Everything about Industry News, eh?

RTR Media rolls on HGTV’s Open House Overhaul

RTR_media_logo

From a media release:

RTR Media is excited to announce the start of production on the new HGTV Canada series OPEN HOUSE OVERHAUL with designer/writer Samantha Pynn (Pure Design, Summer Home).

In Open House Overhaul, Sam and her crew overhaul houses on the real estate market in order to sell them fast and make top dollar. Production on the new 14×30’ series has started in Toronto and will premiere on HGTV Canada this spring. The program will be distributed by Distribution360, making it their first RTR Media property to represent after the recently announced first-look deal.

Samantha Pynn is a writer, decorator, stylist and TV host.  She’s the Contributing Design Editor for Chatelaine magazine and a columnist for the National Post.  Samantha Pynn’s first series with RTR Media was the HGTV Canada hit Summer Home.

Open House Overhaul is produced by RTR Media in association with Shaw Media, HGTV and with the assistance of the Canadian Film or Video Production Tax Credit and the Ontario Film and Television Tax Credit Program.

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CanCon 101

When the Canadian Screen Awards are announced each year (and before that the Geminis), there are always some people who wonder why their favourite Canadian show wasn’t nominated. Sometimes, well, it just didn’t make the cut, but some of those shows aren’t actually Canadian.   So here’s a primer on what makes a show Canadian both for funding and CRTC regulation and for the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television (not actually completely the same thing).

Government-related or CRTC-mandated funding (e.g. Canada Media Fund, Independent Production Fund) and provincial or federal tax credits all rely on the Canadian Audio-Visual Certification Office (“CAVCO”) to determine eligibility. CAVCO has a set of rules that can be summed up generally as Canadian-owned, Canadian-controlled, 75% of the budget spent on Canadians and a minimum of 6 out of 10 key crew. Those key crew are director, writer (one of them must be Canadian), top two lead actors (one has to be Canadian), composer, editor and production designer. Director and writer are 2 points each so it adds up to 10 points.

[To complicate matters a little bit more, the CRTC has its own certification process for programs that will qualify as Canadian for CRTC-purposes when broadcast. All CAVCO programs are Canadian for the CRTC but not all CRTC-certified programs are necessarily Canadian for CAVCO. Trust me – you don’t want me to go there.]

However, different funds have additional rules so a show could be minimally Canadian but not qualify for funding. For example, among other additional rules, the Independent Production Fund requires 8 out of 10 points and the Canada Media Fund requires 10 out of 10 points. These additional rules are to ensure that Canadian taxpayers and cable subscribers are funding truly Canadian shows.

People get confused when they see shows like “Supernatural” and the “Arrow” and they know that they’re shot in Canada so think they are Canadian. What about “Beauty and the Beast” and “Haven”? There is a difference between the two types of shows. “Supernatural” and “Arrow” are American-owned and controlled and hire very few Canadians in key creative positions. They are known as ‘service’ productions because often a Canadian production company is hired to provide the service of producing the show for the American studio.

“Beauty and the Beast” and “Haven” however fall in a middle ground often called Industrial Canadian. They are owned by Canadian production companies and qualify as minimum Canadian productions. They can earn the Canadian production tax credit and count as Canadian for a broadcaster but are not eligible for CMF or other such funds.  While both kinds of shows hire a lot of Canadians in crew positions and often in smaller performing roles, generally only the Industrial Canadian show will hire Canadians in any of the key creative roles.

In the past the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television only required that a television show qualify as minimally Canadian under CAVCO or the CRTC in order to be eligible for consideration for awards. However, the result was that minority co-productions with minimal Canadian involvement, such as “The Borgias” and “The Tudors”, were being held up as examples of the best of Canadian television. Frequently that involvement would be post-production and a few actors and possibly a director.  While the treaty co-production system is based on Canada equally being the minority partner as it is the majority partner and both kinds of programs qualifying as Canadian, some people did not think it was right that a minority co-production should compete in the best program categories and lobbied the Academy to change the rules.

