Bubbling Up

A TIRING DAY -- first big foray into research for new project.   Calgary is cold but I'm warmed by the wealth of info ahead and the possibilities this new story presents.  Ideally, you always want to be able to change and grow a little outside your comfort zone on every project.


Well I'm way outside the zone.  


Today I was ushered into a back room and shown pieces -- little objects of history.  And beyond medals and trinkets there were things with heft -- uniforms.  Why is that uniforms retain a shape  that say, a sweater never does?  There it sits in a drawer locked away and you could reach out and feel the wale and the buttons between your fingers.  If you didn't have to wear white gloves, I mean.


Anyway...it's daunting and it's going to be a challenge and my Christmas is pretty shot right through with obsessing and reading and arranging and carding and discarding and dreaming.  And Gosh, I wouldn't have it any other way.


And I get to indulge my inner historian a bit too. Massive win all 'round.

The Quotable Parker

POSTED W/O FURTHER COMMENT -- this is taken from Brendan Kelly's article in today's VARIETY.  (emphasis is mine.)

Canadian auds get their say

MONTREAL The bitter fight over the future of the TV biz in Canada is set to heat up again this week, with the public poised to weigh in on the debate.

CTVglobemedia executive VP Paul Sparkes warns that if the networks don't get a monthly fee from the cable and satellite companies, "we'll be closing stations and the government will have to deal with that."

The exec went even further, saying the media giant might even close major-market stations or get out of the free-to-air TV business altogether to focus on its more profitable cable channels.

If there is no extra money, CTV wants the rules changed to allow it to pull its network from cable systems like Rogers.

Worse yet for viewers, CTV owns the Canuck rights to U.S. shows such as "Desperate Housewives" and could force Rogers to black them out when they appear on the U.S. webs that Rogers carries, such as ABC.

Meanwhile, cable execs claim the networks are looking for an unwarranted handout.

"We're not the ones that are destroying the system," Rogers senior VP Ken Engelhart says. "We're the ones that lost money for years. (The TV networks) have had one bad year and they're saying the sky is falling."

Rogers execs say the Canuck networks are in an irrational bidding war for U.S. shows, which is a big part of the reason they're losing money -- and it's true that spending on American fare has risen sharply in recent years.

CTV also would like the CRTC to radically reduce the Canadian-content requirements for terrestrial networks, which forces them to fill 60% of their weekly skeds with expensive, locally produced shows. CTV would like to see that quota cut to 35% to help their bottom line.

That's an idea that has Canadian screenwriters seeing red.

The response of Maureen Parker, executive director of the Canadian Writers Guild, is unequivocal.

"We'd say -- 'Good-bye, see ya, get out of the business.' They just don't want to make Canadian television. That's their bottom-line position. They overspend in L.A. and it results in a very unhealthy business environment for everyone because there's no money left for Canadian drama." 

Way to go, Maureen.

Agency party tonight, then off to Calgary tomorrow to research for the new project.  Take care, and if you happen to be in Toronto tonight, I dare say the writer-rip up to beat is Paul Quarringon and the Pork Belly Futures at the Dora Keogh.

Network Viral: It Can Be Done.

IF THE CANADIAN NETWORKS manage to survive to 2013, they should be just about caught up enough in their thinking to start trying to engage with viral videos like, oh, other networks are doing in 2009...

The Little Things

MANAGED TO SCORE some episodes of the eighth season of SPOOKS, the Brit show that's one of the inspirations for The Border.

One of the things you sometimes see on Brit dramas are dodgy American accents.  Spooks/MI-5 has had its good and its bad over the years.  In the current series (the show's eighth) Irish Actress Genevieve O'Reilly takes on the role of the new CIA Liasion to MI-5.

But it's not the accent that jars.

Nope, in the second episode, she takes on a false identity, that of "Victoria Franklin," who she id's as named after "her favorite U.S. President."

Ouch.

I suppose you could say she was taking the name from Franklin Roosevelt, or hell, even Franklin Pierce.  But most Americans in the know, seeing as it's the last name, would probably associate it with Ben Franklin.

Who of course...was never President.

Ouch.

It's the little things that will kill ya.  I remember in my 1st ep of The Border, we scripted chatter between scrambled F-16's and the ground.  And there was a hole in the cut where the stock would go. And when the stock got put in, of course, the plane was an F-15.  D'oh!

People notice.

Nitpickers.

Like me.

Curse you, Internets!

DMc: Bold Cultural Commentator, Massive Douche? Or Both?

WELL COLOUR ME SURPRISED.


The podcast is now up for my appearance on CBC Radio Q yesterday.


