One of Western Canada’s oldest production companies celebrates its 20th anniversary this year.

In two decades, Winnipeg’s Credo Group has worked on everything from cartoon commercials, to a touching portrayal of a young ballerina who lost her will to live.

‘Turning 20 isn’t difficult,’ shrugs Credo cofounder Derek Mazur. ‘It feels much like it did when I turned 40. It’s really quite amazing.’

Mazur and Brad Caslor started the company in the fall of 1974 to produce animated commercials, spots for Sesame Street and independent shorts. A couple of years later they branched into live commercials for national clients like General Motors and McDonald’s.

They added industrial films to their repertoire, landing government contracts with successful showings at worlds fairs in Brisbane, Australia and Seville, Spain.

‘We didn’t think, `how long would it last?’, we were just creating jobs for ourselves,’ says Caslor. ‘Derek looked after the business and I handled the animation. We took it as far as it would go.’

In Caslor’s case, it went as far as 1986 when he decided to withdraw. His high point at Credo came just before he left with the release of his animated classic, Get a Job.

‘In the early days we all used to do everything,’ says the company’s first employee, Joan Scott. We spent hours and hours painting cels.’

Scott started as a secretary, but soon moved into film production, eventually buying Caslor’s shares when he left the company after 12 years.

Credo began to shift away from commercials after making Steam, Schemes, and the National Dream, the historical drama shot for Parks Canada and used in the Cave and Basin display at Banff National Park.

‘This is what triggered it,’ says Scott. ‘We were always interested in drama but making that film pushed us over the edge.’

This initial taste prompted Credo to slip out of commercial production. That, combined with an accurate forecast of gray clouds on the advertising horizon.

‘We noticed the recession coming,’ says Mazur. ‘We could see that budgets would be dropping and there was less activity in Winnipeg. Besides, we didn’t really want to be making commercials when we were 60.’

They tried both formats for a while but soon realized the vast difference between the two. ‘Each requires a whole different group of people to deal with. The clientele and the politics are much different,’ says Mazur. The competition for attention was splitting their energies, so five years ago they decided to jump into drama full time.

They were rewarded with huge success on their first production, Lost in the Barrens, which won an Emmy Award after appearing on Disney Channel in the U.S. The adaptation of the Farley Mowat story was also shown on CanWest Global and cbc in Canada. Their second dramatic effort, The Curse of the Viking Grave, was an Emmy nominee.

The Diviners (coproduced with Toronto-based Atlantis Films) was nominated eight times at the 1994 Geminis. The film won four prizes including best television movie, best supporting actor (Wayne Robson), best photography (Rene Ohashi), and best costume design (Charlotte Penner). The adaptation of Margaret Laurence’s novel is set for a showing on Channel Four in England.

‘Calling cards like these help,’ says Mazur. ‘We can now contact a decision-maker in a major broadcaster in Canada, and now more and more in the United States, and get an answer.’

An even better compliment comes when these same executives call Credo with a script, asking for production help.

As the company grows and expands, Mazur and Scott spend less time behind the cameras and more time behind their desks. ‘My creative energies right now are focused on raising money,’ says Mazur. ‘We’re replacing ourselves as the creative forces with other creative sources.’

An offer of company shares was used to entice two experienced producers to join Credo. Ex-National Film Board director Michael Scott signed up in November 1992 and Kim Todd, formerly with Atlantis in Toronto, came on 15 months ago.

‘When the lead creative people have some control of the company and an expectation of some of the profit, the whole organization becomes stronger,’ says Mazur.

Credo strives to find the perfect size. Shareholders are trying to balance the frustration that could come from limiting the number of projects with the fear of losing artistic control if their agenda becomes too large. They want to expand, but not too much too soon.

‘We’re like a boutique, rather than a large department store,’ says Mazur. ‘It’s not that we want to stay small. We’ll grow as long as we have good projects to grow on. Companies like Atlantis and Alliance have become very big and that hasn’t hurt them. The bottom line is that you still have to make good movies. So there’s nothing wrong with being large if you still make good movies.’

The company has about 30 projects on the go, ranging from purchased options to films being shot this summer. Nineteen writers are working on scripts under contract. The company wants to expand its staff of 12 full-time people and is looking for more producers.

