REVOLVING DOOR:
Bell Media has named Randy Lennox as its president following the departure of Mary Ann Turcke who is leaving for an opportunity with the National Football League. Lennox, a former executive at Universal Music Canada, has been with Bell since 2015 as president of content and broadcasting. Turcke was appointed Bell Media president in April 2015, replacing Kevin Crull. She joins the NFL as president of its Digital Media and NFL Network, based in Los Angeles.
102.1 The Edge (CFNY-FM) Toronto has rolled out a new lineup and new logo. The new morning show has been dubbed Edge Mornings with Melani (Mariani) & Adam (Ricard). Mariani had been part of the (Fearless) Fred and Mel weekday mornings show. Fearless Fred moves to afternoons, while Alan Cross’ weekday show has been bumped from early afternoons to the 6 to 7 p.m. slot. Cross’ Ongoing History of New Music program remains in its Sunday evening time slot.
Willy Percy, Kim Seale and Alece Anderson, better known as the Rock 101 (CFMI-FM) Vancouver morning show team, are now also being heard evenings on Corus Radio sister station Q107 (CILQ-FM) Toronto. The trio are doing a customized show for Q107 with local content and social media, airing from 6 to 8 p.m. ET. The revamped Q lineup kicks off with Derringer In the Morning with Jennifer Valentyne, Ryan Parker & Johnny Garbutt; Joanne Wilder holds down mid-days, while John Scholes is handling afternoon drive. Following Willy on Q, broadcast veteran Andy Frost remains in his 8 to 10 p.m. time slot.
Roundhouse Radio (CIRH-FM) Vancouver has re-appointed Kerry Marshall as news & content director following the departure of Marcella Bernardo, who as Broadcast Dialogue previously reported, returns to News 1130 (CKWX-AM) this month as a reporter/producer. Marshall is best known for his time as a morning newsie on 96.9 JACKfm (CJAX-FM) and CFOX-FM Vancouver. Krystle Landert, who has been with the independent station since 2016, will fill the role of assistant news & content director.
Joel Lefevre is the new overnight anchor at News1130 (CKWX-AM) Vancouver. Lefevre was most recently an anchor/writer at iNews 880 (CHQT-AM) Edmonton, but is best known as a contestant on Big Brother Canada Season 4 where he finished in the top five. Paul Weisser, who had been with the station off and on since 2000, has left to pursue opportunities outside of radio.
Bruce Rainnie is leaving CBC P.E.I. Rainnie will end 13 and a half years on the anchor desk at CBC News: Compass on April 28. Rainnie has accepted a new job as executive director of the Nova Scotia Sport Hall of Fame in Halifax. Rainnie has been with CBC since 1995. In addition to hosting CBC News: Compass, he is known for his work with CBC Sports, including covering seven Olympic Games. CBC says the search for a new Compass host is already underway.
Meanwhile, Kevin “Boomer” Gallant is retiring from CBC News: Compass after 31 years as the weather specialist. Gallant will retire April 28. He started doing weather for Compass on a fill-in basis in August 1986. Gallant plans to stay on P.E.I.
Jeff Winskell, program director for 97.7 HTZ-FM (CHTZ-FM) and NewsTalk 610 (CKTB-AM) St. Catharines, ON has accepted a new role within Bell Media and will be moving to Kelowna to oversee 22 stations throughout the B.C. Interior as group PD, succeeding Mark Burley who fell victim to staff cuts last month. Winskell, who previously was assistant regional brand director for Astral Media in Kelowna, takes up the new position at the end of the March.
Pink Triangle Press has appointed David Walberg as executive director, effective April 3. Walberg will lead a team of 55 staff in Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa and Vancouver. Walberg has worked at PTP for more than 25 years, and is currently its digital chief executive. He succeeds Ken Popert, who has helmed PTP since 1986. Founded in 1971, Pink Triangle Press produces LGBT journalism at DailyXtra.com, operates the gay adult dating website Squirt.org and has produced a number of television projects, including the travel show Bump! and The Gayest Show Ever.
Dejero has named Bruce Anderson its new CEO, taking over from Brian Cram who has headed the company for the last five years. Hailing from Zimbabwe, Anderson is a veteran senior executive, most recently for global commodity producer and trader firm Glencore. Cram remains an investor in the Waterloo-based company, an innovator in cloud-managed solutions that simplify the transport of live video and real-time data across remote or mobile IP networks.
