Vancouver TV Listings, Real Estate Listings, and Movie Listings - What's On

THE BIG DECISION

whatsoninvancouver — Fri, 16 Mar 2012 00:05:21 +0000

On paper, “The Big Decision,” the unscripted series currently airing Mondays on CBC Television, may sound like a bit of a snooze with its corporate backdrop and business elements about work performance, management and budget issues.
In reality, however, viewers may find that this show delivers more raw emotional impact than most scripted prime-time dramas — because “The Big Decision” deals in human stakes that are very high and very, very real.
Each one-hour episode of this new Canadian entry, adapted from a successful U.K. series called “Gerry’s Big Decision,” finds one of two familiar investors — “Dragons’ Den” veterans Jim Treliving and Arlene Dickinson — visiting two established Canadian businesses that are struggling to survive in these lean financial times. In each case, the investor offers some suggestions and issues some challenges to make changes, then decides whether the company’s prospects are promising enough to merit a cash infusion to turn things around.
Each company is evaluated on its own merits, not in competition with the other business featured in that hour. Ultimately, the investor makes the decision to invest in either, both or neither of those companies.
It is, as they say, “just business, not personal,” but inevitably that means some of these people whom viewers are going to get to know and care about are going to wind up with an unhappy ending. That’s where the drama comes in, executive producer Tracie Tighe says.
“That weighs very heavily on the investors’ minds, because they have spent time with these people,” she says. “They go to their homes and share meals with them. They get to know the company and the people who work there inside and out, so it’s a tough, tough decision when it comes down to it, but it’s an investment decision and a business decision. Sometimes the personal just has to be separated. It’s like one of the investors says at one point, ‘This isn’t charity. It isn’t a handout. It’s about evaluating the businesses and see who should continue.’ ”
The March 19 episode finds Dickinson evaluating two very, different companies: Lavish & Squalor, an independent Toronto department store catering to a hip clientele, and Camino, a co-op that made a strong name in the fair-trade coffee and chocolate business.
“Lavish & Squalor is on Queen Street, which is Toronto’s hipster shopping mecca, and over the years a lot of the bigger chain stores have moved into the area,” Tighe explains. “They’ve been struggling with a bit of an economic downturn in the last few years, what with the high rents and just trying to stay alive in Toronto. They are up against it because it’s hard to keep the store stocked.
“It’s a couple that is now divorced but still business partners. They’re divorced from each other, but they’re still completely married to their business. It’s tough for either one of them to let go, so Arlene has some suggestions for their working relationship, which frankly isn’t met with that much enthusiasm.”
Camino, which is co-owned by 11 people, ran into serious trouble after the company invested in a new juice line, only to find itself with no money to adequately market the new products to prospective customers. w

