enRoute films and new foster cat!

Hello/Bonjour,
I take planes about 6 times a year which is too much I realize (I mean, not enough for me but more than enough for the environment but that's a whole other can of bananas), but it's weird how I never get used to flying.
Aaanyway, I watched a bunch of Canadian short films on my last Air Canada flight (including a couple where I knew the people involved!) and I was kind of impressed that they were even available. Obviously everyone I know writes/directs/acts in shorts but I don't get to watch as many as I want to (or should).

POINT BEING:

This is happening and I'm going to go and we should all go, yeah?
I feel like it's our job as young filmmakers and actors to support things that are possibly going to further us, that are good for our industry, that are giving people chances to see things they wouldn't normally see.

"The festival showcases short films from emerging Canadian filmmakers on Air Canada’s inflight entertainment system. Filmmakers get their big premiere in front of a potential monthly audience of 3 million ...passengers, and they honour the best of the fest at an Awards Gala in Toronto."
Which is this event!
More information is at enRoutefilm.ca

Cool? Cool.
.
.
.



Man, blogs are weird, hey? How we promote things and events and even products and then also just talk about random personal stuff or our friends or family and specific events in our lives.



It seems like they'd be almost like a magazine but the blogs that are my top faves are the ones which are personal and detailed and specific and honest. I don't like happy-all-the-time and I don't like being sold on stuff. Weird balance to try to strike.



Especially since this is all new, blogs have never existed like this.


I feel awkward trying to encourage people to read my blog. Like it should be good enough to attract readers on its own. But that's not really how it works. I'm bad at self-publicizing or promoting. Why is that? How do I get over it?
WHO WANTS TO PUBLICIZE ME MORE?



Also, this is my new foster cat, courtesy of Toronto Cat Rescue! She is called Lucy but I choose her name to be Lucinda Bright.
She is a good and calm and cute and nice cat who does not claw up my legs nor chew through my cords! She's the best! Aww so lovely, actually. I always wake up with her curled into me like a little darling. What a baby!

You can see her profile here. And adopt her!

wintertime is a nice time to have a cat to curl up with. Actually, anytime.





My mother does not like the hipstamatic app. It's funny how it's almost more popular these days than regular photo-taking around hipsters.
My mum says, "they look ugly, there used to boxes and boxes of photos lying around that looked like that!"
Which I know because I loved those boxes of shitty photos my grandfather took and I cut a bunch of them up to use and made magnets out of them and stuff. Then my mum threw them out and I was upset.



I got my second pair of glasses today. I'm unsure of how I feel about them and I haven't taken any photos yet but I'm sure I will soon enough.  They are big and sort of the same colour as my hairs.
I didn't have time for photos because I slept in real bad then I spent the day with JL, who I haven't hung out with proper in awhile.



We went to Sam James Coffee and Babe Bar and considered getting (matching snowflake) tattoos at the parlor beside there.
Then I got to see JL's new place which it's funny to see someone's furniture and belongings all transplanted and rearranged in a completely new environment. Also for all the time that I've known him, JL has lived with multiple crazy roommates in the same place. Change change change.
After that we went to dinner at Victory I had the curried lentil thing with rice. Curry plus lentils is pretty much all I'm into these days.
JL is infuriating sometimes but I still like him a lot.



I just turned on the heaters, it's funny how it seems darker out when it's cold.

I'll be the captain, you be the deck hand

hahaha deck hand.


Here's the rest of the picture from hanging out with boys who say no.

This one is the one who is my enemy. Remember when he was on Degrassi? Haa probably blogging that will make him my enemy for real.

Oh well, he deserves it because he got into my timer shots even when I told him not to!

See? I am telling him off.

He was actually probably better at the timer shots than me. Hmmm.

The one on the left was in the gum commercial with me. He is a very good theatre actor. He reminds me a lot of one of my old best friends and so I just interact with him like he's familiar even though he's really not. Super nice guy, though.Too bad he didn't fall in love with me in real life like in the commercial that would be super funny. I only do anything for jokes.





