How Dept.9 is taking bets to grow local film
Dept.9 Studios is betting a new short-form series called Department of Paranormal Affairs can raise the profile of Alberta's film industry.
The show combines monster-of-the-week storytelling (think The X-Files) with comedic characters in a bureaucratic workplace (à la Parks and Recreation). Each episode follows government workers Jenny (Nancy Ngo) and Scott (David Feehan, who also served as a producer and screenwriter for the show) as they work to settle differences between humans and paranormal beings. It's like if the Ghostbusters were social workers.
"Dept.9 is willing to invest in Alberta," the company's development and production executive, Michael Feehan (no relation to David), told Taproot. "We're punching above our weight in terms of the production value that you see on screen."
Feehan served as a producer for the series, which premiered at the Calgary Underground Film Festival on April 27. The company, established in 2019, narrowed down Affairs from 10 potential scripts for a new venture because it posed the greatest chance for success for Dept.9's digital division.
"For what we wanted to do, which was produce a series that had staying power in the long term, that we could produce, hopefully, dozens and dozens of episodes of, we wanted to make sure that it had the right foundation," Feehan said. "To me, that foundation is the story engine and the format."
While shot entirely in Edmonton, the team behind the show is an "even split" between Edmonton and Calgary talent, Feehan said. Donovan Workun is one-third of the primary cast and plays Jenny and Scott's boss, the curmudgeonly slacker Greg. (Workun also plays the titular character in Jason Kenney's Hot Boy Summer: The Musical, the sold-out, runaway hit by Grindstone Theatre).
"What drew me to the role was an audition," Workun, the co-ringleader of Atomic Improv, joked to Taproot. "As a working actor, you want to work."
But once reading the script, Workun said he connected immediately. "I was like, 'Oh, this is a great little idea,'" Workun said. "They packaged it so nicely. It's in manageable chunks that are suitable for the internet or TV or whatever they want to do. I just thought it was really smart, the way they top and tail it, and throw an adventure in the middle. It's almost like an old Star Trek episode."
