Vancouver: DaVinci’s Inquest has won the lottery among Vancouver-based series proposals competing for a primetime cbc slot.

The hour-long series about a Vancouver coroner is produced by Vancouver’s Chris Haddock and Laszlo Barna of Barna-Alper, Toronto. Production will begin this winter with an airdate in September 1998.

The generous timeline, says creator Haddock, will allow writers to develop compelling stories without being harried by production schedules. A winter shoot also improves access to crews, which are in short supply in the summer.

DaVinci’s Inquest will be the cbc’s first hour-long primetime drama from the West Coast and will follow Baton’s Cold Squad, another Vancouver-based primetime series that premiers this fall.

Previous Vancouver-based dramas include 30-minute series such as Northwood, Beachcombers, The Odyssey and Haddock’s Mom p.i. and the hour-long Neon Rider.

Haddock says the first season of 13 episodes will have a budget of about $12.5 million. Production financing is still being arranged, but British Columbia Film and cbc have been involved in the original development.

Haddock will own 100% of the copyright and be able to control the evolution of the series, a first for him.

‘DaVinci’s Inquest is a dream come true, says Haddock. ‘It’s something I’ve tried to do since Mom p.i. ­ a wholly-owned show about Vancouver for Vancouver.’ He adds the show, and his ability to participate in the potentially lucrative distribution (which was being negotiated at press time), will help him develop a production company that is operated and driven by artists who respect a good story.

The other series being considered by cbc were: Watchdog, a series developed by Michael Chechik about Vancouver parole officers; Tofino, a series created by Brian McKeown about a West Coast Vancouver Island town; and Crosstown, a series by local writer Hart Hanson and Ark Films about life on the gritty Eastside of Vancouver.

(These Arms of Mine, a series created by Phil Savath about friends struggling to navigate contemporary Vancouver, is another series still under consideration though in a different category of drama.)

‘We’re very happy for Chris,’ says Watchdog producer Chechik, adding that losing the contest is disappointing but ‘comes with the territory.’ But he’s left with a challenge. ‘We have a tremendous property here,’ says Chechik, ‘and we’re trying to figure out what to do with it.’

Phyllis Platt, executive director of arts and entertainment at cbc in Toronto, neither closes the door on the shows’ prospects nor offers hope about the shows eventually being greenlit. But she is lavish in her praise for DaVinci’s Inquest and the compelling central character.

‘He’s drawn in an extraordinary fashion and drives the series in a way, quite frankly, that I haven’t seen very much of,’ she explains, adding that a one-hour primetime show from Vancouver has been a cbc priority. ‘The material for the series is terribly rich. We can go with cops, the law, politics, love triangles and family struggles.’

Haddock says DaVinci’s Inquest will be an ‘intelligent crime drama’ that pays homage to successful, character-driven British crime series such as Prime Suspect and Cracker.

DaVinci, the lead character, is a former rcmp narcotics officer who re-emerges as a b.c. coroner after dealing with his drinking problem. At 45, he is divorced with a 15-year-old daughter.

Haddock was drawn to the coroner storyline after attending a forensic science conference in Vancouver in 1993 where he spoke about forensic science in the media. The series will likely open with a three-part storyline.

As a television writer, Haddock was weaned on Night Heat, MacGyver and Mom p.i. before developing DaVinci’s Inquest. Barna produced the tv movie Diana Kilmury: Teamster with Alliance and Anne Wheeler in 1996.