When Veronica Tennant approached Rhombus Media with the suggestion that the National Ballet of Canada’s production of The Four Seasons should be remounted for television, the idea was soon added to the award-winning arts production company’s slate.

Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons, choreographed by James Kudelka and featuring Rex Harrington and other dancers of the National Ballet, is being shot as a one-hour special for cbc, with the bbc coproducing and Bravo! set for a second window.

The $1-million program goes into production on May 31 in Toronto, under the direction of Barbara Willis Sweete. Rhombus’ Daniel Iron and Tennant are the coproducers.

When recreating dance for television, Iron says, ‘the camera becomes like another dancer, so the camera moves are quite detailed, and recreating the lighting involves a lot of sensitivity.’

The National Arts Centre Orchestra, conducted by Pinchus Zuckerman, will perform The Four Seasons for the production.

*Barna-Alper expands drama slate

Following the success of Milgaard, which attracted more than 1.5 million viewers when it aired on ctv last month, Barna-Alper Productions is continuing to expand its drama production with a tv movie called Scorn.

A coproduction with Face to Face of Vancouver, Scorn tells the true story of a high-school student who murdered his mother and his grandmother so that he could collect his inheritance. Scorn’s anti-hero ‘even tried to recruit candidates for the murder from his school, but no one took him seriously,’ says Barna-Alper president Laszlo Barna, who is co-executive producing the mow with Face to Face’s Chris Bruyere.

Directed by Sturla Gunnarsson, the $3.2-million production has been licensed by cbc and greenlit by Telefilm Canada. It goes into production late summer.

Barna-Alper is also in preproduction on Frontiers of Construction, a 13-hour science and technology series which profiles some of the leading mega-projects from Canadian construction companies, both at home and around the world.

Meanwhile, Da Vinci’s Inquest, a coproduction with Haddock Entertainment in Vancouver, has been renewed by cbc for 13 episodes, and Turning Points, a documentary series chronicling milestones of history, is moving into its third season on History Television.

This year, Barna says his company is producing 15 hours of primetime drama and 26 hours of documentaries.

*High Road takes Las Vegas

High Road Productions is currently in preproduction on Blues Brothers Take Las Vegas, a documentary about two Toronto boys, Wayne Catania and Kieron Lafferty, who have made a name for themselves as the best Blues Brothers impersonators at the infamous Legends stage show in Toronto and are called by the Las Vegas Legends show to audition at the Imperial Palace.

‘It’s an Alice in Wonderland story with all the glitz of America, the story of people who don’t know who they are sometimes, who are caught up in the lives of others,’ says David Ostriker, exec producer of the $1.2-million documentary.

A broadcast deal is in the works, says Ostriker, however he is reluctant to reveal the details as yet. High Road’s Paul Jay is producing and directing, with Sally Blake coproducing. Joan Hutton is the cinematographer. The doc will be distributed internationally by High Road International.

Another High Road project, Through Thick and Thin, is a documentary dealing with the hidden causes of anorexia and bulimia. ‘This is an issue of tremendous importance to all young women around the world, and to all of us,’ says Ostriker. The $240,000 project was commissioned by CBC Newsworld and has just been greenlit by Telefilm Canada’s Equity Investment Program.

‘This is the first time Newsworld has had access to Telefilm’s eip funding for coproductions,’ says Jerry McIntosh, executive producer of documentaries for Newsworld. In the future, says McIntosh, Newsworld has plans to commission more documentaries than it has in the past. While a final decision has yet to be made as to where Through Thick and Thin will be slotted, McIntosh says it will most likely air on the weekly doc series The Passionate Eye.

Leslie Cote and Felecia Francescut are codirecting, Jay is producing and Ostriker is exec producing.

Opening the Books of the Cold War, another High Road project in the very early stages of development, will give a new spin to the end of the Cold War. The five-part factual miniseries will examine the rise of national violence and corrupt regimes – from the former Soviet Union to Latin America, encompassing the Middle East and the now fragmented Yugoslavia.

‘We will ask some probing questions like, `Where have the weapons gone?’ `What was their benefit?’ ‘ explains Ostriker. ‘The seeds of the havoc that we’re seeing now in the world were planted during the Cold War.’

*L.A. Exposure

Toronto filmmaker Francine Zuckerman’s one-hour documentary Exposure: environmental links to breast cancer is having its u.s. launch with a Tinseltown party hosted by Kim Campbell of the Canadian Consulate in Los Angeles and cosponsored by Raleigh Studios of l.a. and the Breast Cancer Fund of San Francisco. Hosted and narrated by Olivia Newton-John, the film portrays several high-profile Canadian and American women who personally battled breast cancer. The film was broadcast on CBC Newsworld’s Rough Cuts and has also been sold to tvontario and wtn.

