culture
Sunday Funny Sunday
New web series Everyday Is Like Sunday was shot in Toronto. It aims to be your next viewing obsession.
Photo by Emma McIntyre.
Thank heavens for the existence of web video series.
It wasn’t so long ago that television was considered the only respectable serialized video medium. But with successful comedy entries like Wainy Days and Children’s Hospital, the online market has now become so attractive that many established artists—like Friends’ Lisa Kudrow, in the popular Web Therapy—are taking their talents to the internet. A new web series set in Toronto is hoping to make a splash by mining the inherent comedy of life in one’s mid to late twenties.
Everyday Is Like Sunday, as the series is known, has had a long journey to computer screens.
“The goal was to try to make something that would appeal to people who are usually not targeted on Canadian television,” 27-year old writer and producer Pavan Moondi said in an e-mail interview. “There’s a lot of programming directed at teenagers and alternately, at people in their forties and older, so I just wanted to make something that I felt like I would want to watch and that people I know would relate to.” The show was originally intended for television.
After deciding on the online route and joining together with producing partner Brian Robertson, the project began to take shape. Prior to cameras rolling, however, there were a few unanticipated shuffles in the casting.
“We originally had a couple of musicians in the lead roles: Justin Rice and [Islands’] Nick Thorburn,” Moondi recalled. “Nick was on board for a solid year and it was just a matter of waiting for the funding to come through.”
When this took longer than expected, Thorburn’s hectic schedule as a member of three different bands forced him to drop out. He was given a smaller role—appropriately enough, as a musician. The details behind Rice’s departure from the project are much more dramatic. It happened as he was on his way to Canada from the US, which is his country of origin.
“The night before filming he was turned away at the border,” Moondi says. “There was just an issue with the paperwork that nobody really could have anticipated, and it would have taken at least a couple weeks to sort out. At that stage, delaying the production just wasn’t a possibility.”
Instead, local comedian David Dineen-Porter stepped into the role at the last minute, alongside Coral Osborne and another musician friend, Adam Gurfinkel, who had no prior acting experience—something Moondi saw as a benefit.
“He has lots of interesting mannerisms and quirks that may not have been there if he was a professionally trained actor, but they add a lot of personality and dimension to the character. By the end of the shoot, he really became an actor. It was fun to witness that progression.”
Continuing what seems to be a theme, yet another musician was hired to direct the series, The New Pornographers’ Blaine Thurier.
“Blaine came on through a mutual friend and one of our executive producers, Andrew McIntyre,” Moondi says. “Andrew read the script and knew I was looking for a director to direct the majority of the episodes and so he connected Blaine and I. I checked out some of his stuff and thought it was great, and luckily he was interested in getting involved.”
Shooting around Toronto was a worthwhile experience for Moondi. He considered it important to have the locations reflect where actual twenty-somethings would hang out.
“So we shot mostly in Parkdale, which is where the house we rented for the shoot was. Unlovable is used in a number of different episodes and that’s just a case of us loving that bar and the owner, Jamal, just being super cool and accommodating us. We shot scenes in Trinity Bellwoods, Queen Video, El Ruddys, a few other places.”
With the production now complete and a small group of dedicated people working on the finishing touches, Moondi says that what is needed at this stage is additional funding in order to increase awareness. He’s trying to raise money through Indiegogo, a crowdfunding site.
“We really need to invest in marketing the series to get people to find it in a really saturated market right now,” he says. “Since we’re a series, the numbers we draw are really going to matter in a way that isn’t usually a factor with a feature film, and will directly impact whether or not we continue past a first season.”
The photo at the top of the page is now properly credited to Emma McIntyre.