– Vancouver: Speculation suggests that Wayne Sterloff’s job at British Columbia Film is too much for one man or woman.

After 10 years at the helm, the founding president and ceo of the provincial funding agency is leaving at the end of May to pursue domestic production work in Vancouver.

And until his successor is named the job is going to be split up, a model that will likely have some longevity.

Lauren Davis, director of operations at B.C. Film, will fill in as acting executive director in charge of the day-to-day operations of the agency.

Venture capitalist Michael Francis, currently chair of B.C. Film, is going to fill in as acting president, overseeing funding, government lobbying, regulation and the board.

Sterloff says the job has a split personality and could easily go to two people. But who?

Here’s a summary of the candidates collected from those in the know.

Prime candidates, of course, are Davis and Francis. Davis has been groomed for an executive’s job having worked directly with Sterloff for two years.

Francis, meanwhile, might be enticed to add the president’s job to his other chores: entrepreneur, chair of the Vancouver International Film Festival, director of wic.

Others (and this is just an exercise to spark the imagination) include, for the president’s job, Carrie Hunter and Rob Egan. Hunter is the executive director for the B.C. Motion Picture Association, founding driving force of the annual Banff Television Festival, and a provincial voice in b.c.’s unhappiness with federal film policy. Egan works as the assistant deputy minister for culture in Jan Pullinger’s ministry. Pullinger is the minister responsible for film.

For the executive director’s job, Elizabeth Friesen and Alexandra Raffe are among the early favorites. Friesen, formerly of B.C. Film, is director of tv and multimedia at Telefilm Canada in Vancouver, while Raffe is ceo of the Ontario Film Development Corporation.

Wild cards run the gamut from locals to the international set. Vancouver independent producer Stephen Hegyes’ name came up and so did Ontario producer Steve DeNure’s. Channel Four commissioner Stuart Cosgrove, British producer Ralph Simon, Australia-based producer Al Clark and Columbia University professor Annette Insdorf are names on others’ If-I-Were-In-Charge wish lists.

Wh’ever takes on the job, however, will have to deal with an organization that has had its current budget slashed from $4 million to $3 million.

-Body count

By May 7, the u.s. box office tally for Kissed – which racked up a positive review in USA Today May 1 – was us$167,000. It opened stateside April 18.

Total prints in the u.s.: 18. Gross per screen: us$2,023, which is down 24% from the April 26 weekend and 56% from its opening three-day weekend.

Canadian distributor Malofilm d’esn’t talk numbers.

-Who dreams this stuff up?

MOW Nightmare Street stars Sherilyn Fenn (Twin Peaks) as a mother who has to escape a parallel universe to save her daughter. The show is for abc and shoots until May 29 in this universe.

tv movie Misbegotten, for hbo, stars Kevin Dillon (Stag) as a killer who is unable to perform sexually with women and poses as a music composer to donate his genes to a sperm bank. He then stalks the woman who becomes pregnant. Production gestates till May 21.

The Glass Cockpit, a tv movie for cbs shoots until June 2. Starring Robert Urich (Vegas) and Annette O’Toole (Superman), it tells the tale of a jet damaged on takeoff and the efforts of the crew to save it.

Jaclyn Smith of Charlie’s Angels fame stars in a Family Channel mow called Marriage is Forever, about a woman with amnesia who has to reconnect with her family. It shoots until May 23.

Advocate’s Devil, a movie-of-the-week for Columbia/TriStar and abc, shoots until June 13. Ken Olin (thirtysomething) stars in celebrated lawyer Alan Dershowitz’s fictional account of a date rape trial.

-Yokels

Vancouver’s grassroots independent film community has another micro-budget, seat-of-the-pants feature coming down the pike with Lured, produced by Vancouver’s Counterpoint Films. The entirely local project is written by J’e Carangi, directed by Jeremy Levin and performed by homegrown talent.

Budget is less than $60,000. The story focuses on two down-and-out actors who go to the big city in search of fame. Shot on 16mm, there is no distributor yet.

The Prince of Mulberry Street, produced in partnership with Robert and William Vince’s Vancouver-based Keystone Entertainment, is a feature that will get a theatrical release, says Keystone publicist Audrey Skalbania.

Keystone features tend to be the straight-to-video variety. Prince stars J’e Mantegna and Jennifer Tilly in a story about the son of a mob chieftain. Production wraps June 7.

Writer/director Kellie Benz’s The Second Coming – a 13-minute film about a party girl who sleeps with Jesus Christ – has been accepted into the Toronto Worldwide Short Film Festival, which runs in June. In April, it made its American debut at the Ohio Independent Film Festival.

Madam Rose, a sitcom about a psychic who moves in with her socialite sister and uptight brother-in-law, wrapped its pilot episode in Squamish in April.

Real-life professional psychic Diane Mills plays the lead of the show that is produced by Sea To Sky Entertainment and aired on the Squamish/Whistler community access stations in April. Creator Adriane Polo is shopping the series idea to other broadcasters.

-Who’s public now?

Megabyte is about to become a high roller on the stock market. The ReBoot villain and other characters created by Mainframe Entertainment, will be the assets behind an initial public offering. Proceeds of the offering, which were not projected in the initial announcement, will be used to develop and finance a feature film, finance current productions (including ReBoot and Beasties), and equipment and software acquisitions.

Meanwhile, it has been a rich three months for Rainmaker Digital’s fiscal 1997. Revenues are up 95% to $6 million over the same period last year and net earnings are up 94% to $873,000. Rainmaker says it has experienced growth in all of its divisions, buoyed by increased digital effects work in Vancouver and its new facility in l.a.