New sitcom puts comedic spin on life in a northern Manitoba First Nation community

WINNIPEG — HL: New sitcom puts comedic spin on life in a northern Manitoba First Nation community

A new made-in-Manitoba sitcom is in the works putting a comedic spin on life in an isolated Manitoba First Nation community.

It’s loosely based on the life of comedian Paul Rabliauskas who hails from Poplar River, located about 600 kilometres north of Winnipeg.

The 10-part, half-hour comedy “Acting Good” follows Rabliauskas who – after failing in the big city – returns to his fictional home community of Grouse Lake First Nation in Northern Manitoba, a community that lives by its own set of rules.

“Basically about me and my family back home in Poplar River,” said Rabliauskas. “It’s a fly-in community so a little isolated, so basically about my crazy family.”

This is Rabliauskas’s first foray into scripted television but he made his small screen debut back when he was 16 when he hosted an Aboriginal People’s Television Network (APTN) show called “Cool Jobs”.

“It’s important that we grab that humour from an area which usually not a lot of people get to hear from,” said Rabliauskas. “Our humour is a little more… I’m going to call it deadly. Our humour is definitely a little more deadly than what most people are used to.”

Script development is underway and will carry on through the winter, with shooting expected to start on location in Manitoba this spring.

“There’s not a lot of people that have been to an isolated reserve or small community in Canada so for us to sort of open the doors and invite people into our stories and lives will be super fun and unique for the whole country,” Rabliauskas said.

The show is being produced by Kistikan Pictures Inc. for CTV Comedy Channel and was co-created by Rabliauskas, Amber-Sekowan Daniels, Eric Toth and Pat Thornton.

“We’ve got an amazing funny team on this show and you know it feels like it’s all meant to be with everything coming together with comedy and our people. I’m so excited."