Everything about Hudson & Rex, eh?

Canada's Got Talent, Featured, Hudson & Rex, Law & Order Toronto: Criminal Intent

Rogers brings more star power to Citytv Canadian hits

1 Comment

From a media release:

Rogers Communications announced today Citytv’s 2024/25 original programming slate, promising to bring even more jaw-dropping and inspiring moments, loads of suspense, and more star power.

“We just wrapped our best season yet for original programming on Citytv, and are excited to build on this success by delivering more compelling stories and familiar homegrown stars to Canadians,” said Hayden Mindell, Senior Vice President, Television, Rogers Sports & Media

They’ve DUN DUN it again…and again! After debuting as the #1 show in Canada earlier this year*, Rogers today announces a two-season greenlight for Law & Order Toronto: Criminal Intent, in partnership with leading producers Lark Productions and Cameron Pictures Inc. Showcasing original Canadian stories written, produced by and starring Canadians, both seasons are set to premiere on Citytv from early 2025. Filming will commence this July in Toronto. The returning cast includes Aden Young (Rectify, Black Robe) as Detective Sergeant Henry Graff, Kathleen Munroe (City on Fire, Patriot) as Detective Sergeant Frankie Bateman, Karen Robinson (Schitt’s Creek, Echoes) as Inspector Vivienne Holness, and K.C. Collins (The Cleaning Lady, Clarice) as Deputy Crown Attorney Theo Forrester. Tassie Cameron (Pretty Hard Cases, Mary Kills People, Rookie Blue) is the series developer and showrunner. Law & Order Toronto: Criminal Intent is produced in association with Universal International Studios. It is based on the original US series created by Dick Wolf for Universal Television. The Criminal Intent format is licensed by NBCUniversal and Wolf Entertainment.

Shania Twain and comedian Katherine Ryan join Howie Mandel, Kardinal Offishall and Host, Lindsay Ell for an all-new season of Canada’s Got Talent.

Global Superstar, Celebrated Songwriter, and Style Icon Shania Twain is a five-time GRAMMY winner and one of music and fashion’s most renowned trailblazers. With six albums released and more than 100 million albums sold worldwide, Twain remains the top-selling female country pop artist of all time. Her hits include “Any Man of Mine,” “That Don’t Impress Me Much,” “You’re Still the One” and “Man! I Feel Like A Woman!”. Shania was the first artist in history to release 3 consecutive diamond-certified albums. Twain’s first album in 15 years, NOW, was released in September 2017 and debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Top 200 albums, making it the first female country release in over 3 years to top the all-genre chart. The release was followed by a year-long sold-out NOW World Tour. In 2021, Shania kicked off her second residency in Las Vegas called “Let’s Go!” which completely sold out and continued through September 2022. In July 2022, Netflix released “Shania Twain: Not Just a Girl,” a brand-new, career-spanning documentary on Twain’s life and career with an accompanying Highlights album. Most recently, Shania released her sixth full-length album Queen of Me on February 3, 2023, via Republic Nashville/Universal Music Canada, which received glowing reviews from NPR, Rolling Stone, Consequence, Billboard, Variety, and many more.  In April 2023, Shania kicked off her sold-out global Queen of Me tour, which ran through November 2023, and was one of the Top 10 highest-grossing country tours of the year.  This year Shania returned to Las Vegas for her third residency entitled “Come On Over!”.

Twain brings her unparalleled experience, charisma, and knowledge to the judges’ panel as they seek out Canada’s new wave of superstars. 

“Canada!  I’m really excited to discover the amazing talent you have to share,” said Shania Twain, Judge, Canada’s Got Talent.  “Canada is well known for having high calibre creative people and it’s my honour to sit back and see you at your best. Let’s go my fellow Canadians!”

Hailing from Sarnia, ON, comedian and actress Katherine Ryan brings her incisive wit, fearless humor, and commanding presence to the judges’ panel offering perspective from her own journey as a leading figure in contemporary comedy. Canada’s Got Talent Season 4 begins production this fall in Niagara Falls, ON, and premieres in Spring 2025. Auditions for Season 4 are now open on Citytv.com. 

Canada’s Got Talent, the country’s biggest talent competition, returns for another season of showstopping performances from across the country, announced in partnership with MEM Inc., Fremantle, and SYCO Entertainment, in association with Citytv. Season 4 begins production this fall in Niagara Falls, ON, and premieres in Spring 2025 on Citytv and Citytv+. Auditions for Season 4 are now open onCitytv.com.  

Winning over the hearts of Canadians week after week, Citytv’s favourite cop-and-canine duo Hudson & Rex returns for Season 7, set to premiere on Citytv in early 2025. Produced by Shaftesbury Productions, in association with Citytv, Hudson & Rex begins production this month in St. John’s, Newfoundland.

Kickstart mornings with Sid & Meredith on Breakfast Television, weekdays from 6-10 a.m., for a dynamic mix of news, weather, traffic updates, and entertainment, alongside the rest of the BT family – Devo Brown, Tammie Sutherland, Stephanie Henry, and Frank Ferragine. Starting this September, Citytv debuts an all-new national hour of BT from 10-11 a.m. serving up an extra slice of lifestyle entertainment with beloved Canadian media personalities Cheryl Hickey and Tracy Moore. BT with Tracy and Cheryl will feature in-depth conversations that will make you feel seen, life hacks, and tons of fun giveaways, plus fashion, décor, and food content delivered by Canadian influencers you know and love.

