Doyle Runs Down the Cancon Cornucopia

CANADIAN CREATIVES have a tough, fair minded ally in the Globe & Mail's John Doyle. He's not a cheerleader for homegrown stuff -- if it's not very good he'll say it -- which means his recommendations are less dismissable. And though there are those inside the CBC who don't get it, who go apoplectic over every Doyle criticism -- they fail to understand that not only is he just doing his job, but he's doing it from a place of general intense support for the CBC.

So this morning he runs down the Cancon offerings for fall and winter on the various networks. Now, the sensitive people in the CBC are liable to cotton to this passage:

Mind you, CBC takes a Soviet-era, Kremlin-like stance on advance notice of its shows. Asked to provide a list of what's coming between now and late January, CBC's outsourced publicity company essentially provided a list of what's airing next week. Later came notice of two other shows, neither of which I'd pick as really notable.

It seems some CBC shows don't exist until some CBC executive says they exist, which happens in November. This is weird. Thousands of people have seen snippets of the hockey drama MVP on YouTube. The show looks sensationally good and there's much buzz, but it doesn't exist until the Kremlin says it exists. Advance buzz isn't a CBC thing. CBC's policy is this: Whatever you say, say nothing.

A couple of months ago, when the fall stuff was announced, and when CBC specifically announced their fall schedule, they actually took some heat from journalists because they weren't doing enough drama. This, when in reality there were at least three more series in production for later starts. I know. I was working on one of them.

Consequently, the story got spun the way it did instead of the true story, which is this: If you care at all about quality Canadian drama and comedy, you need to care about the CBC. They are doing more, they are making shows with the right budget, and they're working really hard to make them good -- harder than any other Canadian broadcaster. Period.

The attitude that Doyle talks about isn't helping to get that message out. But it needs to get out. For all its flaws, the CBC wears the white hat here.

Anyway -- moving on to the shameless self promotion part of the discussion, here's what Doyle has to say about the two shows I'm involved with this fall:

Across the River to Motor City (CITY-TV, starts Nov. 22) is perhaps the most ambitious of the new Canadian dramas. Set both in Detroit and in Windsor, Ont., and in both the present and the 1960s, it's about private eye Ben Ford (played in youth by Sasha Roiz, and in old age by David Fox), whose girlfriend disappeared on the day of the JFK assassination. Her remains are finally found, and Ben must unravel what happened. Noirish, moody and complex, it's got an awful lot of plot.

The Border (CBC) "confronts Canada's toughest border-security issues" according to the CBC. It's about an outfit called the Immigration and Customs Security (ICS) Squad, and it stars James McGowan, Sofia Milos, Graham Abbey and Catherine Disher. An expensive bet for CBC, the series is big on action and intrigue, in a genre that requires oodles of ingenuity in the writing and directing. The rough pilot episode I've seen is promising but dramatically wobbly.

So there it is. ATR premieres the week of November 22 on Citytv stations in those markets that have them. (Check your local listings for the exact date and time. I think Winnipeg actually goes first, on the 19th.) The Border premieres on CBC in early 2008.

Of the other shows Doyle talks about, I think I'm probably looking forward most to MVP. (I had a shameful early dalliance with Footballers Wives) and Search and Rescue -- though I've also got high hopes for Da Kink in My Hair.

And don't forget, Rent-A-Goalie returns October 28. I've got two eps of that, 2nd season, too.

Oh, and Blood Ties continues on SPACE and Citytv. My eps are toward the end of the season. Oh God, the shameless self promo...somebody stop me...

And in the End...

YOU HAVE a read-through, it goes well, people give their tiny little line changes, you change a couple of character names because they didn't come back "clear for use," and...

...full YELLOW draft.

Sigh.

Anyway, they started shooting yesterday. It looked great. Good energy, lots of extras for our media mob.

I remember why I do this.

