'Anne With an E,' 'Letterkenny' Win Big at Canadian Screen Awards

Genevieve Dulude-De Celles' coming-of-age drama 'A Colony' was named best film at Canada's national awards, and earned Emilie Bierre the best actress trophy.


The Netflix/CBC drama Anne With an E won big Sunday night at the Canadian Screen Awards, earning the best TV drama trophy, with comedies Letterkenny and Schitt's Creek also picking big awards.


And Canada's national film and TV awards gave the French-language coming-of-age drama A Colony (Une Colonie) from director Genevieve Dulude-De Celles the best movie honors. Anne With an E, which hails from Emmy-winning writer Moira Walley-Beckett (Breaking Bad) and is based on the classic Anne of Green Gables book series, also nabbed the trophy for best drama actress for Amybeth McNulty.


The Eugene Levy and Catherine O'Hara chuckler Schitt's Creek, about a wealthy family that suddenly goes broke, was named best TV comedy and earned O'Hara the best comedy actress prize. Anne With an E and the CBC comedy Schitt's Creek, which also streams on Netflix, each grabbed a field-leading 15 nominations each heading into the 2019 Canadian Screen Awards.


Cardinal, a Hulu murder mystery drama that also airs on CTV, earned a best limited TV drama actor trophy for Billy Campbell, and a best limited drama actress prize for co-star Karine Vanasse. And Hulu's Canadian comedy Letterkenny, which streams north of the border on CraveTV, earned a best comedy actor trophy for Jared Keeso, who also shared the best comedy writing prize with Jacob Tierney.


Also in the TV competition, Kim Coates won for best drama actor for his star-turn in Bad Blood, the CityTV/Netflix crime drama, while CTV's The Amazing Race Canada won for best reality TV series. And the British actress Dominique Provost-Chalkley, who plays Waverly Earp on the Syfy and Space series Wynonna Earp, won the audience award, voted on by ordinary Canadians.


On the movie side, the Canadian Screen Awards, produced by the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television, named A Colony, director Genevieve Dulude-De Celles' feature debut, as the best film, while giving 14 year-old Emilie Bierre, the coming of age tale's lead, the best actress prize for playing a young 12 year-old girl who faces bullying and ridicule on entering junior high school in rural Quebec.


The best leading actor prize went to Theodore Pellerin for his star-turn in Family First, a French-language family crime drama by director Sophie Dupuis. And Jasmin Mozaffari nabbed the best director prize for Firecrackers, her debut feature, while the best documentary trophy went to Anthropocene: The Human Epoch, directed by Jennifer Baichwal, Nicholas de Pencier and Edward Burtynsky.


The Canadian Screen Awards were handed out during a gala telecast that aired on the CBC network.