It Is Accomplished.

WELL THIS IS a day some time in coming.

It's with not too heavy a heart I'd like to let y'all know that effective immediately, I'm pressing 'pause'. Dead Things ON Sticks is finally, especially dead, or at least mostly dead, in that magical Princess Bride-y kinda way. Why? 

Wellll...

I've got a new gig that's going to take me to Los Angeles, like so many Canadian creatives before me. I apologize to the friends I didn't get to see before leaving: it came up as these things do, and boom, next thing you know, you're throwing clothes in a bag and hailing a taxi.

The gig is finite; the move...um...Ida know.   I think I can honestly say that I've tried as hard as anyone to make my stand here.  I've worked, agitated, evangelized & given to the cause of keeping quality Canadian creatives at home, in the hopes that things were changing, and that we were getting closer to being recognized & given the creative respect and environment in which to grow.  On good days, I still believe this.  On bad, I accepted a lot of joshing for being naive.  There are people who I consider good friends who actually cussed me out when they found out that I had an actual U.S. Passport.  

There was even a time at Banff last year when -- mmm... let's see, how do I put this?...let's call it a party with a direct, measurable degree of power over the way the Canadian system runs asked me flat out, with deep incredulity, "if you can work in the USA, why would you ever stay here?"

That question made me sad then. It does now. But it is, unfortunately, like our own Gulf of Mexico Oil Slick. That kind of thinking has permeated the water table and the wetlands and the marshes and the beaches and driven deep down into the shale and the bedrock of the cultural consciousness of this otherwise wonderful nation.   Fighting it has made me very, very tired.  Mr. Blackett, this is why. You're just the latest symptom of the problem.

The L.A. writing life & industry is more than well represented by bloggers, and I won't really have my finger on the pulse of the Canadian scene anymore, so I think it's better to leave you in the capable hands of other observers of same: Prairie Dog Will Dixon and Uncle Jim "Axe to Grind" Henshaw.  There's also Jaime Weinman in Macleans. (I secretly think he's more Canadian scene-curious than he fronts; guy just needs a little push.)  Hopefully, John Doyle might get over whatever's been up his bum for the last little while, too (if we don't lose him to soccer writing, I mean.)

For a dose of your Canadian crafty, may I suggest the redoubtable Alex Epstein? And if you want info on Canadian shows, there's no finer resource than Tv-eh? -- still a one woman, all volunteer shop run by not-connected-to-the-industry-at-all writer/editor Diane Wild.

I might pop in from time to time.  Maybe I'll post a few dirty Haikus about CRTC policy or something.  I honestly have no idea.  I'll also continue to represent my fellow Central Canada WGC members on the Writers Guild of Canada Council, as long as I'm able.  From foreign ownership to value for signal to licenses to copyright, there's still a lot of fights ahead. I won't stop if you won't.

Evolution of a Canadian Creative.
Maybe Brioux will write about me now!.

When I put out a PayPal button earlier this year, I was stunned by the number of people who gave me a donation.  Five bucks here, five there -- and more than one person stepped up way more than that -- giving me the equivalent of the yearly subscription fee to Playback Online.  That is just...crazy.  Not bad for something I dashed off every day.  Thanks, from the bottom of my heart for your support.  You bought me a portable hard drive so I could back up five years worth of my rants. Don't trust the cloud, people. Heh heh.



I've learned a lot, knitted closer to my fellow Canadian creatives, and enjoyed the exchanges I've had here immensely over the last five years.  Even the occasional glimpses into the petty underbelly of the internet has made me a stronger person & a better writer.

(Truth be told, I came very close to packing it in last summer after a couple of weird incidents where I was stalked by people mistaking their online familiarity with my writing for an offline relationship.  More than once, I found a stranger laying in wait so they could yell at me "because I yelled at him every day on your blog."  Uh. Yeah.  Then there were the pests who'd just somehow ... be ... whereever I was.  Sometimes with a camera!)

As Craig Ferguson might say, "I KNOW!!!"

The supportive emails & comments, and the Cuppa Joe donations got me through that patch.  But I have to say with all honesty & humility that the thought of being one more dressed-down writer in a city  teeming with them is tremendously appealing to me right now.   I won't miss being the lightning rod -- even admitting that sometimes, yup, I sought out that role.  I guess at the root of things, I like telling stories a lot.  Being the story, really not so much.

