Jeffrey McKay

Canadian filmmaker Jeff McKay was born in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. In 1968 at the age of 7, he moved to Winnipeg Manitoba. His first jobs as a teen were in stage theatre production, in Winnipeg and in southern Ontario. In his early 20's he played drums in several small time recording acts and participated in tours across Western Canadian to small towns and cities. His father was a civil Engineer and a past President of the Engineering Institute of Canada, also a founding partner in UMA Engineering. His father was a real history buff and loved the Canadian prairies. He was also past president of Heritage Winnipeg at a critical time when city developers threatened the demolition of Winnipeg's historic Exchange District. His mother was a teacher and principle of a one room prairie schoolhouse in Saskatchewan, then an art teacher in Winnipeg. His mother made a real impression on Jeff and his love of art and photography. In his mid 20's, Jeff began an 18 year period of work with the National Film Board of Canada as a film editor and as a director. He worked with Ches Yetman in Winnipeg, Kent Martin in Montreal and Halifax and also Don Haig. Freelance filmmaking and editing brought long standing work relationships as editor for photographer and filmmaker John Paskievich and collaborative filmmaking partnerships with documentary producer Merit Jensen Carr of Merit Motion Pictures. Jeff is a recipient of the Peabody Award for his feature documentary film 'Fat Chance'. He has also made many short films. Also three films for the National Film Board of Canada. 'Fat Chance' (45 & 90 min), 'And So To Bed' (60 min) and 'Crapshoot' (52 min). He produced, directed and co wrote an adaptation of Charles Sprawson's landmark book (recently reissued by Penguin Classics), 'Haunts of the Black Masseur - The Swimmer As Hero'. Jeff collaborated with Charles Sprawson to make the film. It was produced by Jeff's production company Edgeland Films and was Executive Produced by Merit Jensen Carr. Broadcasters involved were: ZDF Germany, ARTE France, TVOntario, Knowledge Network of British Columbia, IFC Canada and SCN (Saskatchewan). In 2008 with Merit Motion Pictures, Jeff completed the one hour and feature length '40 Years of One Night Stands', which he directed and was also co editor with Bob Lower. '40 Years' tells the often funny and tragic story of the first 40 years of the oldest operating professional ballet company in North America - the Royal Winnipeg Ballet. In 2011 Jeff began developing with Merit Jensen Carr, the film 'Call of the Forest - The Forgotten Wisdom of Trees', which went into production in spring 2013. The film is inspired by and features Biochemist, classical botanist and author Diana Beresford-Kroeger. Merit Jensen Carr is the Executive Producer and Co-Producer with Jeff McKay. The feature documentary and a one hour version were completed in March 2016. The film was nominated for the Rob Stewart Prize at the Canadian Screen Awards for best Science and Natural History program. The film is a co-production between Merit Motion Pictures and Edgeland Films. It is produced by Treespeak Films.