Aww he wasn't sad, I don't think? Maybe he was. Maybe he got tired of being called Tenille and being yelled at while driving us?


Oh yeah, the guy in the middle runs Whippersnapper Gallery which has been such a great art and music space for the last 5 years and now will be closing its doors. Kinda sad, but also so wonderful what he's done there.
They're having a funeral/good-bye party on July 29th, dress to express your sorrow and drown your sadness in alcohol. Should be fun? 587A College Street.

I wonder how the rest of their tour was.



Yeah so, break in the park yesterday turned into a full-on party hang until 1 a.m.
I knew that would happen! Damn! But it was also totally great. And I've been in such a bad mood the past few days that when I'm feeling alright I tend to kinda want to just go with it, ya know??

Ended up going to Lakeview Lunch after park for drinks and fries. They had caesars on special but they wouldn't let me have a bloody mary on special! What the fuck is that, Lakeview? Stuuupid, it's basically the same drink and isn't tomato juice cheaper than clamato?
Also, they didn't have any beers I could have and they don't have Strongbow anymore. LAAAAAAAAME.
I had some shitty white wine.

Then for some reason I went to Ronnie's with the gang even though I totally meant to go home. Whoooops. Ran into some other friends, though, and it was very fun. I don't even really regret not coming home earlier to clean and work.
Well, kinda.



Working Bon Jovi now. Have a feeling it's going to be a gong show. Just a sneaking suspicion.

Death Comes to Town (on business!)

Weird, I still haven't blogged really about hanging out with (read staring creepily at) The Kids in the Hall.



Sass took me along with her to the Rivoli for a pre-screening of their new show Death Comes to Town.




Hahaa, I'm so funny, I was so excited to meet this guy, Jesse Camacho, he was so lovely and sweet, he's the star of Less Than Kind.
Here's a trailer for it:

I watched all of it online on the CityTV site last year and you should catch up, too! It's moving to HBO Canada for this season, which could be real good for it.. You can look at their new site: Less Than Kind Online. Oh yeah, Mark McKinney is one of the producers/writers..Wow it's link central around here today.

AAAnyway.


I got crazy but Sass stayed cool (she should be a bassist she stays so cool).



You know what, though? Sass is really funny. To me she's funniest when I least expect it. Or when she's really hyper. Or when she pretends not to know how to speak English.

Then we gave some funny people some fingers! I'm sure they appreciated the humour of the situation!


Scott Thompson is possibly my favourite Kid in the Hall. Is it rude to pick favourites?
Also Mark McKinney.

Also all of them, actually... Anyway, I think that Scott is especially lovely.
This article in Torontoist made me love him even more, and also let me know that he as a google alert set up for his name in blogs and stuff. Too bad I'm sure that everyone is writing about him these days so he'll never even notice how much I care....
SIGH.


Chris Locke is very very funny and Scott Thompson thinks so too, that's a pretty big endorsement, I'd love to have Scott Thompson get behind me (SEXUAL INNUENDO).


Chris Locke was very worried about his forehead-pimple. We were all too polite to say anything, good thing he pointed it out so that we could all acknowledge (and photograph) the elephant in the room.

Awww fun times. Did I mention it was open bar? I really need to stop going to places like that. 

 

Oh yeah, I stole a lot of these photos from Sass, so you can go over to her to see more. Yeah? Yeah. 

Haha Bruce McCulloch came over to me and was like "You know in the series, Death has a thing for redheads...." I just laughed so hard.

Yes, so watch the show! You can catch up online: www.cbc.ca/kidsinthehall, especially watch this week's episode because on of my favourite past co-stars plays a hot french puck bunny.. not to be missed!