So now these international co-productions can only compete in the “Best Drama” or “Best Mini-Series” categories if at least 50% of the episodes were both written and directed by Canadians. If a minority co-production has less than 50% of its episodes both written and directed by Canadians then it is eligible under Best International Drama. Any Canadian who has worked on the International drama will still be eligible in their craft category.   That explains why “The Great Martian War” and “The Vikings” are competing for Best International Drama and not Best Drama or Best Mini-Series but crew from “The Vikings” are nominated for Best Director, Best Sound and Best Visual Effects and “The Great Martian War” has a Best Production Design nomination.

So that’s why service productions like “Supernatural” are never nominated for Canadian Screen Awards (they aren’t Canadian) and why “The Vikings” is Canadian but is sitting in the International Drama category.

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Lone Eagle and Just for Laughs team for comedy projects

Lone_Eagle

From a media release:

Lone Eagle Entertainment and Just for Laughs are pleased to announce a new creative partnership to co-develop and produce comedic non-scripted programming.

The two companies will leverage their collective experience in working with comedic talent, concepts and contacts in the network landscape to bring forward a number of high concept projects in the coming months for the North American television market.

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You Can’t Always Get What You Want

I’m talking OTT and SVOD in Canada here so I’m not going to finish the quote.  I played around with Shomi during the free 30 day trial that I was entitled to as a Rogers subscriber. Then Bell Media was nice enough to give me a 30 day guest pass to the mobile version of CraveTV (since I’m not a Bell subscriber that’s all I could get). So I’ve played around a little, to the extent possible.

Here’s my problem. What I would really like to have is impossible either because of outdated business models, Canadian broadcast regulation or a lack of Canadian OTT regulation. I’m stuck.

I would like to have a service that flows seamlessly between my television and my iPad (my kid would also like it to work on her shiny new Nexus phone) so that I could switch platforms in mid-episode or at least keep track of which episode I’m on in mid-binge. This is possible with Netflix but not possible with Shomi and CraveTV because their OTT platforms (the tablet, web and phone platforms) and SVOD (Subscription VOD on your TV) are licensed separately (OTT being exempt from regulation and SVOD being fully regulated).

I would like a Canadian service that supports Canadian programming on all of its platforms. Shomi and CraveTV have to make a contribution to Canadian programming and provide a quota on their SVOD platforms according to VOD regulation, but have no such obligation for their OTT platforms. Netflix has no requirement at all.

I would like to watch the Golden Globes and know that I have access to the cool new shows like “Transparent” (Shomi quickly announced during the awards that they will be carrying it, it is on OTT service Amazon Studios in the U.S.) and “House of Cards” (on Netflix) without having to pay separate OTT subscriptions for each one. Exclusivity is a model that only frustrates the consumer in the Internet world.

I would like to be able to be a Rogers cable, internet and wireless subscriber (well, maybe not but I am anyway) and subscribe to CraveTV. CraveTV is only available to Bell, Telus and a few smaller BDUs and is unlikely to be available to subscribers of their competition. While Shomi and CraveTV are very similar in how they work, and both have lovely interfaces on the mobile platforms (though both were buggy on their web platforms), I would like to have the option to subscribe to CraveTV if I want to and not be locked in to Shomi because of my cable provider.

So, as a Canadian and a lover of television, CRTC regulation and the BDU business models are not working for me right now.

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Cineflix Rights acquires Yap Films’ Battle Factory

media_cineflix_logo

From a media release:

Cineflix Rights, one of the UK’s leading independent television distributors, has acquired new content from Canadian producer Yap Films and South African producer Hive Content, as it heads to the Realscreen Summit 2015 looking to make more acquisition deals with producers.

Cineflix Rights has added to its growing “Factory” franchise with Battle Factory (14×30’, Yap Films). The series takes viewers into the hidden world of military and frontline gear factories all over the world and reveals how they are manufactured.

Battle Factory will sit alongside the highly successful brands Food Factory , Food Factory USA , and latest title Home Factory in the Cineflix Rights’ catalogue.

Food, Booze & Tattoos (13×30’, Hive Content) follows Brett Rogers as he travels across South Africa to track down the most mouth-watering food establishments, the coolest microbreweries, and the edgiest tattoo parlours; as well as showcasing South Africa’s unique and diverse contemporary cultures.

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