"This shocking, historical oversight has now been addressed in a warm, funny and inescapably nostalgic documentary..." Rob Salem, Toronto Star
"It's a TV show! That will! Change! Your life! ..an hour of nostalgic fun." Brad Oswald, Winnipeg Free Press
A "Perfect Pitch" Pat St. Germain, Winnipeg Sun
"Presenting a story so fast, so simple, so amazing, you'll wonder how you ever lived without it!"
As Seen On TV! The K-Tel Story :the media, music and pop-culture phenomena of the 20th Century, is now a one-hour documentary from Winnipeg's MidCanada Entertainment and directed/written by Cam Bennett. The show had its World Television Premiere on CTV, October 7.
"All the greatest hits! All the greatest stars! All on one album!" K-Tel filled our heads with music and our cupboards with whacky products like "The Miracle Brush", the "Patty Stacker", the "Veg-O-Matic", "Record Selector", "Fishin' Magician", the list goes on and on.
Pioneering the art of low-budget late night advertising, K-Tel founder Phil Kives perfected a style of commercial that became a cultural phenomenon. These grating ads slammed into our subconscious and became synonymous with the K-Tel style, and eventually conquered not just Canada, but the U.S., Europe, and even Australia. Not bad for a kid who grew up dirt poor in rural Saskatchewan.
Narrated by SCTV alumnist Dave Thomas (Harvey K-Tel), As Seen On TV! The K-Tel Story reveals the rise and fall of this truly unique company, told through a series of interviews with Phil Kives himself, various K-Tel insiders and employees, and even the voice of K-Tel himself, Bob Washington. The documentary features an endless supply of K-Tel commercials providing a visual archive blended with celebrities, memorabilia, documents, and personal photos.
In addition to its specialty products, K-Tel's music is what people remember most. One of the first companies to create compilation albums, K-Tel topped the charts with sales totalling five hundred million albums over a 20-year period. With interviews from Randy Bachman and BJ Thomas, the documentary revives K-Tel's vast collection, including hits of the 50s, the British Invasion, disco, country and pop music.
As Seen On TV: The K-Tel Story was developed and produced in association with CTV; The Government of Manitoba-Manitoba Film and Video Production Tax Credit; Manitoba Film & Sound; and the CanWest Western Independent Producers Fund and MidCanada Production Services Inc.
See a clip. QuickTime. 5.6 Mb.
For information contact:
Leslie Stafford
(204) 791-3627
leslie@mts.net
