I HAVE HAD roughly eleventy-billion emails from people in the last hour and a half or so asking for my reaction to remarks made by Alberta's Minister of Culture yesterday on a panel at the Banff TV Festival.
Remarkably (or not so, if you follow Canadian media) a Google News search of the minister's remarks a few minutes ago turned up nothing. That's more than 24 hours after the remark was made.
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| Nary a word on the Google, more than 24 hrs later. | If something happens in Canada & the Canadian Media doesn't cover it, are they doing their jobs? Or just waiting for Mary Hart to break the story? |
Globe & Mail, CP, nada. Nobody has covered it.
A friend of mine who works at CBC Radio (which will be going with the story at least locally, soon) forwarded me the clip & script for the soundbite that got people talking. Here it is:
Some startling remarks made by Alberta's culture minister are creating a bit of a stir.
Lindsay Blackett was part of a panel at the Banff World Television Festival on Monday.
The panel included Canadians who've become Hollywood stars -- people like Eric McCormack from the series, "Will and Grace."
Lindsay Blackett was part of a panel at the Banff World Television Festival on Monday.
The panel included Canadians who've become Hollywood stars -- people like Eric McCormack from the series, "Will and Grace."
The conversation was meant to discuss an actor's journey from small town Canada to the big leagues of Hollywood.
But it turned to bashing the quality of Canadian television.
And Blackett was one of the critics.
(and we apologize for the quality of this clip)
in: I sit here
runs: 23 sec
out: what it shoudl be
<<<<I sit here as a government representative for film and television in the province of Alberta and I look at what we produce ... and if we're honest with ourselves .... I look at it and say why do I produce so much shit? Why do I fund so much crap? Why do we do it? Why are broadcasters not picking up more Canadian content? Because Canadian content isn't what it should be.">>>>
Blackett later backtracked a bit by saying Canadians make great programming -- and he pointed to the CBC program, "Heartland," which is made in Alberta.
runs: 23 sec
out: what it shoudl be
<<<<I sit here as a government representative for film and television in the province of Alberta and I look at what we produce ... and if we're honest with ourselves .... I look at it and say why do I produce so much shit? Why do I fund so much crap? Why do we do it? Why are broadcasters not picking up more Canadian content? Because Canadian content isn't what it should be.">>>>
Blackett later backtracked a bit by saying Canadians make great programming -- and he pointed to the CBC program, "Heartland," which is made in Alberta.
That's a helluva clip. Yet it didn't make anybody's news. It showed up NOWHERE until today.
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| Calgary North MLA Lindsay Blackett. Is it just me, or should we get this guy partying with Michel Arpin, stat? |
Because I'm in the middle of something that will perhaps serve as another part of the answer to Mr. Blackett. Not the answer anybody wants to hear, necessarily, but an answer that should be pretty familiar to anybody who's been paying attention to Canadian Film and Television for the last thirty five or so years.
My favorite part though is that even when the guy backtracks, the only show he comes up with is the one that films in his riding. Asshat.
My favorite part though is that even when the guy backtracks, the only show he comes up with is the one that films in his riding. Asshat.
Which reminds me...a tiny little bit of homework. Brush up on the meaning of this word here. And some of its wider implications.
And if you want a slightly lighter take on this fucked up bullshit from "MLA Who Doesn't Even Realize He's Part of The Problem", may I guide you to the always amusing Mike's Bloggity Blog.
Right now, I'm gonna get me a drink and try to wash the stink off.
15 rumbles:
National has picked up the story now as well.
such a ridiculous comment - he deserves the heat.
guess that Twitter feed outta Banff wasn't so useless after all! ;)
I sometimes think we get a little precious about this stuff.
For me, it's just more proof that government types shouldn't have any voice in what we do.
And since he's the guy in charge of us in Alberta it's proof positive that politicians only pay us lip service while putting those least qualified on our portfolio.
And maybe nobody covered the story because if nobody in Alberta takes this idiot seriously enough to report what he said, why should anybody else.
Moreover, at the same time this guy was criticizing Canadian TV, Stephen Fry was doing exactly the same thing with regard to the British industry...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment_and_arts/10326761.stm
And let's be honest, do you really want to compare "The Listener" or "The Bridge" against "Jeeves & Wooster"...?
In terms of genre equivalency, definitely not. In terms of quality? I suspect the same answer applies.
Hmmm...Corner Gas vs. Jeeves and Wooster, anyone?
