Rogers cancels Reel to Real

Rogers Television is cancelling the movie review show Reel to Real after 16 years on-air, one year after the broadcaster received more limited access to Toronto International Film Festival press conferences due to Bell Canada’s festival sponsorship deal.

A spokesman for Rogers Television confirmed that the show, co-hosted by Toronto critics Richard Crouse and Geoff Pevere, will fade to black on Aug. 29. The cable giant’s community TV channel is offered to Rogers’ basic cable customers.

The move comes a year after Reel to Real stopped carrying its signature round-the-clock TIFF coverage of press conferences and film reviews. That followed Bell’s festival sponsorship deal, which shifted the rights to the press conferences to CTV, while Rogers could only air two minutes of each conference.

That restriction convinced Rogers to shift its resources to new programming in the fall that better reflects the local Toronto market, something Reel to Real was hard-pressed to do as it focused broadly on movie reviews and interviews with actors and directors in Cannes or Toronto.

Past hosts of Reel to Real include Christopher Heard, John Foote and Katrina Onstad.