In any case, I'm a big believer in both professional honesty and giving back, which is why as my career gained some steam I tried, whenever possible, to offer a take on industry doings that never seemed to make it into the paper or the trades.  That's also why I tried to make myself available for mentoring & advice to up and coming writers. I don't know how much good that's done, if any, but I encourage each and every one of you to punch through your fear and to speak up for what you believe.  It turns out that the jobs you lose are few, and the fellow travelers you meet quickly become friends. (Most of them anyway; hey, you meet crazies on the subway, too.)  When it comes to the important stuff,  the disagreements we have are better solved in the warmth of the cold light of day. Secrecy, jealousy, and passive aggressive tendencies have not served our industry well. It is time, finally, finally, to try another way.

Look at that. Sermonizing til the end.  Little bit douchey.  Sigh.

This has become the quotational equivalent of using Jeff Buckley's "Hallelujah" in your big climactic TV montage.  But it fits, so eff it--

Margaret Mead once said, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."

We're going to have one more post on crafty later today, just cause that's how I'd like to leave it.  So watch for that.

Good Night, from Sticksville…and Good Luck. 

TV Finales on Q

THE PODCAST for my appearance on Q last week is now up.  Check out me and author Nikki Stafford at about thirty-eight minutes in.

So Long, Farewell...

NO, NOT ME, suckers... some venerable hits taking their final bows...Law & Order, 24, LOST...

...I'll be talking about the shows and their legacies tomorrow on CBC Radio Q.

Community TV & The CRTC

I'LL BE POPPING up in a number of CBC Morning shows this morning, talking about the CRTC hearings on Community Television & the failure of the cable companies' to provide it over the last twenty years.


To anybody following the saga of the CRTC & its abrogation of responsibility to Canadian citizens, this could seem like one more sordid story of the fixed game & how the regulator favors corporate interests over its watchdog role for Canadians, but even by those lax standards, this story's a bit sordid.


I'll be updating this story throughout the morning in between short hits on the morning shows in Gander, Sudbury, Corner Brook, Yellowknife, Victoria, Calgary, Whitehorse and Vancouver.


* * *


So the story goes like this: once upon a time, Canada helped pioneer the whole idea of "community access tv."  Canadians took to cable tv early, as a way to get those precious U.S. stations in crystal-clear.  This made Canadians very early adopters in the world of cable-delivered television. Even today, the number of homes that subscribe to Cable or satellite is higher, by percentage, than it is in, say, the United States.


As part of the deal to defray the cost-intensive investment of putting in the cable lines in communities across Canada, cable co's were given strong regional monopolies.  In exchange, they were heavily regulated under the Broadcast Act -- rates and conditions of license were set.


One of the most notable of these conditions of license was the rule establishing Community Access TV.  Every cable company with a subscriber base of greater than 20 000 customers was required to pay a levy of 2% of gross revenues, that would go into the maintenance & production of local cable stations. Those local cable stations were to broadcast 30% of programs of local interest, generated by the community. In this way, community tv was supposed to be the third tier of broadcasting in our country -- after public (The CBC, local educational stations like TVO, etc.) and private (CTV, Global.)


A generation of people working in TV got their first start at this community level, receiving their first training as camerapeople, sound people, editors, producers or on air hosts.  I did a movie review show on a suburban Ontario local station when I was in university, and many of the people I met at Ryerson University first cut their teeth on their local community stations.


The mythology of the cable channel went far beyond that.  Viewers in Ottawa first got exposed to shock comic Tom Green through his hilarious and odd local show -- which predated the shock comic's 90's program on MTV.   And anyone familiar with Mike Myers' Wayne Campbell "Wayne's World" SNL sketches & eventual movies know that character was the host of his own Cable show, and the character was based on Myers' own experiences volunteering at his local Scarborough Cable 10 channel.


Where things started to change was 1997. That's when cable was deregulated in this country. Suddenly, the restrictions about cable rates were taken off the local cableco's, and ownership provisions were relaxed.  This triggered a consolidation spree in the industry.   Where there were once dozens of cable companies across the country, slowly bigger players like Shaw, Rogers, and Cogeco gobbled them all up.   This led to a consolidation at the community station level, too.


