Everything about Featured, eh?

Featured, Murdoch Mysteries

Murdoch Mysteries: Showrunner Peter Mitchell talks “Murdoch Mystery Mansion”

5 Comments

Spoiler alert! Do not continue reading until you have watched Episode 1 of Season 12, “Murdoch Mystery Mansion.”

It’s been a long, hot summer here in Southern Ontario. Thankfully, the cooler air has arrived and with it the super-cool season première of Murdoch Mysteries. There was a lot to like about “Murdoch Mystery Mansion.” In particular, I enjoyed little things like William not being sure where to hang his hat upon coming home to a jam-packed house, Miss Hart’s unhappiness at Julia still being in charge of the morgue and Sophie McShera’s guest-starring role. I also liked the bigger story steps, including Higgins and Ruth’s upcoming nuptials.

Thanks to showrunner Peter Mitchell for taking time out of his busy day to discuss Monday’s episode as well as a look forward to future weeks. And, he gave me an answer to the question, “Is there a holiday movie this year?” This season, in addition to speaking with members of the Murdoch writing team, I’ll be chatting with members of the cast and crew too. I’m looking forward to bringing you exciting behind-the-scenes insight into our favourite show.

Congratulations on Season 12. You joined during Season 5 of Murdoch Mysteries; has the ride been a fun one?
Peter Mitchell: I think that would be an understatement. It’s been a pretty fun ride.

Not only did you have Frank Lloyd Wright in the first episode but also quite the gory death with a room dripping with body parts. Great job!
PM: Thanks! We also threw in a bit of the Me Too Movement in there and a little bit of Tinder. It’s got a couple of historical characters in there, allusions to the future and a nice, fun little mystery. I liked having the actress from Downton Abbey on, and I thought the actor who played Frank Lloyd Wright was true to what I could learn of him.

Aaron Poole was very good as Frank Lloyd Wright.
PM: It was surprising. I had to keep going back to Frank Lloyd Wright houses circa 1905 because they are so modern. The Murdoch’s house would fit into today’s world. [The set] is based on existing Frank Lloyd Wright houses of the period. It was [almost] completely accurate.

The set design was beautiful.
PM: The exterior was a house that was built along the same lines as a Frank Lloyd Wright house even though Mr. Wright never actually built a house in Canada. He certainly built a bunch in upstate New York and places like that. The exterior was a pretty good match to a lot of Frank Lloyd Wright houses that I researched. And Bob Sher and the art department did a great job with the interior. We added a few Murdoch gizmos, like the potato cooking room and the retractable bed just for fun.

How did the casting of Sophie McShera from Downton Abbey happen? Is that a deal with the UK?
PM: It’s not so much a deal as much as we try to endeavour for the last few years to open up the season with somebody recognizable to our UK audience. They submit a list of people they would like to see on the show and we pursue them. Anybody from Downton Abbey is on the list. The UK broadcaster knows their market and if they’re not from Downton Abbey they’ll probably be from EastEnders.

Gary Harvey directed this episode. Not only has he directed a lot of episodes of Murdoch Mysteries, but you’ve been friends with him for years. What does he bring to the table as a director?
PM: I’ve known Gary for most of my professional life. He has a fairly comprehensive understanding of what I like to see in a show. He’s very good with story and usually captures all of the moments. We can communicate with very few words. He generally knows what I’m hoping to get, even if it’s a sly allusion to Tinder, he knows what matters in the scene and hopefully what matters in the story. He has the experience to get eight out of 10 things with the amount of time we have to shoot.

You already have that shorthand.
PM: Of course. He’s a very efficient director and the actors like him and trust him. The crew likes him and he gets the job done in the time we give him to do it. I don’t have to spend much time on set when Gary is shooting unless I want to go down and make fun of him. [Laughs.] So I’m down there quite a lot. [Laughs.]

We saw William and Julia in a very good place in Episode 1. Lots of loving looks and humour. Will that last for a while?
PM: Oh yeah, I think so. We’ve dialled down on the soap elements a little bit this year. We do a little more work with cases. Julia has yet another new job. We have a few episodes that highlight our secondary characters a little bit more strongly maybe, than in the past. A couple of episodes in a row feature Brackenreid in a very big way. An episode that features Watts in a big way.

