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Cardinal, Featured

Cardinal: Billy Campbell and Karine Vanasse preview CTV’s Blackfly Season

Forget about catching a murderer. The real killers during the filming of Season 2 of Cardinal were the insects. As the title suggests, Cardinal: Blackfly Season—returning  Thursday at 9 p.m. ET/PT on CTV—was filmed during the spring in North Bay, Ont., and boasted a horrific number of flying things that chomped on stars Billy Campbell, Karine Vanasse, and the rest of the cast and crew.

“Mosquitoes were first,” Campbell said during a break in filming last summer. “Then we had the blackflies, then the shadflies, horse flies, deer flies … a hands-worth of horrifying things. The thing about blackflies is that they have an anaesthetic they put into you first, so you don’t feel them biting and you only find out later when you get home and take off your shirt and it starts itching. And it itches for days.”

With Sarah Dodd (Motive) showrunning Blackfly Season, the Cardinal franchise once again embraces Giles Blunt’s book series to tell its twisted tale. Where Season 1 set the table for viewers by introducing Det. John Cardinal (Campbell) and Det. Lise Delorme (Vanasse) and the world they inhabit, Season 2 offers plenty for viewers to feast on. The Nordic noir theme returns with the star addition to the cast once again Northern Ontario, ruggedly beautiful and buggy as all hell. It’s against that backdrop we’re introduced to Red (Alex Paxton-Beesley) a young woman who stumbles out of the forest bug-bitten and suffering from amnesia on Thursday. Who she is and what crime she witnessed is the focus of Season 2’s six episodes.

Karine Vanasse as Lise Delorme

Along for the drama are returning characters in Det. Jerry Commanda (Glen Gould), Catherine Cardinal (Deborah Hay), Staff Sergeant Noelle Dyson (Kristen Thomson), Cpl. Malcolm Musgrave (David Richmond Peck) and Kelly Cardinal (Alanna Bale). New faces in the fictional Algonquin Bay include Ray Northwind (Bruce Ramsay), Kevin Tait (Jonathan Keltz), Det. Alan Clegg (Kevin Hanchard), Scott Lasalle (Kris Holden-Ried) and Leon Rutkowsky (Dan Petronijevic).

We spoke to Campbell and Vanasse, who gave us some Season 2 scoop.

Aubrey Nealon was the showrunner in Season 1 of Cardinal. This season it’s Sarah Dodd. What’s it been like working with her?
Billy Campbell: I’d never had the pleasure of working with Sarah before and I have now. It was as smooth a transition as you can imagine. It was different people involved but the same quality of everything. Aubrey, as you know, did the whole first season himself and it nearly broke him. [Laughs.] Sarah had a few people with her and I think it was a much easier thing all the way around for that reason.

The book this season is based on is called Blackfly season and you filmed during blackfly season. What were the bugs like?
BC: Horrifying. Horrifying. Mosquitoes were first, then we had the blackflies, then the shadflies, horse flies, deer flies … a hands-worth of horrifying things. The thing about blackflies is that they have an anaesthetic they put into you first, so you don’t feel them biting and you only find out later when you get home and take off your shirt and it starts itching. And it itches for days. I slathered myself with mosquito repellant, the DEET-free stuff, and it worked like a charm until I got home and realized they’d gotten under my shirt and had burrowed into my hair and eaten into my scalp. I saw a horse fly down by the river during one day of shooting out of the corner of my eye and I thought it was a hummingbird. I looked and it was a fricking horse fly.

Karine Vanasse: The bugs are really present. I was just really glad I wasn’t bitten around my eyes. There was one scene where they had to film me from one side of my face because the other side was all swollen. The seasons are so well-explored in the books—the beauty of the area and the atmosphere is very heavy—it’s perfect for the heaviness of the story; the weight that Cardinal is carrying compared and contrasting with how lush the landscape is.

Alex Paxton-Beesley as “Red”

Where are we at when we catch up with John Cardinal?
BC: To me, the spine of the show is what’s happening with Cardinal and Delorme. And then, of course, there are the things to support that. The crime itself is almost incidental. It’s almost symbolic of the tortured inner life in a way. Where Cardinal is when we start the second season is, what I’ve figured out, is he really wants to quit. The first time we see him this season he’s lounging in the back of a motorboat on a lake with Catherine and he takes her to see a little cabin on the lake and says, ‘I can fix it up and I can quit.’ She says, ‘Pfft, you’re never going to quit.’ He really wants to be done and, at the same time, he’s afraid of being done because he has a wife who is sick and isn’t sure what he would do if he wasn’t doing this. As far as he and Delorme are concerned, they already feel a certain way about each other.

As far as he and Delorme are concerned, they already feel a certain way about each other. For me, it’s there, it’s just that he can’t even admit it to himself. There is an intimacy between them and I’m convinced a respect for each other as detectives. There is that running under the surface and the things that happen in the second season … Sarah and the gang did a wonderful job of interweaving what will happen in the third season into Season 2.

In Season 1, Lise had a boyfriend in Josh, who was not a character in the books. What about in Season 2? No Josh, right?
KV: Oh no. We see that she’s not really sad about that. What we get from the books is that Lisa really doesn’t have much of a social life. And, by having a boyfriend and then having him leave is just a confirmation that she doesn’t have much of a social life.

What’s her journey in Season 2?
KV: She shared a secret with Cardinal in Season 1 and he didn’t want to talk about it. So, where do you go from there? She still has that feeling he’s keeping something from her and she’s confused about how she’s feeling at her job and working with him. This season we see what it means for Lise to be affected by a case when it hits home. Not because you’re closely related to that person but because you care. That’s new to her.

Cardinal airs Thursdays at 9 p.m. ET/PT on CTV.

Images courtesy of Bell Media.

 

 

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Cardinal

Cardinal returns for Season 2 beginning Jan. 4 on CTV; plus photo gallery

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From a media release:

CTV officially announced today that CARDINAL, the international success and #1 new Canadian drama series of the 2016/17 broadcast season, returns for a gripping Season 2 on January 4. Strategically scheduled in a Thursday night timeslot immediately following the two biggest shows on television, THE BIG BANG THEORY (8 p.m.) and YOUNG SHELDON (8:30 p.m.), the critically acclaimed series airs Thursdays at 9 p.m. ET/PT on CTV and CTV GO, following a CraveTVTM FIRST LOOK streaming beginning Wednesdays at 9 p.m. ET. CARDINAL is also set to premiere on Super Écran day-and-date with CTV.

Viewers can catch up on Season 1 now on CraveTVTM and in a six-part television event beginning Monday, Dec. 25 at 10 p.m. ET/PT on CTV Two and CTV.ca. Click HERE for the Season 2 trailer.

Directed by Jeff Renfroe (ROGUE), Season 2 of the Directors Guild of Canada(DGC) award-winning series stars Golden Globe®-nominee Billy Campbell (THE KILLING) as John Cardinal and the multiple Genie Award-winning actress Karine Vanasse (REVENGE) as Detective Lise Delorme, as they weave through an intricate investigation that exposes the seedy underbelly of picturesque Algonquin Bay.

Cycle 1 of CARDINAL garnered a worldwide audience after Entertainment One (eOne) successfully licensed the series internationally to more than 100 territories, with additional sales still pending. For eOne, the series has been a hit with international audiences, debuting to critical acclaim and strong ratings. International sales include: Hulu in the U.S., BBC Four  in the UK, and Canal Plus in France, Telekom in Germany, Calle 13 in Spain, C More in Scandinavia (Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway), and SBS in Australia, to name a few.

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CARDINAL picks up several months after the events of Season 1. It’s early summer in Algonquin Bay and the blackflies aren’t the only ones out for blood. Detectives John Cardinal (Campbell) and Lise Delorme (Vanasse) find themselves with a strange case on their hands involving a young woman with a gunshot wound to the head. The investigation quickly takes a turn as Cardinal and Delorme uncover a series of disturbing, ritualistic killings that may be connected to their young victim. Cardinal must work to identify the young woman before her attacker strikes again.

Joining Billy Campbell and Karine Vanasse in Season 2 of CARDINAL is an all-star supporting cast that includes Bruce Ramsay (19-2) as Ray Northwind, Alex Paxton-Beesley (PURE) as Red, Jonathan Keltz (REIGN) as Kevin Tait, Kevin Hanchard (ORPHAN BLACK) as Detective Alan Clegg, Kris Holden-Ried (VIKINGS) as Scott Lasalle, and Dan Petronijevic (19-2) as Leon Rutkowsky.

Returning cast members include Deborah Hay (The Anniversary) as Catherine Cardinal, Glen Gould (Rhymes for Young Ghouls) as Det. Jerry Commanda, Kristen Thomson (Away From Her) as Staff Sergeant Noelle Dyson, David Richmond-Peck (ORPHAN BLACK) as Corporal Malcolm Musgrave, and Alanna Bale (PRIME RADICALS) as Kelly Cardinal.