It might not have been so easy to see in a big city like Toronto, (though what was once Etobicoke Cable 10, Scarborough, North York 10, etc. became one-city wide "community station")  in smaller communities, the "local" programming once made by neighbours started to fade in favour of programs made hundreds of km's away. The local flavour was lost.


Around the same time, the cable companies started to shift their focus away from even trying to fulfill that 30% "access" mandate, and programs on the community channels became more "professional", produced by in house staff.


Incredibly, not once in that entire time did the overseer, the CRTC, ask to review or see any of the cable company's records to make sure they were fulfilling their obligations to Canadians.  So what started as small abuses grew and grew and grew.  When the CRTC did limited reviews in 2002, and 2005 of selected channels, they found so many violations in terms of missing logs, no backups, etc, that a picture of the system was impossible to construct.


What did become clear, through the spin and haze of the community cable debacle, was that the spirit of the enterprise had become entirely compromised. In many cases, cable companies were counting as "access programming," "programs" that were nothing more than barker reels and shills for cable services.   MTV promos were counted as "community programming," and audits revealed that the cable companies ran far more commercials & promos for themselves than they were allowed to by law in any local programs they did run.


In essence, a winfall of over $100 million (2008 numbers) a year that was supposed to provide Canadians' access to the airwaves was being used by the cable co's to underwrite their businesses.  We're talking about $680 million since 2002.




Now think about the fight over "Local TV" and the "TV Tax."  Puts a different spin on it, doesn't it?

The Dirty Business

HEY THERE. For five years I've pretty much written what I thought about Canadian TV, and you've read it for free. And that's cool.  I take shit from the interested & the crazy, and know of at least two jobs I lost because I spoke my mind, and that's cool too. I think honest self-reflection is needed to be a better creator, and honesty in general is desperately needed in this community.

People have been telling me for months with my traffic I should go to Google Adsense.  I have been resistant to this. I don't like it.  But you'll notice that I've added a Donate through Paypal button up there to the right.

The idea is this. If you read something here that you think helps you, that you find interesting or inspiring or informing or whatever, click that button, and throw me a Grande Americano, or a couple of songs off of Itunes or something.  I don't expect much.

And hey, if you're one of those radical non-tippers, that's coo too.  See, that's why I don't like the ads. I'll take the radical soft-heartedness by people like me who buy people drinks regularly. And the rest of yas can go on about your day without having to read that weird old tip about how to reduce belly fat in your eyelids, or whatever.

Own The Couch!

WE NOW INTERRUPT this Olympic blog break to bring news that Gordon Lightfoot is d...er, that I'll be yakking about the Olympics on several CBC Radio morning shows tomorrow.

You should hear me pop up sometime in your morning show if you live in the following cities: Ottawa (where I am right now) around 6:20 a.m., followed by Thunder Bay, Cape Breton, Moncton, N.B., Corner Brook, NFLD, Winnipeg, parts of Ontario that get Ontario A.M., Edmonton and Prince George/Prince Rupert.

Freelance TV critic Bill Brioux (who's got an interesting article here on those PPM ratings) will be doing other markets -- then later we have to meet under the clock in Union Station, play back the tapes, and whoever was more awesome gets to pants the other while Nikki whatshername sings O Canada and Stephen Colbert points and laughs and calls us a couple of iceholes.

Well. Not really. But that would be cool.

First day of the Prime Time conference in Ottawa was alternately depressing and interesting, but there'll be time to talk on that later.

Also, LESS THAN KIND, the fabulous comedy that finds a new home on TMN / Movie Central, bows tomorrow night -- look for it.  I've seen the first few eps and they're wonderful. I'll hopefully get a piece up about it when I'm on the train back to Toronto. But we'll see.  And that, as they say, is it.

Off into the Ottawa night now.

Twitter's Other Trending Topic Today

IT'S STRANGE SEEING all those awful pictures from Haiti. All day today I've been hyper-aware of the utter disposability of just about everything I obsess about over everyday.  Bread & Circuses don't mean much when you're knocked to your knees as roundly, as thoroughly, and as perennially as the poor people of Haiti.

