Montreal: Claude Joli-Coeur, former vp legal and business affairs at Astral Programming Enterprises, has joined Coscient in the same position with a mandate to exploit international coproduction opportunities.

Joli-Coeur says he’ll maximize coproduction opportunities for all projects in development at Coscient subsidiaries Allegro Films, Productions sda and Coscient. The focus will be Europe, mainly France, but also the u.k., Germany and the u.s., he says.

How much of the company’s future coproduction will be shot in French appears uncertain.

Says Joli-Coeur: ‘The (French-track coproduction) market is quite limited so we’ll have to do this with investment from Telefilm (Canada), and that means things don’t go as fast as when you do a project with private partners. We want to do another 13 half-hours of Le Courte echelle series, which we did last year with Radio-Quebec. We will be involved in French-language coproduction.’

Coscient is a member of Groupe Expand, a Paris-based financing consortium of French investment and production companies. Joli-Coeur says he’ll meet with Expand at mipcom next month, adding the outlook is promising because Expand is undergoing restructuring.

Coproduction projects include an audiovisual animated encyclopedia series with Radio-Quebec, and a long-form animated tv series based on the Bob Morane novels and budgeted in the $10 million to $12 million range, with French participation from Ellipse Programme, Canal + and France 3.

Joli-Coeur says a major motion picture based on the Morane novels and budgeted at over $10 million will also be produced. Quebec City novelist Paul Ohl (Highlander III) is the screenwriter.

‘We have big plans for this project, with interest from major European and American companies,’ says Joli-Coeur.