Oct 27, 2011
Robin Shanks for iVillage.ca
Montreal director Karen Cho brings three extraordinary Canadians into your home this fall. Citytv, OMNI Television and The Biography Channel are airing a 12 week series, Extraordinary Canadians, featuring some of the country’s most influential people.
Cho, who directs three of the 12 segments (which profile Norman Bethune, Nellie McClung and Lester B. Pearson) spoke with us recently to talk about Canadian women in the arts, and what it was like collaborating with the likes of Adrienne Clarkson and Andrew Cohen.
iVillage: How did you get involved in the Extraordinary Canadians series?
Karen Cho: It was producer Kenneth Hirsch of PMA Productions who approached me about the series. When he explained the concept of the show, right away I was interested. I was really excited to be a part of a series that took a contemporary look at those who have shaped our country and identity.
I loved how Extraordinary Canadians situated Canadian figures within a global context. Be it the suffragette movement, the Suez crisis, or the communist revolution in China, discovering how Canadians joined, influenced, or participated in these world historical events really opened my eyes to our place in history.
iV: As a Canadian woman, how important to you is it to features others like yourself?
KC: History is often the recounted by the “victors” or by those who hold the positions of power and privileged within a society, and I think it is important to constantly challenge this. It is the voices and histories of those we rarely hear from that I’m interested in exploring.
It was certainly refreshing to see women like Nellie McClung, Emily Carr and Lucy Maud Montgomery included in the Extraordinary Canadians series. I was inspired to learn about what these women achieved despite the obstacles they faced.
It was also an honour for me to work with Charlotte Gray and Adrienne Clarkson on the episodes. They offered fresh perspectives and female insight that really deepened our understanding of both Nellie McClung and Norman Bethune’s lives.
Read more here.