Robert Wertheimer (born in Montreal, Quebec, Canada) is a writer, producer, director and executive producer of film and television productions. Wertheimer started working in 1977.
Wertheimer graduated from the University of Vermont's Economics and Business Administration program and also studied Communication Arts at Concordia University in Montreal under the tutelage of Marc Gervais. Deeply influenced by Gervais, Wertheimer gave particular focus to French New Wave Cinema and the impact of Jean-Luc Godard, François Truffaut and others is still readily apparent in his work.
After a long career making theatrical feature films (including Deepa Mehta's Sam & Me which was honoured at the Cannes Film Festival the year of its release, box office champion Bollywood/Hollywood , also written and directed by Deepa Mehta) and television series ( Friday the 13th: The Series ; War of the Worlds ; RoboCop: The Series ; and including his Gemini for Best Series for Due South ), Wertheimer made the choice to write and create his own material.
In 2004, his first television series as co-creator and showrunner, Charlie Jade , commenced production in Cape Town, South Africa. [1] Ultimately, 21 episodes of the program would be made. Charlie Jade was inspired by The Culture of Make Believe by activist author, Derrick Jensen. It was designed to echo Jensen's themes of corporate greed and arrogance and the futility of continuing to pursue an impersonal, materialist agenda on a global scale. These themes are apparent in the design of the story across three parallel universes as well as in the perspective of the main characters who are depicted struggling with the personal and ethical dilemmas triggered by their actions in these universes. In addition to South Africa, Charlie Jade has been broadcast in Canada, Japan, Eastern Europe, France and the United Kingdom. [1] In 2008, the Sci-Fi Channel acquired rights to broadcast the show in the United States. [1]
Wertheimer's next creative effort was the television series Across the River to Motor City which he co-created with Denis McGrath. Produced in partnership with Richard Mozer and David Devine of Devine Entertainment, Across the River to Motor City was an examination of two stages of one man's life threaded through a mystery involving the conspiracy speculation surrounding the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
Wertheimer lives in Los Angeles, California.
Stargate SG-1 is a military science fiction adventure television series within Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's Stargate franchise. The show, created by Brad Wright and Jonathan Glassner, is based on the 1994 science fiction film Stargate by Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich. The television series was filmed in and around the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The series premiered on Showtime on July 27, 1997 and moved to the Sci Fi Channel on June 7, 2002; the final episode first aired on Sky1 on March 13, 2007.
Sky Sci-Fi is a British pay television channel service specialising in science fiction, fantasy and horror shows and movies. It is owned by NBCUniversal International Networks, a division of NBCUniversal and as of 2018, Sky Group.
The Secret Adventures of Jules Verne is a Canadian science fiction television series that first aired in June 2000 on CBC Television in Canada. The series first ran in the United States on cable on The Sci-Fi Channel, and lasted for one season. The show is a fictionalized telling of the life of French author Jules Verne, placing him into the settings of the stories he wrote such as Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas and Around the World in Eighty Days.
Ketan Mehta is an Indian film director who has also directed documentaries and television serials since 1975.
CTV Sci-Fi Channel is a Canadian English language discretionary specialty channel owned by Bell Media. The channel primarily broadcasts speculative fiction and related programming.
Stargate is a military science fiction media franchise based on the film directed by Roland Emmerich, which he co-wrote with producer Dean Devlin. The franchise is based on the idea of an alien Einstein–Rosen bridge device that enables nearly instantaneous travel across the cosmos. The franchise began with the film Stargate, released on October 28, 1994, by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and Carolco, which grossed US$197 million worldwide. In 1997, Brad Wright and Jonathan Glassner created a television series titled Stargate SG-1 as a sequel to the film. This show was joined by Stargate Atlantis in 2004, Stargate Universe in 2009, and a prequel web series, Stargate Origins, in 2018. Also consistent with the same story are a variety of books, video games and comic books, as well as the direct-to-DVD movies Stargate: Children of the Gods, Stargate: The Ark of Truth, and Stargate: Continuum, which concluded the first television show after 10 seasons.
