The Women’s Television Network is budgeting $9 million for Canadian production next year, with funds going into four new Canadian series and into doubling the requisition for episodes 13 to 16 of Natural Angler, Girl Talk, Jane Taber’s Ottawa and Speaking Our Minds.

Launching in October, wtn’s fall schedule will be the beginning of a strategic shift in tone and approach at the network, perhaps best illustrated by the replacement of POV:Women with Take 3, a lifestyle series produced by Barbara Barde out of wtn’s Toronto production office.

Susan Millican, appointed director of programming for wtn last month, readily admits wtn is swinging away from its too serious reputation. ‘We’re definitely lightening up.’

The Canadian series added to the sked are Debbie Travis’ Painted House, produced by Debbie Travis and Hans Rosenstein of Triangle Films in Montreal; Resourceful Renovator, produced by Johanna Eliot through Pick & Shovel Production in Halifax; Baby & Me, produced by Phyllis Laing and Pat McCallum at Buffalo Gal Pictures, and Metro Cafe, produced by Northwest Communications’ Robin McCrary, Badry Moujais and Alex Pkach in Vancouver.

wtn is widening the scope of its programming to cover subjects such as parenting, balancing work and family, and fashion, topics that have been peripheral to the service since its launch in January.

It’s this move towards lighter, mass-market programming that is thought to have cost wtn its founding president, Linda Rankin, who resigned last month. But Millican defends the service’s new direction.

‘If being mainstream means trying to address more aspects of women’s lives, then we’re doing that. I think it’s been proven that programming only cooking shows to women doesn’t work either. We’re learning, and it’s taken us a while to get it, but we’re getting it.’

Often at the receiving end of programming critics and steadily coming in at the bottom of the ratings for the new specialties, wtn has taken its share of knocks over the past nine months. Ironically, it is the only one of the six new services meeting its original revenue projections, contributing more than one-third of Moffat Communications’ fiscal third-quarter earnings of $264.8 million, a 39% increase in revenue to $264.8 million. (For the record, wtn is the only specialty to be carried on basic cable by Rogers Communications, and therefore the only one of the six being paid per subscriber for all Rogers 2,552,970 basic cable customers.)

Although wtn is seeing some ‘seriously viable growth’ – a rise in the 2+ audience in tk from tk – steps need to be taken to increase the breadth of viewing audience, says Millican. Higher profile programs like Lauren Hutton’s new late-night talk show are being added to the fall sked. ‘We’re looking for more movies and more entertainment while continuing to provide educational programming,’ she says.

There have been no layoffs since the service launched nine months ago, says Millican. ‘We’re simply not in a losing position.’

The financial picture is a little grimmer at Bravo!, the last of the specialties to publicize its fall programming plan, but station manager Paul Gratton says Canadian content expenditures are on target for year one and is determinedly optimistic year two targets will be met.

At least $4.7 million was spent on Canadian production this year, on target with Bravo!’s original licensing commitment to spend almost $24 million by year seven, including $10 million for ongoing series and $5.6 million for ArtsFacts, its video performance showcase.

Licence fees running $100,000 an hour at the high end are being paid as promised. ‘We’ve spent our money and we haven’t whined. We haven’t made a profit either,’ says Gratton.

In year two, one-third of the previous year’s gross is slated to be spent on programming. Gratton says that is still the plan and is unwilling to speculate when and if that plan will change as negotiations with the cable companies soldier on.

Discussions began with Bravo! asking for 25 cents per subscriber and the cablecos offering 12 cents. The two are much closer to an agreeable rate than they were three months ago, and Gratton believes contracts will be signed before the end of the year with little change to Bravo!’s production plans.

‘We’re used to living with a business plan that’s a moving target and I don’t expect to back down on our production commitments. We’re here to create new stuff.’

The fruits of last year’s investments are part of the new season’s schedule, including a six-part documentary series on Canadian servicemen’s role in wwii, No Price Too High, produced by Richard Nielsen; Four Original Concerts from the 1995 Cultures Canada Festival in Ottawa, produced by Pierre Touchette of Amerimage; The Spoken Art: The Bottom of the Glass, produced by Jim Hanley and Sleeping Giant Productions; and Why Havel?, a Czechoslovakia/ Canada coproduction about Czech playwright and president Vaclav Havel, produced with Rock Demers of Les Productions La Fete.

New series on the slate include Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman and Fernwood 2-Night (which started in August), Soap, Fame, The Lost Boys and Vanity Fair. Negotiations continue with The Ed Sullivan Show.