Wow, seriously link party around here today. You're welcome.

impressive impressed

Dear men-with-no-chins,
growing a bad goatee will not fool me into thinking you indeed have a chin.
from,
a fellow no-chinner.


I just watched a couple of episodes of that Canadian show Less Than Kind on CityTV's website. Has anyone else watched any of this show? It's about a 15 overweight nerdy boy and his completely disfunctional family in Winnipeg.
I'd been meaning to watch it for awhile, but had to wait 'til they put it online since I am never home to actually watch actual TV.
Um, I really like it!
(How glad am I every time I honestly enjoy a Canadian television program? It's sad, really.)

1. Produced by Mark McKinney. Sharp writing and tonnes of bleeped-out swear words.

2. From the ads for it I thought the actor-brother character would be a caricature and obnoxious, but actually he is quite funny. Coming close to too much occasionally though.

3. Maury Chaykin is awesome. He's such a fun person to watch and plus he's bought ice cream from me before and was always very sweet. Ha, actually, his character reminds me of my old boss from there - those who have met that old boss should watch this to see what I mean "I'm not yelling! Was I yelling?! I'm not yelling!", etc.

4. The nerds! I love nerds! I love highschool (and never wish to go back there. ever.) Great casting on the two supporting nerds, totally totally nerdy.

5. The lead actor - he is only my brother's age and playing younger, but he is strong and funny and sympathetic. And feels authentic.

6. Weakerthans theme song. Nice.

7. "this is a very large dildo. Are you sure you don't have a light?"

Making lists about things is way easier than writing out essays about them. There are things I'm not that into about it. Some of the characters are too much and stuff. But we'll see. I was very pleasantly surprised and I wonder if kids my brothers age would appreciate this show/relate to it...?



Skydome was deeeaaaaaad tonight, nothing to do. I was so bored I cried. I ate pizza in one of the big cupboards for awhile. That part was okay. Oh yeah and one the moustaches came to visit me so that took up a few minutes at least. I also danced around and bossed the new girl.
Pretty classic.

Came home, watched internet TV, ate some hummus. Oh god I'm exciting!!!



Also, I'm pretty sure that Chris Brown's defence that "Rhianna started it" is complete bullshit.
Not that women should hit. No one should hit. But hitting back is not the solution. Especially when you are much, much stronger. And uttering death threats? Classy.
I don't know though, guys. If an 19-year-old kid beats up his girlfriend, should he be written off forever? Does this act of violence mean he will never be able to be in a healthy relationship? Oprah says "he will hit her again". Which, knowing cycles and patterns of violence, is probably true. He's probably hit her in the past.
But he is still a kid. I don't know I don't know.
I'm not defending him, just.. yeah. Violence is so hard on everyone. Obviously.

So I'm going to sleep.

got got got got no time

I left the ACTRA conference early this afternoon to come home and sit around by myself for an hour. Because I seriously cannot be this busy. I am not used to it.
I can't imagine what I'll be like as a successful dude, probably terribly unhappy and long for closed doors and lack of noises.

At the ACTRA plenary meeting this aft one of our board members reported that the CRTC is considering changing the requirements for Canadian content on Canadian networks.
Right now it is $1 spent on Canadian programming for every $10 spent on buying American content.
They are considering changing that to $1 Canadian programming for every $1 American.

CAN YOU EVEN IMAGINE???

I will (of course) believe this when I see it, but holy shit pie!
That would be amazing.
Even half of that would be amazing.
The amount of work that would have to create, the new standards that would be set, the new voices in Canadian programming given a shot...

Kind of inspiring me to create about a billion new shows, gotta say...