Big Shots: XY Need Not Apply

THE TORONTO STAR'S Vinay Menon has a review of Big Shots (premiering tonight) which elucidates in very specific terms, exactly what I was talking about last year in my post, The Eyeballs of Men. From Menon's review:

Who are these whiny imposters television is trying to pass off as men?

This is the question male viewers will ask after watching the premiere of Big Shots (ABC, CTV, 10 tonight). Assuming, that is, they can get through the hour without losing consciousness from all the involuntary forehead slapping.

Notify Guinness because we have a first: a show about men that couldn't possibly be aimed at men. A show in which male characters sit around on a patio and share their innermost feelings or stand around on a golf course and untangle their woes or lounge around in a sauna and bemoan the ephemera threatening to tear their hearts asunder.

In short: a gal pal show in which the gals are lads.

The feminized, science-fiction tv male lives! On TV, at least. I won't be tuning in Big Shots tonight. Based on the preview and the reviews, I've seen what I need to.

If you want to see a version of Big Shots that's actually about men, try to find a DVD of the BBC show Manchild. It's good fun. And for bonus points -- it stars Giles from Buffy!

As Prep Continues...

IT WAS PROBABLY a little ambitious to try and run down prep day by day. Those days easily get away from you. Then it's 10:00 pm and you've been here 13 hours and you're suddenly thinking that life would be better if we didn't have to use the word "and" so much. Really, look at it there on the page. "And." It mocks you. What kind of stupid motherfucking word is "And?"

And don't even get me started on prepositions.

Anyway, I think I left you on Day Four with the Pink Draft out to people, and getting ready for the Blue Draft.

The problem is I kind of forget now what changed from Pink to Blue.

On Friday, there were a couple of more meetings. The first was very long -- and difficult. It's the Playback meeting.

The Border is kind of a tech-y show -- and there's moments that involve seeing information come up on a video screen...news stories, maps, computer searches -- anything that you see on a computer or TV screen has to be edited together, and played back on the day.

One of the signature elements of our set is a very cool looking technical station where one of the characters monitors incoming data. This is where we get a lot of the exposition and story out, and also where the character, who's irreverent and fun, plays a lot of his scenes. There are seventeen monitors there. Each one has to have something up on it. It has to be fed from the other room. If things need to change during the scene, those changes either have to be edited together and played back in sync so it looks like our guy is driving those changes -- OR, it has to be in such a way that the guy behind the scenes really is driving the changes live, in essence doing for real what the character on screen seems to be doing.

So our Graphics & Motion Designer, Jae, has to put together, design and make ready for the day it plays every single element that appears on a computer screen or a TV screen. There's another way you can do this, if you lock off, you do what's called "a burn in." That's where people basically watch a blank (or green) screen and you put it in in post. Canadian TV does this a lot because it's cheaper and it's way faster than trying to coordinate playback on the day -- but it also doesn't look nearly as good. And -- our visual esthetic is handheld -- so it wouldn't really work for our show anyhow.

So you find yourself sitting through a meeting and going...through... every...single ...image. It's great training. Seriously, you will never lazily write "so and so looks up on the monitor and sees a giant condor streaking across the screen then exploding into a frog's anus" again.

Not that you would. Just saying.

Anyway -- it's a loooong meeting. Once again, I'm impressed by the dedication of all the people who work to actualize something that I just cavalierly throw down on a page.

Later in the day, there's a spirited discussion surrounding costumes for our guest lead. The action in my script is compressed so it all takes place in one day. But my guest lead is supposed to be a huge movie star, so we're trying to motivate costume changes. There is, believe it or not, a long and involved discussion on the mechanics of how and when she would change, and why. I have her in a bathrobe for a scene. Really? Ruth, the costume designer wants to know, why would she be in a bathrobe then? She's under great stress at that moment for a reason I can't go into because of spoiling the fun.

And you know what? It's a legit question. All these things that never occur to you -- and they're good questions. It takes a village, man. And once again I remember one of those things about film that really gets to me:

"A film by." Wow. That credit really is bullshit. If only the DGA had an ounce of shame.

