Posts tagged with “Leo awards”

This series had its genesis when I began photographing Vancouver area location shoots in the summer of 2010 to get over a long post-Olympics funk. Film and TV productions like Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, Supernatural, Fringe, Once Upon a Time and our own Continuum and Primeval:New World showcase our city in similar fashion and sometimes put a celebrity actor or two in the frame. find more on my daily blog yvrshoots.com.

Live-tweets turned out to be the best thing about last weekend’s Leo Awards celebrating the best of B.C.-made film and television. Tweets from @LeoAwards gave an award-by-award account plus details of all the hijinks in between at both the Celebration and Gala Awards: hijinks that ranged from Property Brothers Drew and Jonathan Scott mock-fighting over their award to Gala co-hosts Amanda Tapping and Robin Dunne calling each other evil twin and English MILF to Nancy Robertson and Ryan Robbins pitching a new comedy series to Emilie Ullerup re-enacting Angelina Jolie’s notorious one-leg Oscars pose to acting legend Gabrille Rose swearing on stage while presenting the final award to Sisters & Brothers for Best Feature Film.

It was a great way to let the public share in this celebration of artistic talent after a tough week, which had started with the official cancellation of homegrown sci-fi series Sanctuary, the most-recognized B.C. production by far with 18 Leo nominations going in. Sanctuary ended up winning four Leos for its fourth and final season, but only one on the night of the gala for a guest performance by Arctic Air’s Pascale Hutton, who sang beautifully and turned her head right around in the Glee-meets-The-Exorcist episode Fuge.

I’d hoped for a repeat of last year’s wild times on the red carpet outside the Hotel Vancouver on West Georgia Street, but organizers moved the red carpet inside the hotel this year to the conference floor and restricted access. Most of the nominees kept the party going after the red carpet to take a turn at the new Media Wall by the bar where I had a spot, but it was so dimly-lit I had to jack some light from the pro-photographers’ flashes. Here’s The Express’s Johanna Ward interviewing nominee and eventual winner Johannah Newmarch on the red carpet about her supporting performance in mockumentary Sunflower Hour. Ward later dropped by the Media Wall to wrangle nominees Ali Liebert from Bomb Girls and Emilie Ullerup from Arctic Air as a backdrop to her standup.

You can see the start of Emilie Ullerup’s one-leg Angelina homage and note how the popular Cassini brothers photo-bombed the arrangement. That’s Frank on the left and John on the right. Frank Cassini later won a roar from the crowd and a Leo for his supporting performance on The Aboriginal People’s Television Network’s Blackstone, a big winner all round at the Leos, including Best Dramatic Series.

Busy Gala co-hosts Amanda Tapping and Robin Dunne from Sanctuary also graced the Media Wall (on learning that the Vancouver Sun photographer had left) giving us the opportunity to see this madcap duo in action, although Dunne kept his pants on this year, much to my disappointment. Here’s a photo of them behaving for the cameras.

And misbehaving

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This series had its genesis when I began photographing Vancouver area location shoots last summer to get over a long post-Olympics funk. Film and TV productions like This Means War, Mission Impossible 4, Fringe and the new AMC series The Killing showcase our city in similar fashion and sometimes put a celebrity actor or two in the frame.

Wild is the word I’d use to describe Saturday’s red carpet at the Leo Awards celebrating the best of BC-produced film and television: from one nominee going in and out of his character to another striking poses with his elastic face to another threatening to drop his pants to the entire cast of all-Canadian series Sanctuary making funny faces for the cameras. And immortal Sanctuary star Amanda Tapping owned all 100 metres of that carpet in her floor-length black dress and five-inch heels.

Since television built the town of Hollywood North it should be no surprise that Amanda Tapping is its Queen after more than a decade on the Stargate series and then co-creating Sanctuary with writer Damian Kindler and director Martin Wood, two other Stargate almuni who I photographed below watching Tapping walk towards them. Sanctuary came into the Leos with a whopping 17 nominations and the privilege of sauntering the red carpet in prime time (the last half-hour of the two-hour West Georgia Street spectacle).

The almost-block-long red carpet started at the corner of Burrard and West Georgia with Leo red carpet host and actress Gretal Montogmery, who happens to be the significant other of presenter Chad Willett. Having one of their own interview them on camera inspired Sanctuary’s Robin Dunne to unbuckle his belt and threaten to drop his pants (captured and later tweeted in a Twitpic by his co-star Robert Lawrenson). Autograph hounds and fans managed to nab the local celebs …READ THE REST OF THIS ENTRY>>>

This series had its genesis when I began photographing Vancouver area location shoots last summer to get over a long post-Olympics funk. Film and TV productions like This Means War, Mission Impossible 4, Fringe and the new AMC series The Killing showcase our city in similar fashion and sometimes put a celebrity actor or two in the frame.

