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Featured, Masterchef Canada

MasterChef Canada: Michael Bonacini and Claudio Aprile reflect on five seasons and discuss key home cooks

While the contestants change every season of MasterChef Canada, one trio has stayed the same for the past four. Michael Bonacini, Claudio Aprile and Alvin Leung serve not only as judges on CTV’s culinary competition but mentors as well.

They’ve taken that job seriously since Episode 1 of Season 1. Now, with the first episode of Season 5 under our belts, we spoke to Bonacini and Aprile about five seasons on the show, their responsibility as mentors thoughts on two home cooks we’ve got our eyes on.

Congratulations on five seasons on MasterChef Canada. Does it feel like it’s been that long?
Michael Bonacini: It’s been an incredible journey and I’ve loved every part of it. I still find it as exciting today as the first day that I got the phone call that said, ‘You have been chosen to be one of the judges to be on MasterChef Canada.‘ It’s a wonderful feeling and to be five years in is pure magic. The cherry on the cake, so to speak.

Claudio Aprile: Yeah, 100 per cent. Listening to Michael it reminded me of the phone call that I also received. I went into it very cautious and unsure it was what I wanted to do with my career. And then the competitive gene in me kicked in and I went from being unsure to really sure I wanted it when I did the audition. I waited a few weeks and there was no call and when the call finally did come in it was a really exhilarating phone call. What made it very interesting for me is during the audition process, Michael, Alvin and myself spent a lot of time just hanging out off-camera and it was interesting that the three of us got picked. I often thought there was another camera off somewhere just capturing our interaction because the three of us got on. I’m very mindful that this is a rare opportunity and it’s also a time-sensitive opportunity that won’t last forever. When I’m on set with Michael, Alvin, the crew, the writers … we’re really lucky to be part of this family that we’ve made. When I’m on set I’m there and in the moment, in the zone, and it just feels great.

Claudio, this is the first season the three of you hand-delivered the good news to the Top 21 home cooks. What was that experience like?
CA: First of all, you never want to sneak up on a man with a bow and arrow. I’ll never make that mistake again. Don’t ever ambush a large man from the East Coast with a bow and arrow and a bottle of moonshine. He looked at me and grabbed me like a rag doll. Note to self not to do that again. [Laughs.] For many reasons, it was very exciting to actually take MasterChef Canada on the road and deliver this incredible, exciting message to these home cooks. And for me, it really underscored that MasterChef Canada has now become a brand that people recognize. It means something to a lot of people. During my travels, people would stop me on the street and say, ‘I love the show and I love what you’re doing on the show and the Canadian spirit that you really carry so proudly.’

One of the things I have loved about MasterChef Canada is the three of you. You are always so respectful of the contestants even when something doesn’t taste or turn out the way you thought it should. You’re enthusiastic, you coach them along and focus on the positive rather than the negative. How important is it for you to be that way rather than cut the home cooks down?
MB: It is so important to be a mentor on the show. The home cooks have so much respect for each of the three judges. This is something they are putting their lives on hold for, the opportunity to have a life-changing experience for themselves and not in a negative way. Yes, there are dishes that are good and great, and there are dishes that are—to be quite honest—not so great because of bad plating, under seasoning or bad decisions. But all three judges know they have seen that over the years in our own restaurants from our own individual selves and our own employees and it’s part of the course of mentoring, growing and developing people. Long gone are the days when you could scream and shout, throw something at someone and have a tantrum. That’s no way to mentor. It’s about being honest—and I’m not afraid to be brutally honest—it is about communicating clearly and concisely about what I feel is incorrect or could be improved or should have done to the dish to make it better. I think that’s important feedback to a home cook who may or may not have the chance to cook for you again. If that was my son appearing on such a show, I would expect the mentor to act the same way.

CA: When you’re reading someone the culinary law of the land, it serves us in a very poor way if we’re degrading or condescending. It’s not a good look whether it’s a television program or real-life, the optics on that don’t look good. When you can actually control your emotions and speak to someone with dignity and respect it captures people’s attention, both the home cooks and the audience.

