as indigenous production increases and more foreign projects are being attracted to the production centers between Vancouver and Toronto, production companies in the West are growing and forming ties outside their ‘hood. And Edmonton’s Great North Productions and Releasing, a frequent attendee of national and international markets and festivals, has played a part in this outgrowth.

This has been an exciting year for Edmonton’s Great North Communications.

Deals were signed with Nelvana to coproduce the 13-part tv series Jake and the Kid, scheduled to begin production April 1995 and with Toronto-based Atlantis Films to coproduce a number of productions, including the successful continuing drama series, Destiny Ridge and the upcoming four-hour drama, The Voyage of Naparima, a coproduction with Ireland, now in final draft. As well, Atlantis became a minority investor in Great North.

Great North Productions was formed in 1987 when president Andy Thomson, who had worked at the National Film Board in Montreal for 13 years, moved to Alberta to work on the mammoth Canada/China coproduction, In Search of the Dragon. Thomson wanted to create a company that resembled Atlantis, which he had worked closely with when he was at the nfb.

What followed were several successful productions, including Great North’s first drama, Life After Hockey; Tom Alone, a tv movie coproduced with Atlantis for cbc; and Destiny Ridge, now in its second season on CanWest Global.

Great North Productions and Great North Releasing (the distribution arm) fall under Great North Communications. This year, Great North Communications went from owning 0% to 100% of Great North Releasing, formerly owned by minority shareholders, among them Atlantis.

In late summer, Atlantis acquired a 20% minority interest in Great North Communications, not surprising considering Thomson’s past relationship with the company.

Capital from the Atlantis deal is being used by Great North to offset restructuring costs and add staff. Newcomers to the fold are documentary staff producer Jill Sharp and managing director of Great North Releasing, Paul Black. Executive assistants have also been added to each department.

Thomson says one of the reasons Great North wanted to expand was to take advantage of the opportunities provided by the new specialty channels in Canada, such as its new documentary series (with cfrn-tv Edmonton) Acorn: The Nature Nut and the 13-part series Peregrinations for Discovery.

The other reason for seeking capital infusion was to position the company to take advantage of growing international coproduction opportunity. Thomson points to the one-hour documentary about St. Patrick currently being produced for a&e in the u.s., s4c in Wales and rte in Ireland, as an example.

At the Banff Television Festival in June 1993, Toronto’s PTV Productions and Great North Productions announced the formation of the Canadian International Documentary Consortium to specialize in the development and international marketing of independent Canadian documentaries. The organization serves as a broker between small producers and established international documentary outlets such as pbs in the u.s., the bbc in the u.k. and ard in Germany.

cidc provides fund-raising, distribution and administrative services for independent documentary producers. As well it will release Canadian film internationally through Great North Releasing.

cidc has invested in three documentary projects – A Brush with Life, In Search of Moby Dick and Strange Empire – and has sponsored a documentary seminar at Banff last year and will again this year.

cidc is in the process of repping a number of documentary projects and trying to finance them through presales, most recently at the London market and Sharing Stories in Edinburgh.

Thomson says he might consider taking the company public in a couple of years.

In the meantime, Great North is certainly the rising star of the West. Indeed, with the sustained production of Destiny Ridge and the involvement of such a major player as Atlantis, the company can only add to its already distinguished image.