Volume 1 – 2022

Featured in this edition: Arcana Studio, Big Bad Studios, Blachfilms, Coconut Effect Productions, Goddard/Brown, Guru Studio, Headspinner Productions Inc., Lopii Productions, Manito Media, No Problem Productions, Remembrance Pictures Inc., Téléfiction Productions Inc., and A WWB Production, Inc.

Arcana Studio

Arcana’s 10th animated feature Heroes of the Golden Mask has been completed. It was featured on the cover of Animation Magazine, and casting news was included in Deadline and the Hollywood Reporter. It also gained press as it will be one of Christopher Plummer’s last acting roles.

Arcana is in production on many projects, and its first live-action feature starring Michael Rooker and Bruce Willis will air on Tubi this year.

Big Bad Boo Studios

Big Bad Boo has been busy producing Season 3 of 16 Hudson, which is launching on TVOKids, Knowledge Kids, SRC Radio-Canada, TFO, and ICI Television. Five new shorts of 16 Hudson ER are included in the order. 16 Hudson has also been sold to Discovery Kids and Edye. It represented Canada at Mipcom Cannes by bringing in the Diversify TV Excellence Award, and received a Writer’s Guild of Canada nomination, a 2022 Kidscreen nomination, and 5 Leo Award nominations, winning two for Best Writing and Best Children’s Series.

Season 1 of ABC with Kenny G received a Leo Award nomination for best performer Marcus Mosley. Season 2 is in production, and Lili & Lola, Season 3, an original preschool series, is due to premiere in multiple languages on Oznoz, ICI Television, and Shaw Multicultural Channel. 1001 Nights renewed with TV Jamaica and WeKids China for CCTV.

Hulu Original Series The Bravest Knight won 3 prestigious Telly Awards including Gold for Best Use of 2D Animation. It was sold to SRC Radio Canada, TFO, and CBC Kids GEM, covering Canada in both languages, with other sales included to Hopster and RTP Portugal.

Big Bad Boo is green-lighting the new climate change series, Galapagos X, with Schitt’s Creek Jennifer Robertson cast in the lead role. Development slate includes Bebe On the Bus, Billy & the Boingo Band, and Chamber Chasers.

This year, Big Bad Boo launched the first of many BIPOC workshops in collaboration with CMF and CBC Kids. The workshops are free, nationwide, and aimed at fostering diverse talent in the areas of Creative Writing, Storyboarding, and Animation. Big Bad Boo projects and initiatives were featured in a White House press briefing, CBC News, BBC World Service, Kidscreen, Manilla Times, Romper, Etalk, ET Canada, Toronto Sun, and Film Daily among others.

Blachfilms

Both seasons of Le 422 have been sold to Canal + in France and to TV3 Spain.

Coconut Effect Productions

Lady Ada’s Secret Society is in post-production and will be premiering in the spring of 2022 with marbleKids. Playback Online recently featured an article about the project.

Goddard/Brown

M is for more! A third season of ABC Singsong was green-lit by TVOkids. Production on 32 more episodes will begin in early 2022 with the new episodes set to premiere TVOkids later in the year.

An ABC Singsong music album called “Letters and Numbers” was released on major music streaming platforms, showcasing the tunes from Season 1. It was nominated for the 2021 JUNO Award for Children’s Album of the Year. ABC Singsong Season 1 was also nominated for a Youth Media Alliance Award of Excellence in the Best Short Format category.

Big Block Singsong has been airing on CBC for ten years! And to top it off, Big Block Singsong’s tune “Cat” was named one of the thirteen “BIGGEST SONGS EVER” by Sirius XM’s channel Kids Place Live, sitting up there with massive hits like “Everything is Awesome”, “Let It Go” and “Ghostbusters”!

Guru Studio

Guru’s newest comedy adventure series, Big Blue, made a splash with its launch on CBC Kids in Canada and on Nickelodeon in the UK. New episodes are rolling out throughout 2022. Additional broadcast partners for Big Blue include ABC in Australia, CTC Kids in Russia & CIS, EBS in South Korea, NRK in Norway and Boing in France, Africa, and Israel. The launch of Big Blue was highlighted by multiple top news outlets of diversity and environmentalism such as CTV Your Morning. Big Blue creator Gyimah Gariba and Grammy award winning producer Timbaland did an interview with ETalk discussing Big Blue and Timbaland’s involvement producing the theme song.

An official line of True and the Rainbow Kingdom toys is hitting shelves! It received two Canadian Screen Award nominations for Best Preschool Program and Best Direction, as well as a nomination for the first-ever Shaw Rocket Fund Kids’ Choice Award! The series continues to soar around the world with new broadcast partners like Clan RTVE (Spain), Carousel (Russia), WarnerMedia Boomerang (France, Africa), Mediacorp Okto (Singapore), EBC YOYO (Taiwan), TG4 (Ireland), Spacetoon (Middle East), Channel 4 (Finland) and Pixel (Ukraine). Having previously acquired multiple seasons of the series, Gloobinho (Brazil), NET (Indonesia) and NINE (Australia) have quickly acquired Season 4.

New international broadcasters for Pikwik Pack include Tiny Pop (UK), Rai (Italy), YLE (Finland), Gloob (Brazil), Televisa (Mexico), TG4 (Ireland), Canal Panda (Spain) Mediacorp Okto (Singapore), EBC YOYO (Taiwan) and OSN (Middle East & Baltics).

