My Canada 150 Presentation: "The Creative and Competitive Economy"

What follows is an expanded version of what was supposed to be a five minute presentation at the Canada 150: Halton conference - and a MUCH expanded version of the 2 1/2 minutes I actually got to speak.
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Canadian Culture in the Digital Age

Canada has always faced unique challenges to establishing our cultural identity. We are geographically vast, culturally diverse, sparsely populated, multi-lingual... and we sit right next door to one of the most prolific producers of film, television and music in the world.

All we have to unite us as a people and as a culture across such vast divides are our stories, whether told through film, television, literature, music or journalism. But we need two things: the ability to create those stories, and the space to share them.

Looking at the rather vague subject of this challenge as a creative person, two questions interest me:

1) How do we develop funding models for the arts, film, television, and journalism in the digital age?

This is a problem not unique to Canada. The cultural industries and institutions of countries all around the world - especially in North America - are facing a crisis due to advances in technology and profound changes in how people access information, entertainment and culture.

Up until recently, reproduction and distribution of books, newspapers, music, film and television programming has been an expensive endeavor, requiring the participation of record companies, book and newspaper publishers, television broadcasters, film studios and so on.

Today, the function of these entities is eroding as technology enables many artists to produce and distribute their own work, and for their audience to access that work directly, all for minimal cost.

The problem is, people are used to the idea that they are paying for physical media. They buy records or CDs, not music. They buy DVDs, not films; books, not words; newspapers, not news.

Without physical media, how do we value these works, and how do we ensure that artists and writers are compensated for their work? Can we continue to use advertising and sponsorship as the primary means of monetizing broadcasting and news, or will we need to find more direct means as the functions of television and print media are increasingly transfered to the internet?


2) Is there still a need to protect Canadian culture?

The sad fact is, we know more about American history and American democracy than our own because these things aren't just taught in schools - they are taught by the movies and TV shows we watch and the books we read.

One example: my son's grade 9 Canadian History class did a unit on World War II, and spent 11 hours of class time watching 'Band of Brothers' because the teacher couldn't find any film or television productions which depicted the Canadian experience in that war. I find that horrifying.

Another example: during the coalition 'crisis', many Canadians were under the impression that they had elected our Prime Minister directly - possibly because they were influenced by watching the electoral goings on south of the border.

When I was a kid, I lived in the suburbs. But I knew about downtown Toronto by watching King of Kensington, where people of many cultures, races and ethnicities all lived and worked peaceably together. This contrasted sharply with what I was seeing on American shows like 'All in the Family'.

I had never travelled to the west coast, but I knew what it was like there from watching The Beachcombers. In fact, my first impression of Native Canadians was from watching that show.

I have never travelled to Canada's arctic, but I feel that I know what life is like there from watching 'North of 60'. The U.S. show 'Northern Exposure' aired during the same period, and I remember watching it and thinking, "what's with all the white people? I thought this was the North!"

Ensuring that Canadian stories are told in film and television isn't just about nationalism or patriotism - in a country this vast and disparate, this is fundamental to how we know ourselves and understand each other. Short of moving into someone's house, film and television are perhaps the most powerful means of generating understanding between people because they allow us to see through another's eyes and walk a few miles in their shoes.

Without that ability, misunderstandings arise and soon fester. If 'King of Kensington' had been set in Calgary, we might not have some of the problems we have today.

So, what do we do about it? To start, here are three practical things I would recommend:

1) Abolish simultaneous substitution in television broadcasting.

When you watch a show on NBC or CBS that is also being shown on CTV at the same time, CTV overrides the signal coming in from the U.S. and substitutes their own - including their own commercials. In other words, Canadian broadcasters are double dipping, and are therefore rewarded for re-broadcasting hit US shows all night long.

Our private broadcasters have long claimed that Canadian content regulations prevent them from being competitive, and lower the quality of Canadian productions by shielding them from competition with American shows. But in reality, it is simultaneous substitution that is in fact protecting and shielding the broadcasters from having to compete.

By doing away with simultaneous substitution, Canada's private broadcasters will no longer have a monopoly on the airing of U.S. programming in Canada, and will therefore have an incentive to create something different from what the U.S. networks are airing. Something, perhaps, Canadian.

2) Don't take the punitive copyright protection approach.

Copyright doesn't protect artists - it was never intended to. It was originally designed to protect the state's licensing and control of publishing and theatre, and today serves mainly to protect publishers, broadcasters and film producers.

One example: a member of my family who shall remain nameless does props and wardrobe work in the film and television industry, mainly as an independent contractor. On one recent production, he decided to make a duplicate of one of the pieces for himself on his own time.

When he tried to sell this piece online, he immediately heard from the studio lawyers who informed him that despite the fact that he had designed and made the piece himself, had never sold it to the studio, and had never signed anything giving them rights to his creation, it nevertheless was their intellectual property.

He was told to not just remove it from sale, but to physically destroy it and submit photographs as evidence of its destruction. Which of course he did, immediately, because we're just not the kind of people who can afford to hire a team of lawyers.

So no, copyright law is not generally designed to protect artists.

Instead of following the U.S. example of locking up teenagers for downloading movies and music, or digitally locking down media so that it cannot be transfered or converted by the person who bought it, look at alternative ways of compensating artists such as levies on recordable media including IPods and MP3 players.

3) Focus on funding Canadian film promotion as well as production.

Your average Hollywood film production spends nearly as much on advertising and promotion as on making the film itself. In this country, Passchendaele succeeded largely because they spent money promoting it, but most other Canadian films are produced on such minimal budgets they can't afford any form of promotion or advertising at all.

The result is that even the best films this country produces cannot begin to compete at the box office or even the video store because no one has ever heard of them.

Case in point: the two most nominated films for this year's Genie Awards are 'Polytechnique' and 'Nurse. Fighter. Boy.' You may have heard of 'Polytechnique' because there was some controversy about making a film about the Montreal Massacre, but most of you probably aren't aware of 'Nurse. Fighter. Boy.'

I can almost guarantee that you didn't see either of them in a movie theatre, unless you live in Quebec.

I went to Blockbuster recently to look for 'Nurse. Fighter. Boy.' hoping that the multiple Genie nominations might have inspired them to get at least one copy. I spoke to the manager, and not only had she never heard of the movie - she didn't even know what a Genie Award was.

While tax incentives and program funding are essential to film production in this country, more funding needs to be channelled into promotion and distribution. The government should also look into creative ways of promoting Canadian film and television in more general terms, as there continues to be an absurd stigma attached to our homegrown productions.

The digital revolution has created both challenges and opportunities fo Canadian culture. While technology has broken down many of the barriers we once used to protect our culture, it has also removed many of the financial barriers our creative community has faced relative to other countries by making production and distribution of their work affordable and accessible to all.

In a sense, digital technology and the internet have leveled the playing field. Musicians can create and sell digital copies of their own music without the need for studios or music labels. Film makers can finance relatively high quality films on a couple of credit cards and promote them independantly. Bloggers are challenging traditional journalism as the line between the two continues to blur.

Even television broadcasting is being transformed by PVRs and streaming video, destroying traditional restrictions of scheduling and dial position, opening up the potential for quality programming - Canadian programming - to finally break through the static.

With the right policies in place, 2017 will be a good year to be a creative Canadian.

And now back to our regularly scheduled blogging...

