Scott Stinson: Paul Gross on Men with Brooms sweeping along without him Read more: http://www.natio
Paul Gross co-wrote and directed the 2002 film Men with Brooms. He also played the lead role of Chris Cutter. It was his thing. So it was a bit unusual when he first read the TV show spun off from his feature.
“It was kind of odd, to be honest, at first,” he says over the phone from his Toronto home. “I remember getting the first draft of [the] pilot, and it was hilarious, but I could never do it. I don’t know how you write that kind of stuff. If I tried to write a half-hour [show], it would be a disaster. So it was kind of strange and humbling all at the same time. I was very happy, but I was very glad they were doing it and not me, because I wouldn’t know where to begin.”
It’s not that he hadn’t tried to take a second crack at the story of Chris Cutter, who in the film returns to the fictional small town of Long Bay, Ont., and becomes a conquering hero of sorts. He and writer John Krizanc worked up a treatment for a possible sequel, something producer Robert Lantos had long suggested was worth doing.
“We flushed it out until it was almost a full draft, and it was just ... awful,” Gross says. “It didn’t seem to work at all. It wasn’t a terribly difficult decision when we all gathered together and said ‘You know, it’s got some funny pieces in it, but it’s not very good.’ ”
Lantos eventually suggested the half-hour format, and Gross was happy to hand the story off to writer and showrunner Paul Mather. The series is still set in Long Bay, but it’s a new cast of characters who hang out at the curling club and get up to general sitcom hijinks. Gross, as Cutter, narrates, and returns for this week’s episode.
“They’re just lovely people,” Gross says of the cast that includes Brendan Gall as Gary and Siobahn Murphy as his co-worker and flirt interest. “I have to say, it was a little weird,” Gross continues. “When I showed up they were quite a ways into shooting, and they all really liked each other. They were really nice to each other, there was no sense of backstabbing or politics. It was like walking into a camp full of Moonies. It was a really unusual experience. Some sets disintegrate socially, toward the end everyone’s trying to kill each other or jockey for position, but there was none of that.”
Typically Canadian, then. Makes sense for a show set in a curling rink.
--Men With Brooms airs Mondays at 8:30 p.m. on CBC.
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