Thanks for linking. I was shocked that I was the first person to cover it, even it was just for fun. Now the blog has been featured on AM 770 and The Edmonton Journal. Why wasn't this news before the bloggers got to it?
Mike
I am kind of tired, as a television consumer, of the whole debate. I know what I like, I know what some of my friends like, and I'm aware of the difference between our tastes. I tend to like slower paced drama that place emphasis on story and production values, and many of my friends kind of like stuff that looks American. I just don't want to argue any more about whether Corner Gas is better than Intelligence. Then geniuses like Blackett get five minutes without a handler keeping his giant yap on lock and it all blows up again and my blood pressure rises.
It's heating up....sorta. Apparently, people are calling for his resignation.
http://www.cbc.ca/arts/story/2010/06/17/calgary-blackett-resign-blakeman-liberal-tv-crap.html
Can't say that I blame you for that reaction.
The Minister, on the other hand?
Uneducated and out-of-the-loop he may be, but he's not wrong. Like a village idiot, he speaks, however naively, to some kind of truth others most would rather not.
There's IS a lot of shit. MOSTLY shit. And a complacency in writing, directing and producing shit. From the executives to my WGC brethren, it's always: "The Sopranos" this, "The Wire" that. And then nearly zero ambition or diligence or, yes, starving, in order to reach for those heights.
I'm tired of this apologist, kid- gloves-on, we're-in-this-together, don't-criticize-anything-because-they-might-pull-ALL-OF-OUR-funding nonsense. It IS breeding mostly shit. It would be preferable if we'd more often admit it ourselves, rather than leaving some douchebag MLA to say it.
Feel compelled to comment;
1) MLA has a right to his opinion. He really does. That said, his opinion would have had merit if it was backed up with solid research. If he really has watched ALL Cdn TV shows and deemed them all shit, then so be it. Dude's an audience member like any other. Problem is, he spoke without doing any research so his opinion meant nothing.
2) Cdn Media are sycophants for US celebrity news. We need drunker, more destructive Cdn celebs if we're ever going to compete.
Bloggers...keeping people honest.
Well said, Denis. Well said.
Feels like we're being a little hypocritical jumping on this guy but I'll get to that in a second. The annoying part of what he said, for me, is this whole business of asking "Why aren't broadcasters picking up more Canadian content? Because Canadian content isn't what it should be."
Assuming he's referring to Canadian broadcasters, we all know what's wrong with that argument and why it's ridiculously simplistic. The financial incentives aren't there and they make more money on U.S. programming and they're not investing enough in talent or production because they view Canadian programming as a mandate of their license and little more etc. etc. So laying all the blame on the creatives is obviously a stupid thing to say and he should know that.
But what everyone seems so up in arms about is the "shit" comment. C'mon. This guy's not saying anything I haven't heard nearly every single writer and actor I know say at some point in private, either over drinks, or around the writer's table, or between takes, or at a WGC party. Seriously. It's a national fucking pastime. We all do it.
This show is shit, that movie was shit. Who decided to make that shit? How did that shit get funded? I can't believe that guy keeps getting shows/movies. He's shit. Hey, how's that show you're working on? It's okay, but I'm worried it might be shit. How's that show you created? I don't know yet. I'm hoping I can make it good, but a million things could go wrong, and it could be shit.
Shit is like gravity. Shit is the baseline. We're always trying to do slightly better than shit. Because no matter what country you're in or if you're writing movies or plays or novels or TV shows or albums, it's really, really hard to make something that isn't shit. It requires a lot of time and effort and talent and money and sometimes a couple of those things are in short supply for reasons this dude has clearly chosen to ignore, but that doesn't mean he's wrong.
There's lots of shit out there. Canadian shit. U.S. shit. UK shit (see Stephen Fry's comments at BAFTA). I'm always amazed if I do anything and can look at it when it's all done and go "hey, you know, some of that wasn't shit." There isn't a day goes by when I don't worry that I'm not shit at what I do. I'm sure there are lots of folks who think I'm entirely justified in that.
Is this healthy? Maybe not. Probably it's a better thing to build each other up instead of tearing each other down, and usually after our second cup of coffee or a couple of drinks, when we're feeling more generous we do just that. But would we really be worse off we weren't all at least a little harder on our own shit?
I can't fit all of my stupid rant here. See below...
Anyway the guy didn't even say that everything was shit. He said "so much shit." True, when asked for specifics he could only say Heartland which is indeed a little self-serving given that, oh, look, it shoots in his province.
