With the U.S. Screen Actors Guild set to unilaterally impose its Global Rule One May 1, Canadian actors’ and producers’ representatives have seized this as an opportunity to take pot shots at each other.

At the CCTA conference in Vancouver, Rogers Communications CEO Ted Rogers got it right and Shaw Communications CEO Jim Shaw, surely to the dismay of his shareholders, got it wrong. Rogers urged tough action against illegal grey and black market DTH signal providers. Shaw, as reported in this issue, says let the consumers decide. If the intent was not clear, Shaw later went on TV and said cable’s (already relatively modest) Canadian programming contribution could be in jeopardy if the unregulated market share in this country continues to grow unchecked. And of course, that is exactly what is happening.

More cuts at AAC

In the April 15 issue of Playback (‘T.O. studios gear up, but will the go?’), The Comweb Group was mistakenly identified as Comcast.

Montreal: The Canadian completion bond industry has emerged from a major shakeup with one of three established suppliers, Motion Picture Bond Co., slated to wind down operations by midsummer. MPB has not signed any new business since the start of the new year.

Vancouver: British Columbia’s most critically acclaimed feature for 2001 was snubbed again by the Canadian industry – this time at home.

Although many in the broadcast community feel that all the hype about convergence a couple of years ago was just that, the subject was centre stage again at NAB2002, the annual meeting of the U.S. National Association of Broadcasters and the world’s largest electronic media show. The convention took place April 6-11 in Las Vegas.

Montreal: Each morning, by 5 a.m., cast and crew on the new Lea Pool feature film Blue Butterfly, about 100 people in all including locals, Brits and some 40 Canadians, leave their ocean-side hotel to travel deep into the Costa Rican rain forest. It’s an almost uninhabited place with three magnificient waterfalls. Once the crew arrives at Bri Bri, another very long day of shooting begins.

Montreal: Astral Media/Fonds Harold Greenberg has announced $6 million in additional funding for French-language programs, primarily drama for young audiences.

What is a documentary? As the Canadian non-fiction market grows, so does confusion surrounding the definition of documentary. The evolving genre has come to encompass a wide variety of non-fiction formats that compete for funding, but it’s the traditional doc that is struggling.

* Peter Moss, former president of Cinar Entertainment, has been appointed to the newly formed position of VP of programming for Corus Television, effective May 1.

What is most surprising about Trudeau is that, given it covers a subject of great reverence to many Canadians, cinematographer Norayr Kasper and director Jerry Ciccoritti were able to shoot it in such idiosyncratic fashion. The $7.65-million Big Motion Pictures two-part miniseries that aired on CBC is ripe with stylistic flourishes. Kasper dismisses any criticism of whatever artistic licence he and his director took to tell the story.

Montreal: Film and TV producer Cite-Amerique is in financing on an ambitious new round of international drama for 2002/03, including renewals of the tres noir miniseries thriller Dice and the delightful animatronics/puppet series Wumpa’s World. Among new titles, the house is in financing on Blue Dragon, a claymation series based on the books of American children’s author Dav Pilkey, and an English-track feature film coproduction adaptation of the landmark Michel Tremblay stageplay Les Belles-Soeurs.
Dice II, a six-hour coproduction with Box TV of the U.K., is budgeted at close to $6 million and is slated to film on location in Quebec as early as June or July.

Vancouver: Local producer Ogden Gavanski is the Canadian partner in the Spanish coproduction My Life Without Me, a project with legendary director Pedro Almodovar as executive producer (El Deseo Productions of Madrid, Spain).
The English-language, independent production wrapped April 26 and has a budget valued at less than $2 million. It stars Sarah Polley as a young woman who hides her terminal cancer to live her life with a passion she never had before. She makes a list of things to do, including finding her husband a new wife.

If you thought that headline was a mouthful, try swallowing a damages award of $950,000 and a costs award over $800,000 as the CBC had to in the libel lawsuit brought by Dr. Frans Leenan.
After winning his case in Ontario’s Superior Court, Dr. Leenen said, ‘Four years ago we proposed to settle this law suit for $10,000 and an on-air apology. It was refused…The Fifth Estate persisted and took me through 10 weeks of trial.’
The trial judge awarded very high damages for libel against The Fifth Estate and the CBC as well as individual reporters and producers. The CBC appealed.