Julie Payette standing down from royal planet
“We all experience things differently” are actual words in Julie Payette’s statement of resignation as governor general, channelling what Justin Trudeau said in response to an old groping allegation. With that, a former astronaut descended from being Canada’s head of state after three years, before a review of workplace conduct went public.
Dispatch from the anti-Social
Sasha Exeter’s account of text messages with Jessica Mulroney led to the latter losing her show on CTV and being lambasted over white privilege on The Social, even as Jessica’s husband, Ben, remained at the network. Barbara Kay compares the saga to one involving June Callwood—but 30 years ago there was no Instagram to comment on.
Bell Media is pulling the plug on Book Television and Fashion Television. The two specialty channels will die on February 22, after a nearly 20-year run that came out of the CRTC granting digital licences to any potentially sustainable concept. But many of these Canadian stations ended up collecting cable package fees for irrelevant reruns.
The last laugh for the Bobcat
Bob McCown recently expressed his determination to avenge himself with a media empire of his own after being cut loose by Rogers Sportsnet. Now the duo that replaced Prime Time Sports are breaking up: Sid Seixeiro will co-host the increasingly national Breakfast Television, while Tim Micallef is the one who’s sticking to sports:
Drake might’ve been dropping his new album today. But the originally promised January arrival of Certified Lover Boy has been delayed indefinitely, presumably due to his knee surgery. Meanwhile, producer Noah “40” Shebib is readying the launch of his charitable foundation to provide recording studios, while Drake’s dad is on Cameo.
Finally, she’s a real back fire
Annabel Yao is the half-sister of Meng Wanzhou, and their relationship is raised in a promo video where the youngest daughter of Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei expresses jealousy about the attention that comes with being detained in Canada. Moreover, the music video debut by Annabel has been greeted with ridicule online across China: