Paragon teams with Sega for

its first multimedia project

Paragon Entertainment is literally blazing a trail through the streets of Toronto – from the sets of (the now-dozing) Robocop to the seedy Claremont Hotel with Fahrenheit, Paragon’s first multimedia project.

After about eight months of negotiations, Sega of America and Paragon signed a deal for the true video maze game for Sega cd just weeks before shooting started up in late September. The deal has Paragon producing the live-action segments (with a production budget of $1.9 million) and Sega taking over at the programming stage.

The gist of the player pov game is battling the terrors of blazes, and options range from saving transients from a burning hotel to sleuthing the moves of a chemistry professor-turned-pyromaniac as he booby-traps the university where he teaches.

The project came to Paragon through Gary Randall, la.-based president of Paragon Productions, and originated with Fahrenheit producer Megan Hope-Ross. Production continues through to mid-October.

Three on the go

Peter Lynch, maker of the clever and esteemed 30-minute mockumentary Arrowhead, is ploughing through a three-picture field of dreams. He is in development on a a feature-length mockumentary titled Citizen Warwick, is about to start production on Going Up the Blue, a teleplay for CBC Sunday Arts, and has just wrapped a doc (also for Sunday Arts) titled The Artist and the Collector.

Lynch’s keen observations of Hogtown are the stuff of which his films are made. The Artist and the Collector, shot by cbcer Don Spence and now wrapping post-production, is the true story of an obsessive Torontonian art collector and criminal lawyer who gathers the works of painter Rick McCarthy with a frenzy, covering the walls of his home, sometimes six-paintings-deep, with the artist’s work.

Citizen Warwick, supported in development by Citytv, Telefilm Canada and the Ontario Film Development Corporation, tackles the history of the notorious Warwick Hotel, home for 50 years to musicians (some the likes of Ronnie Hawkins), prostitutes, gangsters and cops.

Lynch has created a story about a down-and-out cinematographer whose legacy and expiry at the hotel is investigated by a reporter who has his own personal attachment to the place.

He plans to shoot the low-budget pic in super 16mm in the spring of 1995 and, since the Warwick is now a Sears parking lot, Lynch will be looking for a hotel of similar vintage.

Late fall or early winter is when Lynch plans to start rolling on Going Up the Blue, a 30-minute drama loosely inspired by his grandfather’s experiences as a sports writer and soldier in the Second World War. The piece, featuring Nick McKinney (Vacant Lot) in the lead, will unfold ‘like a radio play,’ says Lynch. Further production details are not yet available.

A date with de Mornay

Alliance Communications is busy in active preproduction on Never Talk to Strangers, a Rebecca de Mornay feature film produced by and starring the American star. Sir Peter Hall (Work is a Four-Letter Word) will direct. A start date has not been set, but rumor says it could be this fall. The two potential locations are Toronto and Vancouver, and according to Alliance insiders, the location will be determined by the start date. Alliance is producing in conjunction with l.a.-based CineVisions.

The House MacIvor built

House, the Canadian Film Centre Feature Film Project production which starts rolling Oct. 11 after about a six-week delay, will be shooting in the same Presbyterian church on Danforth Avenue that housed Blood ‘n’ Donuts last winter.

The Daniel MacIvor play, upon which the $670,000-budgeted film is based, tells of a one-man performance that is born of group therapy and renders a curious effect on its audience.

MacIvor leads an ensemble cast, which includes Patricia Collins, Ben Cardinal (Dry Lips Oughta Move to Kapuskasing), Kathryn Greenwood and Jonathan Wilson of Squawkbox, and features cameos by Stephen Ouimette and Sheila McCarthy.

Producer is Karen Lee Hall, director is Laurie Lynd (The Fairy Who Didn’t Want to be a Fairy Anymore), dop is David Makin (Kids in the Hall), editor is Susan Maggi (Rude) and production design is being handled by Marian Wihak (Paris, France, Lost in the Stars). Exteriors will be shot in Brantford, Ont.

They’re not talking

It’s not official, cbc officials say of the rumored Dance Me Outside television series based on director Bruce McDonald’s feature of the same name. While there is a pilot penned by John Frizzell (Life With Billy), drafts of several episodes, development support from Telefilm Canada, and an executive producer credit for Norman Jewison, the series is miles away from reality, according to one cbc exec in creative affairs.

Dance Me Outside producer Brian Dennis and director McDonald were in Tokyo at press time and unavailable for comment.

You never know

Without a hint of development hell, writer Michelle Jones has seen a play she wrote for her mother/actor’s eyes only blossom unexpectedly into a full-blown performance, and now, a one-hour documentary.

Jones first decided to write The Afternoon Group as a means of communicating some ideas to her mother who had suffered a stroke. Her primary concerns were with the complexities of dealing with such a trauma unprepared.

Much to Jones’ surprise, her mother and a few of her colleagues (all in their seventies) at the Curtain Club Richmond Hill community theater troupe, agreed on a private reading and then decided it would not suffice. Plans for a performance (which took place at the beginning of this month) were made and Jones’ mother and her three friends, including R.H. Thomson’s mother, Cicely Thomson, began rehearsals.

The decision to shoot a documentary that would include footage of the rehearsals and the performance as well as interviews with family members of the stars was hurriedly made.

Jones, who has produced some small training films but works primarily as a writer of screenplays, was suddenly faced with producing a $300,000 film.

Judy Krepansky of White Elephant Productions came on as coproducer and editor, and cbc, tvontario and Vision have all shown great interest in the project.

In September, Jones was one of the five pitchers allowed to do their thing at the ‘Meet the Channel Panel’ at the Toronto International Film Festival’s Symposium. Both Atlantis Communications’ Life Network and tvw expressed interest, if she turns the project into a series.

Medical companies and related financial institutions are the main targets of Jones’ fundraising activities, but she hasn’t got a deal yet. The performance has been shot, but additional shooting is suspended until funds are located.

Best of Input

This year’s Best of Input – a 30-program selection of the Input international industry fest for filmmakers (this spring’s was held in Montreal) – gets a Nov. 18 launch in Toronto.

The forum seeks controversial films, ‘stuff that people will find outrageous, or remarkable in some way,’ says Input board member and Man Alive executive producer, Louise Lore.

Some of the Input standouts this year are Black Daisies for the Bride, a British film on Alzheimer’s done opera-style; The Almost True Story of Pepita, The Gun-Woman, the first Uruguayan dramatic production made in 13 years; and The Belovs, a Russian doc which takes a small village and presents it as a microcosm of Russian life today.