Paragon sees new day for Knight

and begins Kissinger biopic

Things are popping at Paragon Entertainment. In addition to news that the much-delayed series Forever Knight is ready to go into production again, the Toronto-based company has an mow for Turner Broadcasting on the go.

Kissinger is a dramatization of the straight-laced American diplomat’s life and times. Of course, his pal Richard Nixon will play a prominent role in the tv movie. Ron Silver is signed as Henry Kissinger and casting is underway for an American to play Tricky Dicky (up against casting competition from Oliver Stone’s movie on Nixon).

Dan Petrie is directing, Dan Blatt is producing and Jon Slan is executive producer. Production is slated to start in Toronto at the beginning of July. Deirdre Bowen is casting in Canada. Karen Bromley is production designer, and production manager is Brian Parker.

Forever Knight is slated to start production July 27 on 22 episodes and will continue for 32 weeks. Paragon has just closed a deal with Baton Broadcasting in which the broadcaster not only committed to the upcoming episodes but also bought the 48 episodes in existence.

Word is although Geraint Wyn Davies is back in the lead, some cast changes will be taking place. Apparently, the American broadcaster, USA Network, wants a sexier spin to the show. Crewing up was underway at press time.

Also on the slates is the continuing globe-trotting production of the hip science series Kratt’s Creatures, and a number of mows coming up this summer and fall.

Foot notes from fans

Stone Soup Productions, producer of the Harrowsmith Country Life series, is getting all kinds of interesting fan mail, including a request for an imprint of host David McIlwraith’s feet so his admirer ‘can make a personal lamp shade,’ reports producer Janice Dawe.

Boys, Baths and Tutu’s at O’B&D

Producers Tim O’Brien and Greg Dummett of O’B&D Films are set to roll July 3 on The Boys Club. The low-budget feature, coproduced with Alliance Communications, is about an encounter between three adolescent boys and a fugitive.

John Fawcett is directing, Peter Wellington wrote the script and dop is Thom Best (Half Nelson). Art director is Taavo Soodor (Replikator).

Production continues in the Toronto area until Aug. 7.

Alliance is distributing worldwide. Cast is tba, with Dummet and John Buchan at Alliance handling the job.

Also coming up for o’b&d are Jacob Tutu and the Hooded Fang, an mow for cbc which should go into production in early 1996 in Toronto, and the Judith Thompson-scripted The Wives of Bath, with Allan Moyle (Pump Up the Volume) directing. Plans are to shoot the feature based on Susan Swan’s novel in the fall in the city. Alliance is distributing.

F/X rolls at last

Skyvision’s f/x pilot for Rysher Entertainment, after much negotiating down from a series to a one-off, will be rolling in Toronto June 15 to July 18. Paul Lynch (Robocop) is directing the $5- $6-million production (a budget which includes the amortization for the series).

Los Angeles-based John Fasano wrote, Bob Wertheimer (line producer on Robocop) is producing, dop is Malcolm Cross (Due South) and pm is Thom Pretak (Robocop). Executive producers are Kevin Gillis, Stephen Downing (Robocop) and Brian Ross. Cast signed to date include American actor Kevin Dobson (Knots Landing), Aussie Cameron Daddo and Canadian Carrie Anne Moss (Models Inc.), who stars in a new role created for the series.

The pilot will be shooting on the same stages Robocop did at Cinespace.

Special effects – a combination of computer-generated f/x, physical effects and prosthetics – are being handled by Michael Kavanagh and Paul Jones of Digital Pictures. Ken Quinn (Robocop) is stunts co-ordinator.

Cosmic capers

Cosmic City, Imax’s new 15-minute treatment of galactic wonders, is a mix of live action and 3D computer animation. The drama for Tokyo’s Expo in ’96 is set in a space city 100 years in the future and tells of the pursuit of two men (Colin Fox and Denis Akiyama) as they attempt to lasso a comet. The aim is to divert the path of the fireball so that it passes by the space city and can be mined as a water resource.

The local eight-day shoot started May 29 and includes some location shooting in and around Niagara and at a greenhouse since, as one crew member says, ‘There will be farms in space.’ Why not? The story is, after all, based on scientific projections.

There are plans to shoot a shuttle launch at Kennedy Space Center later this summer.

Three animated computer houses are on board: Jet Propulsion Laboratory (an arm of nasa), Ex Machina in Paris and Fujitsu in Tokyo.

Toni Meyers wrote and is coproducing with Graeme Ferguson. Allan Kroeker is directing, dop is Andy Kitzanuk and associate producer is Judy Carroll. No mention of a planet handler.

Cosmic City is a Canadian production sponsored by the Metro Tokyo government.

Liberty Street returns

Liberty Street, Epitome Pictures’ series for cbc, which sees Degrassi kids mature into their twenties (but not into Generation Xers, as one crew member says), has been renewed for season two. Shooting started June 4 on 15 episodes and continues through mid-October.

Most of the cast is back (11 of 13 to be precise) as is most of the crew. Bruce McDonald and Alex Chapple, who each directed an episode in season one, are kicking off this round on episodes one and two respectively. Jane Thompson, Stephen Williams and Stacey Curtis will follow in the helmer’s chair.

Linda Schuyler is executive producer and creator, Sari Friedland is supervising producer and Yan Moore returns as top story editor. Also back are art director Tamara Deverell and dop Philip Earnshaw.

Familiar faces that will reappear on the screen include Pat Mastroianni, Kimberley Huie and Henriette Ivanans. Atlantis Releasing is distributing.

Rub a dub dub

There is a madness to experimental filmmaker Gary Popovich’s bathtub processing method. Black-and-white high-contrast stock is preferable because, he says, it gives the most striking results. Assorted techniques are then tried, such as turning lights on and off during processing, spraying developer onto the surface of the film and adding household cleaners, bleaches, urine – anything within reach.

Famed for his work in the tub, Popovich spent part of last year on tour giving seminars on his discoveries. This year, with a number of films on the go, Popovitch is up to his ankles in fixer.

At the top of his list is Fault Lines, a 20-minute sound poem collage now at the sound edit stage. Electro-accoustic music (composed by Randy Smith), sound fragments and a recorded voice are combined with multiple layers of images on 16mm color reversal stock.

‘It’s a combination of (Allen) Ginsberg’s Howl and a documentary reflection of a poem that weaves right around the North American continent,’ says Popovich.

Coming Attraction, a Super 8, multi-image compilation, is inspired by Popovich’s new experience as a father.

‘It’s a tough assignment,’ he says. No regular home movies for his kid. The biggest challenge is avoiding the cliches so often found in pictures of one’s offspring, and so, for starters, he is interweaving delayed loops into the soundtrack. He also plans to blow up the Super 8 stock to 16mm for optical printing and hand processing.

Also in the works is a 10-minute piece, Guest Host, about ‘some of the craziness’ in the former Yugoslavia. Popovich has relatives in Serbia, Croatia and Macedonia, and he shot a film there in 1985 called Elegy. For this project, he is working with actors as well as using some image layering. It’s at the first draft stage.

Out of Turn, a 70- to 80-minute piece, has been in the works for a couple of years and involves some of the same performative and layering techniques being applied to Guest Host. It’s about sexuality and politics, ‘like everything else,’ says Popovich.