After too many years of production level ups and downs, Manitoba has recently been experiencing a steady, even record-breaking, cycle of movie and TV production in the past few years. From Hollywood features to MOWs, and a crop of upstart domestic production, the Keystone Province is enjoying a much-deserved period of stable business.
Production volume for the 2025 fiscal year hovered around the $400 million mark, according to Manitoba Film & Music (MFM), driven in no small part by 18 major American service shoots. This compares with total production of $225 million in fiscal 2023–24, a period that was negatively impacted by the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes.
Major recent projects shot in the province included horror flick Altar, starring January Jones; action sequel Nobody 2, and action thriller Normal, both starring Bob Odenkirk; the Stephen King sci-fi adaptation The Long Walk, starring Mark Hamill; action-comedy It Takes Two featuring Vince Vaughn; and off-beat action-flick Love Hurts starring Academy Award-winner Ke Huy Quan.
As the province’s production hub, Winnipeg has seen the lion’s share of production, which necessitated studio infrastructure. Luckily, Big Sky Studios entered the scene with a 187,000-square-foot facility. Fully opened in 2023, the studio offers four soundstages, production offices, and additional support space. Adding to the studio capacity already available at the Manitoba Production Centre, and suddenly, Winnipeg could host multiple major shoots simultaneously.
Of course, it takes more than simply great facilities, crews, and locations to attract major productions – it’s also about the money. Manitoba’s provincial government was proactive on this front by introducing a highly competitive provincial tax credit. Incentives that include a 45% cost-of-salaries credit, with bonuses for frequent filming, coproducing with a Manitoba company, and shooting outside of Winnipeg, has the potential to add a further 20% in savings. Throw in the National Film or Video Production Services Tax Credit and Manitoba became very alluring to producers on both sides of the border.
Getting production in is one thing, but providing great service is the next step. One area the province needs continued expansion in is the depth of its crew pool. With big projects suddenly overlapping, crew availability has been stretched to its limits, which has often affected production on lower-budget domestic shows.
When asked what needed to happen to see the Manitoba industry grow, Michael Thom, GM of Big Sky Studios noted both “infrastructure,” and “more crew.” Thom continued “Big Sky is the infrastructure, and [industry groups] On Screen Manitoba and Manitoba Film & Music are working with the local unions on the crew training.”
While Manitoba has now demonstrated that the province can host Hollywood successfully, production levels can be mercurial and might not be so easily duplicated on an annual basis. As larger production hubs in Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal know too well, fickle external pressures make for unpredictable business models – particularly with American production. While the absence of feature films is significant, the background category and stunt departments often take the biggest hit with so many of the titles being action-heavy. Lead and supporting on-screen performance roles, however, would not necessarily feel the potential absence of American service production quite as dramatically.
“We’re not accustomed to those tier A productions being such a significant part of our makeup,” said ACTRA Manitoba Branch Representative Rea Kavanagh. “We would like those opportunities to be part of our ability to expand, but it’s not something our performance community has relied on historically.”
Our local industry has long survived, and often thrived, even during the Hollywood strikes because of independent productions.
Kalyn Bomback
MOW activity in 2024, meanwhile, remained consistent with previous years. The U.S.-based Hallmark Channel alone was responsible for bringing eight TV movies to the province, including Following Yonder Star and Hanukkah on the Rocks. “Those productions hire many of our local performers,” Kavanagh says. “They’re a real bread and butter part of our work here.”
More promising for Canadian culture overall, and the country’s domestic industry, has been the constant stream of domestic productions, which often provide the best opportunities for Manitoba performers.
“Our local industry has long survived, and often thrived, even during the Hollywood strikes because of independent productions,” said Kalyn Bomback. “In some Canadian hubs, it’s mostly service work. But our indies here, keep things afloat when turmoil erupts down in the States.”
For some ACTRA performers, the emergence of major productions appearing on Manitoba’s scene is a double-edged sword. “The bigger productions are the reason I got into [this business],” said Darcy Waite, an actor and filmmaker, whose feature directorial debut, the buddy-comedy Lucky Strikes released in 2024.
“It’s great to get on those sets and work with big-name actors,” Waite continues, “but generally those tier A (productions) aren’t hiring many locals, unlike the movies of the week and indie productions from our local filmmakers. Lucky Strikes was all Manitoba [performers].”
One sector where Manitoba’s industry is seeing tremendous growth and jobs is the ever-growing Indigenous production sector. Ongoing productions including the CTV/APTN comedy series Acting Good are quickly becoming a mainstay in the production community and a reliable job-creator.
To help further this sector’s work and strengthen its long-term future, The Winnipeg Indigenous Filmmakers Collective is doing its part by growing and elevating local Indigenous talent. “They’re an incredible group,” says actor, writer, and director Mary Galloway, who has created a short film for the collective’s Legacy Lens storytelling incubator – a collection of shorts constructed around Elder stories.
“Those small passion projects are impactful to our community, and I don’t see them being created elsewhere,” Galloway says. She adds that the Collective also offers critical technical training. She recently participated in a session teaching 35mm film production, a format that refuses to disappear.
Production in this sector has gone from strength-to-strength since the 2017 launch of the Indigenous Screen Office by the government. In addition to Acting Good (which just completed its fourth season) the Office has supported several locally shot projects including the miniseries Little Bird (Crave/APTN), The Neighborhood Watch and the children’s animated series, Chums. While more support is always needed, Manitoba is primed to be a major hub for Indigenous production in the future. Other recently released independent Indigenous productions include Aberdeen and Green Hill – the first features of local filmmaker, Roger Boyer.
As with any production centre where performers gather to work, their strong and active union local is imperative to both their promotion and their protection. ACTRA Manitoba has seen a dramatic increase in duties, volume and responsibilities with the small but dynamic staff team doing incredible work to serve members provincially and as part of the national body as well. Performers can benefit from several ACTRA Manitoba development initiatives, including a mentorship program, regular industry workshops, and an empowerment series for female performers.
“We already have this tremendously skilled group of people within our membership, but part of an actor’s job is to constantly keep training, because there’s always more to learn,” says ACTRA Manitoba President Bomback.
“The union’s role in fostering a strong performer community in this great province is critical. With more production, comes more opportunity, and with that, more performers. If production in Manitoba is truly rising, then ACTRA performers must be a force in that tide.”
Top Photo: Set in the fictional fly-in community of Grouse Lake First Nation ina Northern Manitoba, Acting Good comedy series stars Jason Mason, Cheyenna Sapp, Roseanne Supernault, Paul Rabliauskas, Tina Keeper, Gabriel Daniels, Billy Merasty, Avery Sutherland.
Mark Dillon contributed to this story.