My dad recently asked me to explain the "Local TV Matters" / "Stop the TV Tax" ad wars to him. I developed brain lock and suddenly couldn't remember any of the information I'd read over the past few months regarding the CRTC hearings and the complex fight over fee-for-carriage.

Tonight I'm sending him the link to this op-ed in the Montreal Gazette, written by Robb Wells of TPB fame. Impressive. He's managed to summarize the entire ludicrous battle in two or three easily digestible paragraphs, while at the same time drawing our attention to the real elephant in the room:

Ever wonder why we have Canadian cable companies and Canadian broadcasters, if all they air is American programming and still charge us a fortune? Couldn't we just cut out the middle-man and pay NBC directly for their TV shows?

... Being able to tune into Canadian TV drama and comedy is critical to the cultural health of our country. How do we know what it is to be Canadian if we can't see and share our experiences, our own lives, our communities, our heroes, and our history on TV, the most popular and pervasive cultural medium in history?

So what can be done to make sure Canadian TV is actually Canadian?

Revenues from fee-for-carriage must be seen on the screen in the form of new, original local, dramatic and comedic programming - broadcasters can't be handed a bag of money to take on their L.A. shopping sprees.

Indeed.

When I started this blog almost three years ago (!), it was with the intention of discussing matters such as the disappearance of Canadian television dramas and scripted comedies. Shows like Da Vinci, The 11 Hour, ReGenesis, Made in Canada, The Newsroom, Wonderland - I loved them all, and one by one I watched them die after not nearly enough seasons.

Such is the life of a TV fan. But instead of being replaced with other Canadian dramas and scripted comedies, they were all replaced by American police procedurals and Canadian clones of U.S. talent shows.

Today, there's nothing left. Even Corner Gas is gone. CTV still has 'Flashpoint' for at least as long as CBS keeps paying for it, but will probably drop 'The Listener' now that NBC isn't. CBC has nothing new this year except for more reality show knock-offs and the Ron James Show, which is sorta, kinda scripted comedy. Global has 'The Guard'.

And that's it. Literally. Even if you count reality TV (I don't), that's two hours of prime time Canadian content per week on Global and three on CTV. CBC is legally bound to run something like 80% Canadian programming, but even they manage to get away with only 5 1/2 hours of scripted comedy / drama per week - and that's counting The Tudors, which as far as I can tell has no actual Canadian content whatsoever.

All of which brings us back to Robb Wells' opening question: if the Canadian commercial television industry produces nothing, creates nothing, and simply serves to re-package and re-broadcast another nation's stories as expensive backdrops for their clients' advertisements, what exactly are we paying them for?

Denis McGrath on Canadian Identity

I think I've mentioned Denis McGrath before. Television writer, producer, blogger, occasional activist, and one of the most passionate and eloquent defenders of Canadian television, Canadian culture, and... well, Canada, that I have ever read.

Maybe it's because he used to be an American that he can see things clearly that we are too blinded by our own ludicrous, obsessive self-loathing to see.

Right now, dear Denis is out on the Rock working as an honest to God showrunner on the new CBC series, 'Republic of Doyle', and took some time out to knock some sense into the rest of us:

The exciting becomes transcendant when you find yourself in a place that's new and exciting to you. I felt this way when I first went to South Africa. I feel it again here in St. John's.

It happens in little ways, as you peel back and discover other elements of the culture that makes this rugged land and this beautiful city so very, very different. It happens when you drive winding roads and look out to sea and see your first Iceberg. It happens when your charismatic lead actor and Executive Producer reminds you that he's a first-generation Canadian; the son of people born into the separate nation of Newfoundland. It happens as you contemplate the hundred different little ways the culture here is different, yet undeniably alive. It makes you think, think of all the other places you've been in this great nation -- Alberta, where they never met a U.S. idea they didn't like, and where they hate the CBC like it's a religious rite. I think of the Calgarians I know who seem as surrounded as liberals in Austin, Texas. I think of Vancouver, aloof and a little smug about its beauty and wonder; as I stare now out the window at its easy equal. I think of winding stone streets in Vieux Montreal, the steps leading up to the Chateau in Quebec City. I think of the few days I spent up in Thunder Bay, another few in Halifax, the sunny times spent on Parliament Hill or wandering the Byward Market in Ottawa. I close my eyes and picture the ferry ride to Vancouver Island, lovely and still through the summer fog of morning. I recall my own teeming, shiny, stinky and occasionally humid Toronto, and how beautiful and majestic the Legislature looked at night the one time I visited Regina, and viewed the place where Medicare began. I think of this wonderful, different, vibrant country -- its parts seemingly ever at war or resentment with each other.

And as I prepare to help craft stories that show off one beautiful part the way it hasn't been shown before, all I can think of is what a gift Canadians miss by not being able to see stories told about all the funky, silly, crazy, wondrous, scary, nifty and puzzling people I've met in all these wonderful cities in this great and vast and puzzling land.

The difference between Denis McGrath and the politicians who make lovely speeches and pretty words about Canadian identity and culture is that Denis GETS IT. He LIVES IT. He's one of the people who creates it and reflects it back to us every day. He understands that without our own stories and storytellers, there is nothing holding us together as a nation and a people.

Nothing at all.

Think of this, oh ye haters of Canadian television: imagine if there wasn't any. What if there had never been a CBC? What if there were no requirements for Canadian content at all? What would we know of each other, and why would we care?

I remember when I used to watch Sesame Street when I was little, I often wondered about that house. You know, the tall narrow one with the steps up the front? I had never seen a house like that in Toronto, but I thought it was neat that those steps were a sort of social centre. I never knew that there were even more interesting houses in Montreal that had those ornate fire escape-like stairs going up the front to the second floor.

I had never been to British Columbia, and wouldn't until 2008, but I kind of knew what it was like from 'The Beachcombers'. That was also the first TV show where I'd ever seen Native people in a modern setting - i.e. not getting shot at. Later, I'd watch 'All in the Family' and wonder why there were people who had a problem with people of other races and religions when everyone on 'King of Kensington' seemed to get along so well.

Still later, I learned a great deal about what life is like in Canada's Arctic by watching 'North of 60'. 'Northern Exposure' was on around the same time, but watching it and comparing, I always wondered why there were so few Native people in Alaska. I never did learn much about our Maritime provinces from TV, except for Anne Murray and the erroneous notion that the Irish Rovers were from Newfoundland. But now I know that all the very best music and comedy in Canada comes from down East, and I look forward to learning more from 'Republic of Doyle'.

I hadn't travelled to any of these places when I watched these shows, but somehow I understood them. Their lives, their issues. If I hadn't had that to go on, I might really have thought that towns in the Canadian Arctic all looked like Gold Rush movie sets filled with eccentric white people. I might have imagined that people in our cities were all either black or white and only barely tolerated each other. And I would never have given a second thought to our western provinces at all. Why would I, when the television was filled with the shiny, polished lives of people in California and New York and Texas?

What goes for geography and culture goes doubly so for history and politics. How many Prime Ministers can you name? How many U.S. Presidents? What do you know more about - the story of Confederation, or the American Revolution? The Canadian parliamentary system, or the workings of the U.S. government ("I am a Bill, I am only a Bill, and I'm sitting here on Capital Hill...")? The Upper Canada Rebellion, or the U.S. Civil War?