Aw, man, let's hope this happens!!!

p.s. - no kittens yet, just an increasingly fat cat. I'm a little worried there's a billion kittens in there... but at the same time, I'd be happy if she'd hold off until the weekend because I'm just too busy right now!

man let's all get together and make some rad stuff

Yesterday I watched Corner Gas and I totally laughed out loud!
I thought parts of it were really quite charming and also clever. It was very funny in parts.
Then I watched Gary Unmarried and Three and a Half Men and I most definitely did not LOL I only groaned/was incensed that such SHIT exists on my television.
The best part of Corner Gas is Oscar (Eric Peterson) for sure. And the worst part is definitely the terrible guest stars. I'm sure that there are people in Saskatchewan who can act, in fact I think I even know some of them. I don't know why they keep choosing guest-stars who are awkward and wooden.
Like I should talk, I haven't worked at all lately!

Aaand I was reviewing performances for putting together my demo reel and guess what, I too have sucked.
I'm getting better and better though. So, there's that.

The other worst part is when the characters become caricatures and the jokes get stale. But that show has had a good run and is coming to an end - with some of the highest ratings in the country.
So, congratulations Corner Gas!

The question is, why hasn't this lead to other good Canadian television?
Letting a comedian create a show is a concept that has been successful many times (and has failed many times also), and yet I don't see any other Canadian comics getting the chance.
CBC is trying to get in on the success of Corner Gas with things like Little Mosque on the Prairie and Sophie.
Except these aren't funny.
They don't have a heart.
I think Brent Butt was really smart with Corner Gas and believed in it and loved it up and that's why it worked out. That's just my humble opinion, obviously, but someone's gotta really really love a show for it to be the best.
They're like little babies who need to be cared for and nurtured and encouraged and they need to be told that they're unique and special. And then the little baby shows need to actually be unique and special.

UGH.

Performers should create the shows as well. Not saying that writers aren't needed, 'cause obviously they are, just saying that the best actors are inherently story-tellers. And have stories to tell and have characters who need voices...
The creators of Flashpoint are both actors (not on that show), just sayin'.
And especially for comedies, it makes sense to have the comedians - the actors - create them television.

In other news, I'm working on creating some TV shows.

I watched Wild Roses tonight. I think I actually might have seen every episode so far, actually. Luckily Dollface has cable with timeshifting (and she also had miniwheats (mmm wheat) and ice cream. Had being the operative word because now it's all in my tum and my tum hurts)

Wild Roses is kind of great!
This week's episode was advertised as "must-see" and it kind of was!
Man do I like TV and I really do look to like, so bear that in mind whenever I'm reviewing something.
But this episode is where we're actually starting to see depth from quite a few of the lead characters. Amy Lalond's character, Rebecca, showed her first turn as a human and capable of hurt, her fiance as well just got a whole hell of a lot more interesting. And someone got killed off! Someone I liked! And we're finally seeing a bit of Clare Stone's character, Charlotte, being a teenager (who interacts with a cute boy). I love shows about teenagers! More than I even know why.
Now I'm actually looking forward to next week's episode, whereas before I was fine with watching the show but mostly because I want, desperately, to support Canadian television.

Aaand the CBC has come into 2K9 and now has their online video player (though kind of awkward to track down sometimes on their disorganized website) with full episodes of both Wild Roses and Being Erica (probably others as well, but I haven't looked into it)
The current episode of Wild Roses.
Having episodes of TV series online is so genius to keeping your audience. With shows driven by intense plotlines it can take as little as a missed episode or two to lose an audience member (happened to me and Heroes, for instance, but I kind of think that show jumped the shark anyway).
Having the episodes online eliminates the problem!

I never would've gotten back into Gossip Girl or Grey's Anatomy or even started on 30 Rock if it weren't for streaming online video.

And I've missed the past couple of episodes of Being Erica, which I originally liked more than Wild Roses, so I'm totally going to catch up on that...

Man all this talk makes me so excited for all the good TV in the world. I'm so, so ready for Canada to start pulling its weight in this department. And supporting its industry!

Canadian Shows I Like

My screenwriter friend in the comments of that last post responded:


"Well, I'll disagree with you a little bit here.