Guru Studio has been ranked as a top production company for another year in the Kidscreen Hot50 Awards! The studio has been picked by Chris Nee (Doc McStuffins, Vampirina) and her production company Laughing Wild for the Netflix Series, Dino Daycare.

Production is in full force on Mecha Builders, a new Sesame Street spin-off featuring Sesame Street characters re-imagined as giant robots. The new series will air in the US on HBO Max. And, more seasons of PAW Patrol are in production, with even more cool new themes and vehicles!

Headspinner Productions Inc.

In the company’s most exciting year yet, it has launched Season 1 of Denis and Me to over 21 million views, and were supported by Wildbrain to produce an additional 20 shorts and 4 x 11 minute specials. Denis was on CP24’s Breakfast Television show to promote the series, and showrunner Diana Moore was profiled in Writers Guild of Canada Magazine. Denis and Me is currently nominated for two Kidscreen 2022 awards – Best YouTube Channel and Best Web Series – and for Best Screenwriting at the Leo awards (Denis Kopotun and Diana Moore).

Happy House of Frightenstein, a 10 x 3 minute animated series on the marbleKids YouTube channel and Family Jr., has also launched. It was featured as a One to Watch at MIPCOM, and was also featured on The Morning Show on CHCH Television.

Headspinner has delivered its first original Spotify Kids podcast, Gardenkeeper Gus.

Lopii Productions

Lopii Productions is proud to present The Fabulous Show with Fay and Fluffy, launching soon on Family Jr.

The second season of My Home, My Life! is now available to watch on TVOkids.com and the TVOkids YouTube channel.

Lopii is currently in post-production on an original series for TFO, #Couleurs Du Nord. Join muralist Mique Michelle as she travels across Northern Ontario and New Brunswick to collaborate with local youth, creating vibrant community murals. Coming in 2022!

The team is also currently in development on a new school-age, live action series for TVOkids.

Manito Média

Manito Média’s new series, La Brigade, is currently in production and will be broadcast in 2023 on Radio-Canada, TFO and APTN. The company is celebrating five seasons – 65 episodes – of Canot cocasse which have been produced and can be watched on Unis TV, Radio-Canada and APTN.

No Problem Productions

No Problem Productions has an innovative, new animation technique that combines traditional shadow puppetry with a modern 2D animation technology, which will be used for its series proposal of Dilly Digger, now finalizing development and beginning production on the first 12 episodes. Famous Canadian children’s author Marty Chan joined forces with NPP’s director/producer Eva Colmers (once a practising shadow puppeteer) for the script of its completed first show, Dilly and the Mushroom Adventure, which can be seen at kids media markets and festivals in Spring 2022.

Remembrance Pictures Inc.

Brother, Man, a coming-of-age drama and youth refugee survival feature film, is now in development with Telefilm, CMF, CrBC, and the CBC. It was the winner of the Whistler Film Festival Power Pitch competition 2019, was featured in Qui fait Quoi and Le Lien MULTIMEDIA and received buzz from RDV Canada, TG Geeks, CMPA’s Daily News Flash, and NSI’s daily newsletter. “Brother, Man” was selected as one of two Canadian narrative features at The Gotham 2021. As a social impact film, it has recently been selected to WEMW’s Impact Pyramid Lab 2022. The project has been workshopped at WFF Writers’ Lab, NSI Business for Producers Lab, and CFC/Netflix Marketplace Accelerator. The script has been developed with assistance from the Canada Council for the Arts.

Téléfiction Productions Inc.

The second season of Les Mutants aired on Télé-Québec and online in the fall of 2021. Both the first and second seasons have been purchased for broadcast by TV5 Monde. A second game was released to accompany the series, called Les mutants mènent l’enquête. It’s one of the biggest games on Télé-Québec’s Squat. The series received six nominations at the Prix Gémeaux in 2021 while C plaaate! received one and Marika received five. Alice Madore won a Prix Gémeaux for her role in Marika for Best Actress in a Show or Series Produced for Digital Media: Youth.

Zoomizoom, a bilingual show aimed at helping young kids learn a second language (French or English), was released on August 31 on ICI Tou.tv and Mauril and later on CBC Gem.

A WWB Production, Inc.

WWB is in pre-production on an animated preschool series, Honeycake!, which is based on the bestselling books by Co-Executive Producer, Medea Kalantar in partnership with Yowza Animation and Tangent Animation, who will develop the Interactive Digital component for the series.

WWB is in development on its YA drama series, Surviving Grace, being co-produced with Brain Power Studio. It is also in production on a feature documentary, D!xon: Play. Pause. Rewind., being distributed by OutTv, sponsored by Absolut, Pride Toronto, Winchester Theatre, LuluLemon, City Dance Corps and the InsideOut Festival. The film is set to be released in the Summer of 2022.

CEO Lanette Ware-Bushfield will be featured on a panel at CMPAs 2022 Prime Time Conference discussing the topic: Being Seen: Directives for Creating Authentic and Inclusive Content. Lanette has been chosen as part of The Canadian Film Centre’s Media Lab (CFC Media Lab) / OYA Black Arts Coalition (OBAC) new accelerator for 2022: Scale-Up Immersive.