Sheldon Wiseman, former president/owner of Ottawa’s Lacewood Animation, is back with a new series out of his toon prodco Amberwood Entertainment.

Hoze Houndz, a half-hour animated kids’ series skewed to the eight- to 11-year-old demographic, has been presold to Family Channel in Canada and is skedded to go into production beginning May 15, with an air date of January 1999.

The action-oriented series will consist of two separate stories per half-hour set in a fire hall run by frenetic and comedic dogs.

‘The dogs run the fire hall but they have to work with the Medicats who run the ambulance and emergency service,’ explains Wiseman. ‘The cats are the epitome of efficiency while the dogs are constantly in disarray.’

Budgeted at $5.8 million, the 13 half-hours ordered by Family are being bridge-financed by Alliance Equicap, says Wiseman, who also expects to access the latest round of the ctcpf. Alliance owns world rights to Hoze Houndz except for the Canadian presale.

Veteran director Neil Hunter has signed on to direct, while Wiseman will exec produce. A team of writers has been hired and voice casting is currently underway.

In development at the Ottawa-based Amberwood is the adult-oriented cartoon series Zeroman, a comedic spoof on superheroes written and designed specifically for actor Leslie Nielsen. Using the voice, likeness and persona of Nielsen, Wiseman feels the series would be suitable for primetime.

Zeroman has already garnered strong interest from one Canadian broadcaster, according to Wiseman, who is currently packaging the financing for the series, which he expects to be a Canada/European coproduction.

Zeroman will employ 30-second live-action bookends at the beginning and end of each show featuring Nielsen in a comedic entrance and exit.

Nielsen, a longtime friend of Wiseman, considered purchasing Lacewood last summer before it was forced to default on a $2.5-million debt to Toronto’s Paragon Entertainment, currently on the selling block.

– Catalyst Entertainment and Jules Verne

Well into post on their two Universal Soldier cable features for Showtime, Toronto’s Catalyst Entertainment is ramping up on a four-hour miniseries based on the Jules Verne novel The Boy Captain.

Catalyst exec vp and exec producer Kevin Gillis says Italian writers Sergio Donati and Luigi Montefiori have just delivered the first draft of the script that will be produced by Catalyst with Italy’s RAI Television, 3emme, also of Italy, and French broadcaster Tele Images.

With an expected budget of us$7.5 million to us$8 million, The Boy Captain should go to camera in late summer or fall. Locations have not yet been finalized, but Catalyst’s Malta studios are expected to be utilized.

Gillis says he has had positive conversations regarding The Boy Captain with a couple of u.s. pay services but no Canadian or American broadcasters are on board as of yet.

The action-oriented family miniseries with a slavery subtext came to Catalyst through its development dealings with Tele Images on the children’s puppet/animation/live-action series Tales From The Longhouse. The Tom Jackson project is currently in development with the cbc.

At last year’s mip, Gillis attended a dinner with Tele Images execs who have already committed to go to series with Tales From The Longhouse. Through Tele Images, Gillis was introduced to the group from rai, who had the Verne miniseries property.

‘The people from rai said they had heard good things about the way we operate and wanted to hear our creative input on the miniseries,’ says Gillis. ‘The next thing you know, Charles [Falzon, Catalyst president and ceo] and I were on a plane to Rome to do the deal.’

– Protocol, Scholastic team again

A gaggle of Toronto effects shops are competing for the whack of work that will be needed on the new Scholastic Productions/Protocol Entertainment series Animorphs, which begins lensing April 20 in Toronto.

The live-action show about a group of kids with the capacity to transform themselves into any animal they touch will run on Nickelodeon starting next fall. Nick will handle all international distribution of the series while Scholastic has the entire franchise for Animorphs encompassing the publishing program, tv series, licensing and consumer promotions.

Among the shops vying for a contract from the 20-episode series are John Gajdecki Visual Effects, d.a.v.e., Spin Productions, Core Digital Pictures and Command Post/Toy Box.

Unlike its major producing role on Goosebumps, also with Scholastic, Protocol’s involvement in Animorphs is essentially as a ‘services entity,’ according to the show’s co-executive producer Bill Siegler.

Based on the book series and Scholastic property from author K.A. Applegate, the show should mean good news for the talent and craft communities in Ontario. Casting for six actors who look 14 to 15 to play the Animorphs is currently underway, and Siegler says that the show will use Canadian directors and a mix of local and u.s. writers.

– OFDC still calling

The Ontario Film Development Corporation has scored two more corporate sponsors for its Calling Card Program, and announced five teams of filmmakers as second-round recipients of funding and services.

The new sponsors are deluxe toronto and the Canadian Film and Television Production Association. deluxe will provide Calling Card recipients with special discounts on lab work and discounts at deluxe video. The cftpa will provide a one-year free membership which allows producers to access the actra collective agreement and the Canadian Independent Production Incentive Program.

The two new sponsors join Kodak Canada and Showcase Television in the program.

The five second-round Calling Card films are: Altarpiece (Dean Perlmutter, producer; Deborah Day, director), Commedia (Frank Deluca, producer; Giacomo Moncada, director); Moving Day (Tina Goldlist, producer; Christine Deacon, director); Stand By Your Booth (Nicolas Tabarrok, producer; Daniel O’Connor, director) and Zabava (Remo Giralto, producer; Greg Klymkiw, director). The five new recipients bring the total number of Calling Card films to seven since the program’s inception last October.

The second-round Calling Card jury was comprised of Laura Michalchyshyn, programmer for Showcase; Jim Murphy, director of theatrical distribution for Motion International; and Bryan Gliserman, senior vp, Cineplex Odeon Films Canada.

Jury observers included Tom Berner, customer service representative for deluxe toronto, and Diane Cappeletto, regional account manager for Kodak.

– Snarling traffic in T.O.

Upcoming big-budget productions shooting in Toronto include Universal’s Bride Of Chucky with director Ronny Yu starting April 13.

Mini-major Phoenix Pictures’ Urban Legend begins April 20, with Jamie Blanks at the helm.

The tv series Total Recall commences production April 22, and David Cronenberg’s next feature, eXistenZ, starts a three-month shoot April 6. Both Total Recall and eXistenZ are from Alliance.