I have to give the folks at Proper Television some kudos. Having that twist of eliminating home cooks during their audition dish prep was dramatic. Clearly, the point being driven home is that you can’t get comfortable in this competition.
CA: The word ‘comfort’ is not a word that I would think of when I think about MasterChef Canada. There is nothing comfortable about it. It is uncomfortable, it’s pressurized, it’s unpredictable. That’s for many reasons. The show is about entertaining first. We don’t want them to figure things out. We want it to be exciting and who doesn’t love the element of surprise? The cooks that watch the show think they have us decoded. And I have to say, you thought wrong. We switch it up a lot. Collectively, we have over 100 years of culinary experience. There is nowhere to hide. We will pick things out.

Let’s discuss two home cooks that caught my eye in Episode 1. Beccy is just 19 years old and made a beautiful beef and beetroot dish. What can you say about her?
MB: Beccy is an interesting young home cook. She has very few words to say and she’s fascinating to watch. She is the youngest home cook we’ve ever had on the show and that’s what makes her interesting. She comes from England and is a tile-setters helper. It’s a pretty humble job and she loves to cook at home.

Claudio, can you comment on Reem? A lot has been made of her Muslim background already, but I was wowed by her baba ganoush.
CA: I think Reem is a very, very talented home cook. There is the religious aspect to her story, but I feel she’s going to champion a different cause. She is very strong and a very kind person. But don’t mistake her kindness for weakness. Her food is incredible, like knockout dishes.

MasterChef Canada airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. ET on CTV.

Images courtesy of Bell Media.

 

 

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Corner Gas Animated, Featured

Corner Gas returns with “magic and sorcery” in Animated series

When I first read the news Corner Gas would be returning—this time as an animated version—I scratched my head and asked myself a few questions. Why are they doing this? Didn’t everyone do what they wanted over six seasons of live action? What would make this different?

“I didn’t want to do something for the sake of doing something,” creator, writer, actor and executive producer Brent Butt says of Corner Gas Animated, debuting Monday at 8 p.m. ET/PT on The Comedy Network. “The legacy of it was too important to me. I’m up for a shameless cash grab—don’t get me wrong—but it had to feel right.”

“I honestly thought that the movie was it because Brent is a man of his word and said that was it,” Tara Spencer-Nairn says. “But then I busted Virginia Thompson one day in a Shoppers Drug Mart shortly after the movie came out. I was in line and saw Virginia and she was on her phone saying loudly, ‘I don’t like how the Oscar character looks.’ I was like, ‘Virginia, I’m right here!'”

Thompson, the show’s executive producer alongside Butt and executive producer David Storey, admits the idea for an animated take on the lives of the folks living in small-town Saskatchewan has been in the works for years, but really gained momentum following the success of 2014’s Corner Gas: The Movie. After six seasons on CTV and a final farewell to fans with a feature film, Thompson figured that was it. But an outpouring of support—and demand for more stories from Dog River—caused the trio to recall something they’d kicked around as a joke years ago: an animated series.

“Brent, David and I got together and had lunch and said, ‘What do we want to do?’” Thompson recalls. “The animated concept kept popping up. We’re really excited about this because it really does come from Brent’s imagination and brand of comedy. It’s a different angle to Corner Gas.” Butt’s love of comic books—he and a friend started a publishing company and his first comic, Existing Earth, was nominated for a Golden Eagle Award before he left that for a standup career—and skills as an illustrator (he designed Corner Gas’ station logo) means that the world can expand beyond the limitations of physical television production.

“I think graphically,” Butt says. “I think in cartoon terms. Corner Gas was always written to be a live-action series because it was loosely based on what I imagined my life would be like if I hadn’t pursued stand-up comedy.” During production of the original Corner Gas, some of the ideas he came up with were dismissed as “too cartoonish.” Butt jokes he spent six years de-cartooning Corner Gas; now he can let Dog River and its citizens go wherever he wants with no live action constraints.

