Hey there – we’ve actually ended up shooting the first of our current slate of movies (Red Torrent) in Maple Ridge BC – I hadn’t been here before but now I’m all too familiar with the place – the main thing i know about it is that it’s a long way from home!  We’re approaching the end of the first shoot and it’s been hectic – it’s tough to make movies in 10 days!  Our cast have been brilliant – Shawn Roberts, Sara Canning, PJ Prinsloo and Levi James are our group of heroes and our baddie is played by Leslie Hope (from 24).  We’ve had lots of special effects to contend with which take ages to set up. Also, the weather has been against us from the start.  You’d hope that August in the Vancouver area would provide a little sun but we had 3 days of rain last week – the horrible BC type of rain which is relentless and depressing! I guess that’s what you get for attempting to shoot a movie in the rainforest!  You might think that rain isn’t the end of the world but the story is about an evil doer (Leslie Hope) who is showering the country with chemical rain so we need to control when the damn rain happens.  

Anyway, enough of that – we start shooting ‘Death Amongst Friends’ very shortly and we’re lucky enough to have another great cast lined up for this one too.  We have Nicholle Tom (The Nanny), David Millbern, William B Davies (X Files), Holly Dignard, Nelson Wong (Kenny Kwan from the Strachey Mysteries which we shot last year), Olivia Cheng, Ben Ayres, Benjamin Arthur and last but by no means least the fantastic and amazing Margot Kidder (Lois Lane, yes THE Lois Lane) – Margot joined us last year for the Strachey Mystery ‘On The Other Hand Death’ and blew us all away with her talent and her professionalism so it was a no brainer to have her back to do a role on this show.  She’s Claudia Brecher who is a real nasty piece of work and we can’t wait to see how she plays it.  

Well, that’s all for now – take care, Philip

So we’re now in production for these 2 new epic movies – Red Torrent and Tidal Justice. As always we’re going to shoot them out in Langley BC in the middle of summer. For those of you that don’t know Langley BC, it’s very dry in August (no Torrent) and it’s about a 90 minute drive from the ocean (so no tide). As you can imagine, a challenge like this really gets the creative juices flowing – though sadly not enough to create a torrent.

Our esteemed director is the legend that is Ron Oliver – he’s incredibly creative and will of course think a way around this minor problem. We’ve spent the whole day driving around the Fraser Valley looking for just the right campsite (that’s camping with tents, not camping with a drag queen and stripper, sadly), just the right house (grand but not so expensive that we can’t afford to shoot there) and just the right bit of road to race a car up and down without actually having to pay the police to close it down. You’ll see a theme here, I’m not keen on spending all of the money up front – because when the wheel comes off half way through the shoot you have to have something to fall back on!

More soon!

Ahh – summer in Vancouver – you can’t beat it (of course you have to recognize it quickly and make the most of it before it’s over – it doesn’t last long).  Actually you can beat it too!  If you’re on a beach in Hawaii or in the Seychelles or on a yacht in the Caribbean or sitting in your pool in Palm Springs in your skivvies.  All of those beat it quite easily.  But what the hell, it’s all i’ve got right now so i’m going to make the most of it because over the next few weeks we’re going to start crewing for a couple of movies so it’s about to get much busier and I won’t have time for idle chit chat or for cocktails on the deck with fabulous friends (in reality it’s a cream soda in the garden with him indoors and the dogs, but I can dream).  Perhaps I should introduce myself before I ramble on any more – my name is Philip and I’m the Senior VP of Production at OUTtv – it’s a very grand title isn’t it?  Needless to say, I still have to make my own coffee and buy my own custard creams.  Anyway, do you work in the film industry in Vancouver?  Are you lesbian or gay (or not!)?  If you are then please feel free to send me your resume with a covering letter if you’re feeling creative – the email address is: careers@outtv.ca – please put ‘For the attention of Philip‘ in the subject line – that way, with a bit of luck and a following wind (damn those hot dogs), it will make it’s way on to me!   Cheers, Philip