CBC/Radio-Canada has unveiled highlights of its upcoming round-the-clock coverage of the Tokyo Summer Olympics and the broadcast team who’ll deliver it. Featuring a record 33 sports and 339 medal events across 42 competition venues, Tokyo 2020 officially begins on Friday, July 23 at 7 a.m. ET (4 a.m. PT) with the Opening Ceremony hosted by CBC Sports veteran Scott Russell and The National’s Adrienne Arsenault. CBC will broadcast 23 hours of daily live coverage throughout the games. Russell will host the nightly Olympic Games Primetime, while Andi Petrillo will be behind the desk for Olympic Games Morning. Perdita Felicien and Andrew Chang host Tokyo Today and Alexandre Despatie and Heather Hiscox are teamed on Olympic Games Overnight. Read more here.
Canadian Cinema Editors have unveiled the nominees for the 2021 CCE Awards. This year’s Lifetime Achievement Award honouree is Michel Arcand, whose editing career spans four decades on films like Tomorrow Never Dies, Sunshine and The Sixth Day. Jane Tattersall is the recipient of the Career Achievement Award. Tattersall is a 30-year sound editor with over 170 film and television credits with recent sound supervising work on The Handmaid’s Tale, The North Water and 13 Minutes.
The Writers Guild of Canada (WGC) and its Diversity Committee have prepared the first, of what will be an annual, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Report as part of efforts to address underrepresentation in Canadian television. The report provides an overview of the composition of WGC’s membership from 2013-19, diversity in writers’ rooms and writing credits on scripted live-action and animated Canadian TV series. Among its key findings are that the percentage of new WGC members self-identifying as diverse has risen steadily from 14% in 2016 to 33% in 2019. The percentage of diverse writers working on Canadian TV series under WGC jurisdiction has also risen from 16% in 2016 to 26% in 2019. In 2019, Indigenous screenwriters represented just 4% of working writers, with very few occupying senior-level writing positions. The report also found that an industry-wide move to shorter episode orders, smaller writers’ rooms and a marked decrease in the volume of Canadian-written shows has decreased opportunities for all Canadian screenwriters, particularly new and diverse screenwriters facing systemic barriers.
ACTRA Toronto is promoting a Diversity Showcase of self-taped scenes by established and on-the-cusp Black performers in its membership. The online promotion is being supported by Ontario Creates, in collaboration with The Casting Directors Society of Canada. The Black Performer Showcase is the first of several with plans underway to follow it with a Latinx Showcase, an Asian Showcase, a Showcase for performers living with disabilities, and a Queer Performer Showcase, among others.
Telefilm Canada has shared a new study on Canadian audiences that finds on average, one-quarter (24%) of Canadians’ at-home viewing time is devoted to Canadian/Québec content. Three-quarters of Canadians agree that more effort should be made to promote Canadian/Québec content both inside and outside Canada. Canadians who are most likely to have difficulty finding Canadian and Quebec content include residents of Ontario, Alberta, and BC, youth aged 18-34 and Canadians from racialized communities. Racialized communities also represent the subgroup of the population that watches the least Canadian/Quebec audiovisual content. Commissioned by Telefilm, the study was carried out by Leger last October and November with 1,875 respondents completing the questionnaire.
Netflix has ordered 10 episodes of Nomadic Pictures sci-fi series, The Imperfects. Former Writers Guild of Canada (WGC) president Dennis Heaton, who previously executive produced and show-ran The Order, will serve as showrunner, executive producer and writer. The series follows three twenty-somethings attempting to track down a group of scientists responsible for an experimental gene therapy that’s turned them into monsters. Among those signed on to the series are actress Italia Ricci (Designated Survivor, Supergirl), Rhianna Jagpal (To All The Boys), and Morgan Taylor Campbell (Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist).
Scott’s Vacation House Rules returns for a second season May 16 on HGTV Canada. In the Corus Studios Original series, real estate expert and contractor Scott McGillivray teaches homeowners how to make investment and reno decisions that turn uninspired cottage properties into profitable vacation rentals. The new season includes integrations from series sponsors CIBC, BEHR, Pollard, ROCKWOOL, and Lowe’s.
The Canadian Film Fest, presented by Super Channel, wrapped its three-weekend run on Super Channel Fuse, with the festival award winners announced. Directed by Wendy Morgan, Sugar Daddy took home four awards including Best Feature, Best Music, Best Performance, and the DGC Ontario Best Director award. Andrew Chung’s White Elephant took home the ReTAKE Furniture Rental Best Set Design award and the Jury Award for Best Ensemble; with the William F. White Reel Canadian Indie award going to Events Transpiring Before, During, and After a High School Basketball Game, directed by Ted Stenson. Find the full list of winners here.
Global News will air network news special, Hidden Hate: Anti-Asian Racism Saturday, April 24 at 7:30 p.m. local time. The special features reporters and anchors from Global News stations across the country, including Tracy Tong, Miranda Anthistle, Sophie Lui, Tracy Nagai and Liem Vu. They’ll explore the rise of racist incidents during the COVID-19 pandemic, the law around hate crimes in Canada, and Asian stereotypes in pop culture. Former Toronto Raptor Jeremy Lin, former Governor General Adrienne Clarkson, and Asian Canadian actors Paul Sun-Hyung Lee and Ludi Lin will also be featured.
ILTV News Channel, which broadcasts daily current affairs content about Israel, has signed a two-year agreement with ZoomerMedia Limited (ZML) giving ZML the exclusive Canadian broadcast rights for ILTV’s Israel Daily, which it airs as part of a Monday to Friday alternative News Hour it shares with CBN News on ZoomerMedia’s Faith and Opinion channels, JoyTV and FaithTV. Based in Tel Aviv, ILTV broadcasts a 30-minute daily news edition, plus magazine content that covers business, technology, science, art, music, travel, cooking and sports from an Israeli perspective.
CTV has announced broadcast details for the 93rd Oscars, airing live Sunday, April 25 at 8 p.m. ET / 5 p.m. PT on CTV, CTV.ca and the CTV app, from Union Station Los Angeles and the Dolby Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center, in addition to international locations via satellite. CTV will kick off its coverage with Oscars: Into the Spotlight at 6:30 p.m. ET / 3:30 p.m. PT, offering viewers a glimpse at this year’s presenters and nominees as they arrive at the broadcast. ETALK Previews The Oscars will air Friday, April 23, with an encore presentation Sunday leading in to the live broadcast. Anchored by ETALK’s Danielle Graham and Tyrone Edwards, it will preview what viewers can expect from this year’s show from COVID-19 protocol to red carpet fashion. As the only Canadian entertainment news outlet to secure a position in this year’s Oscars Arrivals Area, ETALK L.A. correspondent Liz Trinnear will be on the ground at Union Station. Graham and Edwards will also deliver post-awards coverage on Monday, April 26 on CTV and Etalk.ca.
CTV Life Channel is adding Irish television personality and cook Donal Skehan to its lineup of lifestyle programming. Kicking off with Donal’s Super Food in Minutes on May 3, additional new series from Skehan are set to rollout on CTV Life later this year, including Donal’s Family Food in Minutes. Author of nine best-selling cookbooks, Skehan is a food writer, photographer, and television presenter who has appeared on numerous food and lifestyle series around the world, including Junior Masterchef in the UK. He launched his own YouTube channel under Jamie Oliver’s Food Tube Network in 2014.
Sight Seers debuts on AMI-tv Thursday, May 13 as hosts Mark Joly – who is blind – and Laura Warren solve paranormal problems on Canada’s East Coast. Nova Scotia locations explored in Season 1 include the Queen’s County Museum in Liverpool, where wisps of smoke and unusual sounds occur at all hours; Lunenburg’s Boscawen Inn, where ghosts haunting its halls; the Halifax Club, host of strange goings-on; and Randall House Historical Museum in Wolfville, where guests have been touched and pushed.
Super Channel will premiere New Zealand-set family thriller Mystic on Super Channel Heart & Home beginning May 16. Based on bestselling author Stacy Gregg’s Pony Club Secrets book series, the Super Channel Heart & Home Original in association with BBC, was executive produced by Brian Bird (When Calls the Heart). Each half-hour episode will also be available on Super Channel On Demand, the day following its weekly linear broadcast.