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Being unfettered pays off within minutes in Monday’s debut “Bone Dry,” when Brent and Oscar Leroy (Eric Peterson) argue over Brent having forgotten to order more fuel for Corner Gas’ tanks. They’re dry, leading Oscar to surmise the small town will devolve into a world where people fight to the death for gas. Cut to the elder Leroy’s imagination and a riff on The Road Warrior with Oscar, hilariously, as The Humungus. Butt and Peterson are reunited with the rest of the original Corner Gas cast—Gabrielle Miller as Lacey Burrows, Fred Ewanuick as Hank Yarbo, Lorne Cardinal as Davis Quinton, Spencer-Nairn as Karen Pelley, Nancy Robertson as Wanda Dollard—with Corrine Koslo taking over the role of Emma Leroy following the death of Janet Wright.

With half of the cast based in Vancouver and the other half in Toronto, a unique way of capturing their voices for the first season’s 13 episodes was decided on. The technology is good enough that each group could enter a recording studio in their perspective city and do a group read of the scripts.

“We had this lightning in a bottle with these people who were cast to populate this world and interact,” Butt says. “We had that magic chemistry that sometimes happens. That chemistry is a big reason for the success of Corner Gas. Having the actors from each city together means they can react to each other and react over the phone line in Vancouver.”

“We all play off each other,” Spencer-Nairn says. “I feel like if we didn’t do it this way we’d miss a lot of beats. There would be so much comedy lost if we weren’t working together this way and able to react to what the other person is saying live.”

“We could have done it piecemeal,” Butt says. “But there is an intangible chemistry and magic that these people have when they get together and the way they interact is magic and sorcery.”

Corner Gas Animated airs Mondays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on The Comedy Network.

Images courtesy of Bell Media.

 

 

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Industry News

Bell Media buys majority interest in Pinewood Toronto Studios

From a media release:

Bell Media announced today it has entered into an agreement for its Bell Media Studios division to acquire a majority stake in Pinewood Toronto Studios, in partnership with Comweb Studio Holdings, Castlepoint, and the City of Toronto. Pinewood Toronto Studios is one of the largest purpose-built production studios in Canada and the preferred choice for domestic and international producers of film and TV content in Toronto.

As a part of the transaction, Bell Media Studios Inc. will acquire a majority stake in the 33.5 acre (13.5 hectares) facility in Toronto’s Port Lands. The complex includes 11 purpose-built stages, including one of the largest sound stages in North America at 46,000 square foot (4,274 square metres), offices that can house multiple productions at a time, teaching facilities, and a variety of support services for a growing roster of domestic and international film and television clients.

Recent productions filming at Pinewood Toronto Studios include STAR TREK: DISCOVERY, Molly’s Game, Room, Suicide Squad, Spotlight, IT, Downsizing, Crimson Peak, and THE EXPANSE. It has previously been home to Bell Media original productions including ORPHAN BLACK, THE LISTENER, and KILLJOYS,

Nanci MacLean, Vice-President and Head of Bell Media Studios, will oversee operations at Pinewood Toronto Studios.

Pinewood Toronto Studios was represented by Deloitte Corporate Finance Inc. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Quotes:

“The investment that Bell Media is making in Pinewood Toronto Studios and its expansion is significant and is proof of Bell Media’s commitment to our city and of its role as a world-class content creator,” said Toronto Mayor John Tory. “Toronto is home to industry-leading talent in the television and film production industry and as a city we are committed to supporting the growth of that industry at all levels and aspects of that production.”

“Our partnership to purchase Pinewood Toronto Studios reinforces Bell Media’s role as Canada’s leading content creation company,” said Randy Lennox, President, Bell Media. “We’re excited about the synergies that Pinewood Toronto can offer and the role it will play in generating new revenue streams in an open-shop basis.”

“One of the most important things that creative communities need is space where they can take risks, pursue their creative visions, and create outstanding work,” said Alfredo Romano, President, Castlepoint Numa, and Director Pinewood Studios. “We see the enormous positive impact of television and film productions on our city every day and we look forward to continuing our city-building initiatives with Bell Media.”