So finally I focused, took a breath, and just held a thought for the Doctors & the nurses and the carpenters, engineers, rescue workers, firefighters, pilots, construction workers & everyone else with the skills to help now on their way.  Godspeed.

Then, of course, you turn to Twitter and get a bit of perspective. Conan & Leno trending right behind ...

...  sigh ... I guess people do love their circuses.

So it was I was on Q talking about the late night shuffle today with Jian, a writer from my favorite online news site, Salon, and Bill "Soundbite" Brioux, soon to be seen weekly in "Badlands of Brioux," where he'll play the key role of Jackson "Stinky Pete" Brioux.

John Doyle will probably hate it.

(Actually, Brioux's right in the middle of a book on the history of Late Night TV.  Can't wait to read that. Certainly a fascinating legacy and a wealth of stories to choose from.)

You can listen to the podcast here.  The Late Night discussion starts right about the twenty minute mark.

Late Night Lumbago

WHEW. RIGHT BACK and into the frying pan.  Full session today with the CFC folk, discussing their outlines.  Tomorrow I'm on Q, talking about the debacle of Late Night & Leno, and then straight on to a meeting about Development Project One. Whew hoo!

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.

On The Raydio

ONE OF THE interviews I did this morning, for CBC's Toronto Morning show, Metro Morning, with the venerable Andy Barrie is up and available for download.

I have to get a better phone.

Andy's questions were really great -- and he's very informed on the subject.  I think it's a pretty good interview. Listen and see if you agree.

TV Can Be Taxing

I'll be on Toronto's CIUT's Take 5 program about 8:45 am Monday, giving a bit of perspective on the whole "TV Tax" "Local TV Matters" West Side Story Sharks/Jets smackdown going on between Canadian Broadcasters & Cable Co's.

That's 89.5 FM CIUT Toronto -- I think you can also stream live over the web from their page.

Radio Copyright

FOR THOSE OF you in the Toronto broadcast/listening area, I will be on Take5, the morning show of CIUT Toronto 89.5 FM, talking about the Canadian Copyright Consultations.

The interview should happen shortly after 8:30 A.M. today. (Tuesday)

You In The Picture

IF YOU LIVE in Ottawa, Sudbury, or Thunder Bay, Ontario, Quebec City, Corner Brook, NFLD, Victoria, Prince George or Prince Rupert B.C., or Edmonton or Calgary, Alberta, you might be hearing me on CBC Radio tomorrow morning talking about the upcoming CRTC hearings into Private TV license renewals.

All that, as well as the Heritage Committee's ongoing look into the "crisis in Canadian TV" is stuff that may get short shrift from me here, as I prepare for my new job and life. Nice to see the Heritage Committee get caught in a Synechdoche loop this week, though. Seems they've bought into the idea that this "local crisis" is separate, and not part and parcel of a much larger fight about obligations, and the fact that 0ne of the most protected businesses in the country doesn't feel it should have any. Where have you gone, Charlie Angus? An industry raises its beleaguered eyes to you, while the millionaires say, "look over here at local! Look! Look! Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain! Give us fee for carriage!" Ugh.

Anyway, there's plenty of other places to get the full skinny on what's really going on right now, as one group of millionaires (The Broadcasters) square off against another group of millionaires (The Cable Co's.)

Right now, the person who matters least in this equation is you, the consumer, TV audience member or cable subscriber. However you wish to describe yourself, whether you wish to remain the person who matters least in this equation is entirely up to you.

Blue Skies, Smling at Me...

BILL BRIOUX talked to me, as well as esteemed writer/bloggers JIm Henshaw, John Rogers and Breaking Bad's Vince Gilligan about recession-era TV, and how it's affecting what you see on the Box:

As Denis McGrath, a former writer for CBC's The Border sees it, it is all about networks feeling our pain and not wanting to be behind the curve. "We've got to do something to acknowledge what people are going through," he sees them saying, "because there is a danger of being out of step with what people want to see."

