How well CBC’s reincarnated The National does will eventually be answered once the broadcaster figures out a reason for there to be four news anchors. The flagship newscast returned Monday in a generally mistake-free hour. While Ian Hanomansing, Adrienne Arsenault, Rosemary Barton and Andrew Chang all did a fine job, there was never any reason to have
Wendy Crewson chews the scenery to bits in Monday night’s opening episode of Frankie Drake Mysteries. Trust a TV veteran to get the tone just right. Crewson guests as a gold digger with a secret that links her to the main character, flirty, flapper-era detective Frankie Drake (played by Lauren Lee Smith). The series premieres
Back when the earth was still cooling and I was a young lad of 15 I got a job as a bus boy at Ontario Place. It was at a place called The Blockhouse restaurant. It served chopped beef, stew and giant glass pitchers of beer I’d have to fish later out of the West
Last June, at the Corus upfront in Toronto, myself and several other TV beat writers were in a room awaiting Shamar Moore to come in and tell us all about S.W.A.T. The remake of the mid-’70s cop show, premiering Thursday night, was one of Global’s major prime time acquisitions this season. Just before Moore walked into the room, we
One of the last great “characters” of the Television Critics Association has gone to the big cathode ray tube in the sky: Frank Barron. The TCA’s oldest living member passed away Monday according to his widow and constant companion, Margie Barron. He was 98. Put in TV terms, Frank aged beyond the all important 18-49-year-old
This season marks 25 years since the launch of This Hour Has 22 Minutes. Conceived by Mary Walsh as the follow up to her earlier CBC comedy series CODCO, the weekly news satire has lampooned politicians and Canada in general since Jean Chretien was strangling citizens on Parliament Hill. Halifax-based author Angela Mombourquette – who worked
CANNES — British comedian Sir Lenny Henry brought his “one big idea” to MIPCOM Wednesday. The 59-year-old actor, singer and Comic Relief co-founder was asked to give a keynote on diversity and he pushed a very intriguing notion: provide tax breaks tied to diversity. Henry told how, when he first arrived at BBC, the network
CANNES — Forget all that stuff about Peak TV and the new “Golden Age.” Every year at MIPCOM, the heap of content on display during the international TV market is staggering. As it says on an enormous poster on the side of one of the 200-foot yachts out in the harbor, “Content is king. Distribution is