The discussion starts around 21:30 with an interview with the (surprisingly reasonable) Communications Director from the Parents Television Council, and continues with me and Timothy Jay, the author of Cursing in America: A Psycholinguistic Study of Dirty Language in the Courts, in the Movies, in the Schoolyards and on the Streets

Wow that title alone makes me want to drop an F-bomb or two.

Interestingly enough, although I immediately heard from the usual passel of friends and well-wishers saying, "heard you! sounds good" -- the fact that I also got more than one email from people who remain "highly offended" by the use of the word "douche" on TV (and by Michael Buble's use of the word to describe himself on Q, which sparked the segment yesterday in the first place.)


Now my impulse is to say, "wow, with everything people have to worry about, we make a stand on language on TV? Really?" That certainly seems to be one of the prevailing sentiments on the Q blog about the subject.

And yet...and yet... the response I got makes this easily the most controversial appearance I've had on the show. Even though I would argue that I've said way more provocative things on the radio in the past. Goes to show that whatever the conventional wisdom says, people will care about what they care about, not what you think they should care about. It's a good lesson for writers to always keep in mind.

So yeah, maybe it might be great to kill your hero or get that cat...

...but then again. Maybe not. Not if it makes the audience hate you.

One of the negative emails I got to the appearance raised the point that as a man, I really had no right to pass judgement one way or another on the use of the word 'douche.' I'd like to excerpt a little of what I wrote back. I started by pointing out that I think Jay made the point of the segment when he said that society cannot function where we go by what riles the most-easily offended. Then I wrote:

I also really think we hit a slippery slope if the only metric of whether something is offensive or not comes with the proper sex organs or racial orientation attached. What is the difference between that and the argument that only black people can write books featuring black characters, or only deaf people can play deaf people in the movies?  A non-disabled actor has no ability to play someone in a wheelchair?  I don't want to create art in that world.  It's a trap.

South Park did a pretty interesting episode a couple of weeks ago where a similar issue was explored around the use of the word "faggot."   The boys used the word to describe Motorcycle riding guys who were obnoxious, and were taken to task for being homophobic, though it was clear from their stunned reactions that the boys didn't associate that word with "gay" at all.  During the episode they managed to sneak in some of the etymology of "faggot" in there -- and uncovered that long before its association with gay people, it had other meanings -- women, heretics, soldiers drafted into armies and on and on.  Meanings change.

Similarly, where do we go with "bitch?" There's a word that was rehabilitated, robbed of its power largely by -- not women -- but gay men using it with each other, reframing it to something harmless.  That was a pretty serious word to throw around when I was a child.  Now it's mild enough that a singer could have a hit song saying "I'm a bitch, I'm a lover...etc etc." Damn catchy song.  All for the better.

I recognize that there are people out there who do find the word offensive. But the problem here is that you find it offensive because of a usage and a connotation completely divorced from the context of its current use.  By that logic, we should all not be able to use "damn" because to highly religious people, "damning" someone is serious business. 

In high school, I learned the danger of living in a context where what was offensive hewed to the most conservative definition.  I was banned from doing school announcements because I said, "What the hell?" in relation to something -- and that offended one of the highly Christian teachers.

I think in Canada, part of the reason why our art is so mild much of the time is that we use that same metric.  And I don't think it's good for either pushing the envelope of art, discourse and society.  

The other point I never got to make on the radio was that, of course, I do consider that portion of the audience (which includes my Sainted Catholic Papa, by the way) when I'm writing dialogue and cursing into dramatic scripts. One of the differences of opinions I employed on a recent show was where I'd try to shy away, whenever possible, from using "Goddamn!" or characters saying, "Jesus Christ!" because I know that there is still a very large segment of the population that might otherwise have no problem with what I was writing that would view the use of those words as a dealbreaker. Seeing as I was writing for a public broadcaster, and you could easily get at the intent and the cadence and truth of the scene by employing other salty language instead, I generally try to avoid using those epithets. Not because I'm censoring myself, but because the need to use those specific terms is low. And sometimes I think there are writers who'd use them MORE because they disagreed with religion so much that they were delighted to "stick it" to the faithful.


Now, does that make me inconsistent with the use of the word "douche?" I don't think so, cause I don't think that the opinion on that word is anywhere near as settled and universal as the number of people who'd be offended by dropping "Goddamnit!" into a script.


Does that make me a hypocrite? Or merely a big douche?


Couldn't resist. Sorry. Have at it in the comments below.

Cussin

APPARENTLY I'LL BE on CBC Radio's Q tomorrow about 10:30 am ET, jawin about whether Tv is getting worse with the potty mouth.


My father will be so #@&%ing proud.

We'll Always Have Chicken

DRIVING AROUND CENTRAL Florida last week was a bit of an unsettling experience.  A few of years ago, everywhere you looked there were blue tarps, and smashed trees, and the occasional FEMA trailer -- legacy of a recent hurricane. 


