Man With Brooms invades Hollywood

Everybody’s favourite movie-star curler, Paul Gross, isn’t resting on his Passchendaele laurels. The man who once had a slide delivery more solid than that of many TCN readers has not one, but two new projects coming soon... and an award is headed his way this weekend.

CTV and ABC (in the U.S.) have both picked up “Eastwick”, a TV adaption of the 1987 film “The Witches of Eastwick”. Gross plays the part of The Devil, in a very juicy role made famous by none other than... Jack Nicholson.

Gross will also appear in the comedy western “Gunless”, as a nasty American gunfighter nicknamed The Montana Kid (photo above).

In addition, the Men With Brooms maven will receive the NBC Universal Canada Award of Distinction at this year’s 30th anniversary Banff World Television Festival, now underway in Calgary... where delegates will also have the opportunity to be “In conversation with Paul Gross”.

A preview of the famed festival can be found here and a Calgary Herald story summarizing all these Gross adventures can be found here.

And in a more hardcore curling vein...


• Bachelorette Jillian Harris told the media a few things about the “curling date”, from this one:

“I really love the curling date. Curling is – and I hate to say it because curlers are going to hate me – that quintessential, Canadian, nerdy sport. I find it really nostalgic. I did it a lot as a kid, hanging out in lounges. The guys really got into it.”

... to this one:

“This was such a nostalgic date for me. I remember curling bonspiels when I was just a kid — so much fun! To my delight … the guys loved it too!”

Nah, we don’t hate you Jill... after all, since the episode has turned out to be such a hit for tourism in Vancouver, we expect local curling clubs to have their voicemail systems jammed full with messages over the summer.

A note to the curious: Harris’ current hometown may be Vancouver but she’s really an Alberta gal, from Peace River, and that’s where her young curling memories come from ...

• DID YOU KNOW: that curling columnist, editor and book writer Bob Weeks made an early appearance in this leadership convention video for Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff?

• CITY GOOD: PEI’s Charlottetown Curling Club was recently honoured at the Mayor’s Citizen and Recognition Awards night. As the citation reads, “Founded in 1887, the Charlottetown Curling Club has remained a source of recreation, entertainment and camaraderie for the City of Charlottetown and its surrounding communities for 122 years.” Boo-yah!

• CITY BAD: A big boo to the town of Cochrane, Alberta. City councillors have stomped all over the curling club’s request to add two sheets of ice to their facility ...

• Luber’s Lounge has posted the tentative Manitoba Curling Tour schedule for the 2009-10 season ...

• DID YOU KNOW II: that the Ontario Curling Association van in which ED Doug Bakes zips around the province each season is now for sale? Well, giddyap ...

• Toronto’s 13th Annual East York Summerspiel gets underway tomorrow and finishes Saturday. The bonspiel theme is based on the movie Grease, and the club is heavily decorated and awaits the 36 teams that have entered. The curling starts on Friday night at 6:00pm and there will be a live band that night at the club ...

• And finally, we were planning to reveal the incredibly bizarre curling posting from a blogger named Bliss, but Skip Cottage beat us to it. Here is Bob’s take on the eccentricity, which of course simply must lead you to click through and see it for yourself ...

That Curling Movie Star

Curling’s favourite movie star, Paul Gross, is back.

This time, the Canadian star of Due South and Slings and Arrows and, of course, Men With Brooms is now a WWI soldier, in a grandiose film with elements loosely based on stories told by Gross’ own grandfather. Passchendaele has some MWB echoes, too: instead of the challenges of slippery ice, the filmmaker created a slippery, multi-acre mudbowl on a reserve near Calgary. And PG also repeated his multitasking effort in this new film, once again getting his hands filthy as director, star, co-writer, co-producer, editing watchdog, finance-wrangler, and so on.

TCN honcho George Karrys was recently quoted on Gross’ surprisingly good curling skill-set, while film critic Jay Stone – who accompanied the MWB cast on that wild week-long cross-Canada press tour seven years ago – has a write-up here.

The film kicked off the reknowned Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) last night; info via the Hollywood Reporter and U.S. Daily while the red-carpet photo of Gross (above) comes from Empire Movies.


Meanwhile...

• The curling season is definitely in full swing. Switzerland’s Baden Masters is underway as of this morning, but worries over rising costs of air travel and how this may affect the curling season are already coming home to roost.

Three Canadian teams, including Randy Ferbey, pulled out of the Masters citing cost factors, and one wonders just how difficult a season this will be for many Tour events, in any country.

For example, will world champ Jennifer Jones maintain her committment to fly three hours within Canada and then across the Atlantic ocean to compete in a three-day event in Scotland?

Of course, we hope so. In fact, given that Team Canada is arguably one of the top-funded squads around and has no local playdowns to contest in January, we anticipate so. But we worry nontheless, and if not about the Glynhill, other events across the curling landscape ...

• The CUETS Schmirler Classic has a new date this year – this month in fact – and it seems to have paid off ...

• DID YOU KNOW: that an access road in Harbour Grace, Newfoundland has a new name? It has been officially renamed “Jamie’s Way” in honour of Jamie Korab, member of Team Gushue, the 2006 Olympic Champions in men’s curling. An August 18 lunchtime doodah saw the local mayor and provincial transportation minister join Korab for the induction ...

• DID YOU KNOW II: that Korab’s skip, Brad Gushue, was named by the Telegraph as Newfoundland’s second-greatest athlete of all time... ?

• Seems there may be some potential hardware problems in Iqualuit, leading into this fall’s Canadian Mixed ...

• Cynthtic recently gave us an inside peek at BC’s recent Four Foot Curling Camp ...

• Here’s a fun video report on the Bay Area CC’s Crushspiel ...

• Speaking of fun videos, remember Raj Binder at the 2005 Canadian Olympic Trials? Oh yes, it is a classic ...

• Manitoba’s latest Sports Hall of Fame inductions include the 1928-29 Brier champion Gordon Hudson squad, plus curling builders Stan Oleson and Reid Lumbard ...

• Canadian Junior men’s skip William Dion and many other amateur athletes are up for a Quebec award ...

• Former Gushuer Chris Schille stars at The Curling Show ...

• Glenn Howard is vowing to support his friend and ex-teammate Wayne Middaugh in his upcoming tax fight with the Canadian government ...

• Edmonton’s Mark Johnson is off the United States ...

• Manitoba curling has unveiled its new administrators, here and here ...

• Globetrotting curling coach Dick Henderson is back on the ice, and in his hometown ...

• How’s this for a celebrity curling team? Yourself and none other than Kerry Burtnyk, Jeff Stoughton and Vic Peters?

• Speaking of, Peters will not attempt to defend his provincial Seniors title; seems he’s having too much fun beating up on younger competitors ...

• And finally, we’ve told you about the Australian men’s team and their effective use of Microsoft Office Live software. The story is out again, courtesy of MarketWatch, but the latest is this muy cool video showing them using the tool in action ...