This is not a failure of education - it is a failure of culture. Our children are taught Canadian history and Canadian civics in school until their eyes glaze over, but when the teacher gets lazy and needs a movie to show in class, what do they get? 'Band of Brothers'. Which is an excellent series about America's involvement in WWII, but not at all relevant for my son's grade 10 Canadian History class. Happily we now have 'Passchendaele' to show in schools, because otherwise the pickings are pretty slim.

All of these things we know about America - their history, their culture, their government - were not taught to us in school. No. We learned them by watching American TV and movies. That is the reality of this media-saturated century, and yet we seem perfectly content to hand over more and more of our cultural education to a foreign land because we tell ourselves it's 'better quality', or 'more entertaining'.

What it really is is exactly what we've been conditioned to believe, through constant exposure, that movies and TV shows are supposed to look like. It just doesn't look anything like us.

Maybe I should have written in 'Denis McGrath' on that ballot.

Funniest Ad EVER

I am obviously further out of the culture loop than I thought because not only had I not seen this before, but at first I didn't even think this was a real ad for a real company. But it is.

Genius.



Too bad we can't get HULU in Canada.

Runesmith on Ormiston - and Why I Wish I Wasn't

When I attended the Progressive Bloggers BBQ a few weeks ago, a camera crew from CBC was there to film material for an edition of Ormiston Online. Being a Leo, I immediately volunteered to get interviewed despite the fact that I have a face for radio at the best of times, and that day I hadn't even bothered to put on make-up.

The episode aired tonight on The National. You can watch it here (if you must) about 35 minutes in (UPDATE: The segment is now also available on its own). As it turns out, of the 2 or 3 minutes I spent speaking to the second-unit camera crew, the single sound bite they extracted consisted of me blathering about being one of those bloggers who obsessively checks my stats every morning to see how many people have read my blog.

Groan.

I am quite sure I said things that were far more eloquent and insightful than that, but apparently that's not what they were going for. In fact, from what I can tell, Susan Ormiston and Steve "the Jankulator" Janke have some sort of thing going.

Janke. The guy whose idea of 'investigative journalism' is stalking political candidates, following them from their home to the mall and taking pictures of their car. Good call there, Susan.

Sure, she made some effort to profile bloggers with other political affiliations, but apparently the best she could come up with was Cherniak and some Blogging Dipper named Devin. But Janke... well, she was all over him and his nice house and his 4.7 children like white on rice.

Next time someone from Ormiston wants to talk to me, they can just piss off.
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UPDATE: Ok, I take that back. She linked to me. She misspelled my blog title, but that's ok. I forgive her (mmm... traffic....).

Stephen Harper's War on Culture

The Canadian Culture Wars continue with the cancellation of the PromArt program, which provided travel funding to artists, performers and organizations to promote Canadian culture abroad. To justify their actions, a Foreign Affairs spokesperson cited the usual nonsense about "fiscal restraint", even though the program costs a mere $4.7 million a year - an amount so small that I couldn't even find anything in the 2006 budget that was that small.

It's, like, a buck from everyone in the GTA.

Then, of course, came the requisite list of deviant, left-wing, shit-painting, obscenity-spewing "artists" the program has funded in the past.

"Certainly we felt some of the groups were not necessarily ones we thought Canadians would agree were the best choices to be representing them internationally," she said.

Pressed for an example of those who failed to meet such a requirement, Howland cited a Toronto-based experimental rock band.

"I don't even want to say it (their name) on the phone," she said. "Holy F---, that was one that was flagged."

Holy F---'s second album was nominated for a Juno award and the group has been shortlisted for the $20,000 Polaris Music Prize.

Gee, sounds like the title of a certain movie, doesn't it? But 'Holy Fuck' weren't the only ones singled out, of course. A Conservative talking points memo dug up by David Akins at the National Post also lists:

... $16,500 to send Tal Bachman, a best-selling recording artist and the son of The Guess Who's Randy Bachman, to South Africa and Zimbabwe for music festivals... "I think there's a reasonable expectation by taxpayers that they won't fund the world travel of wealthy rock stars..." [ok, hands up everyone who has a Tal Bachman CD?]

... $5,000 to former CBC broadcaster Avi Lewis, who now works for al-Jazeera and who is described in a Conservative memo as "a general radical" [that would be Gemini Award-winning broadcaster Avi Lewis, son of known radical Stephen Lewis}

... Gwynne Dyer, who received $3,000 to help him travel to Cuba for a series of lectures... the Conservative talking points say Mr. Dyer is "a left-wing columnist and author who has plenty of money to travel on his own." [I'm sensing a theme here]

... The North South Institute, a nonprofit foreign policy think-tank, which received $18,000 in federal travel assistance so its representatives could attend a conference in Cuba... The North-South Institute is "a left-wing and anti-globalization think-tank," the Conservative memo said. "Why are we paying for these people to attend anti-Western conferences in Cuba?" it asked. [that would be this North-South Institute, whose Executive Committee is filled with a bunch of commie left-wing... corporate executives].

Even Stephen Taylor sounds like this sort of blatant political button-pushing has left a bad taste in his mouth.

What I find even more distressing is the list of funding recipients that the Conservatives have chosen not to mention - particularly those in the "Film and Television" category, as that one happens to affect my family financially. Because not only did PromArt pay to send Canadian film makers to sell their films at festivals like Cannes and Sundance - it paid to bring foreign buyers to our festivals. All for the bargain price of $350,000.

Here are a few that stood out:

$35,000 To allow the Banff Television Festival Foundation to invite foreign buyers to the Banff World Television Festival.

$15,000 To allow the Festival international du Film sur l'Art to host visiting foreign buyers during the 25e Festival international du Film sur l'Art in Montreal, Quebec.

$35,000 To allow the Hot Docs International Documentary Festival to invite foreign buyers to The Documentary Forum.

$10,310 To allow the Northern Visions Independant Film and Video Association to invite foreign buyers to the Images Festival 2006.

$80,000 To allow Film Circuit International to organize tours of Canadian films internationally.

$12,000 To allow the Toronto International Film Festival to invite foreign buyers to the Sprockets, Toronto International Film Festival for Children.

$53,500 To allow the Toronto International Film Festival to invite foreign buyers to the Toronto International Film Festival.

This isn't some street mime making a pilgrimage to Marcel Marceau's grave. This isn't some performance artist piercing her labia on stage in Munich.

THIS IS BUSINESS.

Yes, for the price of a few plane tickets and a VIP suite, the government can actually sell some of those partially subsidized film and television projects they keep griping about to foreign countries, thus turning a profit on those productions while simultaneously keeping a bunch of long-haired artist types like my husband employed and off the streets.

My husband is a member of IATSE, one of the two big film & television technical workers unions in Canada. Today he showed me the "In Production" list for Toronto for the month of August. It had four items on it. Only one was an actual feature film.

Meanwhile, the much anticipated Toronto FilmPort opened two months ago and is still standing empty. And now there's word that the new Michael Cera movie, "Scott Pilgrim vs. the World" - which is actually set in Toronto - might be filming in New York. Because it's cheaper.

Much as I'd like to, I can't blame the Conservatives for all of this. The threat of a SAG strike, the rising Canadian dollar, and the inexplicable refusal by the McGuinty government to offer competitive tax incentives in Ontario have all inflicted mortal wounds on the film and television industry here.

However, as far as I can tell, Stephen Harper is the only one who is actively trying to kill it.