“The addition of Pinewood Toronto Studios to our portfolio offers us an exciting new advantage in meeting the rising demand for original content across all media platforms,” said Bell Media Studio’s Nanci MacLean. “One of our first actions will be to add a further 170,000 square feet (51,793 square metres) of sound stages and support space, maintaining Pinewood Toronto Studios as a best-in-class film and TV studio.“

“Our Toronto studios are a film and television success story,” said Paul Bronfman, Chairman of Pinewood Toronto Studios. “We look forward to working with Randy and the Bell Media team to produce more high-calibre and innovative programming right here in Toronto and I’m sure that the ongoing sales and marketing support from Pinewood UK will continue to be a significant advantage for our business.”

“We welcome Bell Media to the Port Lands,” said Bill Bryck, a Director of Pinewood Toronto. “We’re looking forward to working with this collaborative partner – a proven international content creator – as they continue supporting our industry here in Toronto.”

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The Detail

Links: The Detail, Season 1

From Bill Brioux of the Canadian Press:

Link: Shenae Grimes-Beech got famous playing teens on 90210 and Degrassi. She’s happy to play a grown-up on The Detail
After launching her career on teen dramas Degrassi: The Next Generation and 90210, Toronto-born Shenae Grimes-Beech embraced the more mature role of Jacqueline Cooper on CTV’s new police series The Detail. Continue reading.

From Michael Pickard of Drama Quarterly:

Link: All in The Detail
The Detail could not be more timely. As the fallout from Hollywood’s sexual harassment scandal continues, alongside the #MeToo and Time’s Up campaigns and the row over gender pay inequality, this Canadian crime series stands apart as a female-led production. Continue reading.

From Bridget Liszewski of The TV Junkies:

Link: Wendy Crewson on the ambitious and supportive nature of the women of The Detail
The television industry has found itself at a tipping point over the last several months. Thanks to movements such as #MeToo and #TimesUp, more and more women are finding their voices and using it to speak up not only for what’s right, but also for what they want to see. Continue reading.

From Bridget Liszewski of The TV Junkies:

Link: Angela Griffin and Shenae Grimes-Beech on why The Detail is more than just “hot cops”
“I fell in love with my character and the storyline that these women are characters and not defined by their gender. Women weren’t the wives or the girlfriends, it was about us, about me and the individual. They are in this male-dominated field and they are kicking ass!” Continue reading.

From Charles Trapunski of Brief Take:

Link: Interview: The Detail’s Shenae Grimes-Beech and Angela Griffin
“Life isn’t perfect and we’re not perfect, so it’s not pretty all the time. I think it’s really exciting to be a female on camera. Just the most tiny details but I think it matters to be in the hair and make-up chair and not feel like we need to walk away and you’re this Glamazon…Who spends so much time in the morning doing that?! Every little thing they’ve managed to humanize these women.” Continue reading.

From Bridget Liszewski of The TV Junkies:

Link: The Detail: Co-showrunner Ley Luins on the exciting challenge of having three female leads
“Right now women are angry and we’re speaking up. There’s a lot that needs to change, a lot of catch up that people need to do and the more we incorporate them into storytelling is how things change. The very nature of this being a homicide show with three strong, female leads means that it’s in the DNA of our show.” Continue reading.

From Peter White of Deadline:

Link: ‘90210’s Shenae Grimes-Beech Hails ‘Badass’ Role On Procedural ‘The Detail’ As eOne Kicks Off Global Sales – Mip TV
“I’ve been on teen dramas my whole life so this was a huge departure for me. I love crime shows and cop dramas as a viewer and it was a character that I could personally relate to. It was fun to be tough and a badass, that comes easier to me than to play the perfect girl next door that I’ve portrayed for so long.” Continue reading.

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Featured, The Detail

The Detail: Angela Griffin and Shenae Grimes-Beech bond over murder cases, messy personal lives in new CTV detective drama

While female cops are, thankfully, commonplace on TV, it’s unusual for a crime series to centre on three female homicide detectives, as does CTV’s new crime drama, The Detail, which premieres Sunday, March 25, at 9 p.m. ET.

“You usually get a single female,” says Angela Griffin, who plays Stevie Hall, an experienced and disciplined homicide detective on Toronto’s Metropolitan Police Force. “You get your sole female lead, and you might get a sidekick, but it’s really rare to have three female leads in a show like this–and it’s great that it isn’t punctuated, it isn’t whacked over your head.”

