June 23, 2023

MURDOCH MYSTERIES STARS LOVE MUSKOKA … AND CAREY’S WINGS

Story and photos Mark Clairmont | MuskokaTODAY.com

GRAVENHURST — Thomas Craig is happy to be back in Canada and particularly Muskoka.

The London-based actor — a star of the Murdoch Mysteries — has a “mate with a cottage on Muldrew Lake.”

And his character, Inspector Thomas Brackenreid, has returned to Toronto from Yorkshire for the exciting two-part fall premiere of season 17, which includes about 20 minutes shot Lake Muskoka in Gravenhurst last week on and around the Wenonah II and at Gull Lake Rotary Park.

The Muskoka Wharf doubled as the Port of Toronto and the one scene on shore had Brackenreid calling for taxi as extras cross back and forth in front of the Segwun and Wenonah II. They day before they spent filming on Lake Muskoka on the Wenonah.

**Thomas Craig and Arwen Huphreys strike a pose on the set of Murdoch Mysteries seson 17 shooting at the Muskoka Wharf in Gravenhurst. Photos Mark Clairmont**

This as the Inspector and his wife Margaret, played by Arwen Humphreys, return for the exciting conclusion of another two-parter, which ended last season in a cliff-hanger.

Star Detective William Murdoch (Yannick Bisson) and his wife Dr. Julia Ogden (Hélène Joy) had been kidnapped and Const. George Crabtree (Jonny Harris) is now the interim inspector after Murdoch turned in his Toronto Constabulary badge after a dispute with his new boss who eventually loses that job too.

I sat down with the congenial TV couple, Craig and Humphreys, on the set at the Muskoka Wharf. Both are original cast members from Season 1 in 2008, when the show began in CityTV and is now on CBC and CBC Gem. Season 17 starts this fall in the show year of 1911.

Craig calls the popular series a “fantasy fairytale.”

**Arwen Humphreys and Thomas Craig have played Margaret and Thomas Brackenreid since season one in 2008 and are happy to be back for season 17.**

“But the thing that’s really neat about Murdoch,” says Humphreys, “and I think the thing fans really like is the murders. That’s part of the fantasy. But the producers have really tried to stay historically correct. I think that’s something that people really connect to.

“What I really like about it is they try to connect within these historical facts our world today. And there have been all kinds of neat things that Murdoch’s invented — or even Crabtree a few years ago who invented TV dinners.”

“And I invented the wings,” adds Craig, a reference to a 2016 episode in Buffalo where Murdoch declines his chicken wing offer. (“Your loss. But I tell you, Murdoch, these chicken wings are the only good thing about Buffalo” — to which the chef intones “Look, the Canadians are eating our garbage.”)

While Bisson wasn’t in Gravenhurst for the shoot, Humphreys and some of the cast and crew did go to Carey’s Pub for wings. And she said “they were good.”

For 16 seasons the two actors have seen the show and “Toronto the Good” emerge from the end of the Victorian period in the late 1800s into the Edwardian era of the early 1900s — bridging two very different centuries.

**Shooting of MM17 included this taxi scene at the ‘Port of Toronto,’ and day on the Wenonah II out on Lake Muskoka, which subbed for the St. Lawrence River.**

At the end of last season Murdoch is kidnapped while the Brackenreids are away and they don’t know that until they are called back from England.

“What we’ve been doing,” says Thomas, “is doubling Lake Muskoka for the St. Lawrence River. So we’ve being going quite far out so it looks like river.”

“It’s really cool,” adds Arwen.

A decade ago Murdoch Mysteries filmed on the S.S. Keewatin in Port McNichol — but it didn’t move — until recently being shipped off to Kingston.

Thomas said he was talking to producer Jeremy Hood saying: “This episode must be costing a lot of money, more than normal. And Murdoch’s not even featured in what we’re shooting. Do you know what I mean. It’s kind of our story coming back from England.”

“I couldn’t believe it when I read the script we’d be doing this,” said Humphreys. “And when I heard we’d be coming up here … and the boat is gorgeous. It’s been a lot of fun shooting here for sure.”

“I come up here every summer,” said Craig. “I got a mate who’s got a cottage just around the corner — on Muldrew Lake.”

**Roll ”em. And they did June 15 as extras wait off camera following their walk-on appearances.**

Humphreys said “fans know that the Brackenreids are coming back, but they don’t know how or what. So I’m not sure how much of the plot we can reveal. But they’ll know real soon (this fall when the two episodes air.) Let’s just say it’s a lot of fun.”

Says Craig: “I bolt straight into the station and everybody’s been taken hostage back at the station (No. 4). So out of the frying pan and into the fire.”

Asked about actor Laurence Murdoch, who plays Henry Higgins, they say that’s his real name.

As for the show, based on Canadian novelist Maureen Jennings’ book “Except the Dying,” Thomas says “they do a mix of serious episodes and fun, light-hearted episodes. And totally off-the-wall episodes. There’s enough episodes to do a mix of everything.”

Humphreys says “In the first few seasons they were trying to stick more to the book, which are quite dark. We’re very light in comparison. And when they did the mini series of Murdoch, they definitely stuck to the book.”

**A couple of horses, includng Tony here, were brought in transform Muskoka Wharf into Toronto’s 1911 waterfront.**

As for how they play their parts now and how much leeway directors give them to work their characters, Thomas said “I think the characters worked us by now. We know them.

“It’s 16 years and 17 summers.”

“But,” says Humphreys, “the nice thing about having been on the show for so long, and playing these characters for so long, is we have a sort of licence to be able to when we get the script we can say ‘can we ….’ We have more of a voice than you have coming on to a show for one episode. So that’s really nice to kind of play around.”

Thomas likes that “Murdoch is quite good a giving young directors a chance. There are always quite a few novices around. But we have good experienced crew helping them.”

The hour-long weekly show, which has allowed the couple to get around seeing a lot of Ontario (him more than her) has essentially maintained its Canadian character and feel. A winning formula that has it in syndication in the U.S.

“I’ve gone white blond. I used to be ginger. That’s how I changed,” jokes Craig, a native of Sheffield, England and fan of his Wednesday football club that has just been promoted to the Championship.

Additional shooting, including a rebuild of the Wenonah’s interior at the Shaftesbury studio in Toronto, will be part of the 26-day filming and eding process, said first assistant directr Dave Manion.

**London actor Thomas Craig comes up to a “mate’s” Muskoka cottage every summer at Muldrew Lake.**

Another member of the crew who was happy to be back in Gravenhurst was Sherry Schell, of Toronto, who for 16 years has been a “stand-in” for the Murdoch actors when the crews set up lighting and sound.

She grew up summering in Gravenhurst when visiting her aunt Lois McLaren and is related to many of the Schells and Barnes’ in town. Her dad was Len Schell. So she got to have lunch with cousin Cathy Decaire, who is married to Jack Decaire — both of whom Sherry is related to on different sides of their family.

Another local familial connection saw director Tom Lynd visited on set by his brother Tom, and his wife Laura, of Huntsville.

The only Murdoch mystery left unsolved at the Wharf was why — when director Lynd called “action” and Brackenreid shouted: ‘Driver follow that cab’ — that the 1919 Model T didn’t start.

“They can be a little finicky when they’re over 100 years old,” says driver and extra Mike Bridgman, of Picture Car Wrangling.

“Cut …. Take 2.”