In the premiere episode, entitled “Red” (Thursday, Jan. 4 at 9 p.m. ET/PT on CTV and CTV GO), Detective Jerry Commanda (Glen Gould) finds a confused, red-haired woman alone at a roadside bar with a bullet in her head. Red (Alex Paxton-Beesley) has no memory of who she is, how she got there, or who shot her. Even after the bullet is removed, she can’t remember anything. Commanda turns the case over to Detectives John Cardinal land Lise Delorme, who must protect Red while trying to uncover her identity and shooter.

CARDINAL is produced by Sienna Films and eOne in association with CTV, with the financial participation of the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corporation, the Canada Media Fund, and the Cogeco Program Development Fund; and with the assistance of the Ontario Film and Television Tax Credit and the Canadian Film or Video Production Tax Credit. Super Écran has commissioned the series for French-language Canadian broadcast. eOne distributes the series worldwide.

CARDINAL is adapted from the John Cardinal Mysteries series, a series of six bestselling crime novels written by Giles Blunt. Sarah Dodd (MOTIVE, RANSOM) serves as an Executive Producer and writer for Cycle 2. Jennica Harper (MOTIVE), Alison Bingeman (19-2), and Jeff Renfroe co-executive produce the series, with Renfroe directing all six episodes. The drama is executive produced by Sienna Films duo Julia Sereny and Jennifer Kawaja (COMBAT HOSPITAL). For eOne, Jocelyn Hamilton and Armand Leo serve as Executive Producers.

 

 

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Cardinal

Production Underway on the Third Cycle of CTV and Super Écran’s Hit Serialized Drama CARDINAL

From a media release:

CTV and Super Écran, alongside producers Sienna Films and Entertainment One (eOne), announced today that production is underway on the third cycle of hit original drama CARDINAL, starring Golden Globe® nominee Billy Campbell (THE KILLING) and the multiple Genie Award-winning actress Karine Vanasse (REVENGE). Inspired by By the Time You Read This and Crime Machine, the fourth and fifth novels in the John Cardinal Mysteries series written by Ontario native and award-winning author Giles Blunt, the third season of the networks’ serialized drama is shooting six, hour-long episodes in North Bay, Ont. and Toronto.

The first season of CARDINAL was the #1 new Canadian drama of the 2016/17 broadcast season, averaging 1.1 million total viewers weekly, and received an unprecedented two-cycle renewal. eOne has successfully licensed the series internationally with the first season of CARDINAL having aired in U.S., U.K., France, Spain, and Scandinavia, among other territories. The second season of CARDINAL recently wrapped production and is slated to premiere as part of CTV and Super Écran’s 2017/18 season.

In the third season, entitled CARDINAL: BY THE TIME YOU READ THIS, the autumn season starts to shroud Algonquin Bay, but the glorious fall colours can’t hide the town’s most gruesome double murder for long. As Cardinal and Delorme’s detective work brings them precariously close to a doomsday cult with nothing to lose, Cardinal launches his own investigation into a case far more personal and dangerous.

Joining Billy Campbell and Karine Vanasse in CARDINAL: BY THE TIME YOU READ THIS is an all-star supporting cast that includes Rya Kihlstedt (RAY DONOVAN), as Sharlene ‘Mama’ Winston; Aaron Ashmore (KILLJOYS) as Randall Wishart; Alex Ozerov (THE AMERICANS) as Jack; Sophia Lauchlin Hirt (THE ROMEO SECTION) as Nikki; Canadian Screen Award winner Nick Serino (Sleeping Giant) as Lemur; Tom Jackson (NORTH OF 60) as Lloyd Kreeger; Jennifer Podemski (BLACKSTONE) as Wendy Doucette; Susan Coyne (SLINGS AND ARROWS) as Susan Bell; and Devery Jacobs (THIS LIFE) as Sam Doucette.

Returning cast members include Deborah Hay (The Anniversary) as Catherine Cardinal; Glen Gould (Rhymes for Young Ghouls) as Det. Jerry Commanda; Kristen Thomson (Away From Her) as Staff Sergeant Noelle Dyson; Stephen Ouimette as Dr. Frederick Bell; and Alanna Bale (PRIME RADICALS) as Kelly Cardinal.

CARDINAL is produced by Sienna Films and eOne in association with CTV, with the financial participation of the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corporation, the Canada Media Fund, and the Cogeco Program Development Fund; and with the assistance of the Ontario Film and Television Tax Credit and the Canadian Film or Video Production Tax Credit. Super Écran has commissioned the series for French-language Canadian broadcast. eOne distributes the series worldwide.

