Phil Fairclough, a U.S.- and U.K.-based factual specialist producer, and veteran Canadian showrunner John LaRose have teamed to launch a Toronto production office, Two Wise Monkeys Canada.

Fairclough (pictured left), who co-founded U.S.-headquartered Two Wise Monkeys with his partner, National Geographic Explorer Mireya Mayor, is known for executive producing feature docs such as Werner Herzog’s Grizzly Man, Encounters at the End of the World and Cave of Forgotten Dreams. He recently took Cher to Pakistan to make Cher & The Loneliest Elephant, and has also held executive positions at Discovery Channel U.S., the BBC Natural History Unit and ITV.

Fairclough and LaRose (pictured right) decided to launch the joint venture after collaborating on the true-crime series Dying to Be Famous (Bounce TV and Court TV/Ion Mystery), about the death of model Ryan Singleton.

The pair’s second collab, and first under the Two Wise Monkeys Canada banner, is the three-part, blue-chip nature series Great Lakes Untamed, which debuted Monday (Sept. 26) on TVO. Fairclough and LaRose coproduced the series with Oak Island Films and Merit Motion Pictures, in association with TVO, the Smithsonian Channel, Terra Mater Factual Studios and Arte France.

Two Wise Monkeys Canada is currently pitching a slate of true-crime, paranormal, history, science and nature series, one of which involves exhuming the grave of legendary outlaw Bonnie Parker (of Bonnie and Clyde infamy).

“John did such an amazing job showrunning Dying to Be Famous, a very complex investigation produced at record speed in extremely challenging circumstances, that we decided we should team up north of the border,” said Fairclough in a release. “Over the years I have done a lot of work in Canada, but my recent experiences on Dying to Be Famous and Great Lakes Untamed really showed me [that] the factual TV community in Toronto is second to none.”

“When Phil proposed we team up, I jumped at the chance,” added LaRose, who will be managing director of the new venture. “We’ve known each other a long time, worked together on several productions, and we have exactly the same creative passion and an uncompromising approach to production.”

This story originally appeared in Realscreen