With a $20-million price tag on its mega-Mars project, Discovery Channel and Galafilm Productions know the stakes are out of this world.

‘Flying to and from Mars will take about two years,’ explains Paul Lewis, Discovery Channel Canada president and the man who spearheaded the project. ‘This project – which is the most ambitious science project ever commissioned – took four.’

It all began in 2003 when Discovery Canada had an approximate $6-million pot of money it had to spend. These were social-benefits commitments (regulated by the CRTC in takeovers) from when Discovery owner CTV bought Netstar.

‘We could have used that money to invest in a number of smaller projects, but we decided to go with one big project,’ explains Lewis, himself a longtime space travel enthusiast.

‘Discovery’s total $6-million commitment helped fund [dramatic miniseries] Race to Mars, [doc series] Mars Rising, educational materials and online activities,’ explains Lewis, adding that the original price tag does not include additional marketing support, advertising or other activities.

Discovery launched a bid-for-proposals invitation, and after 40 pitches were made, Montreal-based Galafilm won the contract.

Discovery’s initial investment was the beginning of Galafilm’s $20-million financing challenge, as the balance of the budget had to be raised through the Canadian Television Fund, federal and Quebec tax credits, and of course, foreign broadcaster investments.

‘We had to raise a fair bit of money beyond what Discovery gave us,’ says award-winning executive producer Arnie Gelbart, also president of Galafilm. He says that potential investors were initially skeptical about far-reaching audience interest in space travel.

‘At first, people would always respond positively to the idea,’ Gelbart explains. ‘They always tend to say, ‘We want something that no one’s done before.’ But then they would come back and ask: ‘Is space really so popular these days?’ Once they could see how serious we were about the facts, about exhaustive research, people warmed up to the project.’

Gelbart says Galafilm consulted more than 175 scientists about what the challenges for a mission to Mars would be and what the year 2030 might look like.

‘The point was to do exhaustive research on this, the next great space adventure,’ says Gelbart. ‘We wanted it to be fact-based. We wanted it to be more like speculative fiction than sci-fi.’

Once investors were convinced of the authenticity of the project, international broadcasters that came aboard as significant partners were The Science Channel (U.S.), ARTE (France) and NHK (Japan). These outlets – as well as Discovery Networks International – will air Race to Mars and Mars Rising after their world premieres in Canada this fall.

The televised blastoff of Race to Mars is Sept. 23, when the Discovery Channel and Discovery HD will air the 4 x 60 dramatic mini that imagines the first manned mission to the red planet, set in 2030.

Shot entirely in high definition on the Sony HDW-F900 camera, Race to Mars was helmed by veteran director George Mihalka (see sidebar) at Montreal’s Mel’s Cite du Cinema. Massive physical effects were handled by Louis Craif, while CG work was supervised by Jacques Levesque.

Orbit continues on Oct. 7 with the broadcast of Mars Rising, a 10-part documentary series that focuses on the precise science and technology that would be required to get the first human crew to Mars and back.

Mars Rising was also shot in HD, over a two-year period, in 48 locations in Russia, Europe, the U.S., China and across Canada, including the Arctic. It is narrated by Montreal-born William Shatner (an actor whose voice became synonymous with space travel in Star Trek before man ever walked on the moon) and helmed by numerous directors, including Jon Kalina and Laura Turek.

The Mars franchise is supported by an interactive website, a live public debate to be streamed online (and broadcast as a one-hour special), an exhibition with the Ontario Science Centre and a coffee-table book published by Madison Press Books.

QuickPlay Media produced the microsite RacetoMars.ca (see Digital Media, p. 11) and the Ontario Science Centre’s exhibit will feature Mars Rovers, space suits, air-lock doors and elements of Discovery’s interactive games. It will open in Toronto in June 2008 and will tour internationally.

Discovery and Galafilm, are banking on growing public interest in the red planet.

On Aug. 4, NASA launched the Phoenix, a probe projected to reach Mars sometime next year. In 2004, U.S. President George Bush announced that the American government planned to get an astronaut on Mars within 30 years.

The Mars fall programming blitz will also coincide with celebrations of the 50th anniversary of Sputnik, the first man-made (but unmanned) satellite, which was launched on Oct. 4, 1957.

-With files from Jesse Kohl and Mark Dillon