Why Canadian authors are hot in Hollywood

Last year, the animated film The Breadwinner, based on a book by Cochrane, Ont., author Deborah Ellis, was nominated for an Academy Award.

On television, Canadian culture is having an exceptional moment, with The Handmaid’s Tale, based on the Margaret Atwood novel, winning an Emmy Award for Best Drama. There was also critical acclaim for the CBC’s Alias Grace, another Atwood property, and Anne With An E, from the CBC and Netflix.

Producer Shaw will also be at the festival this year, shopping Atwood’s 1969 Toronto-set novel The Edible Woman to financiers.

“In some ways I think we have perhaps become more nationalistic as we try to define ourselves against Americans,” says the Toronto film producer. “We are a place of great talent and I think, over the last few years, we’ve hit a tipping point where we truly value our stories and want them told and, moreover, the world is seeing the value of our stories.”

She adds: “It’s an incredible time for Canadians in the industry and I think authors like Margaret Atwood who are so prolific and ahead of their time are making a difference. People outside Canada are noticing.”

While most TIFF fans will be fixated on the red carpet, the festival is also very much about the business of making movies and deals.

Shaw will be a participant in the International Financing Forum on Sunday and Monday, where producers are teamed up with potential financiers to make their movies. It’s kind of like speed dating — but with millions at stake.

In this case, Shaw will need to raise anywhere from $6 million to $8 million to make her film.

“You sort of sit down for 10 minutes and try to show your best self,” says Shaw. “It can either feel like the longest 10 minutes ever if you’re not a match or, at other times, you just want to keep talking. But it’s such an honour to be among these really high level distributors and financiers where you might never get that level of access.”

The forum, developed 12 years ago by the Ontario Media Development Corporation — which on Friday changed its name to Ontario Creates — has been hugely successful. Of the 520 projects pitched, 75 have been financed and produced, which is a strong batting average for the fragile ecosystem that constitutes the movie business.

It’s also something to be proud of. The financing forum model has been adopted by other film festivals to introduce the people with ideas to folks with money. What started as a meeting in a boardroom cajoling producers to meet with would-be movie executives has turned into one of the highlights for producers at TIFF.

“I think producers are beginning to realize there is some fabulous literary content by Canadians and we’re seeing some real results,” says Karen Thorne-Stone, president and CEO of Ontario Creates.

While there are no formal numbers on the number of Canadian literary projects greenlit by producers, Thorne-Stone says that subjectively there “seems to be more activity and definitely more interest.”

A lot of that is coming from the success of the TV adaptations, especially Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.

This isn’t to say that Canada hasn’t had good success in the past at translating works of fiction.

In 2015, Emma Donoghue’s Room was adapted into a Toronto-shot movie, for which Brie Larson won an Academy Award for Best Actress.

There was also Yann Martel’s Life of Pi, which won the Man Booker Prize in 2002. Ang Lee’s 2012 adaptation won four Academy Awards.

And, of course, there was Michael Ondaatje’s The English Patient, which won the Booker in 1992. The 1996 film starring Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche went on to win nine Academy Awards.

But insiders say the flurry of activity and interest they are seeing seems to be more sustained than in the past. It also says something about the strength of Canada’s diversity that our works resonate internationally from writers who are often transplanted Canadians giving a unique world view.

Toronto Star columnist Uzma Jalaluddin’s novel Ayesha at Last, for example, was recently optioned for purchase by powerful movie producer Amy Pascal, the former chair of Sony’s Motion Picture Group. Pascal’s own production company released the all-female Ghostbusters reboot and Spider-Man: Homecoming.

Jalaluddin’s novel has been described as a Muslim take on Pride and Prejudice, as Hollywood looks for the next big racially diverse comedy in the wake of Crazy Rich Asians.

“You don’t have to explain what Canadian culture is about, or why our writers have a diverse point of view, because we are diverse as a nation. That’s already part of our identity,” says Toronto TV and film producer Andrew Rosen.

When Rosen optioned the little known book The Breadwinner in 2009, he didn’t figure that the journey would take eight years before he saw the final product. Or that he would end up at the Oscars with Angela Jolie as the executive producer.

It started with Ellis’s book inspired by a girl who disguised herself as a boy in an Afghan refugee camp.

“It was a great story written by a Canadian and it was something we really were drawn to,” says Rosen.

Rosen initially envisioned the story as a live action film. But then he realized that animation was the best way to go. He optioned the book at another OMDC forum where publishers of Ontario literature meet potential producers.

The $12-million film got a boost when Jolie decided to come on as executive producer.

“I think she was naturally attracted to the material. She had been working with the United Nations and been to Afghanistan many times, so she was enthusiastic about the work,” says Rosen.

The movie lost to Pixar’s Coco for Best Animated Film. But Rosen says it’s a night he won’t soon forget.

“It was pretty surreal, of course. And very gratifying that we stuck through with the process. There were lots of times we could have just given up. But we really believed in the material.”

As for Shaw, she has high hopes she will find the right partners for her film.

Fortunately, she has Canada’s hottest cultural property in the form of Atwood. It’s a name that opens doors and one she doesn’t have to explain in her pitch. Shaw says she is already getting interest from German and British producers.

“Financiers are not so much interested in risk,” says Shaw. “If you have a well-known international property they know they already have a built-in audience. And this is really timely. The book is set in the ’60s, a time of women’s marches and emerging feminism. And it works within the whole context of the #timesup and #metoo movements.”

Shaw says Atwood has read the script, and has given copious and detailed notes, down to the type of hosiery that was used back in the 1960s.

“This is kind of autobiographical; it’s Margaret’s story in some ways and she’s super supportive,” says Shaw.

But given that Atwood seems to be everywhere these days, the question of whether we have hit a peak Atwood bubble can give a risk-averse producer pause.

“There is always some risk,” says Shaw. “You see that with the superhero movies and properties like Star Wars. But I don’t think we are anywhere near that point. And the great thing is that this book is very different from the other books. Alias Grace was about the past and Handmaid’s Tale was about the future. But this one is about our present.”

Besides pitching her film, Shaw has a busy slate at TIFF this year.

Two of the movies she co-produced, Giant Little Ones, starring Maria Bello and Kyle MacLachlan, and the late Rob Stewart’s documentary Sharkwater Extinction are debuting at the festival. So she will be both behind and in front of the red carpet.

“It’s pretty exciting. But there is so much going on behind the scenes in trying to make movies, you’re always on to the next thing,” says Shaw. “It’s such a long journey to get from financing, to actually sitting down and enjoying the show with an audience. It makes you appreciate what a truly great privilege that is.”