Volume 1 – 2021

Featured in this edition: Apartment 11 Productions, BGM Inc., CarpeDiem Film & TV Inc., GALA PROD, Headspinner Productions, K6 Media Group, Little Engine Moving Pictures, Sardine Productions, Silly Robbie Entertainment Inc., Taqqut Productions, and Téléfiction Productions Inc. 

Apartment 11 Productions

Apartment 11 filmed innovatively during COVID and was able to complete production on Big Top Academy: School’s Out Edition for TVOkids and POP TV. This live-action series spin-off of Big Top Academy premiered last fall.

Wacky Number Songs, a 40 x 2’ musical series with a focus on math and numbers, premieres this summer on TVO.

Now in production! Interstellar Ella (SRC, TVOKids, TFO, Knowledge Network, and Ketnet) is a new CGI animated series about a girl named Ella gleefully testing her limits in a star-filled playground called ‘The Milky Way’. This series is a co-production with Fabrique Fantastique of Belgium and is distributed by Aardman Animations.

The first season of Backyard Beats has been nominated for Best Mixed-Media Series at the 2021 Kidscreen Awards. TVO has greenlit a second season, featuring even more DIY instrument projects, to the tune of big-name musical guests and talented Junior Jammers!

The first season of Gabby’s Farm will launch on TVO in spring 2021. This live-action show aimed at preschoolers explores life on a farm from the perspective of seven-year-old Gabby.

In fall/winter 2020, BGM premiered Kid Food Nation: The Show on YTV, where YTV hosts Spencer Litzinger and Tyra Sweet cook up a storm with celebrity chefs and meet Kid Food Nation members from across Ontario. Full episodes of the series can be found on StackTV and YTV’s YouTube page.

BGM is also producing their eighth season of YTV interstitial content for Corus, with The Zone (weekdays 4 – 6 pm), Zone Weekend (Saturdays 9 am – 12 pm) and Big Fun Movies (Sundays 6 – 8 pm). Hosts Duhin, Spencer, Tyra and Alex interview today’s biggest celebs, play games and perform skits.

BGM Inc. is partnering with sister company Oasis Animation to develop the animated series Riley Rocket, an action-packed, rocking comedy about Riley and her band mates, who are secret superheroes that use the power of their music to save the day.

CarpeDiem Film & TV Inc.

In May 2020, feature film Racetime won the Jury Special Mention at the YMA Awards of Excellence!

On the distribution side, Quebec-Madrid based company Pink Parrot Media just secured a deal for Snowsnaps, a 52x5min sequel of the brand Snowtime! / Racetime, with Disney Junior in the US in November and Sky Kids in the UK released in mid-January. The series’ success has grown in 2020 with sales in Turkey, UEA, Slovenia, Spain and re-runs in Estonia and Germany for the winter season. Watch the Snowsnaps trailer here.

The release of Snowsnaps in the UK was covered in a number of publications, including Animation Magazine, TV Kids, The Animation World Magazine, C21 Media and in Kidscreen’s Deals of the Week.

CarpeDiem is starting production of its next CGI feature film, Butterfly Tale, in coproduction with Ulysses Filmproduktion in Germany, to be released by Q3 2022.

GALA PROD

The Adventures of Li’lDoc is a new opus for the Li’lDoc brand, and an original narrative complement to the TV series Ask Li’lDoc (52 x 3 minutes), distributed in nearly 140 countries by CBC / Radio Canada Distribution International since year one.

Li’lDoc‘s mobile game app launched last summer and the game is distributed all over the world on the Apple Store and Google Play Store.

In 2021, GALA PROD plans to produce a French-language documentary TV series with TV5-Unis, Anecdotik (52 x 2 minutes), and two animated series: The Adventures of Li’lDoc (20×11 minutes) and The Fortissimos (20×11 minutes).

Headspinner Productions Inc.

The animated series Denis and Me launched in November on YouTube and December on CRAVE Canada through the CMF-SRF Kids Digital Animated Series Program. It currently has over 15 million views and close to 300K followers! Season 2 is now in production with support from Wildbrain.

Headspinner has also shot a mini-pilot of their upcoming series Hilarious House of Frightenstein.

K6 Media Group

K6 Media Group’s charming animated series, Li’l Santa, (produced through the CMF-SRF Kids Digital Animated Series Program) debuted last December on Coucou (Télé-Québec), Toon-A-Vision, and Toon Goggles. The Li’l Santa Christmas Special Li’l Santa’s Li’l Big Adventure will air this Christmas with even more episodes.

