene

with a book on Canadian animation and a pilot for ytv in tow, Karen Mazurkewich will not be returning to Playback after all. So next issue, Suzanne Wilson – who is preparing for her own departure from the paper mid-May – will hand over Ontario Scene to writer Pamela Cuthbert. Keep sending in those production bits and bites and we promise no more changes for awhile.