Slings and Arrows (2003–2006)

In the fictional town of New Burbage, legendary theatrical madman Geoffrey Tennant returns to the New Burbage Theatre Festival, the site of his greatest triumph and most humiliating failure... See full summary »

Creators:

Susan Coyne, Bob Martin, Mark McKinney

Stars:

Paul Gross, Martha Burns, Stephen Ouimette

22 wins & 28 nominations.

Cast

Series cast summary:
Paul Gross	...	Geoffrey Tennant (18 episodes, 2003-2006)
Martha Burns	...	Ellen Fanshaw (18 episodes, 2003-2006)
Stephen Ouimette	...	Oliver Welles (18 episodes, 2003-2006)
Susan Coyne	...	Anna Conroy (18 episodes, 2003-2006)
Don McKellar	...	Darren Nichols (18 episodes, 2003-2006)
Mark McKinney	...	Richard Smith-Jones (18 episodes, 2003-2006)
Graham Harley	...	Cyril (17 episodes, 2003-2006)
Michael Polley	...	Frank (17 episodes, 2003-2006)
Catherine Fitch	...	Maria (17 episodes, 2003-2006)
Rothaford Gray	...	Nahum (11 episodes, 2003-2006)
Oliver Dennis	...	Jerry (11 episodes, 2005-2006)
Sean Cullen	...	Basil (9 episodes, 2003-2005)
Matt Fitzgerald	...	Sloan (8 episodes, 2003-2005)

Storyline

In the fictional town of New Burbage, legendary theatrical madman Geoffrey Tennant returns to the New Burbage Theatre Festival, the site of his greatest triumph and most humiliating failure, to assume the artistic directorship after the sudden death of his mentor, Oliver Welles. When Geoffrey arrives he finds that Oliver is still there, in spirit anyway, and with his guidance (and often in spite of it) Geoffrey attempts to reconcile with his past while wrestling the festival back from the marketing department. Despite a bitter leading lady, a clueless leading man, and a scheming general manager, he manages to stage a remarkable production of Hamlet -- the play that drove him mad.

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Plot Keywords:

theatre festival | mentor | theatre | theatre group | sitcom | 

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Taglines:

The real show is backstage.

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Genres:

Comedy

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Details

Official Sites:

Movie Central - Season 2 Movie Network

Country:

Canada

Language:

English

Release Date:

3 November 2003 (Canada)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Rhombus Media

Technical Specs

Runtime:

60 min

Color:

Color

Did You Know?

Trivia

The fictional town of New Burbage and its theater festival are presumably named after Richard Burbage, and actor-manager who was the star of many original Shakespeare plays and who spearheaded, in 1597, the construction of the original Globe theater in London.

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Quotes

Anna Conroy: [holding Oliver's skull] It's not that heavy at all!
Geoffrey Tennant: It's much lighter without the ego.

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Connections

Remade as Sound & Fury (2009)

User Reviews

Who says Canada can't compete with the HBO mini-series?

I'm amazed to see no comments about Slings and Arrows. It was simply the best thing I've seen on television in the past few years. Every now and then something comes along that changes the way you look at television. Maybe it's The Prisoner, or Twin Peaks. This year for me it was Slings and Arrows. Easily the best thing to come out of Canada since Atom Egoyan and The Kids In The Hall, it's so well written, acted, and edited, that it blows shows like The Sopranos, Six Feet Under, and Carnivale out of the water. That's asking a lot, considering there are very few well written television shows anymore. It's not just well written, it's hillarious from start to finish. It's great to see Rachel McAdams getting a good role for once as well. Perhaps destined to play the dumb blonde highschool teen, she shines in this role - obviously she's meant for better things. The same could be said about every other member of the cast. This series is simply perfect, from start to finish - dying to see how this gets received abroad or when it'll see a DVD release.