Far away from anything interesting lies the fictional town of Dog River, home of Corner Gas and population of “around 500.” Among the multitudes of inhabitants in this bustling metropolis are a big-city girl turned small-town cafe owner and an ambitious rookie cop who whiles away the day using her traffic radar equipment to estimate how fast birds are flying. Incidentally, they also happen to be pretty easy on the eyes:
Corner Gas is a half-hour comedy created by Canadian Brent Butt and is, essentially, his musings on what his life might have looked like had stayed in his small home community and not pursued a career in comedy. Rouleau, Saskatchewan, the small community in which Corner Gas is primarily filmed, actually repainted their grain elevator to read “Dog River.” Chances are good that anyone who is familiar with rural culture knows how indicative this of Corner Gas’ impact on the small community of 400. Nope, that’s not a typo, 400.
Tara Spencer-Nairn is a Canadian actress and “one of Canada’s Top Ten Superstars of the Future” as selected by TV Guide. Tara currently plays Karen Pelly, the junior of the two police officers assigned to Dog River. According to her offical bio on the Corner Gas website, Tara attended and graduated from Shawnigan Lake School, a boarding school which she “attended after her rebellious nature resulted in her being ‘asked to leave’ another private school.” How endearing is that? She later graduated from the Vancouver Film School and appeared on many Canadian television and film productions, perhaps most notably New Waterford Girl.
I don’t suppose that most lesbian and bisexual women like females in uniform as much as I do, but in case there are a few out there:
Gabrielle Miller plays Lacey Burrows, a Torontonian who inherits the local cafe (“The Ruby”) which is attached to the gas station for which the show is named. She constantly tries, with mixed results, to fit into small-town life.
Here’s a clip of Tara and Gabrielle (it feels weird to pair those two names up – like some sort of fanfiction crossover) as Lacey and Karen:
Corner Gas seasons are limited in length, so both Tara and Gabrielle are free to work on other projectsthroughout the year. Gabrielle concurrently plays Bobbi in Robson Arms and in 2004 had a recurring role in a television show called Alienated, giving her the uncommon experience of starring in three ongoing series in a single calendar year . Also keeping busy outside of Dog River, Tara recently played in a film called Final Draft, which stars James Vanderbeek as a screenwriter trying to make a deadline who is distracted by the machinations of an evil clown from his past. I couldn’t even make that up if I tried. Unsurprisingly, the film is being released (a couple of days ago, actually) straight to DVD. Here’s the trailer:
Corner Gas recently began airing in the U.S. on Superstation WGN, and its fifth season starts in Canada on Monday, Sept. 24th on CTV.
Niuxita, thanks for the great blogging idea!
