Four immensely talented Production Designers, Perry Gorarra. Marian Wihak, Nancy Pankiw and James Oswald each added their ingenuity and personal stamp to over 100 individual sets built over the course of seven years in both studio and back-lot. The challenges were often enormous. From a traveling circus to Dickensian back alleys. From a completely snowbound schoolhouse that had to be shot both interior and exterior in winter blizzards, to cricket fields, castles, caves full of bats and ships at sea!
Over the course of many, many episodes my team of writers and I had opted to set scripts in other locations as well as Avonlea. The production team was challenged to create a permanent maritime seaport out of the cobblestone streets of a 19th century Toronto distillery. The fashionable private girls academy attended by Felicity was staged at Penryn Park an estate in nearby Port Hope. The locations became more lavish, fanciful and more complex as the series grew in size, character and scope. Meanwhile all of the original interior sets for King Farm, Rose Cottage, the Dales, the Pettibones, and the General Store were maintained across four sound stages in Sullivan Studios. Even these became crowded with the mammoth completion of two floors, offices and dining room and kitchen of the Edwardian seaside resort - White Sands. Though Road to Avonlea grew in scale and imagination, it never lost its heart. Thanks to the talented team of designers and set decorators, the show’s unique brand of humor and human drama was allowed to evolve as far as the writers’ imaginations could dream.
When the doors to the Avonlea costume department were closed in 1996, the staff at Sullivan Studios took stock of an inventory that had been created by designers Martha Mann, Madeline Stewart and Ruth Secord over seven years of cutting, stitching, fitting and primping. Imagine 7000 pairs of shoes - including period skates, slippers, high-button boots and dance wear;10,000 costumes – half of which were original designs for all of the lead performers and guest stars; 2000 hats – with enough feathers, frills and furbelows to exhaust a fulltime millinery department. Avonlea scripts presented enormous challenges; and so did the actors who often had much to say about their character development and how it would best be reflected in what they wore. Most female performers had been subjected to seven years of authentic corsets and heavy undergarments had no desire to keep them. Souvenirs were the rare costume jewelry, eye wear, head dresses, wigs and fans had been procured at great expense and sold at the production’s close to enthusiastic memorabilia hunters.
ANNE OF GREEN GABLES: A New Beginning
There is something new developing in the world of Anne…we are beginning work on the newest installation of Anne of Green Gables. That’s right, there is going to be a new Anne movie!
Kevin Sullivan has written a completely original story about Anne’s early years, before she was orphaned. Have you ever wondered who Anne’s mother and father were? What happened to them? Did she have any brothers or sisters? The mystery will unfold when Anne finds a secret letter in the floorboards of Green Gables almost 50 years after she arrived on Prince Edward Island and changed the Cuthbert’s lives forever.
THE CASTING CALL:
Sullivan Entertainment is searching for a new Anne Shirley for the prequel to the Emmy Award winning franchise Anne of Green Gables…
Sullivan is now conducting an extensive casting call on YouTube as well as performing a cross-Canada talent search in seven cities across the country with Casting Director John Buchan (“Away From Her”, “Where the Truth Lies”, “Being Julia”). Sullivan and Buchan will also be collecting audition submissions by mail in search of a new “kindred spirit” to play the role of the infamous Anne Shirley.
They are looking for charming actresses between the ages of 10 – 12 years to audition for the part of Anne Shirley. Auditions must be 1-2 minutes in length and must depict a portrayal of Anne through passages from the film or book. What was life like for Anne before she arrived at Green Gables? Participants have the freedom to create an Anne of their own invention.
Auditions should be submitted through YouTube under the group http://www.youtube.com/group/screentest or send a DVD / VHS submission to Sullivan Entertainment, Attention: The Next Anne Shirley, 110 Davenport Road, Toronto, Ontario, M5R 3R3 by July 20, 2007. Your submission will not be returned and is the property of Sullivan Entertainment. The name of the actor in the audition must be included on tape or online as well as full contact information. Submissions, due no later than July 20, 2007 are the property of Sullivan Entertainment and will not be returned. Furthermore, only candidates selected will be contacted for a live audition.
Please visit www.sullivanmovies.com for updates about Anne of Green Gables: A New Beginning as well as for other exciting film and television projects.