Available to stream across Rogers Ignite TV, Amazon Prime Video, and online at CityNews.ca, CityNews 24/7 in Ontario and BC provides in-depth coverage of breaking news stories, and live events, plus exclusive interviews and in-depth insights. Beginning this July, CityNews 24/7 will expand to serve Alberta, building on the company’s commitment to offer Canadians timely local news.  

OMNI Television’s hit satirical sketch comedy series ABROAD has been renewed for a fourth season, in partnership with Longhope Media Inc. Co-created by and starring Filipina comedian Isabel Kanaan, ABROAD Season 4 will feature six all-new 30-minute episodes in English and Tagalog, airing on OMNI Television in Spring 2025. Loosely based on Isabel’s experience immigrating to Canada as a teenager, ABROAD presents a humorous look at how immigrants think, perceive, and deal with living in Canada.  

Over the last 10 years, Rogers has invested $6.9 billion in Canadian content, part of its commitment to bring Canadians the best content.  

*Source: Numeris, Total Canada, 2+, National Conventional English TV, M-S 7-11p, AMA(000), Consolidated (Live+7), Broadcast Year to Date (2023-08-29 to 2024-03-17)

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedinmail
Canada's Got Talent, Featured, Hudson & Rex, Law & Order Toronto: Criminal Intent

New and returning Canadian original series to Citytv include Law & Order Toronto: Criminal Intent, Hudson & Rex

2 Comments

From a media release:

CITYTV & OMNI TELEVISION ORIGINAL SERIES (PREMIERING ON SUNDAY, JUNE 11):

Premiering on OMNI Television this Sunday, June 11 are two new original series, including the comedy Our Big Punjabi Family and five-part documentary series Katiba Banat: Sisters in Arms, plus an all-new season of Filipino sketch comedy ABROAD.

Starting at 7:30 p.m. ET is Our Big Punjabi Family, a mixed Punjabi and English-language comedy series about a family therapist Sitara (played by Arshdeep Purba) and her family who are forced to move in with her husband’s traditional Punjabi in-laws after they lose their money in a bad investment. Following Our Big Punjabi Family is a new season of ABROAD. Produced in collaboration with Longhope Media Inc., Season 2 of ABROAD – the hit Filipino sketch comedy series – will premiere with eight, all-new 30-minute episodes in English and Tagalog at 8:30 p.m. ET. Co-created by and starring Filipina comedian Isabel Kanaan (Second Jen, Air Farce NYE, This Hour Has 22 Minutes), ABROAD is a Canadian Screen Award-nominated series based on the immigrant experience in Canada. Then, at 9:30 p.m. ET, the premiere of Adhel Arop’s Katiba Banat: Sisters in Arms – a five-part docuseries that uncovers the previously hidden stories of Canadian women who helped to liberate South Sudan.

As announced on Monday, Citytv has greenlit the all-new, one-hour crime drama Law & Order Toronto: Criminal Intent, an adaptation of the legendary Law & Order brand, slated to air on Citytv in Spring 2024.

And, as announced earlier this year, Citytv has greenlit an all-new season of Canada’s Got Talent – Citytv’s most-viewed original series in over a decade – in partnership with McGillivray Entertainment Media Inc., Fremantle, and SYCO Entertainment. New for next season, the winner of Canada’s Got Talent Season 3 will receive $1,000,000 – the biggest cash prize in Canadian television history – courtesy of Rogers. That’s not all! CIBC is awarding each of the six Golden Buzzer recipients next season with $25,000 each, totalling $150,000, to help realize their ambitions. Plus, CIBC will provide the Season 3 winner with financial advice. Applications are open now on Citytv.com.

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedinmail
Hudson & Rex

Citytv announces winter prime-time schedule, beginning January 1

From a media release:

Citytv is the gift that keeps on giving long after Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest on Saturday, Dec. 31, with a roster of new and returning hit series on its winter schedule, plus star-studded live events on Citytv, Citytv.com, and Citytv+.

Beginning Tuesday, Jan. 17 is Citytv’s newest addition to its strong original programming slate Wong & Winchester, produced in partnership with Pixcom. Wong & Winchester is a female-driven buddy detective procedural which follows Marissa Wong (played by Grace Lynn Kung), a bitter ex-cop turned private investigator, and Sarah Winchester (played by Sofia Banzhaf), a former career student with ambitious naivety, who form an unlikely partnership. Earlier in the evening, Hudson & Rex’s paw-fect cop-and-canine duo return with new episodes in its new timeslot, Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET/PT. Plus, Canada’s Got Talent, Citytv’s most-viewed original series in over a decade, returns with an all-new season this March.

