Tag Archives: Featured

Featured, Masterchef Canada

MasterChef Canada gets cooking with Season 6 on CTV

With the coming of spring (finally), so too was the return of MasterChef Canada (finally). And what a return it was! A jam-packed two hours kicked off Season 6 with, once again, the goal of awarding the top home cook in this fine land and giving them $100,000.

And, in a twist to the audition process, judges Claudio Aprile, Alvin Leung and Michael Bonacini personally sifted through a pile of audition photos to choose the Top 18 finalists to do battle. It’s always interesting to see how the finalists interact with the judges—and each other—this early in the competition. Nerves almost always come into play, as do egos and large personalities. Both can get you eliminated pretty quickly.

Once the hand-delivered messages from the judges were delivered, we had our Top 18.

  • Alyssa LeBlanc, Former Public Servant, from Tusket, N.S.
  • Andre Bhagwandat, Hospital Housekeeper, from Scarborough, Ont.
  • Chanelle Saks, Entrepreneur, from Calgary
  • Cliff McArthur, IT Support Analyst, from Scarborough, Ont.
  • Colin Buckingham, Car Salesman, from St. John’s
  • Cryssi Larocque, Former Airline Agent, from Thunder Bay, Ont.
  • Jamie Mayer, Healthcare Portfolio Manager, from Toronto
  • Jennifer Crawford, Senior Policy Analyst, from Kingston, N.S.
  • Jenny Miller, Stay-at-Home Mom, from Havre Boucher, N.S.
  • Josh Miller, Youth Care Home Manager, from Regina
  • Kimberly Fitzpatrick, Writer, from Ottawa
  • Laurie Dingwall, Retired, from Lac Saguay, Qué.
  • Lena Huynh, Lash Technician, from Burnaby, B.C.
  • Marie Le Bel, Entrepreneur, from Westmount, Qué.
  • Mark Hamilton, Firefighter, from Mission, B.C.
  • Rozin Abbas, Digital Marketer, from Toronto
  • Steven Lapointe, International Figure Skater, from Acton Vale, Qué.
  • Tony La Ferrara, Soccer Coach and Retired Teacher, from Whitby, Ont.

And, as has become the custom, those finalists were tasked with preparing a signature dish in hopes of sticking around and acquiring a white apron. Each group of six—chosen by Michael, Claudio or Alvin—took a turn cooking for the judge who signed their invitation. Alvin’s group went first, with the Demon Chef serving as coach. But, in a twist, the signature dish had to be made with chicken. That threw a wrench in the plans of any home cook expecting to make their special plate. I like the shakeup in gameplay, especially when Alvin took some potshots at Michael’s expense.

Cliff’s chicken and waffles landed him an apron, and Alyssa and Josh joined him. Sadly, the other three home cooks invited by Alvin were sent home.

Up next was Chef Michael’s six, preparing something with beef as the focus. Unfortunately, Tony nicked himself during prep and was sidelined for several moments, putting his future in jeopardy. He still finished it and received an apron. Marie was the lone home cook from Michael’s team who was not handed an apron.

Finally, Chef Claudio’s six home cooks took to the floor and prepared shrimp dishes. The standouts were Jennifer’s tart, Rozin’s shrimp and grits and Andre’s curry. Cryssi received the final apron of the episode, setting up the Top 12.

There was barely a moment to celebrate before Episode 2 kicked off with the Top 12 facing their first Mystery Box and Elimination Challenges of Season 6.

Root vegetables were the name of the game for the Mystery Box, testing each home cook to reveal their own roots with an original recipe. It was interesting to see how quickly home cooks like Andre and Colin settled into plating something celebrating their upbringing or background for the second episode in a row, with the former creating a spicy Cajun purée and the latter cod with root vegetables. The judges selected Jennifer’s trout with root vegetable “scales,” Cryssi’s roasted root vegetable soup and Jenny’s vegetables five ways. Jenny won the Mystery Box a test and was safe from elimination for the week.

