– Sliders slips back to TV on Global and Space

Life imitated art when a new fourth season of Sliders, a show about traveling through parallel dimensions, debuted on Global Television this month, and the original three seasons will premier on specialty channel Space: The Imagination Station in July.

Fox canceled the Universal-produced Sliders after its third season due to marginal network ratings (the show premiered in 1995), but fan outcry led to Universal’s decision to produce a fourth season for the Sci-Fi Channel in the States. When Sliders went back into production, Global, the original Canadian broadcaster of the show, acquired the new episodes. Space will carry the new episodes in September 1999.

Sliders premiered on Global on Sunday, May 17 at 10 p.m. in Ontario, Vancouver and Quebec, following The X-Files, and at 9 p.m. in Winnipeg, Regina and Saskatoon. It will launch on Friday, May 22 in the Atlantic provinces.

The timing of the show was no coincidence. May 17 marked The X-Files’ season finale, which leads viewers to the series’ summer movie.

‘There’s a very compatible audience between X-Files and Sliders,’ says Doug Hoover, national vp of programming and promotions at Global. Mulder and Scully have averaged about 2.5 million viewers this season, so at press time, Hoover was expecting ‘a huge audience’ for the Sliders premiere.

‘It’s a little early to tell,’ Hoover adds, whether Sunday will be a permanent slot for the show. ‘We wanted to get some ratings results and get a better feel for the summer schedules from the u.s. networks.’

Sliders takes over the 10 p.m. time slot from The Outer Limits, which will find a new slot once the summer schedule is set, according to Shea Warrington, spokesperson for Global.

After the new Sliders episodes end on Global, the series slides over to chum’s Space, which launches the three original seasons on Monday, July 6 at 8 p.m.

‘[Sliders] was on our wish list from day one,’ says Isme Bennie, director of programming and acquisitions at Space. Despite an audience campaign to bring Sliders to Space, Bennie says, ‘they didn’t influence our choice; we knew it was the right thing for us to have.’

Space is also scheduling Sliders near The X-Files. ‘I knew several months ago that Sliders was going to be possible,’ Bennie explains, ‘so I kept in mind that I would want it at 8 o’clock [for] as many days of the week as possible.’ The series’ three seasons will run four times per week before Star Trek: Deep Space Nine at 10 p.m. and The X-Files at 11 p.m.

– Fore!

Global will induce heavy remote competition with Golf Channel addicts when the Samsung Canadian PGA Championship tees off on Saturday, Aug. 22 and Sunday, Aug. 23 from 4-6 p.m. (est) on the dancing fruit net. The tournament will be broadcast nationally from the Forest City National Golf Club in London, Ont.

– CHRO adopts All My Children

As part of its pledge to program 100% Canadian content, the cbc will let its contract run out on American soap All My Children, after 22 years. chum-owned chro in Ottawa will take the show under its wings in September for an undisclosed fee.

chro (Channel 43, Cable 6) is still ironing out the details, but it looks like the soap will air weekdays at 1 p.m., like it has on any network since before Susan Lucci’s first Daytime Emmy nomination.

chro currently airs Body Tech (an exercise program) and MovieTelevision during the 1 p.m. time slot. According to chro publicist Jennifer Grant, Body Tech airs three times per day, so in September they’ll probably only run it twice. As for MovieTelevision, she adds, the station will change it to another yet-to-be determined time slot. It also runs Monday at 10 p.m.

– Open Mike renewed

Open Mike with Mike Bullard has been renewed for 40 weeks in the 1998/99 season on ctv and The Comedy Network. The new episodes will begin Sept. 14 in its current time slots, 10 p.m. on Comedy and weeknights at 12:35 a.m. on ctv. During the summer, Open Mike repeats will air on Comedy weeknights at 10, but not on ctv.

The new episodes will be taped at the show’s new home, The Masonic Temple, known as The Concert Hall, in Toronto at Yonge and Davenport. Baton Broadcasting purchased the Masonic Temple with proceeds from the sale of a company-owned surplus property elsewhere. Open Mike was previously taped in Studio 99 at Wayne Gretsky’s restaurant.

– Speaking of Mike…

TV personalities galore will be hosting the 14th Annual Sick Kids Telethon. Lloyd Robertson returns to cohost with Liz Grogan from wtn’s Doctor on Call and Globetrotters. Ken Shaw, anchor of CFTO News at 11:30, will be master of ceremonies. Mike Bullard and enow’s Carla Collins will host the late-night portion of the 24-hour live broadcast, which airs on cfto and mctv in Northern Ontario, starting at 7 p.m. (est) Saturday, May 30.

– We’re #1!

From March 2 to April 6, according to Nielsen Media Research, teletoon had a 10.4% weekend share of kids aged two to 11, putting the family animation station at number one specialty channel on Saturday and Sunday, 6 a.m. to midnight. teletoon ranked a 1.6% share (11,000 viewers) with women 18-34 .

According to bbm’s spring ’98 sweeps report, Montreal’s anglophone extended market, adults 18 to 49, have made wic-owned English-language station CFCF 12 number one (30.9) from Monday to Sunday, 6 a.m. to 2 a.m. (full week). cfcf outranked Global (10), cbmt (7.5), WPTZ (7.1), WCAX (5.1), WFFF (4.8) and WVNY (4).

– Let the flag waving begin

CFMT-TV, the Ontario multicultural station, kicks off its coverage of the 16th World Cup soccer tournament on Wednesday, June 10 at 11 a.m. The exclusive holder of multilingual broadcast rights in Canada, cfmt will broadcast 46 of the 64 scheduled final competition matches in four languages. The World Cup schedule will, in some cases, pre-empt the produced language programming and daytime talk shows. ‘I’ve got maybe 60 pages of [schedule changes],’ says Sandy Zwyer, cfmt’s program information coordinator.

The closing games air on Sunday, July 12 at 2:30 p.m.