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C21 DIGITAL SCREENINGS

Muse Entertainment Enterprises

Programming Profile

Muse’s Crawford on streaming boom, development slate

16-11-2022

Oneida Crawford, director of development, scripted, at Canada’s Muse Entertainment, reflects on how changing demand for Québécois content and the streaming boom are providing plenty of opportunities but also raising a few questions.

 

Please give a brief outline of your company and its activities.
Muse is a leading independent Canadian production house and distributor with a solid international reputation in the dramatic scripted space, especially known for high-profile, ambitious television series. We also produce unscripted projects such as docu-dramas, documentary series and lifestyle specials. Muse also has a unique niche in the world as experienced service producers and international coproducers.

 

What shows is your company best known for and what do you have in production?
Muse is best known for award-winning, epic historical miniseries like The Kennedys (History, Reelz), Tut (Viacom, History) and The Pillars of the Earth (Starz). We also make detective dramas such as Coroner (The CW, CBC), The Murders (SundanceNow, Citytv) and Bellevue (WGN, CBC), plus unscripted true crime series For Heaven’s Sake (Paramount+) and The Unsolved Murder of Beverly Lynn Smith (Amazon).

 

Ludlow
Oneida Crawford,
Muse Entertainment

Our slate also includes family-friendly and holiday programming such as Single All The Way (Netflix), Best Foot Forward (Apple) and Cyberbully (Disney/Freeform). We currently have three new movies in production: a holiday movie for Hallmark, a mystery movie for Hallmark and a biopic for Lifetime. We are the service producers behind the hit CBS series Ghosts, which is currently shooting season two.

 

What projects do you have on the development slate?
We have such a variety of projects on our development slate but a few we are especially excited about include: Bride of New France, an epic historical drama series set 17th century Quebec; Cardinal Rules, a half-hour, blue-collar comedy about an Indigenous family living in Surrey, BC; New Detroit, a mysterious sci-fi drama set in a futuristic Detroit; Dare Island, a soapy romance set in the picturesque 1,000 Islands region; and Scorned, a gripping thriller miniseries about two women who hatch a revenge plot on their exes.

 

Bridge of New France
Bride of New France

What is your international expansion strategy?
We really pride ourselves on being a collaborative company and we work with partners all over the world; most recently companies in the UK, France and Australia. Forging these international partnerships is an important part of our growth as a company. We are always pursuing new opportunities for international partnerships and coproductions. We have also been active in expanding our US footprint and have been successfully developing and producing shows for the American market, which has reinforced our strong reputation as producers.

 

How do you see global demand for Québécois content changing and where is demand highest?
Everywhere we are seeing demand for local content; shows that feel authentically rooted in character and setting. Muse is one of the few Anglophone producers in Montreal and so we are in a unique position to be able to showcase Quebecois content in the global market. A great example of this is our historical drama Bride of New France, which is set in Quebec but has been developed in English for a global audience.

 

Swindler Seduction
Swindler Seduction

Another aspect of being a Quebec company means we can work in English and in French. Last year, we produced L’Orignal, a French-language kids’ series for Radio-Canada based on best-selling book Moose by Robert Munsch. We are also proud to have been the service producers for the upcoming Amazon series Three Pines, which stayed true to the original Québécois setting of Louise Penny’s books. We are excited about being able to embrace our home province and everything that makes it unique. This willingness to explore local culture and history has inspired more Indigenous storytelling in Quebec and the rest of Canada, which is a top priority for us as a country.

 

How has the rise of streaming changed things for Québécois producers?
The mandates for these streamers to fund and showcase local content is definitely appealing creatively and helps broaden the marketplace from the existing oligopoly that we have here. But at the same time, we’re all trying to understand how we can ensure the streamers contribute meaningfully. Until we see these local streaming mandates come to fruition, with slates that reflect the diversity of Canadian stories, it’s unclear how positive their impact and investment will be, since many are in direct competition with our domestic broadcasters.

 

What is your company looking to achieve at Content London 2022 and next year?
Having worked remotely for so long, we are most eager to connect in person and hear new company mandates first-hand, as well as find new opportunities for coproductions and to discover new talent. For 2023, we are looking forward to taking out several new series and movie projects in the new year and will continue to produce content in Canada and abroad for the foreseeable future.



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    During its 23 years in business, Muse Entertainment has grown to become one of the largest independent production companies in Canada.

     

    In the late 2000s and early 2010s, it built a solid reputation in the scripted world with projects including the eight-part Canada-produced miniseries The Kennedys, about the lives of the Kennedy family; a North American remake of the British supernatural series Being Human, which ran for four seasons; the Canadian crime series Durham County; and the WWII-set Bomb Girls.
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