INTELLIGENCE, though it was sadly cancelled due to low ratings, was an absolutely stellar show, way better than most US shows. Unfortunately it never locked into a large-enough audience.

DURHAM COUNTRY, which also won a bunch of awards, was also really quite good. Last year I think SLINGS & ARROWS won and it was also an excellent show.

The problem is INTELLIGENCE scored the CBC around 250,000 viewers a week, while THE BORDER gets them 750,000 and CTV's FLASHPOINT, which is explicitly a US-style show that actually plays on CBS in the US, gets over 1,000,000 viewers.

My point is, the networks could certainly be more audacious in their programming, but when audiences don't watch the actually good shows, it doesn't help. Networks are businesses and 1,000,000 viewers for a middle of the road show trumps 250,000 for a groundbreaking one.

Don't get me wrong, there are lots of totally crap shows on Canadian TV. Lots and lots. But there's good stuff too. It's just that nobody watches the good stuff."



And I am with him about all this, except that there is not any promotion for the good shows and/or they are not on accessible networks. I mean, why aren't CTV and Global buying and PROMOTING some of the exciting stuff from Movie Network? And it's not enough for them to just put it on in a crappy time-slot and see if people get around to watching it.
And as for the CBC, if no one's watching that channel it's hard for them to advertise their shows. And when they debut a tonne of new shows and promote the crap out of them and then they all turn out to be quite bad, I have problems trusting CBC's judgement.

I am being unfair when I say there's no good Canadian television, because there is. But I haven't seen very much GREAT Canadian Television. Television that I can't wait to see the next episode of...

Canadian Shows I Like:
This Hour Has 22 Minutes
Rick Mercer Report
Corner Gas (specifically season 1)
Regenesis (I used to watch it when it was on Global at least, it was my first introduction to Ellen Page, who I thought was pretty brilliant in it)
Slings and Arrows (I've only seen 2 episodes of this but they were good)
Durham County (I've only seen one episode of this [man, I should baby-sit again] and it was pretty great I auditioned for it way back in the day and the script was really great and refreshing, actually).

At the ACTRA conference a few weeks ago I went to a workshop that involved the creator/producer/actors from a number of different shows including Da Kink in My Hair, Billable Hours, Rent-A-Goalie, and Flashpoint. They were talking about getting their shows made and also crossing over from acting to producing and writing.
It was a neat session and I liked hearing from all the speakers, especially because it was sort of inspiring, not like that other ACTRA workshop I went to where they basically said "everything is impossible", and "if you have nothing under your belt you will never get anything made" "if you are not a Somebody you can never star in your own show" etc etc etc.
And I like Flashpoint. And I liked hearing from the creators because they spoke to the fact that it really is a very "American" show. They pointed out that the show really is Canadian, especially in the way that it focuses on the characters and their interactions and on the actual emotions of the story.
And that's always been my beef with American crime/cop shows, not enough about the police/investigators/lawyers. I want to know more about those main characters. I don't really care about the violence or the mystery, I'm way more into emotions.
Because I'm a pansy like that.

I am maybe somewhat hopeful out our industry. I am. And it's still pretty new, we're still able to make up rules and I think that kind of anything is possible.
(poor grammar but that's what I sort of mean. ha.)

I don't know how we go about changing the attitude of Canadians about Canadian television without constantly producing top quality shows, but I don't know how to keep the top quality shows on the air without changing the attitude of Canadians about Canadian television.

if at first you don't succeed, try the same thing over and over again

So the Gemini Awards just happened, I guess.
I had no idea on account of I never watch TV on the TV and also it's The Geminis... No one pays any attention. Aaand it wasn't even broadcast on a main network. How ridiculous!
Kind of ridiculous the way we are about our industry up here.

I'll let you in on a little secret, too: if you win a Gemini and want an actual statue to keep (who wouldn't??) you have to buy it!
How wild is that!