The season’s first Elimination Challenge featured nine different proteins for 11 cooks. Jenny’s other advantage? Saving two compatriots; she picked Cryssi and Jennifer to stick around. While some home cooks were happy to select a protein they had experience with, others chose an item they didn’t, choosing to challenge themselves. Kudos to Chanelle for taking the octopus. Meanwhile, Colin was struggling over on his station and managed to burn his salmon and had to start again. Luckily, he had more to prepare but was running out of time. Rozin wasn’t so lucky and scorched some of his lamb ragu, and Cliff discovered his duck leg wasn’t cooked enough to pull away from the bone.

The Top 2 plates were prepared by Chanelle and Tony, who are captains for next week’s team challenge. At the other end of the spectrum were Colin, Steven, Alyssa and Cliff. Alyssa and Colin were given another chance, meaning Cliff and Steven’s time in the kitchen had come to an end.

MasterChef Canada airs Mondays at 9 p.m. ET/PT on CTV.

Image courtesy of Bell Media.

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Featured, Hudson & Rex

Hudson & Rex’s Kevin Hanchard: “This guy felt different, and it felt right”

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Kevin Hanchard has played a lot of authority figures, including doctors, lawyers and police officers. Many police officers, on such shows as, most recently, Orphan Black, Cardinal and Cavendish.

Hanchard can currently be seen on Hudson & Rex, Citytv’s human-canine cop drama, portraying Superintendent Donovan. But unlike the officers he has played in the past, Hanchard describes Donovan as “different.” We spoke to him to find out exactly why, and we get a sneak peek into an upcoming episode where viewers learn more about Donovan.

How did you come to be on Hudson & Rex in the first place?
Kevin Hanchard: It was providence. I was offered the role of Superintendent Donovan. We thought about it and it made sense. I’m sort of at a place in my life, where I’m a little bit older, and I play a lot of doctors, lawyers and cops. And I have played a few cops in the last few years, but this guy felt different, and it felt right. It felt like there was a maturity and gravitas and weight to this guy than other cops I’ve played. It made sense for me to do this. I had been to Newfoundland before to shoot Republic of Doyle, I think going on eight years now, and I remember having a great time out there, loving the people, loving the landscape, the vistas and the sights, the restaurants and all of that. I was thinking, this is just a great opportunity to spend some time in a part of the country I don’t know if I’m going to get a chance to visit.

I’m impressed at how much Hudson & Rex is about the team investigating these crimes. I love the interaction not just between Rex and Charlie, but the team dynamic too.
KH: I really do think it’s an ensemble. Charlie and Rex are the heart of the series, but the four of us really seem to work together as actors and the characters seem to work well together. I think that’s good and bodes well for the future of the show. It just feels right, you know? The balance is where it should be. Even though I’m the superintendent, I’m not there with an iron fist like the guy from Beverly Hills Cop going, ‘Foley!’ That’s not his nature. He’s a little more like a mentor, which allows for some comedic moments and levity in the face of, you know, a murder each week. I think those are the things that allow for the audience to care for the characters and give the show some legs. I don’t think there could be three better people for me to work with than Mayko, Johnny and Justin. They’re super-talented actors and they’re good people. We genuinely enjoy spending time together. They may tell you something different about me, but I’ll at least take the high road. [Laughs.]

How do you feel about Diesel?
KH: Diesel is the only one of us to consistently hit his mark and never forgets his lines. He’s so smart and intelligent and has such a great spirit about him. You can see it in his eyes; there is a wisdom and a depth there that allows him to be the heartbeat of the show. Even though he is a dog and most people are watching for the dog, it’s not exploitive. It’s not a dog getting dressed up in a tutu and going undercover. He’s fantastic. And, for someone who has wanted to own a dog his entire life, this is a great consolation prize.

Looking forward to the episode entitled, ‘Haunted by the Past,’ we’re going to get a bit of a peek into Donovan’s personal life.
KH: We get to find out about his family situation and the fact that he has a teenage daughter. I’m the father of a child that has just gone through his teens and another about to go into his teens and these are every dad’s worst nightmare. Is my child doing drugs or, even worse, is my child hiding something from me? Donovan is human. He isn’t just a cop who is detached from his kid and is all about the work. He truly has an interest in her well-being. All of those fears and hopes and dreams that every parent has is delivered in this guy as well. It’s a wonderful little side story in that episode.

Hudson & Rex airs Mondays at 8 p.m. ET on Citytv.

Images courtesy of Rogers Media.

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Featured, Heartland

Comments and queries for the week of April 5

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Love the Heartland series. Happy there is a Season 12 with all the great cast members. Can hardly wait until it airs. —Sue

I am really enjoying The Murders and really like the look Carter has given to the show. Well done! —John

I can’t believe that Anne with an E received Best Drama over the incomparable Cardinal and/or Murdoch Mysteries [at the Canadian Screen Awards]. Harrumph. The other winners were quite worthy, though. :) —D Mac

My family and I have enjoyed Murdoch Mysteries for years. It’s clever how the writers weave (past) real-life characters into the shows. In the next season, we’d like to see William and Julia realize their dream of having a child … because of Julia’s inability to conceive, it could be through adoption. There could be a young woman who was widowed when her husband died in a farming accident. Tragedy strikes, she contracts a rare disease and dies suddenly. Unbeknownst to Julia and William, the mother had named them as guardians of her infant child, because she had no living relatives and she knew that Julia and William would make good parents for her child. And how about a permanent love interest for George? He’s had enough heartache and is looking for love. Thanks for a great show! —Edith

 

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

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Featured, Jann

Jann: Deborah Grover on Nora’s journey and the “universal story” of Alzheimer’s disease

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“Just breathe.”

That was the advice Deborah Grover gave Jann Arden when they began filming CTV’s Jann in Calgary last fall.

Singer-songwriter Arden is an experienced stage performer with enviable comedic ability, but toplining a TV series—and all the line memorization and mark-hitting that goes with it—is new to her. Grover, who plays Arden’s mother Nora in the series, is a veteran actress with a long list of credits, including films Agnes of God and Where the Truth Lies and TV shows Night Heat and Anne with an E, so she knows exactly what to do when someone has acting jitters.

“When you start to panic and go, ‘I don’t remember a single thing, I don’t even remember my first line,’ it’s like, breathe,” Grover says during an on-set interview last October. “Because it’s all sitting inside of you. You’ve done all your work, so just breathe. So [Jann and I] would start a scene, and just breathe, and boom, it’s there. And if it isn’t there, then we start again. Not a big deal.”

Of course, that approach only saves actors who have done their work, and according to Grover, no one arrived on set more prepared or more committed each day than Arden did.

“She came prepared to work, and every day she’s working on her lines and her scenes and her nuance of the scene,” Grover says. “She’s come at it with everything she’s got, and it’s been fascinating to watch. You know, she’s a Canadian icon, so you want this to succeed for her, because man, what we have to give in this journey is personal, but it’s a universal story. It’s so human.”

In the series, Arden plays a mostly fictional version of herself, a version who is on the declining side of fame and struggling to get back on top—which leads to lots of hilariously unflattering scenarios. However, the show also deftly mixes in Nora’s struggles with dementia, which are based on Arden’s real-life experiences caring for mother Joan Richards, who suffered from Alzheimer’s before passing away in December.  

Grover read Arden’s 2017 memoir, Feeding My Mother: Comfort and Laughter in the Kitchen as a Daughter Lives with her Mom’s Memory Loss, before auditioning for the part.

“I read the book, and during my screen test with Jann, I think she felt I had the right feeling, a certain sensibility, and that seemed to work for her vision of her mom,” says Grover.

The connection between them is evident onscreen, counterbalancing the show’s spot-on bits of entertainment industry satire with moments of emotional depth and familial tenderness.

“It is a fictionalized version, there’s no question,” says Grover. “And I think the more we explore the scenes, the more I discover about her mother.”

Grover’s family was also touched by Alzheimer’s when her mother-in-law was diagnosed with the disease. 

“I got to experience that on a first-hand basis,” she says. “But it’s totally different with every individual, and people have been very open about sharing their stories with me, going, ‘Well, my mom was this,’ or ‘My grandmom was that,’ so you receive it all, and it all adds to the mix.”