Credo is spilling out of the three-story house it occupies on the edge of Winnipeg’s downtown, and will soon move down the street and convert a warehouse into an 18,000-square-foot studio.

Mazur realizes that size is a relative matter. He just doesn’t want to be so large Credo has to tackle unpleasant projects just to stay alive.

‘That’s really the difference between being too big and too small,’ he says.

In the past 18 months the company tallied about $20 million in production costs. This coming year should see close to $25 million.

A semi-formal relationship with Atlantis (Mazur calls it a strategic alliance) lets Credo offer more security to investors and the arrangement provides a distribution service for the smaller company. In the same way Atlantis provides stability and support to Credo, Mazur and company offer opportunities to independent Winnipeg producers like Norma Bailey and Elise Swerhone.

Bailey will coproduce, with Michael Scott, the David Adams Richards novel, For Those Who Hunt The Wounded Down. The made-for-tv script is a suspense comedy set in New Brunswick.

Swerhone will team with Credo’s Todd to coproduce Dark Ballerina. The fairy tale, set in the 1930s, will feature the Royal Winnipeg Ballet’s premier ballerina, Evelyn Hart.

The film business is much like the fashion industry: if you wait long enough the styles will repeat. Just like a man who keeps all his ties stored in a closet, knowing that wide paisleys will eventually come back, Mazur knew his faith in the Wit’s End project would be rewarded.

Just a few years ago broadcasters were reluctant to buy family shows, but the recent push by the anti-violence lobby has the networks looking for this type of material again.

Credo spent about $65,000 over four years developing and trying to sell Robert Lower’s black comedy Wit’s End. ‘We weren’t getting anywhere, but we all loved the movie,’ says Mazur. ‘We just had to wait for the right time and the right buyer.’

Set to begin

Finally, the Canadian distributor is lined up and response from American cable networks is good. Shooting is set to begin this fall.

Credo is planning to begin work on a series soon. Mazur and company aren’t ready to divulge specifics yet, but they have something on the boards.

‘Episodic television becomes truly the bread and butter and the main revenue generator for a company like ours,’ says Mazur. ‘That certainly stabilizes your company.’

Credo loves making films in Winnipeg and Winnipeg filmmakers love Credo.

Contribute enormously

‘They contribute enormously to the local film community,’ says Carole Vivier at the Manitoba Cultural Industries Development Office (cido), ‘both in terms of hiring crews and as a mentor to less experienced filmmakers.’

Vivier tells about the tremendous hand Credo gives to beginning producers and directors. The veterans offer free legal, business, and production advice to the rookies.

‘We owe a lot to this city,’ says Joan Scott. ‘The people, the crews, it’s a special place.’

‘They’re friends, associates, they’re comrades,’ says Winnipeg-based director/producer Kim Johnston (The Last Winter).

‘The film business in Winnipeg isn’t competitive,’ he says. ‘There’s a collaborative and co-operative feeling here. The spirit’s good.

‘We have great crews here and unless there’s a certain quantity of production they can’t stay here,’ he adds.

Winnipeg production houses regularly discuss their technical needs before planning extensive shooting schedules, so they can try to fit their projects into available windows to avoid serious overlapping.

Joint venture

Johnston’s John Aaron Productions is talking to Credo about a possible joint venture. He feels the proposed television movie has a better chance of seeing the screen by combining the strengths of each company.

The swing to drama allows Credo to stay in Winnipeg. To service its national commercial contracts properly, it would have been forced to move to Toronto, Vancouver or Montreal. But tv series and movies are a different matter, Mazur says.

‘There’s been a whole change in the way broadcasters deal with producers in all parts of the world,’ he says. ‘You no longer have to be from the big centers to gain their attention.’

Credo’s prominence has increased to the point that cido feels forced to change its name, largely because of the confusion caused by its similarity to Credo.

‘We’re getting confused with Credo all the time,’ says Vivier.

The key to success in the film business, says Mazur, is being able to produce a good quality product, consistently. ‘The broadcasters look for reliability because they’re investing a substantial amount of money,’ he says. ‘That money is at risk for them if you turn out a bad product. And if you do that, they won’t have you back.’

Mazur expects to be asked back again and again. ‘The next 20 years are going to be real exciting. We’re a growing company in a growing industry.’