FACE OFF

whatsoninvancouver — Fri, 16 Mar 2012 00:03:18 +0000

Space shows how chills are created with season finale and premiere These days, Space isn’t only a destination for watching scary movies but also for seeing how they get that way.
The special effects makeup competition “Face Off” has been a ratings hit for the channel, to
the degree that it had already been renewed for a third round before the second season winner had been named. Immediately after that finale, Syfy debuts the unscripted series “Monster Man,” following a group of creature-constructing veterans as they tackle assignments for various filmmakers.
“It’s a very interesting place for me,” says “Face Off” host McKenzie Westmore, who hails from Hollywood’s most famous family of movie makeup artists. “This season, they’ve really let me have a voice. They let me speak up, not just as somebody who’s been there and knows what’s good or bad but also from a viewer standpoint. Sometimes, what you see in person is different from what’s seen on TV, so I love that I get to have more of a say.”
“At the same time, I’m still the host,” she continues, “so I have to play it Ryan Seacrest-like in a way. I’ll give a little advice, but I don’t want to give too much of an opinion. I can see who’s putting their best foot forward and who isn’t; it’s talent, it’s attitude, it’s time management. There’s so much that goes into this that I’m familiar with.”
So are guest judges who have appeared on “Face Off,” including actors LeVar Burton and Vivica A. Fox and movie makeup masters Greg Cannom and Tom Savini. And there definitely are professional opportunities for a “Face Off” winner: The first victor, Conor McCullagh, worked on the soon-to-open and much-anticipated movie “The Hunger Games.”
“Monster Man” showcases Cleve Hall – whose SOTA FX special effects company has serviced the “Ghoulies” and “Troll” series – and his associates, including his daughters and his ex-wife, as they devise figures for horror movies. Their
boss in the first episode is Sean S. Cunningham, director of the original “Friday the 13th” thriller, who enlists them to “build” conjoined twins that will separate rather graphically.
“I don’t know how I feel about it,” Hall admits of having his efforts spotlighted by television.
“After 34 years of working in anonymity, I’m not sure what’s going to happen the first time I hear somebody yell, ‘Hey! “Monster Man” ’ on the street. It’s new, so we’ll see. So far, I don’t feel any different.”
Still, making “Monster Man” requires Hall to alter his usual business approach. “I don’t like dealing with clients most of the time,” he says. “I’d rather let somebody else handle that. When I do it, it takes so much time away from the creativity that I end up doing the part I was most looking forward to late at night. Unfortunately, much of the time, other people will take credit for my work. My name’s nowhere on it.”
Thus, “Monster Man” provides Hall with something of a guarantee that the credit will go where it’s due. “If there’s a chance of being recognized for what I do, I might as well take it,” he reasons. “Up to now, the people who have known me are the fans, the ones who are really into this stuff. They can tell what my work is.”
Indeed, such avid attention to how effects are created has impacted Hall’s business.
“In the old days,” he reflects, “a lot of the guys kept their techniques to themselves. I don’t mind sharing how I do things. A lot of the time, I’ll stick to simpler techniques, especially since I work on lowerbudgeted films. You don’t have a
lot of time, and you don’t have the budget, to redo things. You have to get it together fast, and it has to work on the first try.” Also known for playing Sheridan Crane Lopez-Fitzgerald on the nowdefunct NBC daytime drama “Passions,”
Westmore is fascinated by “Face Off’ contestants’ fresh ideas … especially knowing so many tricks of the trade from having been a frequent test vehicle for “Star Trek” makeup devised by her father, Oscar and Emmy winner Michael Westmore (who also has been on “Face Off”).
“I’d go to my dad’s lab at Paramount Studios,“ she recalls, “and I’d be playing with clay and rubber. That was my childhood. When I was 3 years old, Robert De Niro was coming over to the house to get prosthetic pieces done for ‘Raging Bull.’ My dad would be in his home lab, my mom would be in the kitchen or whatever, and Robert would be hanging out in the living room playing with me and my toys. It was almost like he was baby-sitting me. He went to my parents and said, ‘I love your daughter. We get along. Can she play my daughter in the movie?’ And that’s how I got bitten by the acting bug.”
As “Face Off” wraps up its second season, Westmore is thrilled to have the third one to look forward to, particularly since it promises more innovation-by-necessity.
“There are those newcomers who make you think, ‘Well, they haven’t been doing this that long,’ ” she says. “but in some respects, that’s what makes this great. It’s a passion of mine, so I love doing this.” w

CURIOUS & UNUSUAL DEATHS

whatsoninvancouver — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 23:57:25 +0000

At first glance, “Curious and Unusual Deaths” sounds like a video version of the Darwin Awards. Anyone with a dark sense of humor knows that the awards are an unofficial annual rogues list of people who manage to arrange their own demises — usually in cruel and stupid ways. It’s an impression that series producer Marlo Miazga is eager to dismiss. The show — which moves to Discovery from sister channel Discovery World for its second season, starting Friday, March 16 — tells the stories of some of the dramatic and slightly weird ways people have met their ends over the years.
“We try not to look at any of them as stupid,” Miazga says. “We know about the Darwin Awards, and we know that there are a lot of interesting stories in them — but a lot of them aren’t true. One of the things we set out for in this series is to not do this with the tone of the Darwin Awards, where human suffering and accidents are about broad comedy. This is a scientific investigation of case studies, where death comes from unexpected means.”
The idea came from a series of lurid pulp novels from the 1920s, which Miazga’s partner found in an antiquarian bookstore in Toronto — one of which was called “Curious Deaths.”
“We thought it would make an amazing show,” she says. “And no one had done it. We couldn’t believe it. So we thought, ‘Let’s pitch this to somebody who might be interested in curious deaths and the scientific plot points behind them.’ ”
The aim, Miazga says, was to combine science and drama with the breathless pulp-fiction style of crime tabloids or comics and the dramatization style popular in such series as “William Shatner’s Weird or What?” The result is a sort of “Ripley’s Believe It or Not” of quietus. “Part of our approach to the series is to give it a really stylized feel, so that viewers can dive into the compelling stories,” Miazga says. “These are not witness testimonies, and it’s not a sentimental approach to the material.”
Rather, the stories are told like cautionary tales that a scoutmaster might tell over a campfire — preferably holding a flashlight up to his face. “Many people have asked us if we’re re-creating urban legends,” Miazga says. “We’re not. We researched these things for months to make sure we’re telling the right story. But we definitely give it a bit of that feel, because if you want to bring a viewer into a story like this, the way to do it is to tell it like you’re around a campfire.”
The means of demise range from the creepy and the weird to dumb enough to make the Darwin Awards. For example, one segment involves a Gulf Coast man who was found encased in sand like Han Solo at the end of “The Empire Strikes Back” — with just his face and hands showing. He had gone surf-casting on a night of the full moon. The fish weren’t biting, so he crawled off to sleep under his pickup, which settled into the sand as the tide came in. Another involves a man who died of a laughing fit while watching a bad British sketch comedy series.
Yet another involves one of just two fatalities suffered during a professional baseball game.
There are even a few celebrity casualties, such as the strange carbon monoxide poisoning death of tennis star Vitas Gerulaitis and the strangling of dancer Isadora Duncan, whose scarf got caught in the wheels of a sports car.
In each segment, the death is shown, followed by experts giving a brief explanation of the medical science of the death and the physical science of the causes.
For example, the man who slept under his pickup fell victim to high tides, wet sand and gravity, leading to death by drowning. The opening credits are an homage to “Six Feet Under,” and the style of each segment is from the strange death sequences that opened each episode of that series. “When we started researching, Six Feet Under was coming to an end,” Miazga says. “And that always was one of the inspirations — the tone of ‘Six Feet Under’ and its beginning scenes. It would always open with some strange death. … Those types of stories and that approach to the storytelling was our intention from Day 1.” w

CANADA’S SMARTEST PERSON

whatsoninvancouver — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 23:55:19 +0000

If you think “smarts” is just slang for intelligence, think again. It turns out that there are at least six different kinds of smarts, and Robert Cohen is out to see who has the most of them. “Canada’s Smartest Person,” hosted by Gerry Dee (“Mr. D”) and airing Sunday, March 18, on CBUT, is a blend of TV and Internet technology designed to find the cleverest Canuck. It’s also a home game in which anyone with the necessary app can play along.
“What we’re going to do in this show is take a tour through the six different categories of intelligence,” says Cohen, the show’s producer. And along the way, we’re going to ask participants in the studio, as well as people at home, to engage in tests — which is really cool and quite groundbreaking. “We’ll look at the real-world application of these intelligences, which could be really varied and really diverse.”
Those six different forms of intelligence are physical, visual-spatial, linguistic, musical, social and logical.
There are others, such as spiritual and existential, but it’s kind of difficult to devise tests to rate them, so the producers limited the competition to these six types of intelligence. They form the Theory of Multiple Intelligences, developed by Harvard psychologist Howard Gardner in the 1980s.
In a nutshell, the theory argues that our traditional concepts of intelligence and IQ testing have never been an effective measure of someone’s smarts. Rather, there is a range of intellectual powers, and the smartest people are the ones who have the greatest abilities in the largest number of them. “It’s great to be a math whiz or a trivia buff,” Cohen says. “It’s great to be an amazing athlete. These are all admirable. But we’re putting forward a theory that the truly smartest among us will show versatility and intellectual strength across the board in six different categories. “Therefore, it could be anybody. This really redefines what it means to be smart. It could be a highschool teacher from Newfoundland. It could be a stay-at-home mom from Saskatchewan. Or it could be a student from the West Coast.”
To find these people, Cohen’s production company put out a call on the Internet for people competitive enough to think they might be able to win a contest to determine the country’s smartest person. Several hundred applied, and four were chosen. “People filled out forms with lots of information about themselves,” Cohen says. “We got to get a
picture of who they were. Then they went through a series of interviews and tests of various sorts. There was everything from testing people’s various aptitudes to multiple intelligence tests, which gave us a profile of their strengths and weaknesses.”
The ideal candidate, he says, demonstrated more than a range of skills beyond the average in most of the categories. The producers were looking for competitive people, too. “We were looking for people who showed strength across the board, who can compete,” he says. “And we were looking for people who represented the different ways of looking at the world, because we wanted an interesting and diverse cast who represent Canadians.”
Also representing Canadians are the members of the studio audience, who will be playing along, and the viewers at home, who can download an app for their smartphones or tablets or perform the challenges on the Web.
For more information on how to play, go to www.cbc.ca/smartestperson and look for the links.
“I think we’re one of the first to do this,” Cohen says. “As the show moves along, some of the tests that our participants in the studio are doing, people at home will be able to engage in the same tests at home, through the mobile Web, on a smartphone or a tablet. “You’ll be able to do the same challenges.”
The four contestants will face 11 challenges over the two hours of the show, involving everything from running an obstacle course and delivering a speech off the cuff to solving math problems. To help devise the tests, the producers recruited a panel of academic advisers, most of whom have done research in the area, Cohen says
“The title, ‘Canada’s Smartest Person,’ is really asking a question: How do you find out who is Canada’s smartest person?” he says “And there’s no concrete answer to that question. “But we’re putting forth an exciting, academically endorsed and proven, researched idea, to get people thinking about it in a different way, what it means to be smart.”w