Watts is great and has been getting a lot of screen time. Should I be reading into that?
PM: I don’t think so. He’s got a considerable amount of talent so it’s a shame not to use him when we can. Higgins has got more airtime this year too.

I just got ‘My Big Fat Mimico Wedding’ in my Inbox. Episode 3 for the wedding. You’re not stretching it out all season?
PM: That’s right. The Newsomes are in full bloom. The wedding: will they or won’t they? And who dies? [Laughs.] It’s a nice, fun comedy.

What can you say about Miss Hart and her plans for taking over the morgue?
PM: She may get what she wants. And I think it’s nice to have a character who is not a true villain, but a bit flinty. It keeps our other characters on their toes and she has ambitions of her own. She’s maybe not as much of a team player as the rest of them.

Is there going to be a holiday movie?
PM: There isn’t going to be a holiday movie this year but there is going to be an out-of-the-box Halloween episode. It’s certainly a standalone episode. And it is probably unlike any Murdoch you’ve seen.

What did you think of Monday’s season return? Have you got questions for Peter Mitchell or anyone else on the cast and crew? Let me know in the comments below and I will ask them in the coming weeks.

Murdoch Mysteries airs Mondays at 8 p.m. on CBC.

Images courtesy of CBC.

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedinmail
Featured, Frankie Drake Mysteries

Preview: Frankie Drake Mysteries returns with a change in tone in Season 2

2 Comments

There are changes afoot in Season 2 of Frankie Drake Mysteries both behind and in front of the camera. As its production company, Shaftesbury, and CBC announced earlier this year, James Hurst took over showrunning duties from Cal Coons. Co-creator Michelle Ricci, meanwhile, has moved on pen Hallmark’s Hallie Dean Mystery movies starring Kellie Martin.

Fans will notice changes in front of the camera. As Hurst told me recently, a shift in tone has taken place for the series’ sophomore season. Serious themes will still be addressed, he says, but there will be less heavy storytelling.

Here’s what the CBC has released as an official synopsis for “The Old Switcheroo,” written by co-creator Carol Hay and directed by Ruba Nadda:

In the Season 2 premiere, Frankie (Lauren Lee Smith) learns that her mother Nora (Wendy Crewson) has joined the board of the Royal Ontario Museum, promising to bring an influx of treasures to the museum’s fledgling antiquities collection. Frankie and Trudy (Chantel Riley) investigate a break-in but find nothing’s been stolen. Meanwhile, Flo (Sharron Matthews) and Mary (Rebecca Liddiard) are embroiled in a mystery of their own after discovering a body in the morgue has been intentionally misidentified. 

And here are more observations from me after watching a screener.

Is Nora going legit?
After a lifetime on one side of the law, can Nora exist on the other? It would seem that’s her goal. Though, her promise to bring more treasures to the ROM had me wondering how she’d get them while staying above board. Speaking of the ROM, it’s a stunning backdrop in Monday’s return.

An X Company star drops by
Yes, I still miss Mark Ellis and Stephanie Morgenstern’s excellent Second World War drama terribly. The hurt was tempered a bit by getting to see Lara Jean Chorostecki back on my screen. She portrays Marian Hartley, a woman whose past is tied to Frankie’s. As with Murdoch Mysteries, Frankie Drake often drops historical references into its fictional tales. Tonight we hear about Howard Carter and Hiram Bingham III. Learn a little more about them here and here.

Flo and Mary take on their own case
These characters are great together. They’re both quirky and unintentionally funny, a winning combination in my book. Seeing Mary struggle to say a certain French dish and the pair teaming to identify the body in the morgue is a real treat. See if you agree.

An adversary for Frankie is unearthed
I’ve been waiting for someone to seriously challenge Frankie since Episode 1 of Season 1. It arrives Monday in the form of Dark Matter‘s Anthony Lemke. He plays Detective Greyson, a veteran cop who gets under everyone’s skin. Also? Slasher‘s Steve Byers drops in to play Hiram Bingham III.

Frankie Drake Mysteries airs Mondays at 9 p.m. on CBC.

Images courtesy of CBC.