I came to the Stargate TV franchise at the tail end of its incredible 14-year run in Vancouver. The third and final series Stargate Universe (SGU), set aboard an Ancient starship called the Destiny, reminded me of Battlestar Galactica, my favourite sci-fi series ever, also filmed here. Only the long, complex mythology of the long-running sci-fi Stargate saga occasionally defeated me.

To summarize: stargates are ring-shaped technology from the Ancients which create wormholes that allow travel between worlds cosmic distances away. In the 1994 MGM feature film Stargate, one is discovered on Earth and kept secret from the public by the U.S. military. Following up on the movie’s mammoth success, TV series Stargate SG-1 began filming in Vancouver in 1997 and ran for ten seasons. Partway through. a spinoff Stargate Atlantis (SGA) — set in the legendary city of Atlantis — launched in 2004 and ran for five seasons. It seemed like  Stargate, already setting records for series longevity, would go on forever here when the third series Stargate Universe (SGU) started airing in 2009, but it was not to be.

Darker-edged but more critically-acclaimed Stargate Universe took home six Leo awards at last year’s annual celebration of film and television in British Columbia, winning Best Dramatic Series and Best Supporting Actress for Julia Benson. I took photos of Destiny crew Benson (Lt. James), Patrick Gilmore (Volker), Elyse Levesque (Chloe) and fan favourite Lou Diamond Phillips (Col. Telford) on the red carpet, without knowing what characters they played.

Not long after, I caught up with Stargate Universe’s first season and wondered if it would be possible to see them filming any of the second season on location in Vancouver. That was easier said than done, since 80% of SGU was filmed on studio sound stages, i.e. the Destiny, with the production only going on location to film rare planetary visits using the ship’s stargate or Earth visits using the communication stones (don’t ask).

Four months later, I found Stargate Universe filming a planetary visit at the old Terminal City Ironworks site (often used by film & TV productions) in East Vancouver. SGU filmed there for several days with a CGIed Stargate inside one of the buildings and virtually the entire cast there, with the exception of Robert Carlyle (Rush) and David Blue (Eli) left aboard the Destiny in studio. I photographed a green-screen on the roof to CGI a scene of Louis Ferreira (Col. Young) looking down on a deserted city: “It wasn’t abandoned. These people were wiped out.” I didn’t stick around once they finished the roof scene and moved inside, so I didn`t get to witness any of the cast`s crazy antics or shenanigans often involving cutup Ferreira, but I did see a happy and relaxed Jamil Walker Smith (Master Sgt. Greer) and Alaina Huffman (TJ), with her two young children, chatting outside their trailers with crew and fans while Ming-Na (Camille Wray) strolled around the block in the sun. SGU filmed other key scenes of this deserted city at the old Watchmen set in Burnaby. And these scenes ended up in the penultimate episode of the SGU series, in fact of the entire Stargate TV franchise.

More critical acclaim fell on Stargate Universe’s first season when the series earned multiple Gemini Award nominations last fall, including one for Best Dramatic Series. The entire cast and the creators flew to Toronto for an action-packed day on November 12th, with stops at Canada AM and then …READ THE REST OF THIS ENTRY>>>

The director of the LEO AWARD WINNING music video for Dan Mangan’s song, Road Regrets, connected with us to let us know he’s just completed a new one for Kathryn Calder! See the last video of hers that I SHARED then enjoy this hopefully-soon-to-be-award-winning gem below…

Directed: Jon Busby
Produced: Jesse Davidge and Marc Demers
Produced at Blatant Studios, Vancouver BC

Director Bruce Sweeney and cast Laara Sadiq, Agam Darshi, Gabrielle Rose, Cam Cronin and Paul Skrudland

Leo Award-winning director Bruce Sweeney screened his Best Feature Length Drama winner Excited at The Ridge Theatre this past Monday. Most of the cast was on hand for a very lively Q&A after the show.

Excited is the story of a man whose love life suffers from an inability to control his, uh, excitement and takes a funny, thoughtful (and mildly pervy) look at relationships – workplace, family, friends and lovers. Shot in 18 days in and around Vancouver, the film is also based here.

The cast of Excited

At the Q&A following the screening actress Laara Sadiq was quick to point out that the the film is a very real and true representation of the diverse landscape in the city, and that ethnicity wasn’t a major focus because it “didn’t matter for the story … it’s about relationships and people.” Director Sweeney revealed that the character of the somewhat over-bearing and involved mother (played by Leo Award winner for Best Supporting Actress Gabrielle Rose) was actually based on his own. To avoid any confusion Bruce declared, “I love my mother!”

Excited is screening tonight at 7:00 pm at The Fifth Avenue, and Bruce Sweeney will be on hand for a Q&A afterwards.

That’s my hand again!

Local actor and The X Files alum William B. Davis was on hand for a screening of director Bruce Sweeney’s Leo Award-winning Excited at The Ridge on Monday night.

Mr. Davis is extremely tall and not nearly as intimidating in person as one might think. I am happy to report that he did not smell of cigarettes.