(h/t to Stephen Taylor for digging up the full list of recipients)

Fuckers Fire Ed & Red

The evil corporate overlords at what used to be our beloved CityTV have proven once and for all that all the weasel words about "nurturing and preserving" City's "unique and special culture" were only so many small piles of doggie doo.

'Ed & Red's Night Party', the latest incarnation of Canada's longest running comedy show, has been cancelled.

Steve K is being very gracious about it:

"There's no ill will. Things change," said Steve Kerzner, Ed's voice and creator. "We just don't really fit, I guess, as presently constituted, with what they wanted to do with the channel."

Yeah. That's one way of putting it, I suppose. And happily Steve and his lovely Liana K (one of us!!) have had numerous offers from elsewhere. But word from the underground is that the mood over at Rogers-owned CityTV is decidedly grim, and the sword of Damocles is casting its shadow over more than one icon of the Temple of Television.

It's the end of an era, man. But it sure was a sweet ride while it lasted.

Conservative Patronage Appointment #147

I kid. I've actually lost track at this point.

Tories appoint former candidate to CRTC

OTTAWA - The Conservative government has appointed a former party candidate to the CRTC - the country's broadcast regulator - raising fresh cries of patronage and hypocrisy.

Marc Patrone was a declared candidate for the Conservatives in Nova Scotia when the federal Liberal government appeared set to fall in May 2005. But he returned to his job as a legislative journalist in the province before the government finally collapsed at the end of the year.

Heritage Minister Josee Verner announced his appointment as a full-time member of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission on Tuesday in a news release.

She did not mention Patrone's ties to the Conservative party.

Verner said Patrone's experience "will greatly benefit the CRTC."

If by "benefit" you mean "hasten the wholesale deregulation of Canadian television and radio", then yeah. I especially like the end of the article:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper promised before the last election to combat patronage by creating a new appointments commission that would screen federal job candidates.

He abandoned the promise when opposition parties rejected his first choice to lead the commission - Calgary oil-industry executive and Conservative party fundraiser Gwyn Morgan.

But I digress.

How apropos that this appointment comes so soon after the CRTC hearings on the Canadian Television Fund. My homeboy Denis McGrath has been following the proceedings closely on Dead Things On Sticks. He posted a particularly eloquent defence of Canadian television and culture last week, and even for a guy who makes his living putting words together, it's an astonishing piece of work.

Go. Read.

My very favourite part is this:

Other countries used to have an insatiable appetite for American shows, too. But somewhere over the last few years, from Germany to Italy to France and beyond, the populace has gotten a taste for their own cop shows, lawyer shows, medical shows. Nowhere was there a discussion or an argument as to whether it was cultural or commercial. There was a recognition that it was all culture, and that it was worthy of support. Most of these countries, to varying degrees, have the same challenges Canada faces – it’s a difficult playing field to compete against the American product. Because it’s difficult, it’s generally recognized – even as a point of national pride – that it’s to be supported. It’s good for the culture, which means good for the country.

... But here in English Canada, culture comes smacking up against industrial policy.

And make no mistake, there’ s an industrial element to this, too.

When one country sells a product into another country at a cut rate, it’s called “dumping.”

If I have more cuttlefish than I can possibly eat in my nation, and I sell you my excess cuttlefish at a really cheap price, it’s good for me because I’m getting rid of it.

Of course, often, that means the cuttlefish industry in that country never gets going. That’s why tariffs are put in place.

What we’re in the middle of here is the side effect of an ongoing skirmish that concerns the industrial dumping of U.S. shows on Canadian channels. The system in this country is set up to allow for that. Simultaneous substitution practically demands it. The networks profit handsomely from it. They argue and lobby to keep their commitment to indigenous production low, as low as possible, to preserve it.

Now, if you happen to be a true believer in Friedmanite laissez-faire economics, then extending that kind of thinking to culture is not a big stretch. It's all just 'product' after all, so why not subject it to the same 'invisible hand' of market forces, just like oil, or beer, or health care services?

If, however, you believe that television is as much a part of a nation's cultural identity as, say, painting, literature, or even film, then just maybe the free market's apparent overwhelming preference for Law & Order / C.S.I. clones and game show / talent contest variants might not be exactly what you're looking for in terms of 'culture'.

I don't know the man, but I suspect Mr. Patrone will disagree.

What I'm Watching, Part 2

MORE NEW SHOWS:


Kitchen Nightmares

This show might make you think twice about going out to eat. Grease covered walls, mouldy pesto, rotten food under the stove... and never mind the frozen ravioli and microwaved veggies some of these places try to pass off for $30 a plate. My Gods, I can cook better than some of these chefs!

It's not so much an 'Extreme Makeover' show as an expose of the restaurant industry, making it that much more satisfying to watch Gordon Ramsey lace into some of these bastards. And really - you can never have too much Gordon Ramsey.


Bionic Woman

I’m one of about half a dozen genre fans who don’t watch Battlestar Galactica. No particular reason - I just never got into it and fell too far behind. So I didn’t have a lot of expectations for Bionic Woman, other than having been a fan of the original when I was twelve or so.

I must say, I’m liking it so far. I wasn’t thrilled with Michelle Ryan at first, but she’s definitely grown on me. Miguel Ferrer is outstanding as always. The tech stuff is done just right, and they even managed a subtle, cool upgrade of that electronic ‘nenenene’ sound from the original.

You know the one.


Life

"Are you really Zen?"

"I’m Zen-ish."

Something I’m noticing through this little exercise is that a clever premise will get me to tune in, but great characters, well cast and well written, will get me to come back every week.

Charlie Crews is a great character, and reminds me very much of one of my all time favourites: Larry in ‘The Razor’s Edge’ (the movies, not the book). He is almost magical in his spirituality, and yet he’s still a sensualist in his love for fast cars, casual sex and exotic produce.

Charlie’s police partner and his accountant / roommate make the perfect companions for him as he explores his newfound freedom and the world which he was denied for so long. They interpret this world for him and try to direct him, but most of the time they just sort of get towed along in his wake.

And then there’s the mystery of the murder for which Charlie was unjustly convicted, which ties the episodes together and gives the show a strong centre of gravity.

This might just be my favourite new show of the year.


Torchwood

Not quite as good as Dr. Who, but still a lot of fun with a nice hard edge. Again, though, why is the CBC spending our tax dollars on a BBC show, with an all British/Welsh cast and crew, shot entirely in Wales?


Dirty Sexy Money

As much as I adore Donald Sutherland, he wasn’t quite enough to get me to watch a second episode. It’s not that it’s a bad show - it just didn’t interest me.


Moonlight

I didn’t make it past the first ten minutes. Sorry, but it ain’t no ‘Blood Ties’ and he ain’t no Henry.


Da Kink In My Hair

I’m not a sitcom person, but I might actually come back to this one. I used to live and work in the very same Eglinton Avenue neighbourhood in Toronto where the show is set, so these people are all very familiar to me. At the same time, the world they inhabit and the issues they deal with every day are different enough from mine to keep me interested. It isn’t really a sitcom, either, although there are some very funny moments.

Now if I can just remember to watch it when it’s on.

__________________________


Next time: Returning shows of note.

What I’m Watching, Part 1

We’re well into the new television season now, so I thought it was about time for me to return to my blog roots and do a little TV Review Roundup.