Zuckerman is now in the midst of turning one of her own dreams into a film. Using a mixture of memory and fantasy, D is for Deborah tells the story of a father and daughter on a road trip. In the course of the 21-minute short drama, the daughter reveals to her father the real story of her life.

‘They really come to terms with their own lives, dealing with regret, death, love, approval, all the basic stuff,’ says Zuckerman. Coproduced by Paula Fleck, with Rudi Blahacek signed on as dop, the project has been mentored by Elinor Reid (Gerry & Tom), who is guiding Zuckerman in her transition to drama from documentaries.

The budget for D is for Deborah is so far under $100,000, and Zuckerman says cbc, wtn and Vision tv have already expressed interest. She’s planning some innovative fundraising, including a big bash to help raise private donations.

*Stupid is. . .

Ellis Entertainment continues its foray into children’s programming with a project titled Stupidity Through the Ages, 13 half-hours aimed at kids aged eight to 13. Still in the early stages of development, ‘the program will have a comedic, almost Monty Python-esque style,’ says Stephen Ellis, president of Ellis.

‘Throughout the ages, there have been all sorts of historical things that have gone wrong, whether they are medical, scientific or military,’ says Ellis.

Continuing with the focus on nature stories, Ellis is in preproduction on Echoes of the North, a one-hour documentary that tells the story of a family of loons living on a lake in Northern Ontario.

‘It really is the quintessential Canadian story,’ says Ellis.

Shooting begins this summer on the approximately $500,000 production, with Kip Spidell producing, Ralph Ellis directing and John Petrella the dop. cbc has expressed interest in the project.

Also in preproduction is Devil Beast (working title), a one-hour documentary about wolverines, which Ellis says has attracted interest from Discovery in the u.s. Producer Spidell has actually acquired a wolverine from birth and is working to get it acclimatized to humans in time for the shoot starting in May. Discovery in the u.s.

Both Devil Beast and Echoes of the North have been financed internally and will be available by mid 2000. Ellis Releasing is handling all projects.

*Striking a Sacred Balance

Kensington Communications, producer of the docudrama series Exhibit A, now in its third season on Discovery and The Learning Channel, is in development on Sacred Balance, a 6 x 1-hour documentary series for cbc based on David Suzuki and Amanda McConnell’s best-selling book of the same name.

‘If we understand our place in nature, we will be less likely to destroy it, says Sacred Balance’s executive producer Robert Lang. The series will be shot around the world on a multimillion dollar budget. Suzuki and McConnell, the series’ cowriters, will also coproduce.

‘Sacred Balance will use very high-end natural history animation,’ says Lang. 4:2:2 out of Bristol, Eng., a company known for its science and nature animation work for the bbc, will supply the animation segments for the series. ‘It’s very high-end cg animation, which enables the viewer to see the tiniest microscopic molecule,’ says Lang.

Lang says 4:2:2 is setting up shop in Toronto to work on the project and is considering establishing more permanent digs here. Lang is currently negotiating with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and pbs for a second window.

*The river wild

Stemming out of its Great Canadian Parks series for Discovery Canada, Good Earth Productions is getting ready to document the last wild river in Canada, Tatshenshini River, which runs northwest of b.c. into Alaska.

Mitch Azaria, Good Earth executive producer, says the one-hour documentary (working titled The Last Wild River) will show this unique river which has been spared the disruption of human settlement on its shores. Ihor Macijiwsky, cinematographer on Great Canadian Parks, is the dop.

Azaria hopes to capture the rare blue black bear, often found in the area near the river. The documentary will be shot mid-June on a budget of $200,000, and is slated for broadcast on Discovery in January.

*Eye of the storm

Hurricane Mitch and Claire, a one-hour documentary shot by Claire Hurtubise, a young Canadian filmmaker who grew up in Honduras, is now in post-production. The child of a family of missionaries who worked in Honduras, Hurtubise returned to her homeland three weeks after Hurricane Mitch to record the destruction and reveal the stories of the survivors of the storm, which killed more than 20,000 people. All of her family’s belongings were destroyed in the disaster while they were on an extended visit to Canada.

The doc has been privately funded so far and shot on Hurtubise’s own camera. Executive producer is Phay Wills (fundraising and special projects consultant of wift-t) and associate producer is Clisson Larrea. Wills is currently approaching broadcasters and distributors for completion funding.

*Cracked gets distributor

Cracked, a docudrama about crack cocaine addiction shot on the streets of Toronto from Motion Video, has just been picked up by distributor Magic Lantern Communications, one of Canada’s largest distributors of educational programming. Produced by the director/producer team of Joe Carso and Frank Elsasser, Cracked stars Joseph Clark (Edison: The Wizard of Light, Future Fear).