We all know we've made some great television and movies in this country. There are plenty of unbelievably talented, hard-working people working at the top of their game. I won't trot out the titles. The same dozen or so movies and shows tend to come up in these arguments and I agree with them. They're not shit. Not at all.
But we have made a lot of shit, too. As I said off the top, a lot of the reasons for that are beyond our control as creatives, and I totally get why it's infuriating that one of the guys at the top of the funding system doesn't seem to get that. The U.S. have made an awful lot of shit, too. The hit and miss ratio may even be more or less the same, but they get away with it because volume is a lot higher and there's rarely public money involved.
We need more investment of money, not less. But throwing money at it alone isn’t enough. We need to train talent and retain talent and give enough care and incentive so that every gifted writer and actor and director and producer and crew member in this country knows they are surrounded by people who are also the best at what they do, and were given the resources to do it.
We need to make more shows, not fewer, even if it means smaller episode orders with slightly lower budgets. A network that only produces one or two homegrown shows a year is naturally going to want to get their hands all over those shows – they have plenty of time and reason to do so. More shows with less at stake might mean that those networks could back off a bit and allow those shows to breathe a little, be what they are, good or bad. The batting average might end up the same but the better shows are going to have a real voice, and probably a real audience (As Steve Smith used to say about his first pitch meeting with CHCH: "Gimme enough money that I can do something, but not enough that you care what it is.")
Hang on, still not done...
More shows also mean more opportunity. For young writers to staff, to grow, to be promoted, to learn about how a TV show gets made. Those people will then hopefully go on to create not-shitty shows of their own one day, as opposed to the current system, where more often than not we hand out development deals to untested writers and then assign experienced showrunners to “story edit” their projects, which generally speaking won’t get made anyway. Because if you’re 23 and you’ve never worked on another person’s show, the show you’re creating has a decent likelihood of being… well, shit.
But even my little farm system-utopia idea won’t make a lick of difference if, when those people are experienced enough to become showrunners, we don’t actually let them run the show. We all know that the word showrunner gets bandied around a lot in Canada, but that we rarely fully embrace the model, so that the showrunner is often reduced to the role of “head writer” and does not, in fact, have final say on the script, the costumes, the editing, the anything, and must instead collate input from all manner of non-writing producers. I’m not talking about collaboration, which is healthy and important, I’m talking about the right to say “no” when it counts.
We all bitch about this. Everyone agrees on it. And we know that on those rare occasions where showrunners actually run the show, the show if often good, and when they don’t, the show is often less good. Sometimes a lot less good. Sometimes even… shit. So what are we up in arms about, exactly?
The problem with this guy is that he sees the symptom but he completely misdiagnoses the disease. Which, given his position, is highly regrettable. But I just don’t think we should be babies about this. Yeah, the bad man said a mean thing. Okay. But really, deep down, we all know his biggest mistake was saying it in public, instead of doing it the only proper, decent way we can respect: Behind our backs.
I was in Banff, and I heard the minister make the comment. I decided to ask him later what he meant by it, and the answer I got made me feel a lot better.
Some of the things that are funded (and I got a sense he was talking more about movies than TV shows) should be considered "art" and not film. They're things that aren't commercially viable, and things that the majority of people won't see. He feels these projects should be going after art funding, and not taking away from the Film and TV fund. If stronger, commercially viable projects can get funding, stuff that people are interested in, and not art pieces that few see, then he can use them as examples of quality products and ask for more funding, thus giving him the ability to fund more quality projects.
Now that explanation was a lot better in my mind than what he said at the panel (and to be honest, you don't have much time to ask a question, so he couldn't really go into the amount of detail he did when I spoke to him later). He definitely should have worded what he said in a much different way, or simply not asked the question/statement at all.
Fry's complaint about BBC's becoming more "childish" isn't that different from Blackett's "why do we fund shit" statement. They both vaguely call for a higher standard of program. The big difference is that Stephen Fry is a wildly successful hyphenate (TV, film, that mega-huge Twitter following) working in Britain and abroad, so it's easier to take Fry seriously.
There really isn't that much of a difference between British and Canadian television. BBC is considered London-centric, while CBC is called Toronto-centric. Both BBC and CBC are criticized for a more populist shift in television programming.
As for ITV, it attracts shit for diminishing its arts and documentary shows in favour of reality shows like Celebrity Wrestling. That's similar to Canwest and CTV having relatively little in the way of Canadian drama, while relying on American shows and reality fare.
I'm generalizing, of course, but you just don't hear how another country's industry works. I just find Britain's industry vis-a-vis Canada's more similar than different.
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