Global Television will produce and air this year’s Gemini Awards on Nov. 19, scooping the annual celebration of Canadian television from its longtime broadcaster, the CBC.
It’s the strongest signal yet that Global, the network once derided as an enemy of Canadian programming, is positioning itself as a Cancon champion. It’s also the latest indication that private casters may be better placed than the CBC to promote such celebrations.

Stepping into the thick of its worst-ever labor disruption, prolific author and producer Guy Fournier has been tapped as the new chairman of the board at CBC.

The aftermath of Hurricane Katrina has put a cloud over Norman Jewison’s next picture, which had been slated to shoot in New Orleans early next year.
Bread and Tulips, a US$10-12-million remake of a five-year-old Italian romantic comedy, produced by Jewison and his son Michael (The Hurricane), was slated to begin filming in the devastated city in March, after Mardi Gras.

With the hockey pre-season now underway, TV networks and media buyers are saying viewership of NHL games is set to bounce back despite the league’s 15-month lockout and fears of backlash from the fans.

While negotiations continued, the war of words between CBC management and employees escalated, as the work stoppage at the network entered its sixth week.

Less than a year after taking over as head of Canadian production, Anne-Marie Varner has exited CanWest to be exec producer of in-house programming at Discovery Channel.

Christal Films’ Familia had a big weekend Sept. 16-18. Not only did director Louise Archambault receive the prize for best first Canadian feature at the Toronto International Film Festival, the film also had a good opening weekend at the Quebec box office, bringing in $160,972 on 46 screens ­- one featuring English subtitles – for a per-screen average of about $3,500.

For the third consecutive year, CTV’s Canadian Idol drew a season average of more than two million viewers for its 34-episode run. Big, but down slightly from last year’s season average of 2.2 million.

The Hot Sheet tracks Canadian box-office results for the period Sept. 9-15 and television ratings for the period Sept 12-18.

Halifax: Gregor Ash is the first to admit there was a lot of pressure on him and his staff to deliver something special for the 25th anniversary of the Atlantic Film Festival. But despite its tug-of-war for dates with the first New Montreal FilmFest, the outcome of this year’s event is sunny, even if the leftovers of Hurricane Ophelia drenched delegates and reporters on its opening weekend.
‘There are huge expectations,’ said the AFF executive director on day three of the 10-day festival. ‘We made quite known that this is the year for us. The other festival put a lot of pressure on us.’

While Hollywood licks its wounds, Quebec is celebrating a record-breaking summer for indigenous films.

And the moral of this story is – get it in writing.