This time, the signs pointed to the financial tsunami that hit Florida harder than a lot of other places in the U.S.  Foreclosure sales, unemployment stories, storefronts left fallow and vacant, and even boarded up walkaways -- where people flew their underwater mortgages, seemed to be everywhere. 


Nothing caught my eye more, however, than the liberal sprinkling of men standing on Street Corners, waving signs for a retail chain. "This location: 70% off! Closing Sale! Everything including the fixtures!"   I counted four or five of them, advertising different locations where Everything Must Go, during my week away.  It was a sobering antidote to the Black Friday hype.


I'm the first to admit that my mind for business has never been a steel trap.  I think back to high school and my Intro to Business class. I don't remember a thing about it -- except for the teacher holding up a computer punch card, and soberly intoning, "no matter what happens, you're always going to need to know how to use these."


Seven days in the sun and the American mediascape, looking back on things here, following the testimony of this group or that group at the CRTC just made me realize with full force how much the supposed Captains of the Industry here are a bunch of old white guys waving punch cards.


First, let's talk about Hulu.


Like a lot of Canadians, I've experienced Hulu only sporadically. (The site is geo-blocked from Canada.) Now, even most of the proxy server workarounds you once could use to see content don't work.  They never worked that well anyway -- as the processing power the proxy sucked up made the video you'd watch stutter if you were on anything other than a screaming fast computer on a wicked fast broadband connection.


But last week, I got the full Hulu.  Late night, catching up on Modern Family, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Family Guy -- and a score of other shows.  A couple of streamed ads. Perfect playback, even on the "light" connection where I was staying.  It worked great. Give me a Boxee or Apple TV interface to my TV -- or hell, WiFi enabled TV, and I am over the moon and don't need another thing to get all the tv I want.   And the only reason I want to make that jump to the TeeVee is demographic -- teens and twentysomethings are just fine leaving it on the computer. 


A massive library of current content. Ready right now.  Whenever I want. New eps posted the day after they first air.  Without fail. Robust interface and playback.  Wicked.


Meanwhile, back in Canada, representatives of the broadcast networks, in pushing their "value for signal" -- made the following suggestions:  they want to extend the Simultaneous Substitution policy so that they can now "delete" programs that they buy the rights to, if they play on a U.S. channel at a different time.  So if you're a cable subscriber, you should get used to seeing a lot more blue screens and "this program not available" warnings.  Hmm. There's value for you.


Well, no matter. Maybe you could watch online too. Rogers just announced a Canadian Hulu, right?  Oh.  Uh. Except it only works if you're a Rogers subscriber. And there's not a lot of content. And like the clunky on Demand channels where programs disappear without rhyme or reason, the interface is kind of lame.  So, uh, it's not like Hulu at all, really.


So it's like the comparison of broadcast websites all over again?  With the Canadian offerings shoddy, scattershot, hard to navigate poor shadows of the American versions? 


Yup.


Hmm.  Let's explain that "value for signal" again?


But let's not be churlish here.  it's not just the broadcasters who've been running annoying ads for months. Let's look at the Cable side.


Bright House Networks is the cable provider in Central Florida.  The picture is sharper and clearer.  There are no artifacts. The HD channels "pop." TCM is a revelation -- I never realized how compressed and shoddy the quality of the signal I was getting from Rogers was.   Plus, when you call Bright House, they're efficient and friendly.  You book an appointment, you get a two hour window and they're always there.  They're pleasant to deal with, and customer focused. 


I don't know a single person in Canada who would use that phrase to describe their cable or satellite provider. 


What else?  Ah yes. There's the matter of the digital transition.  The U.S. has more or less completed the transfer of signals to the digital spectrum. Those analogue frequencies are being auctioned off. Everything's proceeding apace.


In Canada? One by one the broadcasters revealed that they don't really have much of a plan to make the transition, and that there's no way they're going to make the 2011 deadline the CRTC set. The deadline they've known about for years.


So there's going to be a delay in auctioning that spectrum here. So innovations in telephony, more communications choices for Canadians... none of that is going to happen here yet. Hurry up and wait. 


So the Canadian picture seems to be: poor BDU service & innovation, substandard on demand delivery, bad pictures, bad customer service, bungled "Hulu-like" service launches -- everything, in fact, relying on the protections afforded by the fencing of the CRTC, while not living up to any promises or responsibilities under the Broadcast Act. 


Broadcasters solutions to the new reality that people want to be able to watch programs when they want, how they want? Lock down and restrict them more. 


Who are these guys?


