Tag Archives: Kim’s Convenience

Run the Burbs

Links: Run the Burbs, Season 2

From Aisling Murphy of the Toronto Star:

Link: ‘We laugh a lot on set’: Andrew Phung and Rakhee Morzaria on running the ’burbs for a second season
“One thing we noticed right away was that our audience was much younger, was often families and often families of colour. That’s something I’m really proud of. In order for us to make those changes in our media landscape, we have to engage audiences who haven’t always been engaged by mainstream broadcasters.” Continue reading.

From Eric Volmers of the Calgary Herald:

Link: What about Bob? Albertans Andrew Phung and Gavin Crawford face off in Season 2 of Run the Burbs
In the three years that Andrew Phung worked at Calgary’s Village Square Leisure Centre co-ordinating youth programs, he got a good look at bureaucracy. Continue reading.

From Courtney Shea of Toronto Life:

Link: “King Street nightlife is fun, but then you turn 30 and just want to be in bed by 11”: A Q&A with Run the Burbs creator Andrew Phung
“If Full House was about the Tanners, you could say Run the Burbs is about their neighbours—the people whose stories never got told. But our show is unique in other ways: a lot of family comedies are about bickering, whereas my show is about two adults who love their kids. It’s funny that such a basic premise feels fresh.” Continue reading.

From Noel Ransome of The Canadian Press:

Link: ‘Run the Burbs’ has a new showrunner and renewed focus on authenticity for Season 2
Newly minted “Run the Burbs” showrunner Anthony Q. Farrell firmly believes that authenticity is a central part of diverse storytelling — from the script to diverging perspectives on set that express what is real versus “what doesn’t feel true.” Continue reading.

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Industry News, Kim's Convenience

Ins Choi to lead story room for first-ever comedy cohort of CFC’s Bell Media Prime Time TV Program

From a media release:

The Canadian Film Centre (CFC) and Bell Media are pleased to welcome award-winning playwright, actor and Kim’s Convenience co-creator, writer and executive producer Ins Choi as Executive Producer in Residence of the first-ever comedy cohort of The Bell Media Prime Time TV Program.

The comedy cohort, which will run from October 2022 to the end of March 2023, has been designed for writers specifically looking to gain experience in comedy writing and engage in a collaborative comedy series story room. The comedy cohort is an offering for Black, Indigenous and/or racialized creators in Canada, to celebrate and amplify a diversity of underrepresented voices and stories so they can ultimately be seen and heard on screens in Canada and around the world. Throughout the first half of the program, the writer residents will work as a team with Choi to develop an original new series. The selection process for the six writers who will be invited to participate in this cohort is currently underway; their names will be announced in early August.

Ins Choi is best known for his debut play, Kim’s Convenience, which was a nominee for the Dora Mavor Moore Award for Outstanding New Play, won the Best New Play Award and the Patron’s Pick at the 2011 Toronto Fringe Festival, and toured across Canada with Soulpepper. Choi adapted Kim’s Convenience into a TV series of the same name with Thunderbird Entertainment, where he served as a writer, executive producer and co-creator. The fan-favourite series ran for five seasons on CBC, was picked up by Netflix, and won multiple awards, including the Canadian Screen Award for Best Comedy Series in 2018.

Choi’s select theatre acting credits include Banana Boys, lady in the red dress (fu-GEN); Hamlet, The Odyssey (Stratford Festival); and Death of a Salesman, Alligator Pie (Soulpepper). He is currently developing many other creative projects, including his play, Bad Parent, which is being produced for fall 2022 by Vancouver Asian Canadian Theatre, Prairie Theatre Exchange, and Soulpepper.

The Bell Media Prime Time TV Program is recognized industry-wide for training emerging and mid-level TV writers and has played a vital role in the development of new and diverse television series. The program has attracted some of Canada’s most prolific and successful showrunners to lead the story room as Executive Producer in Residence, including Bruce Smith, Michael MacLennan, Brad Wright, Dennis Heaton and Shelley Eriksen. Learn more about the program here.

About the CFC
The Canadian Film Centre (CFC) is a charitable cultural organization that drives the future of Canadian storytelling. Our intensive, hands-on programs in film, television, and entertainment technologies empower, shape and advance opportunities for Canadian creators and entrepreneurs working in screen-based industries. Learn more at cfccreates.com.

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Awards, Featured

Transplant, Kim’s Convenience leads, Sort Of and Scarborough win at the 2022 Canadian Screen Awards gala

Transplant and its lead actors, Laurence Leboeuf and Hamza Haq, Kim’s Convenience leads Jean Yoon and Paul Sun-Hyung Kim, Sort Of and Scarborough were given trophies during the Canadian Screen Awards gala.

Sunday’s online gala was hosted by Tallboyz, who captured four Canadian Screen Awards earlier in the week.

Wynonna Earp received the Cogeco Fund Audience Choice Award which was voted on by fans.