It's finally decided that she can get in the bathrobe, but it needs to happen earlier. Also, our timeline through the day is a little off, and we need to adjust time somewhere in the second act so that there's enough time elapsed for the actions we have to play out. I decide to add a running timeline in the scene heading slugs so it's clear how much time has passed from scene to scene.

The Blue Draft came out on Monday. I started work on it over the weekend and came in and did some more stuff, sending it out about midday. I seem to recall that it was tweaky stuff -- lines of dialogue here, a bit of different staging there. One scene changed significantly -- a psychiatrist scene that I wasn't really getting the flavour of, so one of the showrunners took a pass and I integrated that with my changes.

Because I've added that slugline timeline, though, what is a minor set of revisions still pushes the draft from pages to a full draft. Once you go to production, you lock the script, and then every change you make generates the next coloured page. If you change more than half the pages, you issue a full new draft. Less than half, you issue pages, and people collate the revisions into their last full coloured draft.

People in the other departments kind of hate it when you issue too many drafts. Production has to run the drafts, and that's way more work for them -- and every member of the team : art, costumes, construction, set dec, props -- have all made notes. Every time you make a new draft, they have to go through and transfer those notes across. It's a drag. You learn to dread having to put out a full draft.

The story coordinator looks at you with those damaged soulful, "don't make me do this" eyes, and you just say, "full draft, bitch..." because you're cold like that.

The rest of Monday is easy enough for me, I guess. They're still scouting locations, and finalizing casting of some of the smaller parts.

Tuesday -- Day 7 of Prep

Everything's going Green.

Green Draft, that is. The day starts with a "tone meeting," which is exactly what it sounds like. The story department sits down with the Director to talk through the tone of all the scenes. We've been sneaking a little more emotional heft into the story in the last few drafts. Once you get the story working structurally, suddenly you have room to deepen this note, or that note. The exact turn of phrase you were struggling with suddenly seems to present itself.

There's one more thing we're there to do: cut scenes. The board still looks fearsome on a couple of days. So with fresh eyes, we figure out a way to lop off a scene in Act One and get the essential info out in a later scene. And there's another series of three scenes that we figure can play as one long scene with a walk through.

The problem is that every time you break out a scene, that's a setup. The unit needs to block, light, go in for coverage. If you have too many scenes -- even if they're short, you start to add up the time you spend in that setup and pretty soon you've burned an hour you don't have. The funny thing is, now you know the story so well that you can be ruthless: cut a scene here, combine two, all to make it fit the board.

But it leads to...another full draft. That's right, story coordinator, Jimmy the Bat, Take it! Take it!

There's also a bit of back and forth with the art department. I've called for passports, a newspaper headline, a visa letter -- all of these need to be created. I wind up writing a fake letter for the visa application. I'll save you the freeze frame time next year -- there are no dirty words, just a fun bunch of strung together legalese and officialspeak. It's actually way more satisfying to write that stuff than to open up your mailbox and have to read it. Is it possible that real lawyers get secret fuzzy jollies coming up with this shit for real?

Prep Day 8

The major event today is the production meeting. Once through the shooting schedule, day by day. By now, the story is pretty set. The locations are chosen. We're cast. And so through the meeting, the script pretty firmly passes out of my comfort zone -- as a collection of story beats and scenes, to the realm of the first A.D., Michael -- now it's just a bunch of pieces -- numbers of extras, props needed, cars, playback, art. Here it is, story deconstructed into its component parts. It's in that in between phase -- for the moment, not a story to be told -- but a product to be manufactured.

Then, after, one more playback meeting. I want to kill myself.

There are a few change pages for the Yellow, but we're going to hold them off until the read through. Hopefully the read through will only mean dialogue tweaks. You hear how the actor reads a line, sometimes a substitution they make that works...you answer their questions.

Which brings us to today.

There's a bunch of prop photos that play in my ep, too. (Playback and Prop photos -- I can't make it simple, can I?) They were shot this morning, Cherry Beach standing in for the Sudan. Magic of TV. The Director comes in to tell us they look great.