CARDINAL is adapted from the John Cardinal Mysteries series, a series of six bestselling crime novels written by Giles Blunt. Cycle 3 of CARDINAL is written by Patrick Tarr (SAVING HOPE), who also serves as an Executive Producer and Head Writer, with co-executive producer Noelle Carbone (SAVING HOPE, ROOKIE BLUE) and story editors Shannon Masters and Aaron Bala. Executive Producer Daniel Grou aka Podz (19-2) returns to direct all six episodes. The drama is executive produced by Sienna Films duo Julia Sereny and Jennifer Kawaja (RANSOM, COMBAT HOSPITAL). For eOne, Jocelyn Hamilton and Tecca Crosby serve as Executive Producers.

 

 

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Cardinal

Production underway on second cycle of Cardinal for CTV and Super Ecran

From a media release:

CTV and Super Écran, alongside producers Sienna Films and Entertainment One (eOne), announced today that production is underway on the second cycle of CARDINAL, the #1 new Canadian series of the year starring Golden Globe® nominee Billy Campbell (THE KILLING) and the multiple Genie Award-winning actress Karine Vanasse (REVENGE). Inspired by Black Fly Season, the third novel in the John Cardinal Mysteries series written by Ontario native and award-winning author Giles Blunt, the second cycle of the networks’ serialized drama is shooting six, hour-long episodes in North Bay, Ont. and Toronto before premiering as part of CTV and Super Écran’s 2017/18 season.

Cycle 1 of CARDINAL was the most-watched new Canadian series and ranked among the Top 10 new series overall that launched on Canadian television in the 2016/17 season, averaging 1.1 million viewers weekly. Following the success of the first season, the series received an unprecedented two-season renewal.

eOne has successfully licensed the series internationally with the first season of CARDINAL having aired on CANAL+ in France, Calle 13 in Spain, and C More in Scandinavia, where it became the network’s biggest foreign drama series. Cycle 1 of CARDINAL will premiere June 3 on BBC in the U.K. and June 16 on Hulu in the U.S.

CARDINAL picks up several months after the events of Cycle 1. It’s early summer in Algonquin Bay and the blackflies aren’t the only ones out for blood. Detectives John Cardinal (Campbell) and Lise Delorme (Vanasse) find themselves with a strange case on their hands involving a young woman with a gunshot wound to the head. The investigation quickly takes a turn as Cardinal and Delorme uncover a series of disturbing, ritualistic killings that may be connected to their young victim. Cardinal must work to identify the young woman before her attacker strikes again.

Joining Billy Campbell and Karine Vanasse in Cycle 2 of CARDINAL is an all-star supporting cast that includes Bruce Ramsay (19-2) as Ray Northwind, Alex Paxton-Beesley (PURE) as Red, Jonathan Keltz (REIGN) as Kevin Tait, Kevin Hanchard (ORPHAN BLACK) as Detective Alan Clegg, and Kris Holden-Ried (VIKINGS) as Scott Lasalle. Returning cast members include Deborah Hay (The Anniversary) as Catherine Cardinal, Glen Gould (Rhymes for Young Ghouls) as Det. Jerry Commanda, Kristen Thomson (Away From Her) as Staff Sergeant Noelle Dyson, David Richmond Peck (ORPHAN BLACK) as Corporal Malcolm Musgrave, and Alanna Bale (PRIME RADICALS) as Kelly Cardinal.

CARDINAL is produced by Sienna Films and eOne in association with CTV, with the financial participation of the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corporation, the Canada Media Fund, and the Cogeco Program Development Fund; and with the assistance of the Ontario Film and Television Tax Credit and the Canadian Film or Video Production Tax Credit. Super Écran has commissioned the series for French-language Canadian broadcast. eOne distributes the series worldwide.

CARDINAL is adapted from the John Cardinal Mysteries series, a series of six bestselling crime novels written by Giles Blunt. Cycle 2 of CARDINAL is written by Sarah Dodd (MOTIVE, RANSOM), who also serves as an Executive Producer; and co-executive producers Jennica Harper (MOTIVE) and Alison Bingeman (19-2). Co-Executive Producer Jeff Renfroe (ROGUE) directs all six episodes. The drama is executive produced by Sienna Films duo Julia Sereny and Jennifer Kawaja (COMBAT HOSPITAL). For eOne, Jocelyn Hamilton and Tecca Crosby serve as Executive Producers.

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Cardinal, Featured

Cardinal lands in “Catherine’s” arms

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If you thought last week’s episode was hectic, the season finale of Cardinal includes just as much important detail. I will do my best to try and cover it all.

