The YVR Screen Scene Podcast

Bring It On was a pop culture juggernaut from the moment it somersaulted into multiplexes back in 2000. Audiences loved the saucy, sarcastic, scheming, and stuntin’ squads battling for cheer supremacy at regionals, all leading up to that shining moment when the It of the title has been Brought and the cheer squads do their thing. More than two decades after that first film, the Bring It On ’verse...

Few cultural phenomena of the 1980s were as as destructive or widespread as the Satanic Panic. The Satanic Panic led to arrests, ruined reputations, and more than 12,000 unsubstantiated reports of Satanic ritual abuse that were reportedly “recovered” via the now discredited practice of “recovery memory therapy.” While the Satanic Panic is now largely discussed with derision, there was a period in...

Sonita Henry’s filmography would make for one hell of a marathon on SyFy. Sonita played the President’s Aide in  The Fifth Element , present in that iconic final scene where Milla Jovovich’s Leeloo and Bruce Willis’ Korben get it on in the regeneration chamber. She was the doctor who delivers James T. Kirk in the heart-stopping opening minutes of 2009’s  Star Trek . She portrayed a colon...

Olga Prodan is a somatic psychologist and psychosocial rehabilitator working in Vancouver – and when she isn’t doing that, she’s in Ukraine helping children who have lost a parent on the frontlines. This year’s YVR Screen Scene For Ukraine – which takes the form of a gala on March 29 and an online auction of film and television memorabilia and Ukrainian art running March 27 to April 7 – is a fundr...

Luisa D'Oliveira is a phenomenal actress with keen instincts, a sharp mind, and a big heart. She’s beloved around the world for her nuanced work as Emori on The 100 , a role that positioned her as a disability advocate due to the grace with which her character navigated life as a person with a disability. Other highlights include The Good Wife , where she played a young lawyer going up against Jul...

Alessandro Juliani is beloved for many things: for his acting work on stages on both sides of the Atlantic in productions of classical and brand-new work; for his performances as a voice actor in an array of animated projects, including multiple Barbie movies, Dinosaur Train , Super Monsters , and Death Note ; for his nuanced on-camera work on iconic genre shows like Battlestar Galactica , Smallvi...

Bob Frazer returns to the YVR Screen Scene Podcast to pour one out for Alban Hearst, the anti-witch terrorist leader he played for all three seasons of Freeform’s brilliant Motherland: Fort Salem . In seasons one and two, Alban toyed with all of Motherland: Fort Salem ’s favourite witches – and in the series’ third and final season, Alban plunged to new depths of unhinged hate, while also revealin...

Zach Smadu recently wrapped his third season as Daniel Svensson, an exceedingly tidy lawyer with an exceedingly messy love life, on the locally shot and produced Family Law . As Daniel, Zach – whose filmography also includes plum roles on The Expanse , Cardinal , Kim’s Convenience , Titans , and Letterkenny – is one of Harry Svensson’s three children; the other two are masterfully portrayed by Gen...

Ian Hanlin’s long list of voice credits includes an egg pirate, a black-furred anthropomorphic hedgehog, and an entire cadre of well-coiffed superheroes. Ian voiced Thor in LEGO Marvel Avengers: Loki in Training , Owen Grady in LEGO Jurassic World: Legend of Isla Nublar , Ant Man in LEGO Marvel Avengers: Time Twisted , The Purple Pie Man in Strawberry Shortcake: Berry in the Big City ,  ...

Alison Araya’s work can be summed up in a single word: bold. Whether she’s playing a loving if slightly overzealous Tia on Julie and the Phantoms , a family court judge with a firm hand on Family Law , a fastidious social worker on Riverdale , or a strong-willed woman who ends up in a superhero threesome on Peacemaker , Alison consistently delivers bold performances that reveal a real mastery of c...

Door Mouse is the feature film directorial debut from Avan Jogia, the celebrated writer and actor from Vancouver who is well known for a lot of projects, including the wildly bonkers Netflix series Ghost War s. Door Mouse is a neo-noir thriller about a burlesque dancer and struggling comic book artist (the titular Door Mouse) who is compelled to investigate the disappearances of two of her fellow...

Actor and playwright Hiro Kanagawa ( Star Trek: Discovery ) returns to the YVR Screen Scene Podcast to talk about Forgiveness , his adaptation of Mark Sakamoto’s acclaimed memoir that tells the story of a real-life family confronting the atrocities of the past and finding within itself a way forward. Forgiveness tells the parallel stories of Sakamoto’s maternal grandfather Ralph, a Canadian soldie...

