Each year at Banff, a number of producers are chosen to bring their developing projects to the attention of the international television industry in the hopes of securing coproduction partners and/or broadcaster interest. Playback went back to the 1998 pitchers to find out whether any of their projects have been greenlit for production since last year’s Banff Market Simulation.

Steve Westren had barely stepped off the stage at the 1998 Banff Market Simulation when The Comedy Network’s Ed Robinson cornered him and handed over a card. A moment later, Westren was whisked out the door by cbc’s George Anthony, who was interested in talking a development deal, but not before Channel 4’s Jacquie Lawrence suggested Westren pitch the u.k. broadcaster’s late-night commissioning editor.

Canadian production companies such as Catalyst, Alliance, Canamedia and Summerhill Entertainment were also among the suitors courting Westren after his pitch.

All the fuss was over Puppets Who Kill, a half-hour comedy series cocreated by Westren and John Pattison that’s set in a halfway house for some very delinquent puppets .

Conniving, bitter, vengeful, and twisted – you would not want to leave these anti-Muppets alone with your children. Bill the Reasonable Guy has had 58 ventriloquist partners die in very unlikely accidents, Rocko the dog sang one too many Skinnamarink songs and went berserk in the middle of a show for kids at a shopping mall, and never turn your back on Buttons the bear – especially if you are near the stairs.

Despite all the interest, Westren (a writer/juggler/puppeteer whose credits include Groundling Marsh, Wimzie’s House and Muppet tv specials) and Pattison (a writer/puppeteer/ventriloquist who trained with Jim Henson and worked on Fraggle Rock and the Universal feature The Bride of Chucky) had dreams of the big American deal.

The duo turned down offers at the cbc and Comedy. ‘I was seduced away by the Americans who kept spinning visions of enormous success in the u.s.,’ says Westren. ‘It was very seductive.’

They came close to a deal with a Canadian production company, but on the day a ‘null and void’ clause came into effect if they didn’t sign an agreement, Westren got a call from Jason Alexander’s production company, Angel Ark in l.a., where he had previously dropped off a proposal.

Pattison and Westren hopped on a plane to l.a., met Alexander ‘at his big fancy office on the lot of Universal and razzle dazzled him.’ Alexander loved the project and agreed that the partners would co-executive produce, with Alexander as executive producer.

The project was brought to Universal’s tv arm, Studios usa, with which Alexander had a first-look deal, and together (‘At this point there were nine of us in the room,’ recalls Westren) they went to Fox, which loved the idea and wanted a budget for a demo. However, they opted to go with upn, which gave them development money for a pilot script.

From October ’98 to February ’99, Westren, Pattison and Alexander worked on the pilot.

The experience was an eye-opener.

‘I was getting frustrated with the slow and arduous process,’ says Westren. ‘We were trying to satisfy the needs of upn and Jason’s sensibilities, and without realizing it, we went astray of our original concept.’

During this phase, Westren was struck with insomnia, found himself spending many a night on the Internet, and devised the concept for Internet Slutts, a comedy series centring on two edgy, jaded puppets – Murk, the twentysomething offspring of bicycle couriers, and Wally, the talking penis with a smoking problem – who check out the more bizarre sites on the Web and make their own scathing comments and insights on what they find. He sent a proposal off to Comedy.

upn passed on the Puppets Who Kill script, saying they were looking for a show to follow or lead into Dilbert and the pilot was too dark.

‘We were now looking at yet another long round of shopping, pitch meetings, negotiations and development with the u.s. broadcasters when all we really wanted to do was produce a great little show,’ says Westren. So they decided to sever the relationship with Alexander and go home.

‘After dealing with the big l.a. machine we realized that creatively we wanted to make our show here in Toronto, just get our guts up there on the screen.’

Westren called up Robinson at Comedy, who reconfirmed his interest in Puppets Who Kill and offered the largest budget the specialty channel has ever put up for a pilot.

In March, Westren produced the Internet Slutts pilot for Comedy and has been given the go-ahead on a series of at least 16 episodes. Westren will write some of the shows and will produce and direct with Rian Stockton and John Gundy.

The Puppets Who Kill pilot and the Internet Slutts series will both shoot in Toronto this summer.

Shawn Alex Thompson will direct Puppets Who Kill and The Newsroom editor Alan Novak is interested in coming on board, as is actor/writer Dan Redican.

With a pilot in hand, Westren says they will look to land an international distributor.