Comments and queries for the week of May 27

Greg’s away so the Diane mouse will play in this week’s issue of Comments and Queries. Here are answers to questions we got by Twitter, Facebook, emails and comments:

CBC’s new season announcement

Pure is a new new show, do you know? Because the others were ordered last season, no?

CBC’s 2016-17 season announcement snuck in news of this previously unknown (to me) series about the Mennonite mob, which will apparently air in winter 2017. I posted more about it here but in brief, it’s described as “the story of Noah Funk, a newly-elected Mennonite pastor, who is determined to rid his community of drug traffickers by betraying a fellow Mennonite to the police. But instead of solving the problem, Noah’s actions trigger an ultimatum from Menno mob leader Eli Voss: in order to protect his family he must get involved in the illegal operation. Noah decides that if he must work for the mob, he will secretly gather enough evidence to dismantle the organization.”  It’s created by David Macleod (Haven, Call Me Fitz) and Michael Amo (The Listener, Transporter: The Series).

I wonder if This is That, the webseries, is based on the radio show/podcast.

It is indeed. From CBC:  This is That is an award-winning current affairs program that doesn’t just talk about the issues, it fabricates them. Nothing is off-limits — politics, business, culture, justice, science, religion — if it is relevant to Canadians, hosts Pat Kelly and Peter Oldring will find out the “this” and “that” of the story. Each week, they introduce the voices and stories that give this country character in this 100% improvised, satirical send-up of public radio. In a new original digital series, they will be This is That-ing a new range of topics ripe for parody, including autonomous cars, rock-star chefs and thought leaders.


Private Eyes

Has it been picked up in the UK yet?

No word on international pickups yet for the Global series starring Jason Priestley and Cindy Sampson but it is produced by global studio eOne so they’re likely to be shopping it around. Stay tuned for any news.


Alias Grace

Which network or channel will this air on?

My cyber-sleuthing has failed me and I have no idea. I have an inquiry out to the production office but the bare bones news we have from the above link seems to originate from production information which lists Mary Harron (American Psycho, I Shot Andy Warhol) as director and Sarah Polley (Stories We Tell, Away from Her) as producer — and we know Polley wrote the mini-series adaptation of the Margaret Atwood novel.


Canadian Pickers

I’m trying to get ahold of Scott and Sheldon, do you know how I can do that?

Canadian Pickers was cancelled a few years ago, so the men are not likely to be answering queries related to the show. However, if you think your question outlives the series, Cineflix was the producer and you could start with them for contact information.

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