– Alliance in U.K.

Alliance Communications has announced its first direct investment in the British film industry, acquiring a minority interest in Electric Pictures and funding an expansion of the indie distrib’s acquisition and marketing capabilities. Electric will distribute Alliance films in the u.k.

The venture also means that Electric – which reps films including Priest, The Snapper and Ridicule in the u.k. – will join Alliance as part of Studio Pictures, its bid for a lottery-funded feature studio led by former bbc drama head George Faber. Production companies onside for the $86.4 million bid are Little Bird Films, Oxford Film Company, First Film, Samuelson Productions and Natural Nylon (Ewan McGregor, Johnny Lee Miller and Jude Law). Plans are to make six films in year one and 10 every year after, with potentially half coming from outside-consortium producers.

Canadians in competition for the feature film franchise include Mayfair Entertainment Group, which, scrambling for partners at the 11th hour when Channel Four and Miramax reportedly balked, is in the race as part of the Britannia Films consortium. Renaissance Films’ Stephen Evans will lead the bid. Guy East’s Intermedia, Feature Film Co. and Dakota Films are in tow, as is a development deal with West Eleven Films. Britannia is targeting 24 films over six years.

Also in play is Paragon Entertainment via HandMade Films. HandMade’s Primary Pictures group is frontlining a $52.7 million pitch. Zenith Productions and independent producers Stephen Bayly, Margaret Matheson and Sam Taylor make up the team. Canada’s own Sydney Banks is on board as an equity investor.

Nelvana has thrown its lot in with United Animation plc, a group which includes British producers Martin Gates Productions (Dreamstone), Jerry Anderson’s Inimitable Ltd. (Thunderbirds), Cosgrove Hall Films (Danger Mouse) and Carrington Productions International, a financial backer of film and tv. The group has applied for over $66 million in funding, which is expected to spur three animated films a year at a cost of $202 million.

The studio bids, which were filed Feb. 28, number close to 20. The Arts Council of England will announce its decision in May.

Closer to home in other Alliance news, Diane Keaton will executive produce and star in Northern Lights, a tv movie to be produced by Alliance in association with Prufrock Pictures and Blue Relief Productions.

Production is scheduled for early April in Vancouver with Linda Yellen directing. The mow will be delivered for an August premiere on Disney Channel.

Penned by John Robert Hoffman and Kevin Kane, and based on the award-winning play of the same name by Hoffman, Northern Lights is the story of a New York woman who is summoned to a small town in Vermont to collect an inheritance upon the death of her estranged brother. The inheritance turns out to be his nine-year-old son rather than cash.

Alliance is distributing.

-HandMade ups slate, Paragon signs Kratts

Besides its franchise bid, HandMade Films has other irons in the fire including a slate of five new features in the first half of 1997, which will bring the number of features up to 11 since Paragon Entertainment acquired the company and its library in 1994.

On tap are Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels, a comedy set to shoot in London in April; Written in Water, a thriller skedded to shoot off the North Carolina coast in April; Lotto Boy, a dark comedy which begins in June; Another Life, a drama to be shot on location in England; and Life’s Companion, a comedy/drama scheduled to begin filming in the u.s. in June.

The five new projects were unveiled in l.a. at the American Film Market.

Elsewhere at Paragon, based on the success of their top-rated kids’ series Kratt’s Kreatures, producer Paragon has signed creators Martin and Chris Kratt to an exclusive development deal.

In a deal brokered by Ken Katsumoto, Paragon’s l.a.-based vp of family programming, the Kratts will cook up live-action and animated kids’ programming, including series for the preschool market, as well as tv specials and theatrical features for the family market.

The Kratts already have an 18-book commitment from Scholastic and other licensing agreements with PolyGram Video, Time-Life Video and Hasbro Interactive, and Wendy’s International will support the show with a promotional tie-in this summer.

-On the move

Noted Canadian author, broadcaster and university professor Laurier LaPierre is the third appointment to Telefilm Canada’s board of directors since December.

LaPierre is a member of the Order of Canada and resides in Ottawa. Robert Dinan is chairman of the federal funding agency.

– Myrianne Pavlovic, director, business unit – feature films with Telefilm Canada’s Montreal office, has left the federal funding agency after 10 years as a key person in content analysis. By early April, Pavlovic will join SDA Productions as director of development.

– Philippe de Gaspe Beaubien, Telemedia head and former chairman of the Canadian Association of Broadcasters, has been named the 1997 recipient of cab’s Gold Ribbon Award for Broadcast Excellence. Beaubien, whose broadcasting career spans almost 30 years, will accept the award at the association’s annual Gold Ribbon gala dinner May 1 in Ottawa.

– Rogers Video has announced three internal appointments: sales and marketing vp David Newman is the new vp operations for Western Canada; human resources director Lois Riley takes on the position of vp, human resources; and vp operations Linda Sanderson becomes vp purchasing. An outside appointment has also been made, with Raquel Hirsh, former director of database marketing at Intrawest, joining the company as vp marketing.

– Bravo!’s director of communications, David Ellis, has joined the Shaw Festival as communications and marketing director.

– At Holmes Creative Communications, former Canadian Airlines senior communications specialist Paul Fowler has been named senior consultant and two internal promotions have been announced, with Beth Sulman appointed director of the arts and entertainment division and Martha Haynes taking over as director of client services.

Holmes has more competition this month since J.J. Doe Associates has opened its doors.

Launched by Harriet Bernstein, Tami Wineberg and Robb Collis, the partners are focusing on publicity, promotion, public relations and events for the entertainment industry. Collis was previously marketing and promotion director at CFTR/680 News, cfrb and CHUM Radio; Wineberg spent 10 years at MGM/UA Canada as director of publicity and promotions; and Bernstein was formerly Canadian gm of Disney/Touchstone/Hollywood Films (Buena Visa Pictures Distribution).