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedinmail
Anne, Anne of Green Gables, Featured

CBC’s Anne with an E blooms in Season 2

4 Comments

Moira Walley-Beckett and Anne with an E are on a roll. The former landed the Showrunner of the Year award at the 2018 Rockie Awards gala at the Banff World Media Festival earlier this year while the latter was feted with individual awards and Best Drama Series at the Canadian Screen Awards.

With Season 2 of Anne with an E returning to CBC this Sunday at 7 p.m., we spoke to Walley-Beckett in Banff about what’s to come for Anne Shirley (Amybeth McNulty), Marilla Cuthbert (Geraldine James), Matthew Cuthbert (R.H. Thomson), Gilbert Blythe (Lucas Jade Zumann) and newcomer Sebastian (Dalmar Abuzeid).

There are some new characters in the second season, but the most important question that I want to ask is … the Season 1 finale, the two guys that came into the house … do we catch up with Season 2 right in those moments after? Do we find out what these guys are plotting? Because it would appear that they were plotting nothing but bad things.
Moira Walley-Beckett: They’re bad, bad, bad grifters. Season 2 picks up nine months later, and they are still there at Green Gables, pretending that they didn’t know each other before. We’re going to see how they’ve integrated into the household, what their master plan was in being there in the first place, what transpires, and how it affects everybody and the town.

It isn’t like there is this quick revelation that these guys are grifters and that they may be bad, and let’s get rid of them. They are part of life.
MWB: It’s a long game. It’s a very long game.

How much fun is it to do that to the audience?
MWB: It’s so fun.

You’ve got some diversity in characters in Season 2. I recorded a podcast with Dalmar Abuzeid. Now, we didn’t specifically talk about Anne with an E at that time. What can you tell me about his character Sebastian?
MWB: I’ve been chagrined by the fact that the story of Anne of Green Gables and Avonlea does not culturally reflect the diversity in Canada and the colour in the world. So, my master plan at the end of Season 1, which was my plan from the beginning, was to earn Gilbert’s exit, and put him aboard a steamship, and send him out into the world. It afforded me an opportunity to introduce this new character, played by Dal, who’s a person of colour, who becomes a very, very good friend of Gilbert’s. They travel to exotic ports of call, where we see a whole other part of the world and certainly a whole different cultural experience through the eyes of Gilbert.

Dalmar Abuzeid as Sebastian

That explains the filming in Port Dalhousie.
MWB: Yes. Which is unrecognizable. My art department and my production designers … I brutalized them this season. Because it’s a huge season they just did phenomenally detailed work. I mean, you’d have no idea that you weren’t actually there. Then we have our steamship and the interiors and exteriors of the steamship that we built. It’s just an incredible season.

When did you picture this big season? Was it in your grand plan from the very beginning?
MWB: Yes. From when I was first conceiving of the show and how I not only could go deeper emotionally with all the characters, and Anne particularly, her backstory, but certainly Matthew and Marilla too. But also, how do I want this series to grow? How do I want to expand the world? How do I want to foster conversation in families who are watching? So, it’s always been part of the master plan to expand the story and expand the world.

It must have been really great to get the Season 1 feedback, first from the fans watching on CBC and then the Netflix fans telling you how much they love these characters and your version of it.
MWB: It’s been really exciting to see how excited fans around the world are by this beloved Canadian story and how embracing they’ve been of the departures that I’ve taken from the book, which are, as you know, enormous departures. Basically, by the end of the first episode of the first season, we were off [the book]. I was like, ‘We’re doing this instead,’ and purposefully doing so, because it’s a beautiful template, but for me to have wanted to engage with it and develop it, I wanted it to be more, and deeper, and expansive.

The writer’s room for Season 2, what was dynamic? The female to male ratio, the veterans to new people? 
MWB: Interesting question. Well, I’ll just start by saying I didn’t have a writer’s room for season one, and I wrote every episode myself. I mean, I’m such a control freak. I so loved that experience, but I had the luxury of time to do it that way, and I didn’t have that for Season 2. When I imagined how I wanted to undertake Season 2, I decided to have an all female writer’s room for the show. So, I hired five Canadian writers and one U.S. non-writing writer to break story with me in the room. It was an extremely invigorating experience, and intimate, and safe, and I think corrective for some of the female writers. It’s a diverse room, which was also super important because it’s … why limit? I want all the voices. I want different perspectives. It was a great crucible.