2022 WINTER PREMIERE DATES

All dates are subject to change. All times ET. (s) = simulcast

Tuesday, Jan. 17
8 p.m. Hudson & Rex New Episodes – Citytv Original
9 p.m. Wong & Winchester NEW – Citytv Original

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedinmail
Featured, Hudson & Rex

Hudson & Rex’s Mary Pedersen talks directing and filming two Season 4 finale endings

4 Comments

Last month, we got the scoop on Season 5 of Hudson & Rex from Mary Pedersen. The writer and co-executive producer (top left in the image above)—who has done stints on Murdoch Mysteries and Frankie Drake Mysteries—added director to her resumé when she went behind the camera on Sunday’s newest episode.

“The Good Shepherd,” airing Sunday at 8 p.m. Eastern on Citytv, finds Charlie enlisting the help of an unorthodox ally when Rex is accused of attacking a decorated former police officer. With a guest turn by Shaun Majumder, we spoke to Mary Pedersen about her transition to directing. And, she gives us a major behind-the-scenes peek at the decision to put Charlie and Sarah together.

Was directing an episode of Hudson & Rex something you’ve been interested in doing? And did you end up shadowing some directors over the past few seasons to get ready?
Mary Pedersen: I had shadowed [showrunner] Pete [Mitchell]. I don’t remember if it was my last season on Murdoch or the second to last, but I did shadow him on one of the last blocks when he was directing. Pete’s always been such a mentor and a role model to me as a showrunner and I could see how being a director informs his show running. I think it helps him really marry the creative and the practical. We always have to think about both things in film and he’s got a great eye for, ‘What are we going to see of this? What’s going to be on screen and what’s going to be entertaining?’ And I love his directing.

I knew that, as I’m aiming towards trying to show run one day, that I wanted to direct and learn more about making TV from that perspective, so I’d asked. They were generous enough to take a shot at me. I’d never directed anything before, so I’m very grateful for the opportunity for sure.

What was the hardest part of directing?
MP: The hardest thing was the waiting. We started making plans in January or February for who was going to direct the season. I found out then and started prepping, I think, in July. I was very nervous, but also really what a great creative challenge, to have to do something that I haven’t done before and to look at the show in a whole new way.

When you get into the process of prepping for a season, that’s also very familiar because the writer’s going to prep meetings and we’re familiar with that whole process from start to finish. It was just sitting in a different chair during prep.

One of the great things is that having been on the show for a season and a half, I have so much trust in our cast and crew and people would say to me, ‘You’re not going to be able to mess it up.’ I have so much confidence in our director of photography, Ian Vatcher, who has been on the show from the start, and the first AD that I was working with, George Jeffery, so I felt like I had a good safety net and the nerves basically, for the most part, dissipated after Day 1.

MaryPedersen, second from right, on the set of Hudson & Rex

Writing for the page, you have got the picture in your head. When you’re directing, the pictures are evolving in front of you. Did you find that to be a huge, huge difference?
MP: No. I say no because the first script I wrote 20 years ago, I was faced with that shock of the difference between what you imagine when you’re writing it and what it is when they shoot it and that’s been happening to me over and over since then. It’s never what you think it was, but very often it’s better.

Shaun Majumder guests in this episode. What it was working with him?
MP: I mean he is so lovely and he’s so funny and he’s so thorough. He’s got a speech in the episode and he adjusted it to make it more Newfoundland which I really appreciated. I feel like I lucked out so much with him and, really, with all the cast because they are all so professional, so prepared and so delightful.

Unlike Murdoch Mysteries, where William and Julia’s relationship was dragged out, you didn’t really wait with Charlie and Sarah. They are together. Were you happy with that decision? You can either answer that as a writer and executive producer or as a television fan.
MP: We actually shot two endings for last season. And then it was decided a bit later [which ending to use]. That was because of that exact question, ‘Are you going to want to draw the will they, won’t they out for longer?’

I love a will they, won’t they. I will stick with the show forever for that. I love it, but I also love Sarah and Charlie together. We thought, ‘We can do it.’ They have such great chemistry and I felt like that’s really a challenge for the writers to keep it interesting. What’s it going to be like while they’re together? I’m hoping that we’ve done that.

Hudson & Rex airs Sundays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on Citytv.

Images courtesy of Shaftesbury.

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedinmail
Hudson & Rex

Links: Hudson & Rex, Season 5

2 Comments

From Kaitkynn Nordal of Saltwire:

Link: New face coming to season five of Hudson & Rex: Crime-fighting cops will see new forensic pathologist added to the team
Audiences will have a new friendship to watch unfold this fall in Hudson & Rex’s Sarah Truong and the team’s newest member, Karma Poole. Continue reading.

From Steve Gidlow of MediaVillage:

Link: “Hudson & Rex” Star Kevin Hanchard Has Nothing But Praise for His Canine Co-Star
“Sometimes you get these great pilots and quirky, interesting, fantastic shows that never end up going anywhere. You go, ‘This is really cool, I hope this goes somewhere’ and cross your fingers. Hudson & Rex was one of those quirky, interesting shows.” Continue reading.

From Mike Moore of CBC:

Link: Woof! St. John’s shuts down illegal hair salon … that turns out to be a Hudson & Rex set
A television show about a dog detective recently managed to fool a St. John’s neighbourhood — and even a city inspector. Continue reading.

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedinmail