Famed boat from TV show The Beachcombers on display in Vancouver
CBC's Caroline Chan speaks with Deano Fatovic at the Vancouver International Boat Show. He's restoring Relic's HiBaller II from the long-running TV show The Beachcombers.
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CBC
3 hours ago
- CBC
How the Edmonton Oilers fandom became a kind of religion
Social Sharing For the second year in a row, the Edmonton Oilers are facing off against the Florida Panthers in the Stanley Cup Finals — and the culture of the Oilers fanbase has reached a new kind of fever pitch. Today on Commotion, CBC Edmonton reporter Min Dhariwal and professor Judith Ellen Brunton discuss how the intensity of Oilers fandom in Edmonton transcends mere hometown boosterism to resemble something more like a religion. We've included some highlights below, edited for length and clarity. For the full discussion, listen and follow Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud on your favourite podcast player. WATCH | Today's episode on YouTube: Elamin: Min, I'll start by maybe offering my condolences over game three. I hope things get a little bit better. But we're not here to talk about what is happening on the ice…. Give me a sense of the vibe, of what happens when the Oilers are in the finals. Min: Yeah, well, after a game like game three, the vibe kind of gets knocked down a couple of notches. But I mean, this run has been as good if not better than last year's, and the city is just alive, right? It doesn't matter if you go into a store, you jump into a cab, the driver might be wearing an Oilers jersey, or might have a flag on the car. You go downtown, you see flags and Oilers paraphernalia in the windows, up in the towers. On game days, the downtown just becomes a zoo … and people are wearing their jerseys all day long. So it has certainly made spring and summertime in Edmonton the last couple of years very different from how it used to be for many, many years. Elamin: Judith, the premise of this conversation is, it's not just that a city gets excited when their team is in the finals. It's that there is something different about this fandom. You're a professor of religious studies. Your particular area is Alberta and the way that religious ideology intertwines with the province's culture of oil, oil production, prosperity and also hockey. You recently wrote about this for The Conversation, about how the history kind of amplifies the intensity of this fandom. Can you unpack that idea of where this fandom maybe meets religion? Judith: For sure. I mean, you said it: when there's something weird going on, that's a good moment for a scholar of religion to appear, so here I am. I think that whenever we talk about shared values or zeal, or identity or commitment, that's a good moment to think about religion, because one way to describe religion is just kind of a technology of shared values, or a way people organize their values together. And scholars of religion and sport, which include my co-author for that piece, Cody Musselman, have studied a lot about how team sports act really religionally…. They have lots of rituals. They have prayers and superstitions. Folks wear special clothing, they have certain ideas of how to preserve purity. So a lot of that is already going on with sports. And then of course we can add oil to this, because Oilers evoke another aspect of Canadian society that I think for some people has almost religious importance, which is resource extraction. And in Canadian culture, oil has always been kind of entangled with religion — both religion as we would recognize it institutionally, but also kind of this idea that it's a blessing from God, or it's tied up in ideas of what a good life is and how to live it. So for lots of people in resource extraction communities like Alberta, the possibility of success and the good life that that promises really gets valued over and above other possible risks, including environmental. And the Edmonton Oilers showcase this worldview for sure, in which there's this idea of triumph and luck and rugged work pays off. This is a belief that functions on the ice and in the oil field. So luck is really central to both oil worldviews and hockey worldviews. Historically, this is essential for perseverance within fossil fuel extraction. Striking it rich in the oil fields is really entangled with the idea of divine providence. And sports, similarly, is thrilling, right? You can put all this work in, you can have all the great plans, you have all the right players, but it really takes luck to strike it rich. So oil culture is definitely, in the case of the Oilers, pairing this idea of divine favour with an insistence on rough-and-tumble endurance, which is definitely what's happening on the ice.