What can fans expect from this second season? You’ve already said big. We’re going to have diversity in the cast, going to places that the books have never gone before. What else can you say?
MWB: I guess I can say it’s a challenging season. I’m exploring some topics and themes that are very challenging, and very topical, and very relevant right now. We’re diving deep into bullying, and prejudice, and racism, and intolerance, and gender issues, and sexuality. It’s a major, major season, and it’s 10 episodes.

How is Matthew doing?
MWB: Matthew’s doing OK.

Because that’s got to happen. Well, I guess it doesn’t.
MWB: This is the thing, I’m an unreliable narrator of the book.

Anne with an E airs Sundays at 7 p.m. on CBC.

Images courtesy of CBC.

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedinmail
Amazing Race Canada, Featured

Comments and queries for the week of September 21

1 Comment

The [Amazing Race Canada] finale was good, but I’m super bummed with the outcome. Not having Martina and Phil in the finale made it way less fun to watch. I was really pulling for Taylor and Courtney to win. I never really got into Adam and Courtney, there was just something about them that made them unlikable throughout the whole thing. I enjoyed the season but it seemed shorter than previous seasons. I wouldn’t mind if they went abroad more next season because its always enjoyable to learn and see new countries and cultures. Overall a decent season. —Christine 

I enjoyed the first [Bletchley Circle] series but missed the second one, unfortunately. Sounds like an intriguing take on the previous series, though I wish it had been set in Vancouver rather than the U.S. Hopefully, Season 2 will move to Canada. —John

Super, we love Jonny Harris and Still Standing. Looking forward to the Carcross, Yukon, episode as we have been there, and got lost trying to find our way back out of town LOL. —Steve

Got a question or comment about Canadian TV? Email greg.david@tv-eh.com or via Twitter @tv_eh.

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedinmail
Featured, The Nature of Things

Preview: The Nature of Things opens its new season with “Equus — Story of the Horse”

2 Comments

In 2015, director and anthropologist Niobe Thompson debuted “The Great Human Odyssey” as part of The Nature of Things. It won several awards, all deserved. Now Thompson is back with a new, and expansive, look at the life of an animal that has a close relationship with humans: the horse.

The three-part “Equus — Story of the Horse,” kicking off The Nature of Things’ new season on Sunday at 8 p.m.,  is an ambitious, masterful exploration into the animals through visits to 11 countries, three continents and trips back in time to delve deep into the human-horse relationship.

“No other animal has done more for us,” Thompson says in press materials for the program. “We built the world around us with horsepower. But what is it that makes humans and horses so perfect for each other? And how have we transformed the wild horse we tamed 6,000 years ago into over 400 specialized breeds today?”

Much of Episode 1, “Origins,” does exactly that, with Thompson tracing back to the beginning of this proud, muscular beasts’ entrance to the world. He begins his journey in Saudi Arabia and the Bedouin people, who live on horseback and regard them as members of the family. His two-day experience into the desert is astride the Arab horse, a breed hardy, spirited, quick and able to handle the harsh climate thanks to some unique physical details. The Arab is one of the world’s oldest breeds, but it’s not the oldest.

That recognition is bestowed upon the 45 million-year-old Dawn Horse, a creature that led to modern horses. Tiny, forest roaming, vulnerable to predators, and a fruit eater, fossils of Dawn Horse are brought to stunning (and a humorous) life by evolutionary biologist Martin Fischer and Thompson’s team of 3-D animators. The changing of the planet from a greenhouse world to more temperate place meant the introduction of grasses and shrinking of the places a petite, chubby mammal could hide. So Dawn Horse ran and evolved into the tall, fit animal we recognize today.

With stunning visuals (the slow motion is simply amazing) and Darren Fung’s soundtrack, “Equus — Story of the Horse,” is a gem to behold and will likely garner more awards for Thompson. Future episodes of “Equus — Story of the Horse,” continue with “First Riders,” on Sept. 30 and “Chasing the Wind,” on Oct. 7.

The Nature of Things, “Equus — Story of the Horse,” airs Sunday at 8 p.m. on CBC.

Image courtesy of Handful of Films.

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedinmail