Ken Finkleman
William Bowman is a small town boy with small town dreams. And like any average teenager, when approached with the subject of his future, Bowman would often retreat into the safe recesses of his mind. When a concussion seemingly sends William to an uncertain future, what follows is a series of hilarious capers from William’s status as an average teenager to a nationwide media phenomenon. Is William a product of bad luck? Good luck? Or is his future subject to miracles and unlikely circumstances?
Good God is a Canadian television comedy-drama series which premiered in April 2012 on HBO Canada. The show follows the life of character George Findlay, a role that Ken Finkleman reprised from The Newsroom and subsequent television projects. The series was originally slated to be the second season of Finkleman's previous HBO Canada project Good Dog, but was retitled in accordance with a change in the show's setting. The show was described in early media coverage as having been inspired in part by the launch of Sun News Network. In the show's first episode, for example, Findlay is forced to respond to allegations that his new venture is aspiring to be "Fox News North", an epithet which the real Sun News Network also faced both before and after its launch. The series was nominated for several awards at the 2013 Canadian Screen Awards, including Best Comedy Series, Best Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series for Jason Weinberg and Best Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series nods for both Samantha Bee and Jud Tylor.
It's a strange movie that you have to watch beginning to end, or you'll find yourself completely lost. Based on the Toronto-made TV series "Newsroom," this made-for-TV movie has many well-recognized Canadian actors and comedians. It's a modest comedy that has its "short chuckle of laughter" moments, but the real highlight is similar to the highlight of 12 Angry Men. They obviously endeavoured to make the acting look as real and natural as possible when making this show, and most of the entertainment comes from listening in on their conversations and being convinced by the good acting. This is the similarity to 12 Angry Men.
Foolish Heart was a Canadian television series, which aired on CBC Television in 1999. The series, a short run dramatic anthology, was produced and written by Ken Finkleman following his earlier series The Newsroom and More Tears. Although the episodes were linked by character interactions, each of the series' six episodes focused on a different character's family or romantic relationship problems. Finkleman also starred in the series as George Findlay, the same character he had played in The Newsroom and More Tears. The series won Finkleman a 1999 Gemini Award for Best Direction in a Dramatic Series. The cast also included Arsinée Khanjian, Sarah Strange, Tom McCamus, Nancy Beatty and Patricia O'Callaghan. Finkleman's next project for the CBC was the series Foreign Objects.
More Tears is a seriocomedy television series that was broadcast by CBC Television, as a short run programme; it was written and produced by Ken Finkleman following the success of The Newsroom, and was partly a remake of 8½, by Federico Fellini. As in The Newsroom, George Findlay is the protagonist of More Tears, as a documentary producer, who manipulated his subjects in order to create better television drama. In the final installment, Findlay abandoned the documentary form to film a satire of the neo-conservative government of Mike Harris, the Premier of Ontario. The programme also explored the personal life of George Findlay, his unhappy marriage, and his unhappy extra-marital affairs. The cast of More Tears also included Hrant Alianak, Yank Azman, Arsinée Khanjian, Leah Pinsent, Evan Solomon, and Kenny Vadas. Finkleman's next project for the CBC was the series Foolish Heart.
The Newsroom is a Canadian television comedy-drama series which ran on CBC Television in the 1996–97, 2003–04 and 2004–05 seasons. A two-hour television movie, Escape from the Newsroom, was broadcast in 2002. The show is set in the newsroom of a television station which is never officially named, but is generally understood to be based on the CBC itself. Inspired by American series The Larry Sanders Show and similar to such earlier series as the British Drop the Dead Donkey and the Australian Frontline, the series mined a dark vein of comedy from the political machinations and the sheer incompetence of the people involved in producing City Hour, the station's nightly newscast. Although not originally intended as an ongoing series, the initial run of 13 episodes led The Newsroom to become one of the most critically acclaimed programs on Canadian television in the 1990s. Following the end of The Newsroom, Finkleman produced three different short-run series for the CBC, More Tears, Foolish Heart and Foreign Objects, all of which included Findlay as a linking character.
This satiric comedy concerns a documentary filmmaker (Ken Finkleman) who has brought a camera crew into the home of a typical couple (Robert Cait and Karen Hines) to record the drama of their daily lives. However, the filmmaker soon discovers their daily lives aren't especially interesting, and soon he finds himself deliberately throwing chaos into their path in hopes of making for a more exciting movie. Married Life: The Movie was originally produced as a weekly television series, with four episodes re-edited into this feature; the show's director and star, Ken Finkleman, later went on to create the award-winning Canadian sitcom The Newsroom.
An uptight New York tax lawyer gets his life turned upside down, all in a single day, when he's asked to escort a feisty and free-spirited female ex-convict whom asks him to help prove her innocence of her crime.
In this comic take on big-business wheelings and dealings, an ambitious senator's son (Judge Reinhold) moves up the corporate ladder through undeserved promotions. But against his better judgment, he falls for a woman (the chairman's daughter, no less) who's leading a protest against the company's shady business practices. "Saturday Night Live" writer-performer Michael O'Donoghue scripted this satire co-starring Danny DeVito and Jane Seymour.
It's 1961, two years after the original Grease gang graduated, and there's a new crop of seniors and new members of the coolest cliques on campus, the Pink Ladies and T-Birds. Michael Carrington is the new kid in school - but he's been branded a brainiac. Can he fix up an old motorcycle, don a leather jacket, avoid a rumble with the leader of the T-Birds, and win the heart of Pink Lady Stephanie?
A faulty computer causes a passenger space shuttle to head straight for the sun, and man-with-a-past, Ted Striker must save the day and get the shuttle back on track – again – all the while trying to patch up his relationship with Elaine.
Short-lived variety show starring Dick Van Dyke and assorted guests. The show was best known for Dick's pantomime acting and a recurring skit about the dumbest family in the world, coincidently named "The Bright Family". Van Dyke & Co also featured appearances by the Los Angeles Mime Company.
Unseen for decades, 1980 is Ken Finkleman and Rick Moranis’ enormously funny CBC pilot that was way ahead of its time. A send up of a current-affairs show, 1980 pokes fun at subjects ranging from the current state of the Canadian film industry, academics, the student radicals of the 60s to Hollywood depictions of the Holocaust. Steven Kampmann stars along with Finkleman and Moranis. Also featuring Toronto salesman Phil Givner, Andrew Gilles, Caroline Yeager and the late comedy producer, Joe Bodolai. 1980 shown courtesy of CBC.
