MovieChat Forums > Arctic Air (2012) Discussion > Why are arctic Canadian actors not featu...

Why are arctic Canadian actors not featured?

posted 11 years ago by Awwninga
3 replies | jump to latest

Why is it when we have such talented actors who have been born and raised in the NWT they aren't even hired for feature recurring roles? Instead we bring southern actors to the north, try and instill our ways upon them and our own actors get no further?? Why is it not in their contracts of the shows to hire our actors for principle roles or at least recurring speaking roles as they would be seen regularly in our small towns.
Arctic air is going no better than any other tv show supposively from the NWT like north of 60.
From Yellowknife alone we have Dustin Milligan, Alastair Gamble, Jesse Wheeler, Tobias Mueller - all amazing actors, all home grown yet none of them in proncipal or recurring roles!!!! How is this fair???? Why not make a Canadian star out of Alastair, Jesse or Tobias? Dustin had a shot with 90210. Why not promote talent from within, instead of bringing in actors from all over gods green earth who don't even know what a DC-3 or Cessna 180 is or why they are important to the north!!!
Why not offer chances for schooling in lighting, sound, makeup, hair. Let a northern acting school and shows flourish! We have the landmarks! Show case other communities those southern belle actors would be afraid would be too cold to act in!!

[–] haynes-2 10 years ago

Ice Pilots is much much worse and this is a *reality* series. Buffalo Joe doesn't seem to have any of the local Natives on his staff even though his company depends on government contacts delivering air freight to remote Northern settlements. But he did have a Newfie, a French-Canadian, an Australian, and even the odd Woman as co-pilots but just briefly, it's all White males in the pilot seats.

[–] gbeach 10 years ago

I've seen the same comments about other shows/movies.

First of all, it's not a documentary or reality TV...it's fictional. It doesn't matter if an actor grew up where the story takes place as long as they are believable and the best person they can get for the role. Maybe some of those actors you mentioned were offered roles but turned them down.

I know what a DC-3 and a Cessna 180 are and why they are important to the north. But if you want to talk about planes that are truly significant to the north then that would be the Beaver or the Otter. See, I know all the planes on Artic Air and then some. Does that mean I would be a better actor on the show because of that? Of course not. Because I'm not an actor.

How about Road to Avonlea? How many of those actors grew up in P.E.I. in the early 1900's? None of them even grew up in P.E.I. let alone knew what it was like at that time. So how did they do it? They read the story and, you know, acted.

By the way, does the cast of CSI have to be from Las Vegas or Hawaii Five-O from Hawaii or Hart of Dixie from the south or Chicago Fire from Chicago? In fact, except for one actor on Chicago Fire none of those casts have anyone from the area where the story is based.

---------
Nothing is so good that somebody, somewhere will not hate it. -- Frederik Pohl

[–] TreeShaman (806) 4 years ago

Because people from the NWT are not part of the Toronto elite who get to make those decisions at CBC HQ on Front Street.