Tonight’s episode—written by Aubrey Nealon and directed by Daniel Grou—opens in the aftermath of Eric’s (Brendan Fletcher) death from last week. With any lead as to Keith’s (Robert Naylor) whereabouts dying with Eric, Keith’s family is preparing for the worst possible news: that he is dead and Cardinal (Billy Campbell) is undergoing an internal department debriefing since their assailant died in police pursuit.

Meanwhile, Delorme (Karine Vanasse) is busy tracing the ties between Tammy Lindstrom’s (Fiona Highet) frequent stays at the motel and Cardinal, and the paperwork reveals the connection. Lise tearfully puts John on notice: she is filing her report listing Cardinal as allegedly guilty of corruption in connection with the botched Corbett case from four years ago. Cardinal denies nothing, stating: “You do what you have to do,” but asks she hold off so that he may first speak with Dorothy Pine (Gail Maurice). Delorme agrees to wait until that afternoon, but still something does not add up. Lise meets with Tammy to get her end of the story and Tammy lets slip that she knows about Cardinal’s wife, Catherine (Deborah Hay). Now why would a cop discuss his wife whilst acting undercover?

Back at Gran’s house, Gran (Amanda Smith) is watching the local news where she learns of Eric’s involvement in the local murders. As there is no love lost between Edie (Allie MacDonald) and Gran, Edie takes care of that loose end.

Cardinal himself is also troubled by a loose end … the last remaining piece of the puzzle: the meds. John stops in to visit with Sergeant Dyson (Kristen Thomson) and spots the inventory list from Eric’s van. Included is an empty shopping bag from a local pharmacy. Curious, Cardinal heads to the mall and drops in at Southridge Pharmacy, inquiring if any pharmaceuticals have gone missing. He instructs the pharmacist (Jeff Clark) to recount the triazolam, and sure enough five tablets are missing. The pharmacist names his employee Edie Soames as the culprit.

Edie, it seems, cannot catch a break. She discovers Keith is missing from the trunk of her car. This precipitates a visit to Cardinal’s home. However that goes wrong too. Instead of Cardinal, she is received by Kelly (Alana Bale). Feigning depression, Edie talks her way into Cardinal’s home and then holds Kelly her prisoner until Cardinal arrives.

Cardinal, armed with probable cause, searches Gran’s house. He locates Gran’s body and calls in to headquarters for a full investigative team. Exiting the property, he hears a clanging from the garage and investigates to find KEITH! Keith is still alive and Cardinal rushes him to the hospital.

This leaves one major loose end in the Wendigo Island case: Edie Soames. Dyson orders Cardinal home, where he finds Edie holding his daughter at gunpoint. His own service revolver in the custody of the department, he must somehow save his daughter. Edie shoots Cardinal twice and threatens to take Kelly in retaliation for losing Eric. But Delorme, needing to speak to Cardinal once more before filing her report, shows up in time to take Edie out.

We cut to the hospital room where Cardinal is recovering and Delorme questions him about Catherine’s involvement with the Corbett case. Turns out, Catherine, suffering a psychotic event, attempted to contact her husband, but inadvertently tipped off Corbett’s man and blew Cardinal’s cover. Cardinal has been taking the fall ever since to protect his wife. When confronted with the truth, John admits his guilt for not being there for his wife when she needed him. Delorme then reports to Musgrave (David Richmond-Peck) and clears Cardinal’s name. Both cases are closed with neat little bows.

The final loose end? Josh “Mr. Geology” (Alden Adair) and Lise. Josh made one more attempt to resuscitate his relationship with Lise, but to no avail. Alas, thank goodness, Lise returns home after the case on Cardinal is closed to find he has moved out.

So that is it folks! Talk about a roller coaster. But, no worries Cardinal fans, we close out this inaugural season with the news that CTV has renewed Cardinal for TWO more seasons! This is fabulous news! Grou has done a magnificent job with this production. Live tweeting last week, I said, “This is not amazing TV ‘for Canada’, this is amazing TV.” I will hold to that. To think that in six episodes Grou and Nealon were able to pull off so many storylines so seamlessly and beautifully filmed is fantastic. The attention to detail, the consistency between takes, and the chemistry between all of the cast members was superb! Particularly the chemistry between Campbell and Vanasse; initially a tenuous partnership, the bond was truly established tonight!  I also have to give a shout out to music composer Todor Kobokov, whose work was so critical for setting the mood for this series! I cannot wait to see what all of you bring in Season 2!

What have you thought of Season 1 of Cardinal? Comment below!

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