_______________________


NEW SHOWS:

Chuck

Not bad. It’s funny, quirky, kinda clever - all the usual adjectives. I still haven’t decided if it all adds up to something I want to invest an hour a week in, though. I like Zachary Levi as Chuck. He manages to be just enough of a geek without relying on thick glasses and pocket protectors to hammer the stereotype into the wall. Adam Baldwin could use a little more humour to his character to fill him out a bit (ok, maybe I just miss Jayne), and the hot CIA chick… meh. She just doesn’t do it for me.

The jury’s still out, but I can’t see getting overly upset if I missed an episode or five.


K-Ville

I’m really enjoying this one. New Orleans has always made a fascinating backdrop for all forms of fiction, but setting a television series there post-Katrina is incredibly bold. I remember concerns being raised that the show would back off the social and political issues surrounding Katrina and become just another cop show, but so far they haven’t blinked.

Officers Boulet and Cobb are both strong, complex characters that just keep surprising you. They are unwillingly thrown together in the beginning, but they quickly develop a kind of battlefield camaraderie. Stories of their experiences during the flood are told in flashback and colour everything they do, but the show still manages to be about the present and the very practical problems these cops are forced to deal with every day. The writers deserve a lot of credit for pulling off what has to be a tricky balancing act.

Hell, they even got the Voodoo right.

Now if I could just get that image of Anthony Anderson in the drive-thru window talking about the ‘special sauce’ out of my mind.


Journeyman

This is another keeper, largely on the strength of Kevin McKidd’s lead. I like him, I like his character, and I like his relationship with his wife. I even like the premise of the show. After all, who doesn’t like a good time travelling story? All the comparisons to Quantum Leap have been made, but there are enough differences that I think Journeyman deserves to stand on its own.

Having said that, I’m not sure that a show where the hero gets a different ‘assignment’ helping a different batch of guest stars every week can really stand up in this day and age. It just seems so… eighties.

We’ll see where they go with this, but so far I’m enjoying the trip.


Pushing Daisies

My husband loves this show, and most of the critics seem to agree. I’m trying to love it. I want to love it. I’m still watching it every week hoping it’s going to grow on me, but so far it’s just not happening.

Part of my problem is the whole 'one-touch-alive, two-touches-dead' thing. It’s just seems way too... contrived. I know, I’m the one who likes the show about the time-travelling guy, but that’s just one simple crazy, impossible thing he does. With Pushing Daisies, I feel like I need to consult Hoyle’s to figure out all the rules. Like, why does he have to re-touch someone within exactly one minute? Why not 57 seconds, or 73 heartbeats? And how did he figure out the exact time? And when he goes overtime, is it always the closest person who dies instead? Is there a maximum distance? If there’s no one else around, does he die instead? Or does he just take out an acre of lawn?

I could probably get past the absurd artifice at the heart of the show if that was the only problem, but combined with the pompous voice-over and the Technicolour Tim Burton set design, it’s all just too, too much.


The Tudors

So this is what passes for Canadian Content these days. Really, I’m all for co-pros, but could somebody please explain to me exactly what’s Canadian about The Tudors besides the bankroll and Henry Czerny? Hell, they need a disclaimer in the end credits:

"Absolutely no Canadians were hired in the making of this episode"

My favourite part so far: Thomas Boleyn pimping out both his willing daughters in a blatant bid for power and prestige in the court. Nice.


Cane

My husband hates this show, but then he never did like Jimmy Smits. Which is fine by me. This way, Jimmy and I can have some alone time.

The whole cast of Cane is top-notch, especially Hector Elizondo and Rita Moreno. That, plus the appeal of getting a good look inside a world most of us know nothing about makes it one of my favourite new shows this year. The only potential problem I can see is if they start backing off of the violence and the hard edges on some of the characters. That's about all it would take to turn Cane from being a Cuban ‘Sopranos’ into a Latino ‘Dynasty’.


Kid Nation

This show horrifies me on a number of levels, most of them socio-economic. It started off well, but then instead of just letting these kids work out what sort of society would work best for them, the whole thing has turned into an experiment in hyper-capitalist social engineering.

I did find it interesting that the kids originally got along pretty well, and started out doing whatever jobs that they were best at - like the girl who took charge of the kitchen. But no, that’s not dramatic enough, so the producers divide the kids into competing tribes teams which immediately start taunting and fighting with each other. Then they impose a goddamn class system where the first place team in the competitions gets to be the ‘upper class’ who do no work for high wages, and last place gets to scrub toilets and haul water for next to nothing.

I am anxiously waiting for the proletariat to rise up and smash the bourgeois class structure in a socialist revolution.

And yet. Can’t. Stop. Watching.

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More new shows tomorrow.

Jen's Addiction

Monday is officially the new Tuesday.

Tuesday nights have always been an issue for me when it comes to my TV habit because I have choir practice that night. Fortunately I have two TVs with VCRs in the house and a husband who knows how to work them, but it’s still a pain in the ass because, for some reason, every year every network decides to schedule all of my favourite shows on Tuesday nights.

I was just looking at the schedule for Monday.

At 8:00 we have ‘Chuck’ which I wanted to check out, and ‘Prison Break’. Ok, so far so good. At 9:00 we have ‘K-Ville’, which I watched last week and thoroughly enjoyed, ‘Dr. Who’, and the mother of all season premieres, ‘Heroes’. Then at 10:00 there’s ‘Journeyman’, the season premiere of ‘Eureka’, and ‘Saving Grace’. And then there’s that Ken Burns ‘War’ documentary that I kinda wanted to check out but I guess I can live without. So none of this would be a serious issue except…

I HAVE TO WORK MONDAY NIGHT!

I don’t know what to do. Do I skip 'Dr. Who' and hope that it gets re-run later in the season? Do I abandon Grace, who I've grown terribly fond of? Do I take a chance that ‘Journeyman’ will be an early casualty that I didn’t want to get invested in anyway?

Maybe I can switch shifts at work. But that would be wrong, wouldn't it?

Hello, my name is Jennifer and I’m a TV addict.

(Belated) Blatant Self-Promotion

A few weeks ago, Diane over at TV, Eh? asked if I would be willing to be interviewed for her first ever Canadian TV Podcast. Being a Leo and therefore never one to decline an invitation to make a public fool of myself, I said, "Sure!"

The podcast made its debut on July 17th HERE, and features segments by writer boys Denis McGrath and Alex Epstein, the Beachcomber's Jackson Davies, blogger and industry maven Caroline, and myself. Definitely worth a listen. Alex is particularly eloquent in his defence of Canadian culture. Bev Oda, Jim Shaw, and the head of the CRTC should be locked in a room and forced to listen over and over again until they get it.

Anyway, I would have let you know earlier, but I had to get a friend to download it for me and burn it to disk so I could listen and make sure I didn't sound like a complete idiot first. DAMN YOU, DIAL-UP!!!

Enjoy.

Another Blow for CanCon

Remember when Jim Shaw had his little tantrum last winter over how much money he had to pay to the Canadian Television Fund to help pay for stupid Canadian shows like Trailer Park Boys?

The CRTC responded almost instantaneously, and recently published the recommendations from their CTF task force. None of it's good for Canadian television. I won't get into all the gory details here - let Denis over at DTOS explain it to you.

In summary, the task force recommends that the CTF be split into two parts: a 'Canadian Heritage' component that would fund 100% Canadian, 'cultural' productions for the CBC and other broadcasters, as well as aboriginal and educational productions, and a more 'market-oriented' fund for commercial productions that would only have to be 80% Canadian.