McGrath is about to take his own step toward the light. He leaves this week for Newfoundland, where he will run the writing room on The Republic of Doyle, an upcoming CBC private-eye drama he describes as retro and fun. But even darker shows like AMCs' Emmy-winning Breaking Bad – a show about a dying school teacher (Bryan Cranston) so desperate to provide for his family he turns to selling drugs – have had to adjust to the new economic reality.

"Reality does impact, and you can't help but pay attention to what's going on in the newspapers every day," says Breaking Bad creator/producer Vince Gilligan. He sees his show as being about "a good man who makes a very bad decision" and then "the cascade of consequences, the domino effect from that decision." It is an extreme example of what a lot of people are dealing with today.

Suddenly, CEOs and bankers are the new bad guys on TV. The Canadian-born creator of the American cable drama Leverage, John Rogers, says the recession probably helped his show get a second season because many of his stories focus on people going after corporate criminals. McGrath found it interesting that the creators of the midseason ABC comedy Better Off Ted had tapped into a growing cynicism and mistrust about the corporate world. "It has finally sunk in that these guys have wrecked our economy," says McGrath.

There is word leaking out from Friday Night Lights that job-loss storylines will be on the agenda next season. "It's certainly on producer's and writer's minds and that means those kind of stories will be on the table in the coming weeks," says veteran Canadian TV screenwriter Jim Henshaw (BeastMaster).

"The only thing the networks want to see right now are what the networks are calling `Blue Sky Shows,'" says McGrath, who has heard through his agent and writer friends in L.A. that "Happy stuff` is all the rage. "All those Criminal Minds, CSIs, dark, crime procedurals are in real trouble.

"When the real news is all doom and gloom, the dive to comedy and escapism is almost a reflex."

Corner Gas takes a Victory Lap

SO TOMORROW NIGHT is the last episode ever of Corner Gas. Interesting timing, seeing as Brent Butt's little show resurrected the hopes of a generation of homegrown screenwriters.

I get to say as much in the Toronto Star today, in a rework of themes I first published here.:

Corner Gas was run like an American show. They set up a story room where writers broke stories and polished scripts, as a group. The star had input, but writers kept the tone consistent. Executive producers Virginia Thompson and David Storey engaged a showrunner – a senior writer whose creative vision trackedthe show through the process, as a production partner – not merely a peon.

This represented a sea change from the usual Canadian method, where non-writing producers and directors would routinely change and tinker with scripts so that by the time they were shot, they wound up looking like any other piece of art made by committee – drab and unfocused.

On Gas, the writers' work was respected, and that attracted the finest comedy writers in the country. The jokes were slightly absurd, sharp but never mean. The characters were pleasingly self-deprecating and not too full of themselves. Canadians recognized themselves in them.

At industry events, the anti-Corner Gas chatter soon faded to whispers, and stopped. It's hard to argue with success.

In the end, credit goes as much to its audience as to Brent Butt or CTV or the show's producers and writers. The audience found the show, stuck with it, and made it a hit. It may not have been the thing people were talking about in the ivory towers of Toronto – it has always done better outside of Canada's cities – but the rest of the country knew what they liked.

Now, Corner Gas is part of the national conversation. When people want to knock the CBC, they repeat the story that the public broadcaster passed on the show. (Not true.) It's held up as a successful export; an exemplar of Canadian values. The show's filming locale, Rouleau, Sask., has even become a minor tourist attraction.

The effect of Corner Gas writers on current comedy in Canada cannot be overstated. Canadian creators may still have to fight for their share of the airwaves. But now we have an example that proves that a homegrown hit is indeed possible.

My little piece is beside Rob Salem's fuller appreciation. In fact, tributes to Dog River have been flowing in in papers all over the country this weekend, which is entirely appropriate.

And I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that appended to every one of those stories is a small minded, typical internet troll whinge about tx dolllrrrrss and nobodylikesittttt and so on and so on -- the bane of the Canadian Cultural philistine, the boulder that we who toil in cultural industries have to roll up the hill every day. (They're also known as Albertans. Ah, just kidding. Not really. No really. But really not.)

No matter. That two year old post is still generating comments here on this site, I'm going to quote from another one I got just the other day. Take away the toxic politics behind any show's creation in Canada, and hear the words of somebody without a dog in the hunt -- a guy who stopped by from Akron, Ohio (that's prime new product testing country, folks!)

