“Nowhere, and I mean nowhere, in the tourist videos, brochures, or pamphlets did they say how hard it was to meet women in this city.”
These words are spoken by the character Troy McMaster in the pilot episode of Single & Dating in Vancouver, a witty new web series that explores the highs and lows of dating in the so-called “no fun city.”
The series, created by local actors, focuses on Troy (played by Troy Mundle), an actor who recently moved to Vancouver from rural Ontario and is ready to meet the right woman and settle down. Troy shares his frustrations of being single in Vancouver with best friend Michael Robinson, a yoga-practising womanizer, his sassy co-worker Sheri Wilson, and up-and-coming real estate agent and single dad Chad Mayweather.
The first episode, which was released earlier this month, has Troy and his friends exploring online dating.
Life mirrors art for lead actor and producer. Like his character Troy, Mundle moved to Vancouver from Toronto in 2005. Not knowing anyone in the city, he decided to try online dating.
“I thought trying Lavalife may be an interesting way to find people, and interesting it was. Inevitably there’s a high percentage of times where, when you get there, the person that is portrayed online really isn’t the person you actually meet in the coffee shop,” Mundle said with a laugh.
These experiences led Mundle to come up with an idea of creating short videos about bad dates, which he decided instead to turn into a series of scripted half-hour episodes. Mundle worked with friend and fellow actor Michael Goudge, who plays “sexual philanthropist” Michael Robinson, to write the series.
Mundle enlisted the help of Sheri Rabold, whom he worked with on Stargate Universe, to play Sheri Wilson. In the series Troy and Sheri both work as stand-in actors.
As the only female lead, Rabold says her character is an “important feminine anchor” who counters some of the stereotypes about Vancouver women.
“She’s constantly trying to defend her sex because the three guys are out there looking for a woman and they tend to stereotype,” Rabold says. “[Sheri] creates some balance. In the world of testosterone she’ll be the estrogen.”
Co-producer Jane Avery, who met Mundle in an acting class at Leap Studios in Vancouver, says the show is relatable. Before shooting the series, Mundle, Avery and a camera team went down to English Bay to ask people what they thought of the dating scene in Vancouver.
“The story that Troy wrote became confirmed,” says Avery. “[We said], oh my god, this is true, and there are even more wacky, wild stories out there that people have actually experienced.”
The team behind Single & Dating in Vancouver is happy with the response its received so far for their first episode, which can be viewed at sadinvan.com or on YouTube.
Some comments on the YouTube video praised the cinematography and acting, while others criticized the show’s Vancouver focus with such comments as, “No one cares about Vancouver.”
Avery says they’ll keep putting in references only Vancouverites may catch — Troy, for example, is nearly hit at the end of the episode by a cyclist not using a bike lane.
“Vancouver is the fifth character in this show. We’re going to keep giving Vancouver those inside jokes. And if you’re in Timbuktu and you don’t get those jokes, that’s fine. We want to see Vancouver represented as Vancouver.”
Avery says that although the dating scene in Vancouver is unique, the show still has a wider appeal. “If you’re single and dating anywhere, you’re still going to probably have an online dating horror story.”
Two more episodes of Single & Dating in Vancouver are on the way, and then the team hopes to raise funds to produce another three episodes to complete the season. The series will then be submitted to the Leo awards and national and international film festivals.
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