It isn’t a spoiler to say that Nora moves from simply being forgetful—as in a scene from Wednesday’s new episode, “Weeknd at Charley’s,” when Jann loses her patience with her mom for misplacing her phone—to suspecting something more serious is going on as the season progresses.

“As the journey gets more pronounced, you’re seeing a little bit of forgetfulness, the dementia is there, and then there will be the diagnosis at the end of the six-part series,” Grover says. “Hopefully, if there is a second season, there will be an exploration of the journey with mom and what that means and how the family deals with it through humour, through the heartbreak of it all. But you’ll hopefully get all those colours because Jann wrote about it all in her book.”

While a second season of Jann seems like a good bet, thanks to strong early ratings, Grover is also thankful for her recurring role as Aunt Josephine on the CBC/Netflix series Anne with an E, which started filming its third season in March.

“What a lucky actor I am,” Grover says. “I’ve got two amazingly different things on the go, and hopefully, other things that will fill in the cracks. I feel extremely blessed in these character years when you go, ‘Well, isn’t it over?’ No, it’s just beginning. Man, it’s just beginning. I’m having more fun than I’ve had.”  

Jann airs Wednesdays at 8:30 p.m. ET/PT on CTV.

Images courtesy of Bell Media.

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Featured, Reality, Lifestyle & Documentary

Preview: Paramedics: Life on the Line champions B.C.’s paramedics and dispatchers

In the spring of 2017, I recommended folks check out CBC’s web series Save Me. Season 2 of that project is on the way and looks at the types of people paramedics run into on the job. But while Save Me is scripted, Paramedics: Life on the Line is not.

From Lark Productions—the same folks behind Emergency Room: Life and Death at VGH—Paramedics: Life on the Line, debuting Tuesday at 9 p.m. PT on Knowledge Network (and online for those not living in B.C.), follows real-life paramedics and dispatchers at British Columbia’s Emergency Health Services.

“Building on our rewarding relationship with Knowledge Network, we are privileged to now work with BC Emergency Health Services and share their stories,” executive producer Erin Haskett said back when the project was announced. “This is a unique opportunity to provide viewers with an inside look at the work of the paramedics and dispatchers, share their daily experiences and directly see the impact they have on our community.”

And what a look it is. The opening credits—featuring sirens and a babble of dispatcher voices asking clarifying questions and dispensing advice—Paramedics instantly drops viewers into the whirlwind that is this career. It’s not easy. The aging population in the Vancouver area means more visits to seniors. And, with a stagnant number of ambulances on the road, that means stressful, jam-packed shifts.

Over at Ambulance Station 246, we meet Marco and Chris as they visit an elderly woman suffering from pain in her left arm following a fall. Donning their detective hats, the pair ask about the situation surrounding the incident—how did it happen, where did it happen—before assessing a suspected broken arm and shuttling her to the hospital. But aside from tending to his patient, Marco shows incredible patience and asks personal questions. That builds an almost instant relationship and trust. As Marco explains, he likes to help people regardless of the reason he is there.

Meanwhile, it’s chaos at the Dispatch Operations Centre. Where Marco and Chris can only answer one incident at a time, dispatchers juggle a flood of emergency calls, assess what type of service should be sent, and order them. In my mind, this has got to be the toughest job. I can’t imagine anything worse than attempting to get information from the concerned patient, family or friend in distress on the line. Footage of call taker Yehia on the line with the mother of an infant (“Is he awake? Is he breathing?”) is harrowing and horrible.

But Paramedics: Life on the Line isn’t just about the job; the 10-episode series also shines a light on the lives and relationships of those who do it. From Adam and Carol-lyn discussing Game of Thrones to questionable food choices and drivers who simply do not know what to do when a vehicle with flashing lights and a siren is trying to get somewhere quickly, the series is an incredible peek at the people who are truly putting others before themselves every day.

Paramedics: Life on the Line airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. PT on Knowledge Network. It can also be streamed on the Knowledge website.

Images courtesy of Talk Shop Media.

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