Actors are trickling in for their costume fittings with Ruth. Our guest lead is flying in from Los Angeles later this afternoon. The Producers will meet her later.

Then, at the crew lunch, the read through, some quick and dirty changes and hopefully we'll issue Yellow pages tonight. And hopefully it won't be a full draft.

Tomorrow we shoot. And another episode starts prep.

So it goes.

Americans are a Gassy People

WELL CONGRATS all around to those toiling out in Rouleau.

From Playback:

Americans have been charmed by the quirky residents of Dog River, who drew high ratings to Superstation WGN when Corner Gas made its south-of-the-border premiere.

Amid favorable reviews from U.S. critics, the first two episodes of season one scored 357,000 and 290,000 viewers (2+), respectively, on Sept. 10 at 8 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. ET. Those numbers compare favorably to America's Funniest Home Videos, the highest rated show on the satellite and cable channel, which garnered 541,000 viewers in the same Monday timeslot the week prior.

The Gas episodes also played well in the key 18-49 demographic -- 176,000 and 168,000 -- taking second place behind AFHV and even finishing ahead of a Cubs-Cardinals game.

"Baseball, especially Cubs competing for the division title, is big on our network, so this was a great start," a spokesperson for WGN tells Playback Daily. The Chicago-based channel reaches over 70 million U.S. homes. It celebrated the premiere of the Regina-shot comedy, seen here on CTV, with a free gas giveaway during an online contest.

We can do this if you support us. There are more Corner Gas's in us yet!

The Dad-O-Meter

MEASURING ONE'S reaction to new fall shows is by no means an exact science. But this year I've rolled out a new tool.

I got a second TV.

One for the bedroom. It was an impulse buy. I've not had a TV in the bedroom, well, ever. At least since I lived with my parents -- in those long ago times when I moved down to dwell, sturm and drang and all, in the basement.

Having a TV in the bedroom, of course, means that one is able to watch TV in bed. And that means that shows can now be measured by using the Dad-O-Meter, which is carefully calibrated in UoS (Units of Sleep.) If I find myself dozing in the middle of the show, (UoS 1) you know that's not good news. If I actually catch myself snoring, (UoS 5) that's a pretty signficant indictment. (There are other gradations on the UoS scale, including "lost time," to "mixed with dream for more satisfying viewing experience" but they're all highly technical measurements, so I won't get into them.) Suffice it to say that the use of the Dad-O-Meter also provides the most concrete evidence yet that I am indeed turning into my father.

My father falls asleep in front of the TV all the time. Then he wakes up ten minutes later and can't follow the action and starts asking questions. But he doesn't fall asleep in front of Rome, say. He discovered the Dad-O-Meter years ago.
So what does the Dad-O-Meter say about the new fall shows thus far?

K-Ville

I liked the pilot, but wasn't sure I saw the show past the cop show set in New Orleans thing. And you know what? If they're going to set a cop show in N.O. and then back away from the Katrina implications, then I definitely am not interested. The preview for Ep 2 looked like it might be going that way, so I stayed away (for now.) It's on the PVR but I decided to check out some other fare.

Chuck (may not be exactly as pictured)

...surprised me. Not because I liked it -- Zachary Levi is winning and the action was great, and that lead actress I've never seen before was good, and she sure is gorgeous. (And just in case you weren't sure of that, they give you not one, but two scenes with her in her underwear to make the sale.) Yes, Chuck was well-executed and fun.

Nope, I'm surprised because I don't want to go back. I guess the thing is, at the end of the day, with the very few "add" slots I have for TV viewing, I'm not clamoring for a cross between Alias and The 40 Year Old Virgin. I want different things from each of those genres. Sorry Chuck. Nice try. But I did stay awake.

Hey..isn't Rachel Bilson coming on this show? Mmm. Maybe one more. I'll check back in a few weeks.

Journeyman

was equally a surprise. I'd read a few vaguely disappointed reviews, and yes, the show is basically Quantum Leap. But there's a couple of things that really drew me in.