I don't mean to be impertinent, but it strikes me that there might be somebody you guys could talk to to get over this hump you all seem to be having with thinking outside the box a little bit, as the world you've known comes down around you.


Maybe you could talk to us.  


Creatives.  


Crazy idea, I know. But think about it.  A few years ago the knock on Canadian shows was that they looked cheap. And they were cheesy. And slow.


So we had crews that busted their ass and upgraded their skills. D.O.P.'s raised their lighting game.  Now, you rarely see the kind of flat, Shoppers Drug Mart lighting you used to see on Canadian TV.  Instead, there's the brilliant and vibrant frames you see on Flashpoint, or The Border, or Being Erica. 


Writers heard the knock of the slow moving story -- and many of us committed to our craft, studied, and worked to try and figure out a way to come up with excitingly paced stories that can still deliver at a lower budget.  Do we always get there? No. But we get there a lot more often than we did. We saw the need, and we changed. We also looked at the structure of how things worked and said, "well, if you want something that has pacing and where the creative fires on all levels, you have to empower us a bit."  So we slowly began the process of educating a reluctant industry here about what a Showrunner is, how it works in the U.S. system, and why it has a better chance of delivering your audience a vibrant product than the bad old way of doing things. 


There's been lots of pushback on that, of course...but there are also lots of veterans who've stuck around here who are more than capable of taking on that role.  We just need to get to the point where they hire them off the top -- not once the show is already in chaos in production.


There were other changes too.  A recognition of the importance of source music, of faster editing and more dynamic shooting.  Producers and writers on the other side of the aisle studied the lessons of Reality TV, and changed the kinds of shows they pitched.   Quietly, around the margins, Canada became a place that does great lifestyle and reality shows.  


I also watched HGTV when I was in Florida.  And I saw, literally, that half the shows on the air there are made here.  That doesn't get written about a lot. But it's true.  There's also an explosion in animation, in tween shows, in children's. Quietly, around the margins, creatives who live the most precarious of existences here have looked at the challenges of the market over the last decade -- the collapse of first-run syndication, squeezed license fees, the rise of internet-ancillaries -- and tried to adjust our way of doing things.


It's not perfect. We're not there yet.  There's deadwood and nepotism and people who shouldn't be doing what they're doing, sure. But at the same time, there is Battle of the Blades, Flashpoint, Corner Gas, Dragon's Den... I could go on... while broadcasters get up there in Gatineau and proffer no new ideas and refuse to even acknowledge the new world they're already living in -- the post Hulu, TV Everywhere world that there's no going back from -- Canadians are watching homegrown programs in numbers not seen in years.


And events like a FIVE MILLION audience for the Grey Cup game show that -- whatever the broadcasters want to claim -- that there is a hunger out there for something to watch that isn't just a rebroadcast of a U.S. show.  Canadians will watch them if they're good.


The problem is, of course, that our partners up to now have had a vested interest in, well, making sure they're not too good. And even when they are, claiming that they don't make money.  


It's pretty ironic, in fact, that just about the only part of their business these guys have mastered as well as their American counterparts seems to be the "Hollywood Accounting" part.


The comparisons and contrasts from my week in Florida were eye opening in the extreme.  But it wasn't until my last night that it all came together -- when the power went out.


Day after Thanksgiving, seven p.m.  Whoosh.  Total darkness.  Too early to go to bed. What to do?  


Rummage through the hurricane kit. Find the batteries for the radio.  Put 'em in, and tune the dial...


...And there, in the dark, for forty minutes or so, we listened to the clear, bemused voice of Ira Glass and This American Life.  


A couple of great stories -- about Poultry and the Supernatural.  A hiliarious anecdote about an Orthodox Jew who goes to heaven only to find out that God is, in fact, a huge chicken.  And the archangel Michael's job is to feed him and keep his cage clean.  "All that praying, all that suffering, and for what? God is a chicken!"


"Not A Chicken.  Just... chicken."


See, I'm really not doing it justice. And that's the point. Reaching back to an earlier form, the rules are different, the delivery different, but what was there, gloriously alive and vibrant and entertaining -- was the story.  The story will survive, no matter what form or challenge we throw at it.  For those of us whose business is story, that's got to come as a comfort, no matter how backward and antiquated and maddeningly out of touch the captains of the industry seem, it's we, who have rolled with the punches and changed what we do already over the last few years...it's we who will survive.


So maybe the business mind isn't the be all and end all. Because a business mind that can't see the change coming and get on board isn't going to be around much longer.


Don't believe me? 


Man I wish you could have seen those guys on the corner.  70% off. Everything Must Go! Fixtures Too! This location only.


This location on Hiawassee, or International Drive, or South Conroy, or Colonial...


This location only. 


Everything must go.


Blockbuster Video.