To speak to Don McKellar, you might find him a curious choice to lead a Banff master class on writing.

For one thing, he says he finds screenwriting a slogging task that he must cajole himself into completing.

‘I don’t want to suggest I’m a brave warrior. I have a low attention level. And I find writing difficult. Unless I’m sort of tricking or surprising myself, I couldn’t really do it,’ he explains, packing his bags for Banff.

This element of surprise comes out in the writing itself. Despite a prodigious output – from feature films Highway 61, The Red Violin and Last Night (which he also starred in and directed) to the TV series Twitch City – McKellar is renowned for tackling the new, different and difficult.

Waking at dawn to sharpen a couple of pencils and sit down to writing? Not McKellar.

‘I wish I did, and my producers wish even more,’ he adds.

But McKellar’s admission of his difficulty at writing uncovers a clue to one side of his temperament – he may be forever humble, affable and self-deprecating, but he is not one to merely make a comfortable living off film or TV scribing. Instead, he aims at scripts written from the edge, and on the edge.

‘When exploring a project, it’s important to consider why you’re engaging in that medium at that time,’ he offers. ‘Good TV is something that takes TV seriously as a medium and does something that only TV can do.’

McKellar also argues that while film or TV projects begin with the written word, a script should not be ‘literary or authorial.’ Rather, he strives for a ‘filmic’ language.

Not one to toot his own horn, McKellar can’t point to any one piece of his film or TV writing that is more personally cherished than others, saying only that ‘I don’t think to this point I’ve written anything that took me backwards in my career.’

And while McKellar says that writing ultimately gives him the most creative satisfaction, it can also be a lonely craft. Meanwhile, acting gets him out of the house, while directing allows him to be ‘commanding people.’

‘I’m pretty controlling, and I would encourage writers to be the same,’ he suggests, adding that you have to know what you’re talking about when fighting from your corner. ‘It doesn’t help if you’re controlling and naive.’

But the triple-threat talent insists he does not give in to volatile public indulgence.

‘I don’t generally scream,’ he insists. Instead, he embraces a collaborative approach to film and TV production, learned when he was once part of a group running a live theatre company.

‘There were three of us, and we felt the best idea would win out. Of course, that was a bit Utopian and didn’t last forever. But if you can reason your argument and you’re right, you have a good chance of winning in the end,’ he advises.

Also not lasting forever, he fears, is financing and support in Canada for homegrown film and TV projects.

‘The funding system and TV system have never been worse,’ he says. He insists it is more important than ever to create innovative movies and TV shows, ‘if for nothing else than to prove these funding bodies wrong.’

So great are the hurdles emerging in McKellar’s path, and in that of other Canuck creatives, that he is rethinking an earlier decision to resist migrating to Hollywood for job security and possible stardom.

‘I thought [Canada] was a place where innovation was not only possible, but was required to succeed. Now, for the first time, I’m questioning that,’ he says.

It doesn’t help that he sees Hollywood surpassing Canada in respecting network TV writer/producers and auteur filmmakers.

‘This is the first time [the mainstream public] can mention the names of Hollywood writer/producers,’ he remarks.

Having taken his share of Hollywood meetings already, McKellar is not altogether ruling out working there.

Still, he likes his chances in Canada.

‘At this point, when I’ve had my own TV series and almost all that I’ve written has been produced, I’m grateful and would be foolish to give that up,’ he says.

McKellar’s most recent and upcoming work is in the acting and directing realms, however. He has just completed an acting stint on the Rhombus Media 6 x 60 comedy Slings and Arrows and is getting ready to direct the adaptation of The Colony of Unrequited Dreams, the acclaimed Wayne Johnston novel featuring a fictionalized central character based on long-serving Newfoundland premier Joey Smallwood. But McKellar won’t have to agonize over the writing on this one – Michael Amo (Tagged: The Jonathan Wamback Story) is penning the adaptation.