CHEX-TV’s Mike Judson has signed off from the Peterborough station after five years as weather analyst and host/producer of CHEX Daily. Judson is leaving to host a morning radio show in the city, but isn’t saying just where yet. The Thornhill, ON native previously spent time at stations in Antigonish, NS, Calgary, AB and Lindsay, ON before landing in Peterborough at Country 105 (CKQM-FM), Energy 99.7 (CKPT-FM) and Magic 96.7 (CJWV-FM).
Dan O’Toole and Jay Onrait will return to TSN this fall. SC WITH JAY AND DAN will air weeknights at midnight ET. The Canadian duo’s nearly four-year run on the Fox Sports 1 network came to an end last week when Fox announced Feb. 22 was the final edition of the Los Angeles-based Fox Sports Live show, which debuted in Aug. 2013. Fox opted not to renew their contracts, which are up at the end of March. O’Toole and Onrait landed at Fox after a long stint co-hosting TSN’s SportsCentre from 2003 to 2013.
Annabel Slaight is retiring from the Shaw Rocket Fund as chair of the Board of Directors. Slaight, who co-founded OWL magazine in 1976, has spent 18 years with the fund, helping evolve it as a driver of Canadian children’s programming. Slaight passes the torch to senior broadcast executive Christine Shipton. Most recently, Shipton served as chief content officer, chief creative officer and SVP of content for Shaw Media. Christine has also held senior positions with The W Network, Blueprint Entertainment, Landscape Entertainment Canada, Alliance Atlantis Television and Alliance Communications.
RADIO/AUDIO/PODCAST:
Denham Jolly, the licence holder of Canada’s first black-owned and operated urban radio station, has published his memoir In The Black: My Life. Jolly was president of Milestone Communications, which launched The Flow 93.5 (CFXJ-FM) Toronto, after a 12-year battle to get a licence, fueled by the the need for a stronger voice for the black community. At its launch in 2001, Flow 93.5 became the model for urban music stations across the country and is credited with helping introduce artists like Drake and many others to commercial airwaves.
SIGN-OFFS:
Paul Nicholls, Feb. 23, suddenly while on vacation. Nicholls was well-known in the community of Georgina, ON as a former town councillor and Rogers TV personality. He was most recently known for hosting the current affairs program Politically Speaking after serving as a town councillor from 1994 to 1997 and sitting on the board of directors for both the Georgina Public Libraries and Georgina Cares organizations. In addition to his extensive volunteer work, Paul was a distinguished toastmaster and actor, starring in local productions and short films. Former mayor Rob Grossi hosted a special edition of Politically Speaking on Rogers TV on Tuesday to celebrate Nicholls life.
Jack Gray, 90, on Feb. 23. One of the driving forces behind the creation of The Writers Guild of Canada (WGC) in 1991, Gray committed 25 years of his life to working on behalf of Canadian screenwriters. He was the first writer-president of ACTRA, serving two terms from 1978-81 and was the last chair of the ACTRA National Writers Council. Believing strongly that screenwriters needed to be represented by a writer-driven organization, Gray organized his fellow screenwriters into leaving ACTRA and forming the WGC. In 2002, Gray was given the WGC’s “Writers Block Award for Service to Canadian Screenwriters.”
Pierre Pascau, 78, on Feb. 28. Born in Mauritius, the well-known Montreal talk show host and reporter, joined the Mauritius Broadcasting Service at the age of 19 and was subsequently awarded a three-year scholarship to the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. During his time at Guildhall, Pierre worked as a freelance reporter for the British Home Office. In 1965, Pascau moved to Montreal, working as a reporter for CBC Radio’s Cross Country Checkup and CBC Television’s Hourglass. He later moved to CFCF-TV Montreal, establishing himself as an investigative reporter. While at CKLM-AM during the October Crisis, Pasco was contacted by the Front de liberation du Quebec responsible for kidnapping British diplomat James Cross and served as an intermediary between the FLQ and the government. Pascau went on to have a short-lived run as co-host of Canada AM in 1974, moving on to CKAC-AM where he hosted L’Informateur. He left the station in 1990 for CKVL-AM where he began hosting Le Point du Jour. Pascau retired in 1997 and relocated to Paris in recent years.