Two problems with this:

1) Separating 'cultural' from 'commercial' television productions is like picking the green peppers off your pizza and asking a three year old to eat them. They're presenting Canadian Content like it's some nasty vegetable that nobody wants to eat, when in fact it's very tasty when cooked right.

2) The 8/10 CanCon point system for the second, larger fund? Given past history, chances are excellent that those two points will be handed to American writers. And there goes the creative control.

The CRTC is accepting public comments on this proposal until July 27th. The boys of the Writers Cabal are all over this one - Will Dixon explains where and how to submit your own comments here, and McGrath posted his own submission on his blog today. It's long, passionate, very detailed, and states the case far better than I ever could. Read it.

I'm not in the business and not nearly as well informed (or as eloquent) as Denis, but for what it's worth, here's what I sent in today:

As a Canadian and a devoted viewer of Canadian television, I am alarmed at the CRTC task force’s recommendations regarding the CTF. Splitting the Fund in the way that has been suggested and handing the bulk of the money over to productions that will likely have no Canadian creative input at all will take an already bad situation and make it infinitely worse. Despite what the private broadcasters and cable companies might be telling you, trying to generate ‘commercially successful’ television by allowing American writers to assume creative control through the proposed 8/10 point system can only have the opposite effect.

It should be apparent to anyone looking at the success of shows like Corner Gas, Little Mosque on the Prairie, Trailer Park Boys, Degrassi, or Da Vinci’s Inquest, that when given the choice and something good to watch, Canadians love Canadian television. The immense popularity of these shows illustrates quite clearly that the key to success, however elusive, does not lie in the presence of American stars, or in emulating generic American shows. Each of these shows is unique, well written, and 100% Canadian in their production and their perspective. They are also selling extremely well in the U.S. and international markets, precisely because they look nothing like American shows.

If the CRTC goes forward with these recommendations, shows like these will be replaced with more Canadian copies of American reality shows and more bad, generic sitcoms and detective series. At best, we might be treated to the hideous spectre of ‘CSI: Vancouver’ starring Luke Perry.

This is NOT what Canadians want. It is only what we will settle for when there is nothing else to watch.

It is the mandate of the CRTC to protect the interests of the Canadian public. By putting these new recommendations into practise, the Commission will only serve to protect the short term interests of private broadcasters and cable companies who do not, in fact, need any protection at all. In the long run we will all lose, because nobody will be watching at all. We’ll be downloading all those wonderful BBC shows instead.

Respectfully submitted,

Jennifer Smith
Milton, Ontario

Gettin’ My Geek On

I spent a lovely couple of days this past weekend at The Convention Formerly Known as Toronto Trek, a.k.a. ‘Polaris’. Just for the record, if anyone thought this rebranding was an indication that this convention was no longer the very acme of geekdom, they would have been immediately disabused of this notion upon encountering the Kingon handfasting in the lobby on Saturday.

Despite what my parents and sister think, I consider myself only a minor geek. I read some science fiction and fantasy, but only rarely. I don’t read comic books, or even graphic novels. I do not dress up as characters from my favourite movies or TV shows, although I did borrow my husband’s lab coat with the Dharma patch because I was chilly. I do not wear a tail, or vampire teeth, and the only 'collectible figurine' I own is my Buddy Christ. 'Cause that's cool.

I do love my genre films and TV shows. I also love Canadian TV, which is why I’ve been anxiously waiting to see ‘Blood Ties’, the new show based on Tanya Huff’s series of vampire / P.I. novels set in Toronto. I haven’t actually read any of the books yet, but I have been following scriptwriter Denis McGrath’s blog posts on the production and the show sounded intriguing.

On Saturday I got to attend the Canadian premiere of the first two episodes, which were followed by a Q&A with Tanya and showrunner Peter Mohan. Mr. McGrath didn’t attend, which is just as well since I spotted a group of fanfic writers roaming the halls with torches and pitchforks shouting his name.

‘Blood Ties’ is fantastic. Comparisons can and have been made to other shows, but the characters are so strong and complex and the writing so sharp that the show stands firmly on it’s own as a unique take on the vampire genre. Vicki Nelson, the kick-ass cop-turned-private investigator (Christina Cox) is perfectly cast - beautiful without being overly ‘pretty’, mature, tough, flawed and funny. In fact, Tanya mentioned later that when she first wrote the novels ten years ago, she had mentally cast Cox as Vicki based on her work in 'F/X: The Series' - only thinking of her ten years older.

As for Kyle Schmid as Henry Fitzroy…

Oh. My. Gods.



There was actually an audible gasp from the women in the audience the first time he appeared on screen. And he’s not just gorgeous - he smart and intense and witty enough to more than hold his own against Vicki.

If they play their cards right, this show has the potential to be huge.

The Q&A offered some intriguing insights into the problems involved in Canadian television production. One person asked why, since the novels and the series are specifically set in Toronto, the vast bulk of the shooting was done in B.C. The answer? Money. Toronto just doesn’t come close to offering the kinds of financial and tax incentives that B.C. does, and they simply couldn’t afford to shoot here except for some second unit exteriors and file footage of the CN Tower.

Sad.

One question that nobody dared ask was what effect the recent sale and split-up of CityTV and Space to might have on the show’s future. The series was initially sold to Lifetime in the U.S. (also sad), which is currently airing the first season. It was then picked up by CityTV to be aired this fall, and was supposed to have been given a secondary window on Space. Now that plan is probably in the crapper, and while CityTV is still committed to the first season they bought, it’s anyone’s guess as to whether their new corporate overlords will want to pick up a second season.

Keep your fingers crossed.

Summer Viewing

As an unrepentant TV junkie, summers have always been a difficult time for me. It used to be worse, back when the networks had a set season from September to May and just wrote off the summer months with movies and re-runs. These days they fill the schedule with cheap reality tripe, but they also run a few of their more ‘high concept’ series up the flagpole in the hopes that they’ll catch on with the dedicated few still watching.

It can make for some interesting viewing, but unless you’re a die hard ‘Idol’ fan it’s still pretty slim pickings. Here’s what I’m watching so far this summer:

Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip
(Thursdays 10:00, NBC)
The deathwatch continues. I find it unbearably sad that they’ve cancelled my beloved Aaron, but at least they didn’t just kill the thing before taking it to the end of the season. The last episode is coming up this Thursday, and if (when) they kill Jordan I will be extremely unhappy.

The Shield
(Tuesdays 10:00, CHCH)
The new season (well, new for Canada) started a couple of weeks ago. Good as always, with Michael Chiklis devouring every scene he’s in. Yummy.

Hell’s Kitchen
(Mondays 9:00, CITY, Fox)
Most reality shows bore the hell out of me. I’ll still watch ‘Survivor’ out of habit, and the ‘Amazing Race’ is always fun, but the dozen or so versions of The Gong Show currently out there are just tedious. The one exception is 'Hell’s Kitchen', which features a dozen wannabe chefs trying to prove themselves before Gordon Ramsey, a man who makes Simon Cowell look like a kindergarten teacher. This year he’s put one guy in the hospital already, seemingly from stress. Can’t… look… away.

