Morgenstern and Ellis report that Colantoni in particular is enjoying playing a cop, especially the actors’ boot camp with Toronto’s real-life Emergency Task Force. “He came back from the production office that day and he was like a little kid with his eyes wide open,” Ellis said. “Of course he primarily plays a negotiator and he doesn't get to do that. We're valiantly trying to write that in for him as we get towards the end of the season.”
Johnson is the American in the ensemble, though she’s now based in Montreal and “we consider her an honourary Canadian,” Ellis laughed. “She’s a really natural and warm actor.”
Both Ellis and Morgenstern started their television careers in front of the cameras, so Morgenstern was a natural for the prominent though silent role as the first episode’s hostage. “It was an interesting experience to feel like the sacrificial lamb,” she commented. “I don't get to speak, but I get to be at the centre of a lot of stress."
“She was one of the few really good actors who was willing to have no lines and subject herself to being in the arms of a large and aggressive and shouting Croatian man for five days,” Ellis joked.
“I think I started to develop Stockholm syndrome myself, being captive for that length of time,” she countered.
The overnight success of having their own television series greenlit by CTV and picked up by CBS during the writers strike has been four years in the making, shepherded by executive producers Bill Mustos and Anne Marie La Traverse. Tassie Cameron (Would Be Kings, The Robber Bride) serves as head writer, part of the “extraordinary writing team” that Morgenstern lauded in the interview.
In the self-conscious world of Canadian television, Flashpoint’s success or failure will no doubt be held up as an indicator of the state of the industry as a whole. Morgenstern and Ellis admit to some nerves about the upcoming premiere but they aren’t dwelling on that particular aspect. Rather, they're focused on the opportunities that CBS’s additional clout will add to the show.
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