Brenna Coates lit up the screen as Lucy on CBC’s Coroner and in the indie horror thriller The Sinners, and also won a 2018 Dora Mavor Moore Theatre Award for her work in Jez Butterworth’s Jerusalem. Jessica Steen’s long list of credits includes Stargate SG-1, Republic of Doyle, NCIS, and Lisa Stillman on Heartland, the longest-running hour-long scripted drama in Canadian history. Brenna and Jessic...

Johannah Newmarch and John Emmet Tracy are equally matched in terms of talent, fearlessness, and generosity of spirit. Johannah is beloved for her work as Molly on When Calls The Heart , and for her many film and television projects spanning all genres, including Garage Sale Mysteries , Project Mc2 , Gracepoint , and Polaris . John Emmet Tracy is known ’round the world for his scene-stealing roles...

Michelle Harrison has portrayed Nora Allen on The Flash for all of its nine seasons. Being Nora Allen is a big responsibility: Nora’s untimely death in the pilot is the event that sets everything in motion. Nora is seen in multiple timelines, as the embodiment of the Speed Force, and as the ultimate representation of motherhood, love, and sacrifice – and the woman who portrays her contains just as...

Amanda Tapping is beloved around the world for iconic roles on Stargate SG-1 and Sanctuary and her ever-growing list of television directing credits (including an impressive run as an executive producer on the cult favourite Freeform series Motherland: Fort Salem ); Sabrina Rani Furminger is host of the YVR Screen Scene Podcast. Since Amanda and Sabrina’s first interview together in January 2013 (...

Dr Jules Arita Koostachin wrote and directed Broken Angel , a thrilling dramatic feature that premiered at the imagineNATIVE Film and Media Arts Festival, won the award for Best Feature at the 2022 American Indian Film Festival, and screens at the 2022 Whistler Film Festival. Broken Angel is a story about healing and mental illness, family and acceptance, domestic violence and legacy, and trauma a...

Jewel Staite and Paul McGillion are two wildly talented actors with lengthy filmographies and stellar reputations. Jewel is beloved for her work on Firefly , Serenity , Stargate Atlantis , her hilarious tweets and TikToks, and for her leading role as Abigail Bianchi on the award-winning and critically acclaimed television series Family Law . And Paul is renowned for roles on Stargate Atlantis , Fi...

Leah Gibson has lit up the screen in an array of critically acclaimed shows like Manifest , Arctic Air , Batwoman , and Jessica Jones , where she played troubled nurse Inez Green. She was nominated for a 2022 UBCP/ACTRA Award for her work on Joe Pickett , Paramount Plus’ astounding neo-Western crime drama. Leah plays Jeannie Keeley, a wife and a mom who is all passion, all fire, and, according to...

In the fifth episode of our ongoing #IndustryBFFs series, actors Brady Roberts ( Paper Champions ) and Sachin Sahel ( The 100 ) talk about their friendship forged in wrestling, why the new monthly wrestling show Boom! Pro Wrestling is the hottest ticket in Vancouver, and the coffee meeting that changed everything. Episode sponsor: UBCP / ACTRA

Karin Konoval is a highly accomplished actress with a knack for disappearing into complex, sometimes non-human, roles. Karin portrayed an orangutan named Maurice in the Planet of the Apes films. In 2018, she won a UBCP/ACTRA award for the dual role of Chucky and Judy in The X-Files , and in 2019, she was inducted into the BC Entertainment Hall of Fame. She’s beloved for playing Deena Petringa on t...

In the fourth episode of our ongoing #IndustryBFFs series, screenwriters Meredith Hambrock ( Corner Gas Animated ) and Jennifer Siddle ( Some Assembly Required ) talk the inner workings of a comedy writer’s room, Vancouver humour, guff-giving, and what a friendship between two comedy writers can look like IRL. Episode sponsor: UBCP/ACTRA

Actor Adrian Petriw appeared on the YVR Screen Scene Podcast in 2019 and 2020 to talk about his voice acting career and eat babka with host (and fellow Ukrainian) Sabrina Rani Furminger. But those previous appearances were before February 24, 2022, when Russia fully invaded Ukraine, displacing and traumatizing millions of Ukrainians, killing thousands, and mobilizing Ukrainians in the diaspora to...

On October 4, Women in Film and Television Vancouver – AKA WIFTV – announced that it would be making some significant changes to its name, its long-running Vancouver International Women in Film Festival, and its logo. In a letter to the WIFTV membership, they wrote, “We believe that everybody who has faced historical exclusion and marginalization due to patriarchy and sexism is deserving of our or...

Patrick Keating is the creative force behind Inside/Out: A Prison Memoir , a theatrical performance film in which Patrick shares his real-life story of years spent in and out of Canada’s penitentiary system. Patrick is an actor and storyteller who has performed in more than 40 stage productions and close to 60 television and film productions, including Virgin River , The Flash , Resident Alien , a...