TV/FILM/VIDEO:
Two Canadians took home Oscars at Sunday night’s Academy Awards. Montreal’s Sylvain Bellemare gave a shout out to his hometown as he accepted the Oscar for Best Sound Editing for his work on Arrival. Alan Barillaro of Chippawa, ON also took home an Oscar for his animated short Piper, which screened in theatres last year ahead of Pixar’s Finding Dory. According to Numeris, the awards show drew 5.5 million viewers to CTV, up one per cent over last year. The show delivered a 53 per cent share, with one in two English-speaking Canadians tuning into the four-hour broadcast. Viewership peaked with 6.7 million viewers at 8:48 p.m. ET as Mahershala Ali (Moonlight) accepted his Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. Oscars Opening Ceremony: Live From The Red Carpet drew 2.9 million viewers, up eight per cent over last year.
HBO Canada says the dawn of the Donald Trump era is netting record audiences for its talk shows. Final data from Numeris indicates after four weeks, the average audience for Season 15 of Real Time with Bill Maher is 404,000 viewers, a 73 per cent increase over Season 14 and the highest audiences ever for the series. Meanwhile, the Season 4 premiere of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver on Feb. 12 was the series’ most-watched episode ever on HBO Canada, with an average audience of 403,000 viewers, double the average audience of the Season 3 premiere.
Groupe Média TFO has struck a partnership with Ontario-based tech startup Vubble. The agreement will see online French-language educational videos delivered to IDÉLLO, Groupe Média TFO’s educational, digital platform. The Vubble service offers a variety of high-quality short web videos from Canada and around the world from current affairs, math and science to travel and cooking. Series include Hygiène mentale – Éducation aux médias dealing with media literacy; Axolothors-série #1: Une journée chez les astronautes taking an insider look at how astronauts are trained; and J’irais dormir chez vous – Iran, a unique travel adventure series with Antoine de Maximy.
CBC’s Breaking Barriers Film Fund, aimed at helping level the playing field for underrepresented creators like women, Indigenous people, visible minorities and persons with disabilities, has announced its inaugural recipients. Meditation Park, written by Mina Shum, Angelique’s Isle, written by Michelle Derosier, and Octavio Is Dead! written by Sook-Yin Lee are the inaugural projects to receive financing through the fund. The CBC’s commitment will see the public broadcaster invest at least $7.5 million into the fund over the next three years. All three films are also supported by Telefilm Canada.
Dale Johnson brought his film Pawn Sacrifice to his hometown of Camrose, AB last month to open the 8th annual Nordlys Film and Arts Festival. The film financier and creative producer arrived direct from the gala premiere of his latest film The Lost City of Z in Berlin. Directed by Academy Award winner Ed Zwick and starring Tobey Maguire, Liev Schreiber and Peter Sarsgaard, Pawn Sacrifice tells the story of American chess prodigy Bobby Fisher and his tumultuous role within superpower rivalries at the height of the Cold War.
Stingray Digital Group Inc. has completed the first phase in the rebrand of iConcerts, a television channel and on demand service dedicated solely to live music. Currently distributed in 85 countries as Stingray iConcerts, the company says the rebranding effort ensures a consistent identity across Stingray’s portfolio of multi-platform music products and services available to content providers. The second phase of the rebrand will include a new, responsive website.
Much is launching a nationwide freeview on more than 30 TV service providers between March 7 and April 4. Among the new additions to the Much schedule this month are British comedy Brotherhood, prank show Fameless with host David Spade, and the debut of Conan O’Brien’s special Conan Without Borders: Made In Mexico.
More than 40 live television channels are coming to YouTube, but Canadians will have to wait for the service. Dubbed YouTube TV, the $35 a month streaming service will be available in major U.S. markets accessible via YouTube’s mobile app or website. It also includes a cloud DVR feature with unlimited storage. A subscription offers access to ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, ESPN, The CW, Disney, MSNBC and Fox News. The service is similar to Sony’s PlayStation Vue service, Dish Network’s Sling TV, and AT&T’s DirecTV Now, which are also only available in the U.S.
Toronto Mayor John Tory is promising to streamline regulations to better position the city to compete for film, television and digital productions. The city says that production contributed more than $2.01 billion to Toronto’s economy in 2016, topping a previous high of $1.5 billion in 2015. Combined with investment from broadcasters and interactive digital media, that figure climbs to $3.26 billion. The bulk of that was from 115 foreign and domestic TV productions which brought in $908 million in 2016. Investment by broadcasters was down year-over-year about $69 million to $211 million, while interactive digital media rose to $1.05 billion, from $1 billion in 2016. Commercial production was up 10 per cent to $380 million.
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