Having acquired the global rights for Dollicious last year, K6 Media Group is developing an exciting 360° brand strategy for the IP which includes publishing, toys, an animated series, TV specials and more.

The group has also just launched their publishing house, K6 Editions, that will be launching the Dollicious comic book series this year and is publishing the latest volume of the successful Canadian comic series, Biodome.

Little Engine Moving Pictures

Cutie Pugs won a YMA Award, a W3 Award and a 2020 Kidscreen Award, and received its second nomination for a Prix Jeunesse. It was one of the most-viewed preschool series on both Hop! Channel Israel and Hopster UK, and is selling to a raft of new international partners.

Hopster Head of Content Ellen Solberg promoted Cutie Pugs in a December 2020 Worldscreen interview as one of its most-viewed preschool series. Sharon Moverman, Director of Acquisitions at Hop! Channel Israel also cited Cutie Pugs as one of its top-viewed preschool programs.

Cutie Pugs ABC is Little Engine’s debut animated series, commissioned by TVOKids, which launched September 2020 on TVOKids, TVOKids YouTube, and Knowledge Channel, and is being distributed at Kidscreen Summit, Annecy Festival, MIPTV and MIPCOM this year.

S is for Storytelling, a new Sesame Street animated short, premieres on HBOMax in the US and Treehouse in Canada, marking Little Engine’s first collaboration with Sesame Workshop.

Little Engine launched a summer Creator Preschool Pitch Initiative which received over 60 submissions from across the country. Two animated properties by female creators were optioned and are in active development: Camp Coup and Tiny and Tall. They are being actively tracked by international broadcasters, and Little Engine is entering into follow-up meetings at Kidscreen Summit.

The company partnered with Calgary-based country music legend George Canyon to develop Happy Trails, a musical variety series for CBC.

Starseeker, a live action CGI-hybrid sci-fi series, is in development with European and Canadian partners.

Sardine Productions Inc.

Sardine Productions is partnering with Studio Bozzetto & Co. on a series called The Game Catchers (52 x 7 mins), its first co-production with Italy. Produced for Radio-Canada, Toon A Vision, Knowledge Network, Rai Yoyo & DeaJunior, and financially supported in Canada by the Shaw Rocket Fund, the CMF, the SODEC & the CPTC, the series will start airing in Q4 2021.

Sardine Productions announced the production of a fourth season of the popular TV series Leon, with an additional 52×1’, which brings the total number of episodes to 208×1’. Web games will simultaneously be produced and all content will be available for distribution in Q4 2021. Season 4 will be released on SRC.

Silly Robbie Entertainment, Inc.

Silly Robbie’s World is a live action / puppet / animation combination show that focuses on important issues that kids face every day, such as healthy living, self-esteem and treating others the way you want to be treated. A full 13-episode season features all original music (composed by Robbie Doherty (Silly Robbie) and Rob Reid (co-producer)) with a soundtrack available on all major streaming platforms.

The show aired weekly on Eastlink TV across Atlantic Canada, and is now airing nationally where Eastlink has service. The series is also available on YouTube in its entirety.

Silly Robbie’s World was featured in every SaltWire newspaper across Atlantic Canada (The Chronicle-Herald in Halifax, The Guardian in Charlottetown, and the Telegram in St. John’s).

Robbie Doherty has competed in four Tim Hortons Briers, and Curling Canada did a feature on the show.

This series was completed with little resources; truly a home-made project. Producers look forward to the potential of a full-length movie or Season 2.

Taqqut Productions

Anaana’s Tent Season 2 aired in 2020 on APTN with the Inuktitut version starting in February and the English version starting in May. Both seasons are available to watch on APTN Lumi. After COVID forced a delay, Season 3 is now in production for APTN!

Anaana’s Tent has been featured heavily as one of the series that will be airing on the new Inuktitut language TV channel Uvagut TV.

Inuktitut kids series Ukaliq & Kalla is now available on IsumaTV.

In 2021, Taqqut began production on the upcoming animated and live action kids series Tundra Friends for APTN.

Téléfiction Productions Inc.

Marika was nominated for a 2020 Prix Gémeaux for Best Original Program or Series Produced for Digital Media: Fiction, and Nicolas Germain-Vien was nominated for Best Male Performance for a Program or Series Produced for Digital Media: Youth (as part of Marika 2). Season 4 will be available on the ICI TOU.TV platform starting in February 2021.

The new Les Mutants series aired starting in August 2020 on Télé-Québec, and a second season is in production.