Also, classically Canadian information,The Star tells me that "many" of the shows that won awards have already been canceled. Including Intelligence and Cock'd Gunns. This marks the second time that Morgan Waters (of Cock'd Gunns and The Morgan Waters Show) has won a Gemini for a canceled show. This country is ridiculous!
We are ridiculous about this industry!
So content to just take in anything the U.S. is doing and not produce anything meaningful of our own.
UGH.

Good thing I never get around to writing anything, there's no damn point around here!

This country keeps on producing shit series that are just mimicking American shows. It's so frustrating!

How does Quebec have its own thriving film and TV industry and we do not?
This is unacceptable.
We accept and praise mediocrity constantly. We pat ourselves on the back for the shitty things that get made.

I wish I had the answers though.
Same rant after same rant, I know.
Maybe it's just going to be one of those days.

But, hey, I've been taking my iron and vit. D every day and now I'm only sleeping 7 or 8 hours a night instead of my usual 10-12...

good morning world, let me barf on your face

Oh hi, booked a part!

Also, so hung over. I'm having issues typing because of how it is making me nauseous.
Yuck.
It's okay I don't have anything to do today besides brat around on the internet.

Anyhow, apparently going to be doing a couple of days on a tv-movie for the Amercian History channel, about the Manson family. Yikes.
But, Yayayaya. Fun times for me. I've been having dreams lately about being on sets.

Actually I had a really good one the other night. After I posted those videos of Jonathan I dreamt that we were shooting a Home Improvement reunion special together and that we had to share a dressing room (this is where you think it gets naughty) and so we became friends and hung out and went and played in the snow and in the sea (my damn dream, it can make as little sense as I'd like). Then we were late getting back to set and our pay got docked but I didn't care because I had a new best friend!
Sigh.
I was actually in a temper when I woke up because I just wanted to get back into that dream.

I worked at the Big Chill all yesterday and it was rainy and no customers except it was made alright by a bunch of my friends coming visit! Hurrah!
I ate way too much ice cream, quelle surprise.

Then top Toronto headshot photographer, David Leyes came around and they did a shoot in front of the store. He and his cohorts moved all my stuff around, bought ice cream, shot photos (not headshots) and was very charming and congeal. If I had an extra spare $700 lying around somewheres I would totally go get my headshots done with him. For certain. When I'm rich.
Anyhow, it helped waste part of my afternoon, that's for sure.
No, do go look at his website if you haven't already, such good stuffs.
Like I dream of being able to do.

After work went for dinner:



(that's my favourite ring I'm wearing, in case you were wondering)

open-face veggie burger at Last Temptation. Mostly still avoiding wheat, except in beer format, so didn't eat much of the bun.
veggie burger - $3.25, add side salad for $1.25 = good deal


all photos except this one were taken by her, jfyi


weirdly pretty




his face is totally cut off at the side there, click through to see the whole image, same like always.


oh hi fat cutelet face of mine

Nice patio sit. yessss patios.

After that I met up with Dollface and babes in Trinity-Bellwoods and we park-drank and chattered. My BFF, Spenny, came by and we laughed about some things.

Then Dollface and I head over to Sweaty Betty's which was flippin packed like holy jeezus hipsters calm the eff down. But what do I know because after that shot that Tanya "e-talk" Kim bought me I was o-b-l-i-t-e-r-a-t-e-d. For realzzz. She was very very fun and funny though, not lame like (I assume) Ben Mulroney is. Oh except that episode of the Morgan Waters show with Ben. That was okay. Mostly because it was making fun of Ben though... hmm here you go:


Luckily Dollface and cottage-friend Pony Club (yes I really am going to blog about that trip really soonskies) put me in a cab instead of letting me ride my dumb bike home. Not the smartest cookie in the cradle.
I ran home up my street from the cab in bare feet because wedges are not for running in. Why was I wearing heels, even? That's the real mystery of the evening.

K, guys. I need food or something. Why does everyone have jobs? Why isn't it always brunch time???