Here are the winners in Sunday’s television and film categories:

Best Lead Actor, Comedy
Paul Sun-Hyung Lee, Kim’s Convenience

Best Lead Actress, Comedy
Jean Yoon, Kim’s Convenience

Best Comedy Series
Sort Of, CBC

Radius Award
Maitreyi Ramakrishnan

Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role
Liam Diaz, Scarborough

Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role
Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers, Night Raiders

Lifetime Achievement Award
Bob Cole

Ted Rogers Best Feature-Length Documentary
Kímmapiiyipitssini: The Meaning of Empathy

Changemaker Award
Kayla Grey, Kathleen Newman-Bremang, Amanda Parris

Best Host or Presenter, Factual or Reality/Competition
Brooke Lynn Hytes, Traci Melchor, Amanda Brugel, Brad Goreski, Canada’s Drag Race

Best Lead Actress, Drama Series
Laurence Leboeuf, Transplant

Best Lead Actor, Drama Series
Hamza Haq, Transplant

Best Drama Series
Transplant

Achievement in Direction
Shasha Nakhai, Rich Williamson, Scarborough

Gordon Sinclair Award for Broadcast Journalism
Rassi Nashalik

Cogeco Fund Audience Choice Award
Wynonna Earp

Best Motion Picture
Scarborough

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Awards, Kim's Convenience

Simu Liu to host The 2022 JUNO Awards in Toronto, live on CBC

From a media release:

The Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (CARAS) and CBC announced today that Simu Liu, Marvel Studios star of Shang-Chi and The Legend of The Ten Rings, is returning to his hometown to take on a new role: host of The 2022 JUNO Awards Broadcast. The first in-person iteration of the show since 2019, this year’s event will be held at Budweiser Stage in Toronto, on Sunday, May 15 and broadcast and streamed live across Canada at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT on CBC TV, CBC Gem, CBC Radio One, CBC Music, CBC Listen, globally at CBCMusic.ca/junos and CBC Music’s Facebook, YouTube and Twitter pages.

“It’s an absolute honour to be hosting The 51st Annual JUNO Awards,” said  Simu Liu. “Canadian entertainment and culture hold a very important place in my heart and getting the chance to experience the festivities in my hometown makes the experience even more special to me.”

This past year, Liu made history as the star of the first Asian-fronted movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Shang-Chi and The Legend of The Ten Rings (2021), which earned him The People’s Choice Award for Favourite Action Movie Star. He also made headlines last December after a widely-applauded hosting debut on Saturday Night Live. Prior to that, Liu starred for five seasons in the CBC original comedy series Kim’s Convenience, which won the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists (ACTRA) Awards for Outstanding Ensemble in 2017. The show later went on to win the award for Best Comedy Series at the 2018 Canadian Screen Awards. Liu’s other film and television credits include ABC’s Fresh Off the Boat, Awkwafina Is Nora from Queens and NBC’s Taken. His memoir, “We Were Dreamers: An Immigrant Superhero Origin Story,” will be released by HarperCollins in May 2022.

Tickets for The 2022 JUNO Awards start at $39.95 and go on sale Friday, March 4.

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Featured, Kim's Convenience, Run the Burbs

Andrew Phung returns to CBC with his own creation, Run the Burbs

Like other fans, I was gutted when Kim’s Convenience came to an end. I missed the laughs, the family dynamic, and the diversity I was seeing on my television screen. Thankfully, that hole has been filled by Andrew Phung—Kim’s Convenience‘s Kimchee—in Run the Burbs.

Co-created by Phung and his best bud and collaborator, filmmaker Scott Townend, Run the Burbs—debuting Wednesday at 8:30 p.m. on CBC—follows the Phams, a young Vietnamese-South Asian-Canadian family living on a cul-de-sac in the suburbs.

“Relatable” was the first word that came to mind as I watched the debut episode of Run the Burbs. In those opening moments, I witnessed something I’ve done myself: trying to deliver a trunkful of groceries from the car into my house in one trip. To see the Phams—father Andrew (Phung), mother Camille (Rakhee Morzaria), daughter Khia (Zoriah Wong) and son Leo (Roman Pesino)—draped like pack mules struggling in the heat, made me laugh out loud at them, and myself.

“For this family, in particular, they make these mundane moments big,” Townend says. “And there are the families around them as well. People are going to say, ‘I have a neighbour like that.’ I’ve got neighbours like this, Andrew’s got neighbours like that. It was important to find the comedy in those everyday moments.”

In the works since the summer of 2019, Phung says Run the Burbs came organically and easily, thanks in large part to their longtime friendship and the way they constantly supported each other. By December of that year, Phung was confident what they had created would end up on a network.

“We had something here that was so fun and full of life and energetic,” Phung says. “What’s wild to me is that, through the process, a lot of it has remained the same.”

At the centre of Run the Burbs is Andrew Pham, a whirling dervish of a man who is full of positivity, good-natured humour and truly believes in the good in everyone. Even when there are down moments, like in Episode 1, when a planned block party seems to be going off the rails, it doesn’t last long. And with high-powered and diverse comedic talent in Phung’s co-stars and supporting roles played by Aurora Browne, Ali Hassan, Julie Nolke, Jonathan Langdon, Chris Locke, Samantha Wan, Simone Miller and the late Candy Palmater, the laughs are loud and last long.

“We are incredibly fortunate to have the cast that we do,” Townend says. “It is a powerhouse of comedy and every episode, every actor brought something new to the part. They took what was on the page, directors included, elevated it and made it better.”

Run the Burbs airs Wednesdays at 8:30 p.m. on CBC and CBC Gem.

Images courtesy of CBC.

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