In Which Our Heroine Dreams of Meeting a Hero at the CRTC

Mary Pedersen was pursuing a Masters in Creative Writing when she got her first production job on the Sci-Fi series, Starhunter. Mary sold her first spec script to Starhunter that same season, became Junior Story Editor on the series, and co-wrote a second episode. Her original family drama series, The Mighty Madigans, is now in development with Halifax Film and CBC. Her blog, Ruts and Grooves, explores the intersection of screenwriting craft and having the bejeezus scared out of you by the job of writing.

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I've wanted to be a television writer for ten years, but the best, most defining thing that happened to my writing happened in the last two years, when my project went into development. The opportunity raised the stakes for me, and now I want to say to all new writers - take your passion and your dream and find ways to raise the stakes for yourself.

I'm passionate about TV. I remember, at seven years old, fighting my Dad for the privilege of watching Eight Is Enough. He'd have preferred to ban television from the house. I bonded with my younger sister over LA Law. I loved Chuck, admired Leon, wanted to be Carrie, and itched to strangle Olivia as Street Legal joined LA Law to solidify my lifelong affection for legal procedurals.

Later, I dissected Peter Berg's short-lived Wonderland and obsessed over NYPD Blue. (Most of the "memorable quotes" on the show's IMDB page were lovingly contributed by me. Before I had children, of course.) Today, the excitement with which I greet new episodes of Glee and Being Erica is unseemly.

I'm a tv nerd.

And so to be a television writer - to create for others the kind of stories that have brought me so much delight - is my dream. I don't hold that dream up to be any more important than anyone else's. Yet - it is important.

In the past ten years, I've thought a lot about the wisdom and folly of holding out for a dream. Especially living not in LA or New York or even in Toronto or Vancouver, but in Halifax, a place that makes roughly one drama series every decade.

It might have been wiser to move away. Or easier and less foolhardy to settle. To take an office job, maybe for a big corporation, or in the government. To forget creating, and be content with watching someone else's stories. But instead, often perilously poor and for no reason except that faith seemed better than hopelessness, I clung to my dream with an obstinance that surprised me.

When I had children, it became simultaneously harder to continue, and more impossible to quit - I didn't want them to grow up with someone who hadn't followed through.

Someone said that a pro writer is an amateur who didn't quit. I'm still not sure that I will be a pro, but something as important is happening. I'm watching a dream - that sweet, uncomplicated, naive vision - transform into reality, which is messier but loads more satisfying. The process is painful and it feels risky. But it's paying off. I have more substance than I did before, and a little more confidence. I know myself better. The decision to aim high is itself defining, and the journey is as important as the destination.

For much of the time I've been on this journey, my husband supported me - out of faith in my emerging ability, and out of love that exceeded financial anxiety, although some days just barely. So let me tell you a little about this guy, the love of my life. He likes to say provocative things like: “Why can’t I use the same sponge on the floor and the dishes?” Or: “Canada should just join the United States.” I mean, can you believe it? Canadians would never stand for it.

Except when it comes to entertainment. Nowhere is the absorption of Canada by the US more apparent than in the film and television industry. Some would have us believe that getting our entertainment delivered to our door by the United States doesn't hurt us. It's just entertainment, and there are a lot of things more important in the world than that. Yet - it is important.

Have you noticed how many of our pop culture references are American?

And it isn't just entertainment. So many of the news links traded around among Canadians on Twitter and Facebook are American. We can all summon ire about Sarah Palin at the drop of a hat - why don't we have our own vapid, over-exposed dilettante to deride and fear with such passion?

Canadians might be forgiven for believing that it's because we're just less interesting than Americans, less dramatic, less foolish and less heroic. The stereotype goes that we are more bland and more virtuous than Americans. Moosepucky. It's because not enough people are getting paid properly to tell our stories.

The people at the CRTC aren't the only ones with a hand in fixing this problem - they're just today's best opportunity. How they respond will tell us about how our society deals with with big ideas and passions and risk. It will tell us about our nation's character.

Are we really so mild that we'll let our corporations mistake audience viewing habits for a willingness to sell our cultural soul, one episode of "Entertainment Tonight Canada" at a time? Do we want our children to grow up feeling second-rate, with their noses pressed up against the television screen of someone else's life, with their country telling them that unless their passion is for staying rich or playing hockey, no one here will care?

The corporations have exposed their weaknesses. Canada's creatives have brought passion, skill, ambition and obstinance to the table. For me, for my kids, for our industry, and for anyone in this country with any kind of dream - for our very character, I hope the CRTC will respond by raising the stakes.