Cision Canada
7 hours ago
- Cision Canada
PARAMOUNT+ GREENLIGHTS SKYMED SEASON 4
Production Begins later this summer and Includes Returning Cast Natasha Calis, Morgan Holstrom, Mercedes Morris, Sydney Khune and Aaron Ashmore. TORONTO, June 11, 2025 /CNW/ -- Paramount+ announced today a greenlight for Season 4 of Canadian series SKYMED with Paramount+ in Canada on board for first time in the series history. The hit medical drama follows the triumphs and tribulations of young medics and pilots who fly air ambulances across the remote skies of Northern Canada, weaving together intense journeys with jaw-dropping medical rescues 20,000 feet in the air in the most remote conditions. Produced by Piazza Entertainment, the eight-episode season begins production later this summer in North Bay, Ontario and Manitoba, and will stream exclusively on Paramount+ in Canada, the U.S., Latin America and Brazil, UK, Australia, Italy, France, Germany, Switzerland and Austria. Additionally, Paramount+ in Canada will welcome SKYMED Seasons 1 – 3 to the platform this fall introducing the full series to new audiences prior to the fourth season's exclusive premiere on the service in 2026. "Paramount+ in Canada is thrilled to introduce our audiences to SKYMED, a Canadian story set against a truly spectacular part of our country," said Vanessa Case, Vice President of Content, Paramount+ and Pluto TV Canada. "Julie Puckrin created something really special, and Vanessa Piazza and the team at Piazza Entertainment brought it to life. Originally developed with the CBC, we're excited to continue the series as we partner with Piazza Entertainment to deliver a fourth season of this fresh and Canadian take on the medical procedural." "We're thrilled to be partnering with Paramount+ in Canada and to continue our relationship with P+ globally," said Vanessa Piazza, Executive Producer and President at Piazza Entertainment. "It's also exciting that a new audience will be able catch up on previous seasons of SKYMED – and get ready for Season 4 – all in one place on Paramount+ in Canada." Returning to SKYMED are series regulars Natasha Calis (Nurses) as Hayley, Morgan Holmstrom (Outlander) as Crystal, Mercedes Morris (Ghosts) as Lexi, Sydney Kuhne (Ginny & Georgia) as Stef, and Aaron Ashmore (Ginny & Georgia) as Wheezer. Additional casting announcements will be made in the future. SKYMED Season 4 will be produced by Piazza Entertainment in association with Paramount+ in Canada and CBS Studios. The series was created by Julie Puckrin and inspired by her sister and brother-in-law, who met flying air ambulances. Puckrin also serves as executive producer, along with Gillian Hormel and Vanessa Piazza. From Manitoba, Rhonda Baker, and Carrie Wilkins serve as producers. SKYMED is distributed internationally by Paramount Global Content Distribution. The first three seasons of SKYMED were produced by Piazza Entertainment in association with the CBC and CBS Studios. Seasons 1-3 are currently available to stream on CBC Gem and will be available on Paramount+ in Canada this fall. About Paramount+ Paramount+ is a global digital subscription video streaming service from Paramount that features a mountain of premium entertainment for audiences of all ages. Internationally, the streaming service features an expansive library of original series, hit shows and popular movies across every genre from world-renowned brands and production studios, including SHOWTIME®, BET, CBS, Comedy Central, MTV, Nickelodeon, Paramount Pictures and the Smithsonian Channel™, in addition to a robust offering of premier local content. The service is currently live in Australia, Austria, Canada, the Caribbean, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latin America, Switzerland, the U.K. and the U.S. For more information about Paramount+, please visit and follow @ParamountPlusCA and @ skymedtvseries on social media. About CBS Studios CBS Studios is one of the world's leading producers of entertainment programming, with dozens of globally popular series for broadcast and streaming. The Studio's expansive portfolio includes a diverse slate of commercially successful and critically acclaimed programming which includes genre-defining franchises such as NCIS and the STAR TREK universe, fan-favorite comedies such as The Neighborhood and Ghosts, the newly reimagined Matlock, and buzzy international co-productions such as COLIN FROM ACCOUNTS and upcoming King & Conqueror. About Piazza Entertainment Piazza Entertainment was founded in 2016 by Executive Producer, Vanessa Piazza (SkyMed, Lost Girl, Dark Matter, Nurses, XIII, The Other Half). Piazza Entertainment is a film and television production company established to create premium television programming for the domestic and international markets. Piazza's partnerships included a multi-year first look deal with international distributor and studio Entertainment One, which concluded in 2019. In addition to SkyMed, Piazza Entertainment has several other projects actively in development.