Traveler
(Wednesdays 10:00, ABC)
This is an odd one, and I’m still not sure how much I really like it. It’s part of the networks’ ongoing efforts to work out a formula whereby they can replicate the success of serials like ‘Lost’ and ‘Prison Break’ without actually being unique or creative. Every once in a while a good one will stick ('Heroes'), but more often than not they stumble upon a promising idea only to cancel it as soon as the initial ratings come in, thus discouraging potential viewers from committing. Except me, of course - I just keep letting myself get sucked in only to have my heart broken again and again. So yeah, ‘Traveler’ is pretty good, but I’d still rather be watching ‘DRIVE’ YOU BASTARDS!

Dr. Who
(Mondays 8:00, CBC)
Hooray! I can stop covering my ears every time my friends talk about the latest episode they downloaded. I miss Rose, but Martha is cool. I’ve heard that ‘Blink’ is the creepiest episode in the series so far - can’t wait!

The Ritches
(Sundays 10:00, Showcase)
Eddie Izzard as an Irish Traveler is just too delicious. The portrayal of this hidden world of gypsies and grifters is fascinating enough, but transplanting a family of Travelers into an upscale gated community in suburban America takes the ‘fish-out-of-water’ scenario to a whole new level. Brilliant.

TV on DVD
My husband and I are both self-employed with a teenaged son who eats his own weight in food every day, so we can’t afford fancy things like satellite TV or high speed internet. So this is what I’m reduced to: renting shows I can’t get otherwise on DVD.

~ I’ve already burned my way through the third and final season of ‘Deadwood’. I had wanted to spread out the disks a bit to make them last, but they’re like chips - you just want one more, and then one more, and the next thing you know it’s three a.m. and they’re all gone. Sigh.

~ Season 3 of ‘Slings & Arrows’ is coming out next week, so I’ve been re-viewing the first two seasons in preparation (I own them all). I have decided that the solution to all of the current problems with Canadian television is this: give Paul Gross as much money as he wants to do whatever he wants with.

~ I would really like to see ‘Big Love’ but the video store I work at doesn’t carry it, nor does Rogers. I’ve heard rumour they have it at Blockbuster, so I’ll be checking there tonight. I promise not to eat them all at once.

~ I have a serious David Milch jones on right now, so I am desperate to see 'John from Cincinnati'. I suspect I will have to wait until the fall for the DVDs, unless some kind reader would care to slip me a few episodes under the table. Just to tide me over, you understand.

I am also anxiously awaiting the return of 'The Sopranos' on CTV and 'ReGenesis' on Global, so if anyone knows if these or any other good shows are being aired on channels I can actually get this summer, do let me know.

My Canada Doesn’t Include the Fraser Institute

One of the best things ever shown on Canadian television was Paul Gross’ two-part political thriller ‘H2O’. I know, it’s hard to imagine a Canadian political thriller, but believe me - this thing was slick, well written, and extremely disturbing. When I first saw it three years ago, I thought it presented a fascinating but unlikely, maybe even paranoid scenario.

Right now, I’m starting to wonder if the writers didn’t somehow arrange to have Steven Harper’s memoirs transmitted from the future.

The story centres around the son of a beloved Canadian prime minister who dies under suspicious circumstances during a canoe trip. The son makes a stirring speech during the funeral (sound familiar?), and is encouraged to run, which he does - seemingly reluctantly. He wins the party leadership and thus the prime minister’s office, at which point he begins to do some very strange things like creating loopholes in environmental assessment laws, stacking the bilateral committee overseeing boundary waters, and bribing the premiers of Ontario and Quebec into opening the door to bulk water sales to the U.S.

Behind all the machinations and intrigue stands a shadowy group of international power brokers, businessmen and right-wing economists who belong to ‘The Burnham-Wood Institute’, a thinly-veiled reference to The Fraser Institute and other similar organizations.

As it turns out, the sale of water is only the first step in a much larger Machiavellian scheme which is articulated at the climax of the film in a speech that sounds a lot like…

Well, like THIS:

Canada must reduce trade and ownership barriers, integrate economy with U.S., say Manning and Harris

Toronto, ON - Canada needs to fully open its economy and drop restrictions on foreign ownership in all business sectors including banking, financial services and telecommunications, Preston Manning and Mike Harris say in a new policy paper released today by independent research organizations The Fraser Institute and the Montreal Economic Institute.

The two also call for eliminating Canada’s supply boards and agricultural subsidies, establishing a customs union and common external tariff with the United States, and reforming Canada’s approach to foreign aid.

The recommendations are laid out in International Leadership by a Canada Strong and Free, a policy paper in which Manning and Harris argue that Canada should redefine its international position by becoming the world’s leading proponent of free trade.

And that's just the tarted-up version for the press release. The report itself is somewhat more blunt:

"For Canada, Mexico’s presence at the NAFTA table is no reason to avoid action on our urgent national interest in pursuing a formal structure to manage irreversible economic and security integration with the United States."

And my personal favourite:

"Government has no place in the decision-making of Canadian consumers, importers, or exporters."

Other bloggers have done a terrific job of excerpting the juiciest bits of this steaming pile of excrement document and explaining why these ideas are so dangerous to our country, so I won’t repeat all that here. Go read Creekside and The Galloping Beaver for a summary.

Go ahead. I’ll wait.

….

I’m old enough to remember when NAFTA was first brought in. I even remember its predecessor, the U.S./ Canada Free Trade Agreement. Those of us who protested loudly at the time were generally dismissed as paranoid protectionists with no faith in Canada’s ability to compete and thrive in the open marketplace.

Since then we have seen American corporations shutting down factories in Canada and the U.S. and re-opening them in Mexico or wherever else they can exploit people willing to work for pennies an hour. We have seen how the U.S. can simply chose to ignore any trade rules that they don’t like, even when court after court insists that they abide by them. We have seen Canada having to import oil despite producing more than enough to supply ourselves, simply because there is a clause in NAFTA that says we have to export the same percentage of our oil to the U.S. no matter how much more we are producing.

Now substitute the word ‘water’ for ‘oil’ in that last sentence and see who’s being paranoid.

I spent some time this afternoon composing a lengthy (ok, lengthier) tirade against free trade and globalization, but I’ve decided to spare you since a) other people more knowledgeable than myself have already said it better (including my grandfather), and b) the elimination of trade barriers is one of the least obnoxious recommendations in this report.

The real issue here is this: do we want our country to become more like the United States, or less? And don’t kid yourselves - economic and military integration will inevitably result in social and cultural integration. At that point, it won’t even matter if we still have our own government and our own flag. In every other respect we will be indistinguishable from Americans. I’m sure this would all be very good for business, but very bad for anyone who would rather be Canadian.

That’s ok, though, since I am quite sure that the Fraser Institute and it’s members are not even remotely interested in what’s best for Canadians.

There's No One Left But Me... And Him

Mr. McGrath put me on to this dreadful bit of news, courtesy of John Doyle:

The last thing the Canadian TV networks and the watching Canadian audience need is more air-headed coverage of American celebrities.

But that's precisely what we're going to get with CanWest Global's bizarre decision to foist the execrable E! Entertainment Channel on Canadians. With the signing of a cheque and, presumably, the agreement of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, CanWest Global is turning over its venerable CH stations to the content of an American cable outfit that's entirely devoted to maniacally intense and superficial reporting on U.S. showbiz. This move is grotesque. It's the sellout of a string of Canadian over-the-air channels to dumb-as-a-post American cable coverage of already overexposed and often talentless idiots.

