It takes a big man, apparently, to play third fiddle to a kid and a bear.

That’s what’s hanging up progress on Bearboy, Norstar’s $15 million feature cowritten by Stuart Margolin and Richard Beattie (Cold Comfort Farm). Englishman Stewart Raffill is on board as director, but finding a male lead is proving a pain.

‘It’s like Jeff Daniels said about being in Fly Away Home,’ says Norstar’s Peter Simpson. ‘You need to check your ego at the door. It’s not a role for everybody.’

Meanwhile, locations have been scouted in the Rockies and production’s expected to begin in June.

Norstar’s also prepping another Beattie script, a pet project of his inspired by Alfred Noyes’ poem The Highwayman (a favorite of Anne with an ‘e,’ for those who know their Lucy Maud). Canadian Keoni Waxman (I Shot a Man in Reno) is directing the dark comedy, budgeted at $3.5 million. Casting for The Highwayman should be completed come Christmas and it’s expected to be shot in Toronto in the new year.

Speaking of casting, Norstar’s setting its sights high for The Fourth Angel, a $15 million-plus thriller/love story written by Allan Scott (The Preacher’s Wife) and to be directed by Yves Simoneau. ‘icm loves the script,’ says Simpson, who adds that there’s interest from someone in the ‘Liam Neeson’ category. The film is set in Europe and is skedded for next summer.

Also on deck at Norstar is Iceman, an ‘action buddy comedy’ from Vancouver writer Arnie Olson (Cop and a Half). The search is on to attach a director and cast.

-Back to the drawing board

Coproducer skittishness has put Stephen Braund’s Minimum Wage Warriors on the back burner for now. Braund, under the banner of writer/producer/director, was to coproduce his first feature with Suhkvinder Sekhon and Hank Khan of Eternal Movies International, but the partners flew the coop just prior to production. Braund says he’s now looking at guaranteeing distribution in order to sweeten the pot for new investors, and he hopes to do it in time to start production again in March.

Minimum Wage Warriors, to be shot on 35mm for under $1 million, is the story of a video store clerk who goes cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs and takes his customers hostage at the end of a bad, bad day.

-Where the jobs are

Short of using a crystal ball or hiring the services of Jo-Jo the midnight psychic, it’s hard to tell what the Canadian film and tv landscape’s going to look like even five years down the road, let alone in 2006. But Women in Film and Television – Toronto has enlisted the help of industry ‘visionaries’ to compile stats to steer its membership in the right directions.

The group – under the now permanent leadership of executive director Joan Jenkinson – is surveying over 65 national big cheeses in areas like regulation, public and private broadcasting, public and private production, cable, distribution, post, industry associations and funders.

The respondents are being asked to apply their expertise to questions about human resource trends (level of employment opportunities, job sharing, contract work, etc.), changes in consumer demand for entertainment, tv as an educational tool, forces of change within the industry, and growth sectors.

It’s all part of a strategic planning initiative wift-t has undertaken to help women advance their career prospects in film and tv. Jenkinson expects the study to be available mid-March.

-Rippin’ and Trippin’

From the sci-fi stylin’s of Producers Network Associates, Sandra Kovacs (with business partner Rob Heydon) has moved into the sub-zero world of snowboarding. Kovacs bought up half of Heydon’s Vision Films and the duo have produced Rippin’ and Trippin’, two 45-minute 35mm videos directed and shot by Heydon together with a posse of up-and-coming dops including Margaret Mallandruccolo, David Pelletier, Walter Ross and Jason Tan.

The $40,000 budget was heavily supplemented by sponsors like Rip Zone, Simple, Airwalk, Da Kine and Burton who made sure the crew didn’t go without lodging, food, gear, clothes or lift tickets. The action is cut to tunes from Leftfield, The Chemical Brothers, Trigger Happy and Dragonfly.

Kovacs and Heydon are now traveling Asia and Europe to forge distribution channels for the videos (they’re handling distribution themselves), and broadcasters with an ‘extreme sports’ bent – like ESPN2 in the u.s. – have shown interest in a broadcast window.

There’s already a distribution deal with Blockbuster in Canada, and Kovacs is optimistic about nailing down an agreement with a retail chain like Shoppers Drug Mart. The project also has the support of MuchMusic – it intends to air at least part of the videos. It’s hoped that the revenue from Rippin’ and Trippin’ and its yet-to-be-produced siblings will raise enough cash for Vision to self-finance a feature.

What kind of feature? Well, suffice it to say Kovacs hasn’t strayed too far from her pna roots. ‘I’m thinking of doing something like Blade Runner, something sci-fi but with a feminist edge.’