A story in today’s Variety raises huge questions about the future of Canadian broadcasting, strike breaking and cross-border production.
CTV’s aptly named Flashpoint–one of two dramas the network recently announced–is going to air concurrently on both CBS and CTV, beginning sometime this summer. The police drama will feature Toronto-native Enrico Colantoni (Veronica Mars) and other Canadian-born stars, and–most significant of all–is being written by Canadian writers.
This would seem to put those writers in an awkward, to say the least, position. The Canadian Guild settled their contract a year ago but their U.S. brethren are locked into a bitter, 13-weeks and counting dispute. Isn’t CBS reaching across the border for a scripted solution? And how can the Canadian Guild look the other way?
Variety’s Josef Adalian writes that “Flashpoint is believed to be the first scripted project developed and ordered to series by a broadcast network since the WGA walkout in November.
Final deal points between (CBS Paramount) and CTV were being finalized Monday, and a deal could be announced as soon as today.” The series is expected to start shooting in Toronto in April.
More on this later, but check here for the full story in today’s Variety.
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Bill, what was the arrangement regarding that show Due South which was also a CTV show that aired in the US on CBS? Was it the same deal as the one Flashpoint is getting?
Sorry it took so long to post back here, Dennis. Same deal, with Canadian writers and performers working on a show that crossed the border into the states, except CBS did not co-finance the series up front as they are doing with Flashpoint, they simply bought U.S. rights to it. Could be wrong but that is how I understand it and if anybody knows better please bring me up to speed.