First, I thought it was a really well-executed pilot. Great production values, but it didn't exactly look like it was $10 million more than any other ep of the series...I'm not looking to be burned by that this year. Second, Kevin McKidd from Rome is just a magnetic guy. He's a great actor, and you want to go with him. I also appreciated that they didn't go for the obvious cultural reference points when they were in the past. Okay, yeah, there was the guy talking on the cell phone the size of a casket, but there were subtler touches as well. I loved the old clip of Bryant Gumbel and Jane Pauley on the Today show, and the Less Than Zero billboard. I liked the murky morality doublecross -- he's kind of there to save someone, but kind of not. If anything demonstrates the change of attitude in America in the twenty years since Quantum Leap, it's how they handled that plot.

And then, Lord Baby Jesus, there she is. Moon Bloodgood. Oh, man. Seriously, was this woman created in some sort of Evil Genius' lab? Nice twist with her character too -- also being some sort of 'traveler.' And all the stuff with the wife didn't feel forced to me. I liked how committed he is to his wife. Made me feel good and gooey about True Lurrv. "Honey, I love you so much I didn't even have sex with Moon Bloodgood." That should be on a card.

The thing is, I feel like this exact show broke my heart earlier this season, with Daybreak (and Bloodgood, too) so I'll be watching the ratings closely before I commit to an 'add' here.

Cane

Gosh, they're really taking this one seriously. But Jimmy Smits is such a solid television performer that maybe I sh...zzzzz.zzzzZZZZZZZzzzzZZZZZZz.

Big Bang Theory

I was actually asleep before Chuck Lorre's credit came up.

Back To You

Troubling. Pilot was boring and I dozed. Jokes felt creaky. The character of the news director is exactly the same character that Grant Shaud played on Murphy Brown, and that was, what, twenty years ago? Oh wait, except this guy's overweight. And so we get a moment when the audience gets to laugh at the sweatstains under his arms. Nice.

It's not exactly Frasier and Niles quipping about Opera, is it? I also wanted some more genuine nastiness between Patty Heaton and Kesley Grammer. He's an anchorman, for God's sake. I don't want him to be likable. And while we're at it, you should be working harder to make me forget the movie Anchorman. I'm thinking about pulling out the DVD while I'm watching this. Not a good sign.

I can't believe it's not better, though, so I'll give it one more. Maybe. If I stay awake.

Reaper

Here's where the Dad-o-Meter breaks down a bit. I didn't get to the end. (Oh, let's face it, I didn't get much past Act Two) but that's not the fault of the show. Ray Wise as the Devil is fantastic and funny. It had a familiar feel to it, because I'd just watched Chuck, which plays in much the same arena -- but I liked Reaper's sidekick character way, way better. That must be it. The Dad-O-Meter wasn't properly calibrated. I didn't see enough of Reaper, but what I did see made me want to see more.

The Dad-O-Meter did come through on one more essential point. As I fell asleep, I kept hearing James Nesbitt's Ulster accent, intoning, "YES, DAAAHDDY!"

Not a one of these shows has the slick, scary, pulsing originality, "I wouldn't dare sleep through this" as Jekyl. Not a one.

Madder

REMEMBER THE OLD Peanuts cartoons where Snoopy would do a happy dance for joy?

Cue up the Vince Guaraldi...

New York - NY, September 24, 2007 - AMC announced today that it will renew Mad Men for a second season continuing the network's mandate to deliver a distinctive viewing experience through cinematic-quality original programming. Created, written and executive produced by Matthew Weiner (Executive Producer/Writer, "The Sopranos"), Mad Men follows the personal and professional lives of New York advertising execs circa 1960. Lionsgate (NYSE: LGF), the leading independent filmed entertainment studio, produces the series. Season one's finale will be on Thursday, October 18th at 10PM EST.

Corner Gas: The Writers Speak!

SEASON FIVE of Corner Gas, which begins tonight on CTV in Canada (9:30 pm -- new time, following Dancing With the Stars) brings a few important behind the scenes changes to Dog River.