The show focuses on the professional and personal lives of Stevie, her rough-around-the-edges rookie partner, Detective Jacqueline “Jack” Cooper (Shenae Grimes-Beech), and their tough boss, Staff Inspector Fiona Currie (Wendy Crewson, Saving Hope). The fact that these characters come from three different generations makes it all the more compelling.

“We’re on totally different pages in our journeys in life, and I think that gives people a lot to relate to,” says Grimes-Beech. “That, and the fact that these women truly are supportive of each other in today’s whole movement of female empowerment.”

That kind of support is on display in The Detail‘s debut episode, “Wake Up Call,” as the detectives investigate an apparent suicide the day after Jack learns a shocking revelation about her personal life and publicly acts out. The fallout makes Fiona question whether it’s worth keeping her on the team, otherwise known as “the detail,” but Stevie quickly comes to her partner’s defense, pointing out that, despite her screw-ups, Jack “sees things other people miss.”

According to Grimes-Beech, a Toronto native best known for Degrassi: The Next Generation and 90210, Jack’s penchant for trouble actually helps her on cases. “She definitely is a bit of a rule breaker because she thinks outside of the box,” she explains. “I think if Jack got her shit together, she may not be as good at what she does. But I think it lands her in hot water at work, and it certainly does not play out well in her personal life.”

That makes Stevie the apparent adult in the partnership. “Stevie’s really methodical, she comes from a family of cops,” says Griffin, a British actress with dozens of TV credits, including Coronation Street, Inspector Lewis and Brief Encounters. “There was never really any chance of her doing anything else, she always wanted to be a cop, and she absolutely plays by the rules. I think that’s one of the draws to Jack. There’s a real attraction because she’s so much more raw, she plays so much more on instinct. And Stevie can’t do that.”

However, while Stevie appears to have her professional act together, Griffin says the mother of two is dealing with some very real family problems. “There’s an honesty to Stevie that I think you don’t often get on TV,” she says. “Which is sometimes, when she closes the door on her family to go to work, she breathes a sigh of relief because it’s actually sometimes easier to go and deal with the dead bodies and deal with the murderers than it is to deal with a teenage daughter.”

As the season progresses, things will get messier for Stevie and Jack, as their professional and personal lives intersect in painful ways. An old lover (David Cubitt, Medium) and an old case present problems for Stevie, while the personal trauma Jack encounters in the pilot continues to evolve and fester, eventually threatening a case and straining Stevie and Jack’s partnership.

But, again, it comes down to support. “These women are putting their lives in each other’s hands every single day,” says Griffin. “They have to trust each other. They have to have a really quite incredible bond, and I think that they work at that.”

As for Griffin and Grimes-Beech, The Detail–which is very loosely based on the U.K. series Scott & Bailey–has provided each of them the opportunity to grow as actors.

Grimes-Beech never envisioned herself landing a detective role. “When I was in the audition waiting room, I felt very out of place,” she says. “But once I read the dialogue, I felt I had stepped right into this girl’s shoes.”

Executive producer Ilana Frank (Rookie Blue, Saving Hope) felt the same way and fought for her to play Jack. “Because of my age or whatever, people were a little unsure of giving me the job,” Grimes-Beech says. “But she really had my back the whole way along.”

Meanwhile, Griffin had to polish the North American accent she’s been keeping in her “back pocket” since she–and a wave of other British actors–began regularly participating in the annual pilot season for American and Canadian productions. “You’ve really got to get that accent off if you want to have a chance with a part, so I’ve been doing it for a couple of years,” she says. “And I was fortunate that we had an amazing dialect coach who came onto set and helped me out.”

Still, she was nervous about getting it right. “I’ve got to say, the first couple of weeks of filming, I was probably thinking about how I was talking more than what I was talking about,” she says.

To help, Griffin chose to stay in Stevie’s accent “from the moment I got up in the morning” until the show wrapped each night. She would then suddenly revert back to her British accent–a switch that sometimes startled her co-stars.

“We would forget, and then we would wrap, and she would [speak in a British accent],” Grimes-Beech laughs. “We all totally forgot that she wasn’t from here.”

The Detail airs Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on CTV.

Images courtesy of Bell Media.

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