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CHUM Going the Distance at the box office
It looks like second time could be a charm for CHUM’s feature film aspirations.
After only four days in theaters, CHUM’s second attempt at a teen flick with mass audience appeal, Going the Distance, looks like it may do just that. By comparison, Decoys, the first CHUM-branded feature designed to be anything but a typically obscure Canadian feature, fell way short of its big box-office aspirations.
CTF greenlit 75% of English applicants
So far, so good. That’s the word from the Canadian Television Fund which, five months into its much-ballyhooed new deal for producers and broadcasters, reports that its funding machinery is running smoothly. Or, more smoothly than it used to, at least.
CBC narrows daytime project list
Out of 350 applications, the CBC has short-listed 12 finalists in its daytime soap-opera project.
Summer hot for CTV sked
Over the last four years, broadcasters across North America have been abandoning the traditional September-to-May TV season in favor of premiering new programs throughout the year, even during the summer season, long thought to be a ratings wasteland. For some, the new approach has quickly paid dividends, but other broadcasters continue to struggle.
Canadian Olympic wins boost CBC audiences
Canadians may be more inclined towards the hockey, curling and other icy events of the Winter Olympics, but this summer more Canadians were watching the Olympics unfold in Athens than did when the Summer Games were hosted in Sydney, Australia four years ago.
CBC braces for NHL strike
A National Hockey League work stoppage this fall would be a body-check to the CBC, but whether the public broadcaster will be slightly bruised or put on the long-term injury list is a question mark.
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Fahrenheit raises AAC’s profits
Cirque sells street show to Germany, France
Just five years after Cirque du Soleil Images was formed, the production arm of the Quebec performing arts phenomenon has produced its first live television special to commemorate the 20th anniversary of Cirque du Soleil. The live show, performed and recorded July 11 for the finale of the Montreal Jazz Festival, not only dazzled the 200,000 music lovers gathered in the city’s downtown streets and more than 500,000 Canadians watching the live show on CBC, but also forged new international partnerships and distribution avenues into Germany and France for the young Montreal production company.
People
* CBC’s head documentarian Mark Starowicz, creator of The Journal and executive producer of Canada: A People’s History, has been named an Officer of the Order of Canada.
TVA and TQS founder Pouliot dead at 81
After a long battle with aphasia, Jean A. Pouliot, founder of French-language television outlets TVA and Television Quatre Saisons, died on Aug. 8 in Montreal. He was 81.
AAC unveils fall specialty sked
Alliance Atlantis has unveiled the fall programming for its slate of specialty channels, including the lineup for its newest, Fine Living Canada, set to launch Sept. 3.
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Black keynotes history confab
Five percent by 2006 not realistic
Each year Canadian producers come to TIFF in hopes of using the high-profile international festival as a launch pad for their features. The Canadian films presented at TIFF are theoretically the cream of the crop – the best of our national cinema.
Administering rights for the collective good
Marsha Henry is a lawyer in the Knowledge Management department of the Toronto law firm of McMillan Binch LLP.
Addendum
There were a couple of omissions in the Aug. 2 Post Quarterly feature ‘Canucks help post summer blockbusters.’ Toronto-based Dave Asling Miniature Effects was the miniature effects supervisor on the Twentieth Century Fox feature I, Robot, while Toronto’s Deluxe Sound & Picture provided dailies and sound mixing to the Alliance Atlantis release Resident Evil: Apocalypse.
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