Wynne jumped at chance to appear in update of 1978 film

It seemed like a good idea at the time.

Enthralled by Peter Raymont’s seminal 1978 National Film Board of Canada documentary The Art of the Possible, Premier Kathleen Wynne jumped at the chance to star in an updated version.

“I was persuaded to do this video because I had watched the video of (former Ontario premier) Bill Davis, which was lovely, but everybody was a man and everybody was smoking,” she told the Star last month.

“It was a very different time and so I thought it was a good idea to have an update.”

So she agreed to allow Raymont’s company, White Pine Pictures, to film her at home and at Queen’s Park over a four-month period for Premier: The Unscripted Kathleen Wynne.

A documentary crew led by director Roxana Spicer was given an all-access pass for weeks on end, attending cabinet, sitting in on high-level briefings, and flying to Sudbury with the premier during the February byelection.

Wynne, spouse Jane Rounthwaite, deputy premier Deb Matthews, Finance Minister Charles Sousa and top Liberal aides wore microphones for meetings and sat down for formal interviews afterward to give context.

As per an agreement with producer Raymont, the premier’s officials screened a few minutes of footage on May 1 to ensure it did not violate cabinet secrecy or anyone’s privacy. They were alarmed at what they saw.

That led to Spicer and editor Michael Hannan quitting the production following a tense meeting with the premier’s senior advisers.

With no director or editor attached to the project, TV Ontario cancelled the planned June 6 broadcast and is demanding a refund of its $114,075 advance from White Pine.

The film’s future remains in limbo largely because Wynne and her associates have not agreed to sign the errors and omissions insurance release forms needed for it to be screened publicly.

Most people interviewed for the documentary — including this reporter and Star editorial cartoonist Theo Moudakis — signed the waivers.

Despite that lack of co-operation, Wynne and her officials deny trying to exert any editorial control over the final product, which they have not seen in its entirety, and insist they want it to be aired.

Sources say the Liberals are unhappy it appears to focus more on the Sudbury byelection controversy than the spring budget.