I'm a huge Corner Gas fan here in the states - after stumbling upon it on WGN America one late night.

Unfortunately, WGN appears not to be interested in airing the final season, so I've gotten the show "other ways". It appears that CTV has made a recent decision to allow streaming CG from its website outside of Canada, which is great.

Now, I know I'm a "Canadaphile" and even have a CBC Radio widget on my desktop (!), but whether the snobs admit to it or not...CG is a well-produced, well-written, well-crafted show. Brent Butt is a funny writer and comedian, the entire cast is talented as heck, and the show is on a par production-value wise with any show down here.

With no offense to the late Don Adams, CG is no clone of "Check It Out!", which we Americans got on cable a long time ago.

And anyone who would rather watch "According to Jim"...the mere thought makes me shudder.

You can like or not like Corner Gas. But it is not the same kind of sitcom claptrap we produce here in the States, and that your networks (such as CTV and Global) ship back to you in a closed feed.

Amen, and Sayonara Gas. You'll be missed.

Today, Sponsored By Pepsi!

I'LL BE ON CBC RADIO's Q this morning just after 10am talking about the SNL Pepsi MacGruber Super Bowl spots.

EDIT: the podcast is now up -- it's the first item.

Breaking Up Is Hard On You & Can TV Icon Video Special!

THE PODCAST for my latest appearance with Nikki Stafford on CBC Radio's Q is now up. Fun starts at about the thirty minute mark.

And as a special Q Bonus, why not check out a couple of Canadian TV interviews from the TV version of the show...

Jian chats with: The Trailer Park Boys



Brent Butt from Corner Gas



And Kid in The Hall and Less Than Kind showrunner Mark McKinney

They Call Me Mister Q

I'LL BE ON CBC Radio's Q again this morning, talking to Jian about why breaking up's not hard to do.

10: 00 a.m. on your local CBC stations. Uh. 930 ish on Sirius and an Newfoundland. I'm up in the 2nd block.

Michel Arpin, You, and Q, Too.

I'LL BE ON CBC RADIO'S Q today, right at the end of the program, talking about this. Which is really about this.

Make sure to drop by the discussion on Ink Canada to ad your .02 (CDN) to the discussion about which Canadian Films and TV shows we should sned to Mr. Arpin in the future. Or if you can't do that, feel free to comment on the thread below.

In the meantime, I and others who had written to Mr. Arpin about this all received the same timely response from him explaining the context of the Playback interview:

Thank you for sharing your concerns in your e-mail dated January 15. Rest assured that I share your passion for Canadian television programming – in all its varieties – and Canadian culture.

As you may know, I have dedicated my entire career, now stretching over 40 years, to the Canadian broadcasting industry. In fact, you may be surprised to learn that early in my career I was a television producer.

It has been my privilege to serve as the CRTC’s Vice-Chairman of Broadcasting since September 2005, and in the last three and a half years, I have participated in numerous hearings and decisions that hopefully have benefited the Canadian television industry as a whole.

Those who are appointed to the CRTC have the obligation to remain independent and to share their expertise with their fellow Commissioners and Commission staff. Our decisions are guided by the principles and objectives of the Broadcasting Act, and are made on the basis of the facts and the public record before us, regardless of our personal preferences.

As mentioned in the Playback interview, my primary mandate as a regulator is to “create a framework for [creative people] to allow the broadcast media to expand and provide better service to Canadians.” The more successful we are in creating this framework, the more Canadian television creators will have opportunities to tell their stories.

As far as the Playback quote is concerned, you must appreciate that the interviewer asked me to name my favourite show; I felt it was inappropriate given my position. However, rest assured that, throughout the year, I watch all types of television news, documentaries as well as drama or feature films.

I've been doing this a long time, and I find it difficult to imagine where the question and the quote Arpin gave lined up. The important thing, though, is trust. Trust that you put in an official in that position. Trust that says, "I believe you're working for me, and not just for moneyed cable and broadcaster interests." I'll be making that point in my follow up letter. Stay, as they say, tuned. Or if you don't like these kinds of cultural debates, you could always read a novel. I guess.:)