You rang, again?

Vancouver – Vancouver producer Gavin Wilding’s chaotic production year takes a new turn with the return of the comedy Bob the Butler, which was supposed to go ahead in March in Victoria but is now scheduled for Aug. 9 to Sept. 3 in Vancouver.

Wilding says Bob the Butler’s financing was thrown into crisis by the clampdown on British tax shelters earlier this spring. (It was the same for Wilding’s production of Chaos – the Wesley Snipes thriller – which lived up to its name with a number of production shutdowns during its Vancouver run this year.)

The $4.5-million comedy, using the U.K. sale-and-leaseback program, also had to replace its U.K. partner, moving from Baker Street Films to Venus Film Partnership, says Wilding.

Tom Green and Brooke Shields star. Production delays mean that John Cleese, originally cast, wasn’t available because of the promotional obligations of Shrek 2. British actor John Fortune (Calendar Girls) replaces Cleese in the new production schedule, which will do four days of production in the U.K. when it moves from Vancouver.

Brit director Gary Sinyor (The Bachelor) helms the story about an aspiring butler who travels to the U.K. for training.

Wilding says his next venture will be Foursome, the film adaptation of the play by Jackson Davies. Production on the story, about a set of friends who reunite for a game of golf, is supposed to begin in October, with British Columbia Film, the CanWest Western Independent Producers Fund and other investors attached. Equinoxe is set to distribute. Ian Edwards

Feature debut for Kwan

Vancouver – Local short film writer/director Julia Kwan (Three Sisters on Moon Lake) makes her feature-film debut with Eve and the Fire Horse, one of the last features to benefit from the outgoing Feature Film Fund at British Columbia Film.

Production runs July 23 to Aug. 21, mostly in New Westminster.

The Vancouver-made drama, in production for less than $2 million, tells the 1970s-era story of an imaginative nine-year-old girl learning about life and death through the passing of her grandmother and the religious conversions of her mother and sister.

Along with the B.C. Film money is funding assistance from Telefilm Canada, CanWest Western Independent Producers Fund, The Harold Greenberg Fund and non-industry private investor Tom Brown. Mongrel Media is the distributor.

Vivian Wu (The Joy Luck Club) and Lester Chan (Eat Drink Man Woman) star with two young newcomers from Vancouver – Phoebe Kut (who plays Eve) and Hollie Low (the elder sister).

Screenwriter Kwan has already won a Writers Guild of Canada award for the script, which includes a number of blue-screen/CGI effects inspired by Eve’s imagination. Artifex Studios of North Vancouver will supply the visual effects.

Shan Tam (Lunch with Charles), Erik Paulsson (Protection) and Yves Ma are producing the feature. Ian Edwards