This is absolutely horrifying. I grew up with 'The Hilarious House of Frightenstein' and 'Party Game', and later, 'Smith & Smith' and 'The Red Green Show' - all developed, produced and aired by CHCH in Hamilton. These guys were doing original, local, low budget, Canadian programming back when CITY TV was just a throbbing bulge in Moses' pants.


The CRTC is a pathetic, impotent joke. Billy Van must be spinning in his grave.

Bev Oda: "Da Vinci's Inquest... wasn't Tom Hanks in that?"

From a rather horrifying interview with Heritage Minister Bev Oda in Playback Magazine:

What do you like to watch on TV?
(Laughs) I watch the news, I watch CPAC. Other than that I don't have much time. I used to watch the History Channel and A&E and Discovery.

Ha ha. Because really, when you're all busy determining the future of Canadian television, why would you want to waste your time actually WATCHING CANADIAN TELEVISION?!

Television: Art or Commodity?

"You people in the arts have got to decide if you’re a business or a charity. If you’re a business, make your market and sell your product. If you’re a charity, go to the government - that’s where the big money is." - Slings & Arrows

There has been much talk lately about how to pay for Canadian television. It’s not a new debate, but it has been brought into the spotlight recently because Shaw Communications and Quebecor have suddenly decided to renege on their CRTC obligations and withhold payments to the Canadian Television Fund (happily, Quebecor recently changed its mind).

Their main complaints about the CTF seem to be that a) most of this money is spent on productions that end up on the CBC, and b) the shows which are subsidized in this way are shows that, according to Jim Shaw, "nobody watches". Shaw’s prime example of this trend seems to be ‘Trailer Park Boys’ which does nothing to bolster his argument. As for most CTF productions ending up on the CBC, this is hardly surprising since they are responsible for the vast bulk of Canadian content currently being aired.

Beyond this specific crisis, the current debate goes to the heart of how we perceive television.

My favorite cabal of Canadian television bloggers (McGrath, Henshaw, Dixon et al) has spent the last few weeks arguing the relative merits of public funding vs. private funding vs. the open market, and the quality and ‘entertainment value’ of shows resulting from these various models, mostly in the pages of ‘Dead Things On Sticks’. I have spoken my piece in response to several of these posts and have so far avoided being banished or flamed into oblivion, for which I am grateful. However, I’m getting the impression that there is a fundamental difference of opinion at work here that needs to be addressed.

With many of these posts, as with Jim Shaw's comments, the underlying assumption seems to be, "if these shows were any damned good, people would watch them". This is basic economics: if you give people the choice between a quality product and a piece of crap, if properly informed they will chose the quality product. This assumption was highlighted in one response which likened the Canadian television industry to the U.S. auto industry, in that it has been protected from open competition for so long that it has resulted in a grossly inferior product.

There are two false assumptions here. I’ve already addressed the inferior product part in my response. The second is that the market operates on cars and entertainment in the same way: if it’s good, people will watch it. Unfortunately, this also assumes the corollary: if it’s crap, nobody will watch it. I think I can dispute that with one word:

Norbit.

A cursory glance at the Top Ten movies at the box office this week - or any week - will dissuade anyone of the notion that quality sells when it comes to entertainment. The same can be said for the top rated TV shows. This is not to say that good shows are never successful or that bad shows never fail. Only that quality, however we chose to define it, has little or nothing to do with how popular a television show will be.

More often than not, the majority of people will chose to watch shows that are comfortable. Shows that follow a familiar pattern, like a sitcom or a police procedural. Shows that do not challenge their opinions or values or make them unhappy. I don’t think this is elitism - it is simply an observation of human nature.

People will sometimes watch other kinds of television shows. Shows that break out of the box. Shows that make them think. Shows that surprise or even offend. Sometimes enough people watch these shows that they manage to survive and even prosper on network television, like ‘Lost’ or ‘Heroes’ or ‘24’. In most cases, however, such shows are relegated to pay cable channels like HBO or Showcase, where only those who can afford to pay can watch them.

The problem has always been that Canada has a tenth of the population of the U.S. and therefore a tenth of the money (or less) to throw into television production. Scripted television is very expensive and ratings-based advertising dollars just aren’t enough in this country for anything other than megahits. This leaves us with two options. Produce a small number of safe, conventional shows that have a better than even chance of appealing to the majority and therefore paying their own way through advertising dollars alone, or…

Subsidize. Through tax dollars, through the CTF, by any means necessary.

If you view television as a commodity, this option is heresy. TV is product. Period. If it doesn’t sell, it’s crap and doesn’t deserve to be on the air.

If, however, you view television as a performing art like, say, theatre or dance, then this is the obvious solution. The arts, especially the performing arts, have always been subsidized for the simple reason that popular (read: profitable) does not always equal good. In fact, hardly ever. For art to do its job as art it has to be allowed to make people uncomfortable, and that’s not the best way to sell tickets.

We aren’t used to thinking of television as art because most of us aren’t old enough to remember when it was an extension of radio, which in turn was an extension of the theatre. It was a lot easier to see the connection back in the golden days of Chayevsky and Sterling when most television shows were performed live on a studio set.

Unfortunately, the current American system has gotten us so used to the idea of television as billboard that we no longer expect art, let alone demand it. We accept that the majority should rule as to what gets aired and what doesn’t. We accept that mediocrity is the will of the people.

"Television, the scorned stepchild of drama, may well be the basic theater of our century." - Paddy Chayevsky

It’s a new century now, and with it comes new technologies and new delivery systems that will likely make the network broadcast model of television as obsolete as the all-powerful corporate sponsorships of the fifties. I like to think that this will be good for television, and for Canadian television in particular, because it will allow unique, interesting shows to reach a small but appreciative audience that won't have to pay through the nose to access them.

I just hope that Canada will still have something unique and interesting to offer when that happy day arrives.

(Next time: How Television Can Save the World)

The Next 'It' Girl?

I tend to stay up way past my bed time on Tuesday nights. Tuesday is choir practice, so I get my husband to tape my shows for me (hello, my name is Jennifer and I'm a TV addict). Happily we have two VCRs, so I get to come home and watch both 'Intelligence' and 'House'.

Last Tuesday's episode of 'House' was astonishing. The story and the writing were top notch, to be sure, but what really caught my attention was the girl who played 'Eve'.

Meet Katheryn Winnick.

Now, keep in mind that I have a plain girl's aversion to pretty girls. It's a form of bigotry I don't endorse, but I must admit to a tendency to assume that if a woman is classically beautiful then she probably isn't smart, funny or talented until she proves otherwise.

Katheryn Winnick may be beautiful, but I hardly noticed. I was too mesmerized by her performance. Mind you, this was a spectacular, scene-chewing role she was handed, but I suspect that not many actresses could have pulled it off without going over the top into melodrama.

The last time I reacted to an actress like this was the first time I saw Claire Danes in 'My So-Called Life'. Remember that? Remember how fresh and open and genuine she was? Remember thinking that this actress was somehow different and wonderful and going places? That's what this was like.

Sadly, Claire Danes' career never really lived up to that initial flash of potential. In fact, she's way up on my list of the 'Top 10 People Who Should Fire Their Agent' along with Vin Diesel and Christian Slater. Hopefully Winnick has a better agent, because I would really like to see her in more than a single TV episode. It looks like she's got fairly significant roles in a costume drama and a psychological thriller coming up, so this gives me hope.

Oh, and as an added bonus... she's Canadian!