Montreal: Pioneer documentary filmmaker, ‘cinema direct’ militant and cinematographer Georges Dufaux is the recipient of this year’s Prix Albert-Tessier.

Still active in the industry at age 71, Dufaux emigrated from France in 1957 and worked at the National Film Board as dop, director and administrator from 1957 to 1989. He headed the nfb’s French Programme from 1986-89. Dufaux’s recent shoots include the Mort Ransen feature Shegalla, shot in b.c., and the cbc miniseries Big Bear, which will be broadcast Jan. 3 and 4, 1999.

Dufaux’s selected filmography includes City Out of Time (1959), Caroline (1964), Le Festin des morts (1965), Homme multiplie (1969), Osaka 70 (1969), Les Beaux souvenirs (1981), Une Histoire inventee (1990), La Demoiselle sauvage (1991), Souvenirs d’Othello (1995) and three episodes of the international women’s anthology series, Femmes: une histoire inedite (1996).

The annual Quebec government award for career contribution in cinema includes a cheque for $30,000.

*Pram’s world

Pram Productions International’s current slate includes shows for Life Network, Radio-Canada, Canal Vie and France’s TF1.

Michel St-Cyr, gm for Pram’s new English-track division, is exec producer of Trend Spotting, a 26 half-hour series for Toronto-based Life.

‘We’re talking about architecture, clothes and design,’ says St-Cyr. A segment called ‘Guilty Pleasures’ covers things like chocolates and martini bars.

The show uses ‘often ironic’ editorial titles but no host and was taped mainly in Montreal, along with Toronto, New York and Paris. The producer is Joan Takefman, a former producer with cfcf-tv.

Life execs include Barbara Williams, vp programming, and Jim Erickson, program director. The export agent is Nathalie D’Souza of Filmoption International.

There are high hopes Life will renew, but St-Cyr says a decision isn’t likely before early spring.

Pram-Quebec, headed by Isabelle Robert, is producing Kamikaze, an imported improv series for src; Le Combat des Chefs, a Canal Vie cooking game show formatted from the u.k. series Ready, Steady, Cook and seen on the Food Network in the u.s. as Ready, Set, Cook; and Etes-vous libre ce soir?, a single’s mag also seen on Canal Vie.

As for Pram’s Paris operation, Pram sarl, it’s producing four new 90-minute Surprise sur prise specials for TF1. Over the years the elaborate hidden-camera gag show has been sold to 72 countries.

Pram also produces comedy and concert specials, including two this year for Global-Quebec.

St-Cyr and producer/writer Heidi Berger are developing a doc on Jewish immigration in Montreal and New York during wwii.

Pierre Robert is Pram president and principal.

*More than pretty pictures

Montreal writer/director Pepita Ferrari has completed a second draft of The Emma Edmonds Story, a feature script based on the true story of Canada’s Civil War heroine, Sarah Emma Edmonds.

Raised in New Brunswick, Edmonds left home at 18 to sell bibles. ‘She dressed as a man and by the time the Civil War broke out she was only 21. She fought as a spy and a front-line hospital orderly,’ says the filmmaker.

Ferrari has pitched the project to Productions La Fete and Galafilm. They responded positively, but Ferrari says ‘it’s not going anywhere right now. In fact, I’m more interested in doing a third draft than anything.’

Ferrari is also developing Garden of Eve, a low-budget historical family drama, in association with producer Martin Paul-Hus of Amerique Film. And there’s a short film application at the Canada Council as well as a fascinating doc history series in development with Montreal filmmaker Anne Henderson.

Ferrari’s personal spin on history is to tell ‘stories in a new and innovative way that is more emotional so the audience becomes engaged. This is my objective as a filmmaker, to break through the pretty-picture syndrome [associated] with period film.’

Ferrari wrote and directed the critically acclaimed one-hour doc By Woman’s Hand, a portrait of Montreal women artists in the 1920s. Coproduced by Films Piche-Ferrari and the National Film Board and exported by Cambium Releasing and the nfb, the film recently sold to Bravo! Other projects include The Petticoat Expeditions, a one-hour doc on the Canadian travels of three Victorian women.

Ferrari’s partner, Louis Piche, is an animation director currently working on the Cinar Films’ series Mona the Vampire.

Ferrari was the only Quebecer to attend this year’s Women in the Director’s Chair workshop in Banff.

*How about the kids?

Cinar Films and Salt Lake City-based Feature Films for Families are shooting a second mow, Who Gets the House? Budgeted at $3.5 million, it’s a dramatic comedy about kids who take charge when their parents file for divorce after 20 years of marriage.

Filming goes from Nov. 20 to end of the year with Tim Nelson directing. Andre Guimond is production designer and Georges Archambault is the dop on this 35mm shoot. Cinar chairman Micheline Charest and president Ron Weinberg and fff ceo Forrest S. Baker iii are exec producing. Producers are Patricia Lavoie and Josee Mauffette.

fff will distribute on video and in limited theatrical release in the u.s., while Cinar has international tv and video rights.

Last fall, the two companies shot the mow The Ghost of Dickens’ Past.

In other news, Cinar and Simon & Shuster Interactive have unveiled plans to publish two cd-roms based on the popular preschool series Wimzie’s House. The show is broadcast on Radio-Canada, cbc, Tele-Quebec and pbs.

Both cd-roms and simultaneous digital video disc versions will be launched at the ’99 American International Toy Fair in New York, Feb. 8-15. Cinar and Micro-Intel are producing.

The new Wimzie multimedia titles will be published in both English and French and are designed for kiddies aged three to seven.

*Family films in Sicily

The 70-day Montreal leg of the autobiographical underworld miniseries Family: The Life and Times of Joseph Bonanno wrapped last week with an additional nine shooting days slated in Castellammare, Sicily and Rome, which is standing in for the Mafia capital of Palmero.

The story line in Italy (circa 1924) has a young Bonanno escaping with his life to Palmero after a spot of discord with Il Duce’s slack-jawed fascists.

Cast includes Oscar-winning actor Martin Laudau (Ed Wood, Crimes and Misdemeanors) as the elderly mobster, Edward James Olmos, and Canadian actors Bruce Ramsey and Tony Nardi as the young and middle-aged Bonanno, respectively.

Michel Poulette is directing and Productions La Fete’s Kevin Tierney is producing in association with Showtime Networks, exporter Hallmark Entertainment, Daniel L. Paulson Productions and Armeda.

Cast and crew will be home for the holidays, Dec. 21.