Doctor Who in Canada and the United States refers to the broadcast history of the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who in those countries.
Wolf Lake is an American supernatural drama television series that originally aired on CBS from September 19 to October 24, 2001. Nine episodes were produced, but only five aired before the series was canceled by CBS. The full series, including the four unaired episodes, was later picked up and broadcast on UPN in April–May 2002. Wolf Lake depicts a pack of werewolves living in a Seattle suburb.
Jupiter Moon is a science fiction soap opera television series first broadcast by British Satellite Broadcasting's Galaxy channel in 1990. 150 episodes were commissioned and made, but only the first 108 were broadcast before the closure of BSB. Episodes 109–150 were first shown in the UK on the Sci Fi Channel in 1996.
Frank Herbert's Children of Dune is a three-part science fiction miniseries written by John Harrison and directed by Greg Yaitanes, based on Frank Herbert's novels Dune Messiah (1969) and Children of Dune (1976). First broadcast in the United States on March 16, 2003, Children of Dune is the sequel to the 2000 miniseries Frank Herbert's Dune, and was produced by the Sci Fi Channel. Children of Dune and its predecessor are two of the three highest-rated programs ever to be broadcast on the Sci-Fi Channel. In 2003, Children of Dune won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Special Visual Effects, and was nominated for three additional Emmys.
Charlie Jade is a science fiction television series filmed mainly in Cape Town, South Africa. It stars Jeffrey Pierce in the title role, as a detective from a parallel universe who finds himself trapped in our universe. This is a Canadian and South African co-production filmed in conjunction with CHUM Television and the South African Industrial Development Corporation (IDC). The special effects were produced by the Montreal-based company Cinegroupe led by Michel Lemire.
Digital Satellite Television, commonly abbreviated to DStv, is a Sub-Saharan African direct broadcast satellite service owned by MultiChoice and based in Randburg, South Africa. Launched on 6 October 1995, the service provides multiple audio, radio and television channels and services to subscribers, mostly in South Africa and Nigeria. DStv formerly had operations in Thailand under United Broadcasting Corporation (UBC), which is now TrueVisions.
Caprica is an American science fiction drama television series. A spin-off prequel of the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica (2004), Caprica is set 58 years before the main series. Caprica shows how humanity first created the Cylon androids who would later turn against their human masters. Among Caprica's main characters are the father and uncle of William Adama, the man who becomes the senior surviving military leader of the fleet which represents the remnants of the Twelve Colonies in Battlestar Galactica.
Painkiller Jane is a science fiction and action television series based on the comic book character of the same name. Airing on the Sci Fi Channel in the US starting April 13, 2007 and Global in Canada, it starred Kristanna Loken as the title character. The show was canceled after one season of 22 episodes.
AXN Sci Fi was a European pay television series channel of Sony Pictures Television. It was available in Italy, Poland, Hungary, Ukraine, Romania, Kazakhstan and Bulgaria on Sky Italia, Boom TV, Bulsatcom, Cyfra Plus, Cyfrowy Polsat, Digi TV, Dolce, iNES, Max TV and N. The channel was launched in Czech Republic and Slovakia in October 2007.
Denis McGrath was a dual-citizen Canadian–American screenwriter and producer. Born in New York City, he resided and worked in Toronto.
Comet is an American digital broadcast television network owned by the Sinclair Television Group subsidiary of the Sinclair Broadcast Group. The network focuses on science fiction with some supernatural, horror, adventure and fantasy series and films, sourced mainly from the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film and television library. Sinclair also owns Charge! (action), Stadium and TBD (youth) broadcast networks. Comet is also available via Apple TV, FuboTV, YouTubeTV, Roku, Sling TV, Dish Network and Sinclair's Stirr.