Toronto Star
9 hours ago
- Toronto Star
Why penguins are the perfect gay icons and banana slugs deserve their close-up: what this wildlife researcher learned making a doc about queer animals
It all started with birds. Armed with binoculars and a notebook, wildlife conservationist Connel Bradwell was always outside as a kid, watching and listening. 'That curiosity never really went away,' he says. 'Being out in nature, trying to understand what animals are doing and why, has always been one of my favourite things.' After working mostly in wildlife conservation, research and education, he recently moved into wildlife filmmaking. His newest project — done in collaboration with co-writer Erinn Drage, director Rio Mitchell, producer Carolyn Whittaker and cinematographer Ryan Wilkes, plus composer Kimmortal — is more fabulous than most. 'Animal Pride: Nature's Coming Out Story' (now available via 'The Nature of Things' on CBC Gem) features Bradwell's quest to find and understand the queerer members of the animal kingdom, and delve into why this fierce phenomenon has gone underexplored for so long. ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW What inspired this documentary? My interest in queer behaviour in animals started when I saw two male orcas exhibiting same-sex behaviour while I was working in the field. As a queer person, that moment really struck me. It was surprising, moving, and it opened up a lot of questions for me. That experience sparked a journey, one that led me to learn more about queerness in the natural world. It became really important to me to share these stories, because they show that queerness exists across species and that it's always been part of the natural world. How did seeing the gay orcas make you feel? There was physical interaction, bonding, even what looked like courtship. At first, I was fascinated from a scientific perspective. But as a queer person, I also felt something much deeper. It was powerful and unexpectedly emotional. It challenged the idea I had grown up with that queerness is unnatural or only something that exists in humans. Seeing that behaviour play out so clearly in the wild really stayed with me. What were some of the most fascinating findings you uncovered about gay animals? In species like bighorn sheep — pictured in Radium, B.C. — and raccoons, same-sex behaviour is a key part of how individuals bond, says Connel Bradwell. CBC Just how widespread same-sex behaviour is across the animal kingdom. It is not limited to a few species; it has been documented in over 1,500, from insects to mammals to birds. And it is not just about sex. There are long-term pair bonds, courtship rituals, co-parenting and deep emotional connections between same-sex partners. I was especially struck by the stories of animals forming lifelong same-sex partnerships, like some species of albatross, where two females will stay together for decades and raise chicks. Another surprising finding was how queerness shows up in social structures. In species like bighorn sheep and raccoons, same-sex behaviour is a key part of how individuals bond, form hierarchies and maintain group cohesion. What really stood out overall was that queerness in nature is not rare. It is not an exception or an anomaly. It is a natural and consistent part of life on Earth. Learning that was not only fascinating but also deeply affirming. ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW Any other intriguing facts that the documentary gets into that you're excited to become more common knowledge? One of the things I'm most excited for people to understand is that learning about queer behaviour in animals is not just a fun fact or side note. It is actually essential to species conservation. When we ignore or dismiss same-sex behaviour or other forms of queerness in the animal world, we miss out on a full understanding of how these species live, reproduce and survive. If research assumes that all animal pair bonds are heterosexual, or that reproduction is the only behaviour worth studying, we end up with an incomplete picture. That can limit conservation efforts, especially in breeding programs, population monitoring and habitat planning. Understanding the full range of social and sexual behaviours, including same-sex parenting or bonding, gives us a much more accurate and effective foundation for protecting species. Did you have any funny moments making this film that were especially zany? One of my favourite things about our documentary is that it's joyful and fun. There are a lot of funny moments, but one that really stands out involves banana slugs. We filmed with a world-renowned gastropod expert who walked us through their bizarre mating rituals, everything from eating each other's slime to slow, twisting contortions. But it's not just the behaviour that's interesting. The slugs themselves challenge a lot of our assumptions about binary sex and gender in nature. What made it hilarious was the setting. We were all crammed into this tiny tent in the middle of the B.C. rainforest, soaked and muddy, whispering and barely moving, just waiting to see if the slugs were into each other. It was surreal. And what's even better is that we filmed them in a way that has never really been done before, with mood lighting and real drama. We gave them the full love-story treatment. That's something I love about this film. It celebrates queerness and science, but it also doesn't take itself too seriously. Nature is weird and beautiful and sometimes very funny. ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW As a queer person, what was the most meaningful moment of making this film for you? Wildlife conservationist Connel Bradwell says making the documentary 'Animal Pride: Nature's Coming Out Story' reminded him that queerness has always been part of the natural world. CBC A big moment for me was meeting and learning from some incredible queer scientists. These are people who have been doing important research for years, often in spaces where queerness hasn't always been welcomed or acknowledged. Hearing their stories and seeing the way their identities shape and enrich their scientific work was really inspiring. Why has news and knowledge of gay animals been suppressed for so long? Scientists have actually been documenting same-sex behaviour and diverse gender expressions in animals for many years, including species like penguins. Despite this, much of that knowledge has been overlooked or even suppressed because research has traditionally been filtered through a heteronormative perspective. In some cases, reports of same-sex behaviour were hidden or censored. Historically, it was considered taboo or even illegal to discuss homosexuality in animals, and those attitudes sometimes continue today. There are stories of scientific work being challenged, and books on the subject being removed from libraries or facing institutional resistance. This silencing has shaped how we understand the natural world. It has reinforced the mistaken belief that heterosexual relationships and fixed gender roles are the default in nature. Our documentary aims to change that by sharing these overlooked stories, showing that diversity in sexual and social behaviour is normal, widespread and has always been part of the natural world. Which gay animal in the film is the most powerful diva of all, in your opinion? Why should this creature be a queer icon for the rest of us? ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW If I had to pick the ultimate gay diva in the film, it would definitely be the penguins. Early studies called their same-sex behaviour depraved and hooligan-like, which was pretty harsh. But once you see them in action, you can't deny they have a wild side! Penguins are bold, fearless and full of personality. They break all the old stereotypes with their cheeky antics and strong bonds. They're not just cute, they also remind us that queer behaviour in animals is totally natural, vibrant and sometimes downright rebellious. That mix of charm and mischief makes penguins the perfect gay icons. They show us that being yourself means embracing all parts of who you are, even the wild and unexpected bits!