DANCING WITH THE STARS

whatsoninvancouver — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 23:50:14 +0000

Let the “Dancing” begin anew. Following a round that was muchdiscussed last fall — thanks to such contestants as Chaz Bono, Ricki Lake, Nancy Grace and the eventual winner, war veteran-turned-actor J.R. Martinez — “Dancing With the Stars” starts its 14th ABC season Monday, March 19. Tom Bergeron and Brooke Burke Charvet return as hosts, with Len Goodman, Carrie Ann Inaba and Bruno Tonioli judging again.
And the new competitors? As usual, the mix includes actors (“Family Matters” alum Jaleel “Steve Urkel” White), singers (Gladys Knight), athletes (tennis icon Martina Navratilova), celebrities known mainly for being themselves (“Extra” co-host Maria Menounos) and the now-requisite Disney Channel star (Roshon Fegan of “Shake It Up!”). Also on board: “Little House on the Prairie” staple Melissa Gilbert; “Melrose Place” and “General Hospital” veteran Jack Wagner; singer Gavin DeGraw; “The View” co-host Sherri Shepherd; Donald Driver of the Green Bay Packers; telenovela star William Levy; and opera’s Katherine Jenkins. “I’m a private guy,” White says, “and I have no problem saying I’m old-school, adapting to a new regime of celebrity. The real reason I’m doing the show is the fans. There’s been an outcry for my participation in the show, and the second my mother found out about that, she started sending me emails en masse … as if she needs any other reason to contact me. It’s her favorite show.”
White realizes “Dancing” will let him take steps toward being known for something other than his most famous role. “Quite frankly, in the last couple of years, going outside my comfort zone and doing things I haven’t even been trained to do have brought me the most success.”
For Menounos, being in the spotlight is a real turnabout, since she has reported on the show. “It was never fully my assignment,” she notes. “There are certain reporters whose beat was ‘Dancing With the Stars,’ and I’d done it on occasion. I was there for the season finale last time for ‘Extra,’ and I remember Tony (Dovolani, one of the series’ pro dancers) being like, ‘You should do the show!’ ”
As with White, Menounos knows what “Dancing” visibility could do for her profile. “It’s one of the biggest shows, and for ‘Extra’ as an entertainment-news show, it’s one of the No. 1 things we cover. I’m positive my life is about to make a real sea-change.” w

LISA RAY: NEW HOST OF TOP CHEF CANADA

whatsoninvancouver — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 17:31:05 +0000

