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A few weeks ago NSI hosted a whirlwind Facebook Q&A session for prospective applicants of the NSI Totally Television course.

Queries were answered by our fabulous 2017 students: Gemma Holdway, Alexandra Caulfield, Jon Mann and Rob Ramsay, and our wise and experienced NSI Totally Television program advisor Julie di Cresce and program manager Joy Loewen.

In a slightly more digestible format, here are recaps of some standout questions and answers from that session.

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I’m interested in hearing about what relationships or connections the students made that were particularly valuable: Seasoned writers? Production companies? Guest speakers?

Jon Mann: All of the above. They are all valuable connections for different reasons/stages of development of the script. I think the most valuable relationship for us was having NSI put their stamp of approval on our script (and on us) which has put us on radars we never thought were possible.

Gemma Holdway: Our story editors, Sandra Chwialkowska and Karen Walton, were fabulous. Not just as story editors but in terms of industry advice they both gave us. Very supportive people.

But we also had other very generous guests … Chris Hatcher comes to mind. He’s a line producer who went through our entire budget with us, helped us figure out how much we would need to produce the show we wanted to make. We would bring this up during our pitch meetings and it showed that we’d done our homework and we wanted to make our show right.

Did you find you were swayed in any way to change your project tone-wise and/or genre-wise with the program? Or did you choose to in order to be more audience appealing?

Alexandra Caulfield: Our project really didn’t change much in terms of tone. We found a structure we wanted to work with throughout our series and we really dug deep to flesh out ALL our characters and their motivations (it’s a pretty psychological show). The script changed, but the project itself has remained true to the core we submitted with.

I think the most important thing is to get clear on what your project is actually about and why it is important to you. Then you will know what is good, market-driven advice that can help you shape and smooth the rough edges of your project, and what is someone wanting your show to be something it isn’t.

Is the course a full-time kind of thing or were you able to do it while also holding a job?

Julie di Cresce: Ideally you are able to maintain your full time gig but you will need some flexibility – you will need to attend the boot camp in Toronto which is five days (one week) and if you advance to the second phase, another four days for the second boot camp. They’re scheduled about four months apart. The majority of the work can be done on your own schedule otherwise.

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Find out more about applying for this program. Deadline for applications is August 13.

NSI Totally Television is made possible by Presenting Sponsor Bell Media; Program Partner Telefilm Canada; Supporting Sponsors Super Channel, Corus Entertainment and Breakthrough Entertainment; and Territorial Sponsor Yukon Media Development. NSI Core Funders are Manitoba Sport, Culture & Heritage and the City of Winnipeg through the Winnipeg Arts Council.

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