But first of all, let's give credit where credit is due: a Canadian sitcom is entering its fifth season, as a broad based popular hit.

As many as two million people watch every week, out of a nation of about thirty million. Subtract the seven million people who speak French as a first language and you're talking two million from a possible audience of 23 million. That's like 26 million people tuning into a comedy show in the USA. Math may be hard, but it doesn't lie.

If you're trying to make the argument that Canadians don't want to watch Canadian TV, Corner Gas is a most inconvenient truth. (People darker than me, for instance, might wonder why, if you go to CTV's site today, you'd be hard pressed to find any banner headlines, or well-publicized links to promote the fact that their most popular homegrown show premieres tonight. Not on the Etalk daily page, not on the main CTV page. I'm sure that's just an oversight, right?)

Corner Gas also managed, earlier this year, to spark a very un-Canadian showbiz bit of news: a talent raid. Two writers from Corner Gas, Showrunner Paul Mather, and 4th Season Story Editor Rob Sheridan, were lured to rival network CBC's Little Mosque on the Prairie, a show that posted an average of a million viewers a week.

This fall, Canadians will be in the strange position of being able to choose between two hit homegrown sitcoms that take place in Saskatchewan.

Corner Gas ended its fourth season with its highest seasonal ratings ever, and with an appearance by Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper. In a whimsical episode, the writers teased the end of the series, for a moment suggesting that maybe Brent was selling the station, and Lacey was moving back to Toronto.

Luckily that turned out all to be a bad daydream of Hank's.

The following interview with two of the show's writers, new Showrunner Kevin White, and Producer and O.S. (Original Showrunner) Mark Farrell, is a combo of two conversations. You can hear the full conversation with Mark as part of the current TV, Eh? podcast. The interview with Kevin was conducted via email, from the Corner Gas set in Rouleau, Sask.

DTOS: You now have something on Corner Gas you haven’t had for awhile – turnover, with two of your writers going to Little Mosque. Are there any other changes we should expect from the show this fall?

MARK FARRELL: Well to be fair I was heavily involved in April through June, but Kevin White really was the Showrunner this year. I think it’s a good thing, actually, I know you’ve blogged about this too. We had a chance to bring in Norm Hiscock, who’s a great writer, and Gary Pearson, another really good writer, and shake things up, change some of the dynamics of the writing.

KEVIN WHITE: Obviously new writers bring different tastes and experiences to the show and that helps generate stories we haven't done before. For example, Norm knew this guy his own age who knit. And he would sit around knitting in social situations, just nodding, saying 'uh-huh' as others talked. Norm thought it'd be funny if Hank did that and it became an episode.

MF: Kevin brought a different style to the room than Paul had, to meetings and stuff.

KW: Mostly it means I get called Paul a lot. Also I have more meetings. As show runner, you run the story department, and work with all other departments to make sure what's in the script gets shot the way the writer intended - that includes checking out all the props, wardrobe, new sets being built, etc. Basically you're around to answer questions like, "Is that hat yellow enough?", "Does this rubber hammer look real?" and "When's Paul coming back?"

DTOS: Is there any opportunity to put your own stamp on the show at this point, Kevin, or is it pretty much already established?

KW: The universe of Corner Gas is well established. Which is good. It's a good universe. So as far as stamps go, I'm not out to change it. But we (the writers) did consciously try to explore sides of characters wehadn't seen as much - Emma being unsure of herself, or Oscar not hating everything, or Lacey asserting herself more as a local. And we avoided any new stories concerning hair.

MF: I’m actually looking forward to seeing Mosque, to see what Paul and Rob and Greg Eckler and the other writers bring to that.

DTOS: So we don’t have some kind of big Canadian Saskatchewan-set series smackdown coming? There’s no Biggie-Tupac rivalry coming here?

MF: We might do that more on 22 [This Hour Has 22 Minutes, Farrell's other show, which competes with fellow CBC topical comedy show The Rick Mercer Report] than on Gas.