Chef and restaurateur Mark McEwan and Los Angeles restaurateur Shereen Arazm return as head judge and resident judge, respectively, but there’s a new host welcoming 16 competitors as “Top Chef Canada” kicks off its sophomore season Monday, March 12, on Food Network Canada.
International actress and recent cancer survivor Lisa Ray takes over the hosting chores from season one’s Thea Andrews, who appears in episode three as a guest judge. “Thea is pregnant and couldn’t resume her role,” explains Ray, who was recommended for the hosting gig by Steve Gonzalez, a fan favorite from season one. “I was extremely enthusiastic but at the same time slightly hesitant, because I don’t really have a lot of experience in this kind of programming. But after sitting down and meeting the team, it seemed like the perfect fit for where I am in my life right now. I am a recent cancer ‘graduate,’ and for me to take on hosting this fabulous franchise felt like a celebration.”
Ray freely acknowledges that she isn’t a credentialed food expert, but she is a devoted and knowledgeable foodie. “I have a passion for food, and I have lived all over the world and been exposed to so many cuisines,” she says. “I consider myself a food voyeur, because it’s the first thing that I always like to talk about. On the program, I position myself as the audience. I am the one who gets to ask the questions that have plagued us for so long, like ‘What the hell is a confit?’ ”
Ray says she had even more fun than she had expected filming this season, although she was caught off guard by how attached she became to the “cheftestants.” At the end of episode one, when she had to utter “Pack your knives and go” to the first luckless chef, she kept things together on camera then went back to her dressing room and burst into tears. “Shereen, who came back and comforted me, said, ‘Lisa, you know what? I know it’s really hard, but don’t worry. It only gets harder as you get to know them better.’ It just took a little while for me to understand that this is a very, very serious competition. There’s a lot at stake, a lot of money, for the winner, and all these chefs have chosen to throw in their lots to be there. I believe the team has actually stepped up the challenges this year from the first season, and some of them are absolutely twisted.”
In addition to Andrews, guest judges and tasters for the upcoming season include Toronto Maple Leaf Colby Armstrong, “Lost Girl” star Anna Silk, Alan Thicke, recording artist Johnny Reid, Mike Holmes (“Holmes on Homes”), Spencer Rice (“Kenny vs. Spenny”), American chef and “Top Chef All-Stars” winner Richard Blais and celebrated chef Lidia Bastianich, among many others.
As for the cheftestants themselves, they reflect Canada in all its diversity, Ray says.
“Aside from representing all the areas of Canada, there is also a great diversity in terms of ethnicity and culinary backgrounds,” she says. “We have everyone from Kunal (Ghose, age 39) from Victoria, B.C., who runs this very smart little gourmet fish and chips establishment that operates out of a repurposed shipping container on a pier, to Xavier (Lacaze, 30), who is from Calgary and cooking at a great restaurant there, but originally from France.”

FASHION STAR: THE SHREWDEST HOUR ON TV

whatsoninvancouver — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 17:28:22 +0000

Combining the public’s appetite for fashion competition shows with the desire for instant gratification, the NBC series, premiering Tuesday, March 13, allows viewers to buy clothes the night they are on TV.
Granted, QVC caught on ages ago that viewers will buy what’s on TV, but “Fashion Star” is different. H&M, Macy’s and Saks Fifth Avenue all have buyers on the show.
Once buyers bid on items, that clothing is available online by the end of the show. The next day it can be bought in the store. The show was shot in July to allow enough time to make the clothes.
“The concept is to make home shopping attractive and immediate,” Elle Macpherson, host and an executive producer, says from her home in England. “So often it is quite boring. How cool is it to go online or watch a fashion show on TV and see the way it moved on the body? How they put it together, how is the hair, what do the buyers think? And you get all this great feedback and direction of how to wear the garment.”
This is a fun contest, but above all, it is brilliant marketing. The set is what we have come to expect with singing contests; flashy, shiny with a lot of noise and hype. There are three mentors, all successful in fashion: John Varvatos, Jessica Simpson and Nicole Richie.
Richie’s role is to encourage designers and “to convey the message that being successful in one season does not mean being successful the next season,” she says. “I am here to hold their hands and go through the journey with them and encourage them to be themselves and listen to buyers. Understand there is a difference between being an artist and being a businessperson and pushing them to express their individuality as a designer and make that transition from designer to building a brand.”
“Some of them have had success in their own right,” Richie continues, “and some are very successful in the cities that they are from.
And some had bigger success in department stores, and that hasn’t worked out for them. It is important that once they step into department stores, they stay there. This is not about designing the $10,000 gown made out of feathers.”
The 10 episodes begin with 14 designers, and as with all competition shows, it’s impossible to not form allegiances, fleeting though they may be. The 90-minute pilot introduces some people who genuinely understand clothes and see this as their big break. Then there is one guy who would be king. He designs leather
motorcycle jackets and is incredibly dismissive and rude to Simpson and Richie, saying women couldn’t understand men’s fashion. Two of the buyers are women. They explain they need to be able to work with a designer.
Each week there is a challenge. Among them, Macpherson says, are: “What does your billboard look like? Or what are your predictions for summer trends? Or what is your logo? How does fashion fit in the marketplace?”
Designers who make clothes that aren’t all that flattering on a willowy model must learn that those clothes are going to look far worse on most women.
“We have had designers on the show who are more designing for themselves and what is cool than who their customer is,” Richie says. “But unless it means something within this department store, what is the purpose other than just a beautiful piece?”
This is a show that can be watched by families, though it’s most likely to be embraced by mothers and daughters. Impulse shoppers, beware! “Fashion Star” could be hazardous to your credit card.

