Filmmakers invade Martime ex-forces bases
November 1, 1996
By Sid Adilman, The Toronto Star
ABOUT FACE! Ingenuity in the Maritimes has created a new income-spinning use for former armed forces bases and it could easily spread across the country.
Even when they resigned recently for different reasons, Defence Minister David Collenette and General Jean Boyle - or their senior aides who stayed on - didn’t trumpet the news.
Stripped of military personnel and the money they spent annually in the local communities, two former Martime bases are now housing actors, producers, directors, writers, film studios and crews. And their communities are enjoying unexpected economic relief.
A recently decommissioned military communications base in Mill Cove, Nova Scotia, near Halifax - still with its own military guard at the gate - is home for Black Harbour, a TV drama series that begins Dec. 4 on CBC.
It stars Geraint Wyn Davies and Rebecca Jenkins and uses three buildings - one, the former base’s gymnasium converted for the show into a boat- building shed and a spacious office building used by, among others, the series’ executive producers, Wayne Grigsby and Barbara Samuels, the creators of North Of 60.
Despite the changes, Grigsby, Samuels and company keep the militarily drab paint in offices and corridors and also retain the base’s names on office doors such as “mess manager.” Grigsby calls the digs “terrific space; we were lucky to find it.”
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November 1, 1996
By Sid Adilman, The Toronto Star
ABOUT FACE! Ingenuity in the Maritimes has created a new income-spinning use for former armed forces bases and it could easily spread across the country.
Even when they resigned recently for different reasons, Defence Minister David Collenette and General Jean Boyle - or their senior aides who stayed on - didn’t trumpet the news.
Stripped of military personnel and the money they spent annually in the local communities, two former Martime bases are now housing actors, producers, directors, writers, film studios and crews. And their communities are enjoying unexpected economic relief.
A recently decommissioned military communications base in Mill Cove, Nova Scotia, near Halifax - still with its own military guard at the gate - is home for Black Harbour, a TV drama series that begins Dec. 4 on CBC.
It stars Geraint Wyn Davies and Rebecca Jenkins and uses three buildings - one, the former base’s gymnasium converted for the show into a boat- building shed and a spacious office building used by, among others, the series’ executive producers, Wayne Grigsby and Barbara Samuels, the creators of North Of 60.
Despite the changes, Grigsby, Samuels and company keep the militarily drab paint in offices and corridors and also retain the base’s names on office doors such as “mess manager.” Grigsby calls the digs “terrific space; we were lucky to find it.”
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