After a two-month delay, Prairie Giant: The Tommy Douglas Story – the 2 x 120 miniseries from Regina’s Minds Eye Entertainment – will air on CBC on Sunday, March 12 and Monday, March 13 at 8 p.m.

Originally set to air over two nights in mid-January, the broadcast of the $4-million mini was delayed by CBC because of the run-up to the federal election. According to Kevin DeWalt, president of Minds Eye, the original timeslot had been scheduled for six months before it was bumped. He says having to move its airdate was disappointing, but understands why the Ceeb felt it was the right thing to do.

‘I guess they thought it was too political to be aired near an election,’ says DeWalt. ‘It’s hard not to cover off on some of the political side to [Douglas].’

Douglas, named ‘The Greatest Canadian’ in a CBC series in 2004, started the CCF political party, precursor to the New Democratic Party. He was premier of Saskatchewan from 1944 to 1961 and introduced universal public medicare to Canadians.

In a December letter – responding to criticism the broadcaster had received from lobby group Friends of Canadian Broadcasting for delaying the airing – Eva Czigler, CBC’s acting exec director of network programming, wrote, ‘It is our belief that to broadcast a major biographical program series about a man closely identified with one political party and one set of views seven days before the federal election would risk giving the appearance of bias. Rather than take that risk, we decided to postpone the series.’ 

But DeWalt says that the delay may actually work to the big-ticket mini’s advantage.

‘We’ve had a few more months to promote and get the word out, so maybe in hindsight it was a blessing,’ says DeWalt.

The push behind Prairie Giant from the broadcaster has been significant. It has benefited from heavy support during CBC’s coverage of the Winter Olympics with TV trailers and spots.

‘[The broadcast delay] afforded us an opportunity to promote to a very broad audience,’ says Chuck Thompson, CBC’s director of communications for English television. ‘We get a very good cross-section of demographics of both genders that come to the Games, and people that don’t watch CBC all the time.’

Directed by John N. Smith (Random Passage) and written by Bruce Smith (The Investigation), Prairie Giant stars Michael Therriault as Douglas, Kristen Booth as his wife Irma, and Don McKellar as Saskatchewan finance minister Clarence Fines. Shot in winter/spring last year, the production chronicles Douglas’ life from the 1930s – when he arrived in Saskatchewan – to the 1970s. The shoot stayed entirely in Saskatchewan – known for its 1930s and ’40s architecture – except for one second unit day in Ottawa.

‘We wouldn’t have been able to do it anywhere else in the country, because doing period stuff is not cheap,’ says DeWalt. ‘For the budget we had, I think we’ve delivered extremely high production values.’

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