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November 11, 2007 Mark 9:00 Monday night on your must-watch calendar and tune to CBC TV...for ‘Intelligence’. Dear friends.... I am pretty sure that in all the scores of articles, action alerts and columns I have sent out I have never promoted a TV program... because, well, it just didn’t seem appropriate or necessary. But there is always an exception if you wait long enough. The CBC drama ‘Intelligence’ is one of those exceptions. I am writing to you because CBC senior management has had the program in its gun sites for over a year and almost killed it after its first season. Without public support I am convinced it won’t survive. That would be tragic. Many of you - I hope - already know about his extraordinary program (9:00 p.m. on Mondays). It is the creation of producer Chris Haddock (of Da Vinci’s Inquest and Da Vinci’s City Hall fame). Although I am no TV critic, for my money this is the best English speaking drama on TV anywhere. Its co-stars are a Vancouver drug kingpin, Jimmy, and the regional head of CSIS, Mary, who have struck a deal: he provides her with information about security issues (like gun smuggling) and she does her best to keep him out of jail. But that’s just the overall context for a show rich to overflowing with incredible characters - all drawn with care and attention to detail. It’s the only drama for which I have ever unplugged my phone. It is so full of tension you almost welcome the commercials. But what makes this program especially interesting for me is its deep integration theme. Starting last season and building rapidly in the first 3 episodes this fall, the CSIS character, Mary, and her team have been investigating a corporate plan to “erase the border between Canada and the US.” The principal focus is the threat to Canada’s water. In the last episode, Mary had the hotel meeting room of Canadian CEOs (including bankers and oil men) bugged to find out just exactly what was in the works for the creation of the “North American Union.” (Last season she outed a CIA mole in CSIS.) The behind the scenes drama is just as riveting. In spite of its excellence (or maybe because of it) CBC senior management seems determined to kill it off. I first twigged on this perverse situation this fall when I caught the first new episode purely by accident of channel flipping. While every other program was being promoting (Little Mosque on the Prairie about every 20 minutes it seemed) there was not a single promo for this program. A hockey-nut friend of mine tells me that on a recent hockey night in Canada literally every new and old show was promo-ed, except for Intelligence. I am still digging for all the reasons behind this plan and I will have more, hopefully soon. Part of the explanation is that every time a new “team” takes over at the CBC they think they own the place and decide to put their unique stamp on the network programming. That means axing the old. This time around the new stamp looks decidedly American low brow. According to Richard Stursberg, vice-president of CBC-TV, “CBC Television needs to be more like Tim Hortons and less like Starbucks.” Ironically, while Stursberg is eager to pull the plug on Intelligence, a US network wants Haddock to do an American version. Go figure... And in the meantime do not miss the next episode. Audience numbers are down because of no promotion. We need to drive them up. Pass it on. Murray Dobbin, policy analyst for the Council of Canadians
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