Salter Street’s Bill Niven has switched hats, stepping down as vp of development and moving into production with 40 15-minute episodes of Pirates, a new preschool puppet series for ytv.

Written by Jeff Rosen (Theodore Tugboat) and Greg Malone (codco), the show is aimed at the three-to-five set and combines contemporary-looking puppets, cgi and music. Niven says the series should allow him to put his education degree from McGill University to good use. A director has not yet been named.

Also new on Salter’s production slate is Mrs. Greenthumbs, a 26 half-hour comedic gardening show for Life Network; The Industry, a six half-hour comedy series for cbc starring Rick Mercer; Amp’d, a half-hour pilot for The Comedy Network, and the one-hour The Cathy Jones Comedy Special, also for cbc.

– Pinsent wins, again

Shooting began in Toronto June 12 and wrapped in Cape Breton June 24 on cbc’s $2-million mow Win, Again!, directed by Eric Till and produced by Robert Sherrin.

Gordon Pinsent penned and stars in the two-hour tv movie about a man who is set free after being wrongfully convicted of murder and the complications that arise when he returns to his Nova Scotia home.

Win, Again! also stars Gabrielle Rose (The Sweet Hereafter), Michael Riley (Perfectly Normal), Leah Pinsent (More Tears) and Eric Peterson (DaVinci’s Inquest).

– December 1917 posts

The Halifax Explosion, which killed or injured more than 2,000 people when two foreign munitions ships collided in Halifax harbor on Dec. 6, 1917, is the subject of a half-hour drama from Chronicle Pictures and Charles Bishop Productions for Global.

Now in post-production, December 1917 is part of Global’s Atlantic Drama Initiative and is budgeted at around $500,000. The film was shot over six days earlier this month on locations in and around Halifax, including Citadel Hill, the Public Gardens and Halifax harbor.

Evangelo Kioussis and director Scott Simpson penned the original script, which tells the tragic story through the eyes of an elderly woman as she reflects on her days as a young Halifax nurse during wwi.

December 1917 is set to air Aug. 29. Kioussis and Chronicle partner Craig Cameron are the coproducers and Charles Bishop and David Coole of Charles Bishop Productions are executive producers.

Chronicle has a tv series and a feature film in early development.

– Dooley Gardens shoots

Shooting began May 27 in St. John’s on Rink Rat Productions’ Dooley Gardens, a six half-hour sitcom for cbc.

Scheduled to wrap on June 28, the $2.1-million series is set in the oldest hockey rink in St. John’s and stars Andy Jones, Mary Walsh, Andrew Younghusband, Nicole deBoer and Derek Duggan. Rink Rat’s Mary Sexton is producing.

Funding sources included Telefilm Canada, the ctcpf lfp and the Newfoundland and Labrador Film Development Corporation.

– Two on the go from d’Entremont

Documentary producer/director Peter d’Entremont, president of Halifax’s Triad Films, has two projects headed for production this summer.

D’Entremont is executive producing The Spark and the Keeper of the Flame, a $300,000, one-hour documentary on Inuit art slated to begin shooting in late July, with local ad John Houston making his directorial debut.

Also skedded for a late July shoot is Military Wives, with another first-time director, Wanda Graham, at the helm. The $200,000 doc for Baton is a personal story about growing up in the military.

D’Entremont recently wrapped production on The Illuminated Life of Maud Lewis, a $400,000 documentary on the Nova Scotia folk artist with the National Film Board for Vision tv. The film was shot over the course of a year in what d’Entremont describes as a ‘really stylized way,’ with actors recreating pieces of Lewis’ life.

D’Entremont is hoping the film will unspool at the Atlantic and Toronto festivals.

– Prepping for Paradise

Fredericton’s Atlantic Mediaworks is in preproduction on Paradise Sighting, a $400,000 half-hour drama for cbc slated to go before the cameras in August.

David Petersen will direct and Didier Maigret will shoot the coming-of-age story about two teenage boys laying a railroad track near a New Brunswick internment camp during the summer of 1945. Bruce McKenna wrote the screenplay based on a short story by Alan Donaldson.

The three-week shoot will take place outside of Moncton and producer Daphne Curtis says as many New Brunswick crew as possible will be used.