ASHLEY JUDD: ‘MISSING’

whatsoninvancouver — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 17:22:57 +0000

Suggest to Ashley Judd that her latest character is right in her wheelhouse, and she won’t disagree. After playing heroines-against-all-odds in such movies as “Kiss the Girls,” “Double Jeopardy” and “High Crimes,” the former “Sisters” regular is proud to say she’s doing her own stunts for her television return in the action-drama series “Missing,” premiering Thurs, March 15 on CTV.
Judd stars as Becca Winstone, whose son (Nick Eversman) vanishes 10 years after he saw his CIA agent father (played by Sean Bean) apparently killed. She also was an intelligence operative, and she calls those skills back into play as her search takes her across Europe.
“This was a really good fit for me,” Judd says of filming “Missing” on location. “It was only 10 episodes, which allowed me to stay really involved with the balance of my life. It has the power of a network behind it, and the premise is simple and unforgettable. The producers made quite an impression on me, and as I look back on our season and the remarkable places we filmed, what continues to stand out for me are the people … the quality of the relationships, and how much I enjoyed all my co-workers.”
Still, Judd wasn’t sure about doing “Missing” at first, though being overseas is something she’s used to; she and husband Dario Franchitti maintain a home in Scotland. “ I like to travel, I also like to be home,” she notes. “I started to feel concerned about the length of the commitment, and a friend of mine sighed, ‘Oh, my gosh. Europe in the summer? How bad can it be? We started with two weeks in Croatia,” Judd reports, “which I had never visited. It delivered everything the brochures promise. I could walk from our hotel, which was carved into the side of a cliff, to the seaside villa. I thought the first pool I swam in was magnificent, until I swam in the next pool. Then we moved on to Rome and Prague and Paris and Istanbul. It was quite an adventure.”
That description also applies to the plot of “Missing,” since in the course of seeking her son, Becca is reunited with people from her past. Often not happily. “There’s something of the reluctant hero in a lot of my characters,” Judd reasons. “A common theme that I’ve played, and that audiences have enjoyed over the years, is that these women are pitched into extraordinary circumstances beyond their control. And yet each of them is able to rise to the occasion and kind of act out a wish fulfillment. The writers would begin developing
every episode of ‘Missing’ by asking, ‘Where are we emotionally? What is happening in the hearts and souls of our characters?’ Becca is confronted with an old lover and old enemies she has to ingratiate herself with, in order to procure their help again, and all of it is really intense. I think her arc will be satisfying to audiences.”
With filming completed on ABC’s initial order for “Missing,” the daughter of country music’s Naomi Judd, and sister of singer Wynonna, is proceeding with her other activities, including her work for organizations such as YouthAIDS and the International Center for Research on Women. “I do enjoy a full life,” she confirms, “and I believe I can do it all.”