KW: I don't think there'll be a throw down. Mostly because I don't know what that means. I'm very square. But the two shows seem very different to me. The muslim characters we've added are different. The mosque Brent joins is different. So I think audiences can enjoy both without thinking oh, one show is copying the other.

MF: It is odd how Regina has become the promised land of Canadian comedy. It’s one of those weird things. Gosh, if people are just going to watch Canadian TV and not say it’s crappy, that’s good.

DTOS: Kevin, can you tease us with any other plot elements from the new season?

The one where Brent works in the gas station is pretty funny. And there's another one where Oscar gets cranky. Other than that the season opener involves everyone trying to make a cable access show. In other episodes Oscar and Emma buy a craftmatic bed which affects Emma romantically. Hank starts using his dirty truck as a notepad. Brent dares Oscar to stop using the word jackass. And Lacey gets naked.

DTOS: The other big change this year, I guess, is that Gas goes to syndication in the U.S. this fall, on WGN. Do you approach that with any kind of trepidation? Are you excited? Do you think they're going to get it?

KW: I'm excited about it. The U.S. press has been positive and it's quite different than other shows on American TV. Just watching WGN promos for it, you see grain elevators and prairie stretching forever, and you think, that's kind of cool. In Canada it's easy to take Saskatchewan for granted but when you see it like that in the middle of all this American programming, it stands out. I hope they like it. Especially Season 5.

MF: Anecdotally, I’ve got some relatives in Wisconsin and, I think it’s going to play well, especially in the flyovers. I don’t know how it’s going to go over in NY or Los Angeles and stuff, but I don’t think Dog River is that different than places in Indiana or Wisconsin or Michigan…WGN is great.

It seems like it’s a good fit. There haven’t been a lot of [hit] half hour comedies in the States.[lately] And even though this is a single camera, it kind of has a three-camera feel in terms of tone. So I think it could do okay, actually. How’s that for a vague answer? “I think it could do okay, actually.”

DTOS: A very Canadian answer.

MF: There you go.

Podcast, Ho! Features Corner Gas' Mark Farrell

DIANE OF Unifed Theory of Nothing Much and TV, Eh? has produced her 2nd Canadian TV Podcast. This one's chock full of Fall Preview goodness, and in honour of tonight's fifth season premiere of Corner Gas, it also features my interview with Corner Gas and This Hour Has 22 Minutes Producer/Writer Mark Farrell.

Later today I hope to get a transcript up of part of that interview, along with questions I asked of new Corner Gas showrunner Kevin White.

Gas returns to CTV tonight at 9:30 pm (new time!) Earlier seasons are running in the USA on the WGN Superstation at the following times:

• Monday - Thursday 12a ET
• 2 episodes - Wednesdays 8p ET
• Friday 2:30a ET
• 2 episodes - Sundays 11:30p ET

It's Not That the Grass Is Greener, It's That No One Seems To Know How To Make a Decent Lawnmower on a Budget Anymore.

FOR GREAT insider buzz on the anxieties fueling the-just-underway TV season, check out this Slate article by Kim Masters. Crazy budgets are making everyone, well, crazy.

Now, here's one of those rare cases where I can frame something for two totally different audiences: the fifteen or so American readers I haven't yet alienated with all the Canadian TV talk, (Q: Who the fuck is Jim Shaw? A: He's a gay porn star in Canada. Note: Not really) and those Canadians who look down to L.A. as the Yellow Brick Road.

As she riffs off the current climate and picks up the baton of the Kim Masters article, Kay Reindl at Seriocity says something that almost knocked me off my chair:

Why is it such a struggle to adhere to a budget?

