'Canada's Got Talent' Canceled After First Season

Rogers Media's competition show, a spin-off of the international franchise from Fremantle Media and Syco Entertainment, will not be returning for a sophomore run.

TORONTO – Canadian broadcaster Rogers Media on Friday said it will not produce a second season of the Martin Short co-hosted Canada’s Got Talent TV talent show for its Citytv network.

The Canadian spin-off of the international Got Talent franchise from Fremantle Media and Syco Entertainment was produced by Toronto-based indie Insight Productions.

The inaugural Canada’s Got Talent season, which recently crowned three dancers from Sagkeeng, Manitoba as winners, got Citytv back into the Canadian primetime stakes with Sunday night competition episodes.

And that followed Citytv already doing big numbers with the NBC talent show America’s Got Talent, co-hosted by Canadian Howie Mandel.

But given the soft Canadian TV advertising market currently, parent Rogers Media decided not to go forward with a sophomore run for an expensively produced reality show that calls for cross-Canada audition and judging rounds.

“After careful consideration of all factors, including the current economic climate, Citytv has refocused its programming strategy and will not be producing Canada’s Got Talent for the 2012-13 season,” Rogers Media president of broadcasting Scott Moore said Friday in a statement.

At the same time, the broadcaster is making a big push into local sitcoms showrun by Canadian screenwriters with Hollywood experience.

Thunderbird Films is producing 13 episodes of the multi-camera comedy Package Deal from creator Andrew Orenstein (3rd Rock From the Sun) for Citytv, while Force Four Entertainment is producing Seed, a 13-episode sitcom about an ill-equipped bachelor who ventures into sperm donation from Joseph Raso, who co-executive produced Disney’s Zombies and Cheerleaders.

Citytv is also to air The Bachelor Canada this Fall, with an all-Canadian cast, and its perennial ratings challenge Sunday night was in part solved when ABC moved Revenge to Sundays at 9 p.m., to be followed this Fall at 10 p.m. by the rookie series 666 Park Avenue.