THE AGE OF ANXIETY

whatsoninvancouver — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 17:20:17 +0000

Many if not most North Americans are living in a high-pressure world. The sputtering economy has people putting in longer, more stressful hours to hold onto their jobs, if they have them, while global issues ranging from war to climate change and beyond are enough to give anyone some sleepless nights.
Unfortunately, many people struggling with everyday anxieties are being coaxed into believing they have mental disorders that require medication, according to “The Age of Anxiety,” an enlightening documentary premiering Thursday March 15, on CBC ’s “Doc Zone.” Ann-Marie MacDonald hosts.
“The line between a disorder and our normal anxiety is starting to blur,” says producer Ric Esther Bienstock. “This perfect storm is brewing where everybody is feeling anxious, pharmaceutical companies are marketing directly to the consumer, and doctors don’t have time to talk to patients and suggest, ‘Maybe you just need to work out a little bit or stop working a 50-hour week.’ People want a quick fix, so they’re looking to pills as a solution.”
The film illustrates how drug companies exploit cultural anxiety by looking at Paxil, a drug that really took off after marketing wizards managed to convince the public that plain old shyness was a disorder that required medical treatment. “The film isn’t a soapbox, but I think as you watch this, you start realizing that you might be self-diagnosing,” Bienstock says. “Take a little step back before you take a pill. Obviously, you don’t want people who really need medication not to take it, but the numbers are telling. When they say 50 percent of the population is going to be diagnosed with a mental disorder, that’s crazy, unless we’re all going crazy, and I’m wrong.”

COMMUNITY

whatsoninvancouver — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 17:17:35 +0000

After leaving the air on Dec. 8, NBC’s quirky comedy “Community,” beloved by a rabid few but, unfortunately for ratings-starved NBC, not adored by double-digit millions of Nielsen families, returns on Thursday, March 15, to finish out its third season (with a fourth a big question mark). “We’re in the middle of shooting our finale right now,” says star Danny Pudi in mid-February, dressed, as are all the main cast members, in a hospital gown. “This isn’t the finale; these are pickups from another episode, but it’s our final week of shooting ‘Community,’ maybe forever. We don’t know. It’s an exciting time on set,stress-filled, maybe. And I’m wearing a hospital gown. Is that part of the wardrobe? Maybe. We don’t know. Are we mental patients? We don’t know. I don’t know what’s going on.”
What is known is that Pudi’s co-stars Donald Glover and Joel McHale get to jump on a trampoline, but not Pudi. “They wouldn’t let me,” he says. “I think they were worried that I would injure myself.”
And at some point, co-star Chevy Chase booms his way through several takes of a peculiar song that includes multiple recitations of “You’re welcome.” In other words, it’s just another day at fictional Greendale Community College, where Pudi and his co-stars play adult students who have little in common besides being thrown together in a study group.
Along with the actors, rounding out the study group are Yvette Nicole Brown, Gillian Jacobs and Alison Brie.
Created by Dan Harmon (“The Sarah Silverman Show”), “Community” has become known for its offbeat characters, dense and frequent pop-culture references, unconventional storylines and concepts (from a full-on paintballwar action movie and a stop-motion animated Christmas special to multiple alternate timelines), and tonal shifts (from laugh-out-loud funny to bemused to occasionally poignant).
It’s allowed the actors to show a range, particularly McHale. Before playing the series’ closest thing to a leading man, former lawyer Jeff Winger, he was known mostly for light humor and as host of “The Soup” on E! Entertainment Television. “It’s been a real sandbox to play in,” he says, a coat thrown over his hospital gown, “from being naked playing pool to being an action star to being a vampire to who knows? It’s just been great. I have not played an elderly Chinese woman yet. That’s the one slot I’ve got to fill in there.”
Brown appreciates the relationships around the study-room table. “These characters,” she says,
“are people that you know or people that you’re like in some way. What’s beautiful about these people is, no matter what they do to each other, they forgive and move on, which I think is great, and the fact that we have a racist and five or six different religions, different races, all mixed
together. You have Jeff Winger, who doesn’t care about anybody, or isn’t supposed to care about anyone, who doesn’t believe in love, but he does. Everybody’s growing beyond the person that they always were on this show. I just think it’s universal in that way. Along with laughs, “Community” can also break hearts “in a good way,” says Brown, “and then put them back together at the end of the episode, because that’s what life is.”