It’s the end of the road for Big Brother Canada. For now, at least. Host Arisa Cox made the surprising announcement on Monday afternoon with a post on Twitter.
“It’s been FIVE BRILLIANT SEASONS and now it’s official, @BigBrotherCA is on hiatus,” she wrote. “MASSIVE LOVE to our BB fam from the bottom of my heart.”
The announcement came the same day Corus made its upfront announcement, outlining American primetime acquisitions and Canadian original orders and renewals. Big Brother Canada wasn’t listed on any of the press materials, but it being a spring program isn’t always on fall materials.
“We CAN and we WILL get through this together!” Cox tweeted a few moments later. “The second we know more I’ll share it, so stay tuned. LOVE! #BBCAN @BigBrotherCA @Global_TV”
Listen to our interview with Big Brother Canada supervising producer Trevor Boris
The hiatus comes following the series’ May 18 season finale when professional poker Kevin Martin of Calgary emerged victorious, scoring the $100,000 grand prize, $30,000 gift card from The Brick and 2017 Toyota ’86. Season 5 of brought back some of Canada’s favourite houseguests from the past to battle new houseguests from the present, pitting them against each other in a fight for future supremacy inside the Big Brother Canada “Odyssey†house. Second chance houseguests included Gary Levy from Toronto; Neda Kalantar from Vancouver; and Bruno Ielo from Ottawa. First-time houseguests joining the returning players included Andre “Dre†Gwenaelle, a masters student from Montreal; Mark Chrysler, a bartender from Edmonton; William Laprise Desbiens, a marketing student from Trois-Rivieres, QB; and Emily Hawkin, a bartender from Lindsay, ON.
Though fans should still hold out hope Big Brother Canada could return, Insight Productions—the folks behind the program—placed Canadian Idol on hiatus with CTV after six seasons. It never came back. Insight produces Top Chef Canada for Food Network Canada and The Amazing Race Canada for CTV.