I have no fucking idea. But I think part of the problem is in the selling of the show. When networks and studios open for the development season, it's sort of like shopping. You've already bought stuff but you're tired of that stuff now. You've seen he limitations of last year's iPod. You're looking for the next generation. So that's sort of the mindset of these executives. NOW they're gonna make their names, with a show that YOU are going to pitch! It's SO exciting! Can't you just feel it??? So people come in to pitch. And the only way to distinguish your pitch from the eight zillion other pitches is to, well, distinguish it. Make it splashy. Cool. EXPENSIVE. This is an EVENT, network and studio peoples!! So they buy said expensive, splashy shows. And then the studios, in their effort to distinguish their shows to the networks, give pilots enormous budgets. Like, ten million dollars worth of budget. Two weeks to shoot. It's nirvana.

So you've gotten two weeks to make your pilot and ten million dollars with which to make it. Naturally, your show looks HOT. It's slick. It's wonderful. And the test audiences are absolutely floored. Why, it's like watching a MOVIE! I love this! So your show gets picked up.

Now, you have seven or eight days to make each episode. And around two and a half million bucks, if you're lucky. How the hell can you make your show for less than a THIRD the budget? Welcome to this year's fall schedule. This seems to be what's happening, what's going wrong with all of these shows. They're simply not constructed to be made for these budgets. And this is making the networks very, very cranky. They want their action bionic show. They want their TweeVee pie maker show. They want their vampire detective show. But the studios can't pay for them.

Obviously, something needs to change. I hope this year makes everyone realize that but based on what they're buying, it probably won't. It'll still be about pilot as sales tool. What they SHOULD do, if they had any balls, is order shows to series instead of to pilot. When they've got the scripts they want to consider for series, order five scripts. Then they'll see if the show is sustainable. Based on that (which will cost FAR less than a ten million dollar pilot), they can order shows to series. That way, you'll get a realistic series budget. Your pilot won't feel like an entirely different show. You will already have to adhere to a series budget in order to make your pilot.

They can still have upfronts, too. Just move everything up. Have the scripts in by February. Order your shows. Make the pilots, for reasonable budgets, and then go off to New York and prance around for the advertisers. It would also make life easier for showrunners and executives trying to staff these shows. Because the staffing would already be done by the time the pilots are greenlit.

They will NEVER do this, but it's something to think about.

Okay, my fellow Canadian creatives...get off the floor.

I KNOW!

We've just started making Pilots, and she's saying the problem is the American TV industry should be doing things more like...um...they've usually been done in Canada! Ordering shows to series based on script alone?

AAAAaaaaaaaAAAAAAaaaAAAGh!


Goldmannnnnnn!

Damn you and your Nobody Knows Anything!!

I'm going to go rock foetally now.

What "Your Stories" Say About You.

ALLESSANDRA STANLEY has a lovely essay in Today's NYTimes about TV. I think her point about TV usurping Music is dead on. The whole article's worth reading.

It’s a rich television age and a demanding one. The selection is now so plentiful and fragmented and good. And deciding among hundreds of channels, on-demand options, DVR, Internet streaming and iPhones requires so much research, planning and commitment that viewers have become proprietary about their choices. Alliances are formed, and so are antipathies. Snobbery takes root. Preferences turn totemic. The mass audience splintered long ago; now viewers are divided into tribes with their own rituals and rites of passage.

A favorite show is a tip-off to personality, taste and sophistication the way music was before it became virtually free and consumed as much by individual song as artist.

Before the Internet, iPhones and flash drives, people jousted over who was into the Pixies when they were still a garage band or who could most lengthily argue the merits of Oasis versus Blur. Now, for all but hardcore rock aficionados, one-upmanship is more likely to center around a television series — like metaphysical clues buried in “Lost,” whether the current “Battlestar Galactica” is an affront to the 1978 original (some bloggers sneeringly refer to the current incarnation as Gino, short for “Galactica in name only” ) or who discovered “Flight of the Conchords” when it was a comedy team performing in concerts, not an HBO series.

Television used to be dismissed by elitists as the idiot box, a sea of mediocrity that drowns thought and intelligent debate. Now people who ignore its pools and eddies of excellence do so at their own peril. They are missing out on the main topic of conversation at their own table.

OH and look. mmm. Tina Fey.