Jefferson Lewis

Canadian screenwriter and film producer

Howard Jefferson Lewis (born 1951) is a Canadian screenwriter and film producer from Montreal, Quebec.[1] He is most noted as the writer of the film Ordinary Magic, for which he was a Genie Award nominee for Best Adapted Screenplay at the 15th Genie Awards in 1994.[2]

## Background

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Born and raised in Montreal, he is the grandson of Wilder Penfield.[3] After graduating from Queen's University with a degree in film studies, he worked as a journalist for the Ottawa Citizen, CBC Radio and Southam News before publishing Something Hidden, a biography of his grandfather, in 1981.[3]

## Film career

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His book was also adapted into a National Film Board of Canada documentary by filmmaker Bob Lower,[4] which drew Lewis more directly into filmmaking. He wrote a number of documentary shorts for the NFB in the 1980s, and was a writer for the short-lived television soap opera Mount Royal, before making his feature film debut with the screenplay for The Paper Wedding (Les noces de papier) in 1989.[1]

His second screenplay, Ordinary Magic, was directed by Giles Walker and released in 1993.[5] The following year, Michel Brault released My Friend Max (Mon amie Max), from a script cowritten by Lewis and Guy Fournier.[6] For that film, he won the award for Best Screenplay at the 1994 Rendez-vous du cinéma québécois.[7]

In 2002 he wrote Paule Baillargeon's NFB documentary Claude Jutra: An Unfinished Story (Claude Jutra, portrait sur film), for which he won both the Gemini Award for Best Writing in a Documentary Program or Series at the 18th Gemini Awards,[8] and the Writers Guild of Canada award for best writing in a documentary.[9]

His later screenplays included the feature films Emotional Arithmetic[10] and French Immersion,[11] and the documentary film Outbreak: Anatomy of a Plague.

## Personal life

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He was married in the 1970s to Catherine Keachie, a marketer in the publishing industry.[12] After that marriage ended in the mid-1980s, he remarried to actress Andrée Pelletier.[7]

## Filmography

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* The Paper Wedding (Les noces de papier) \- 1989
* Ordinary Magic \- 1993
* My Friend Max (Mon amie Max) \- 1994
* Creatures of the Sun \- 1997
* Claude Jutra: An Unfinished Story (Claude Jutra, portrait sur film) \- 2002
* Emotional Arithmetic \- 2007
* Outbreak: Anatomy of a Plague \- 2010
* French Immersion \- 2011

## References

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1. ^ a b John Griffin, "French director, anglo script-writer generate marital bliss with Paper Wedding". Montreal Gazette, April 29, 1990.
2. ^ "The 1994 Genie nominees". Playback. November 7, 1994. Archived from the original on June 3, 2021. Retrieved June 1, 2021.
3. ^ a b Charles Godfrey, "With Bible reading, hard work and obeying the Golden Rule, Penfield could do anything". The Globe and Mail, October 31, 1981.
4. ^ Rick Groen, "Engrossing NFB documentary on a brilliant man Penfield's life-long quest". The Globe and Mail, November 21, 1981.
5. ^ Bill Brownstein, "Filming magic on a shoestring; Despite little fanfare, Canadian movies can hold their own". Montreal Gazette, January 15, 1994.
6. ^ Charles-Henri Ramond, "Mon amie Max – Film de Michel Brault". Films du Québec, February 3, 2009.
7. ^ a b John Griffin, "Max caused award-winning writer some pain". Montreal Gazette, February 20, 1994.
8. ^ "Best of documentary, news, sports honoured". North Bay Nugget, October 20, 2003.
9. ^ "Screenwriters honoured". Toronto Star, April 15, 2003.
10. ^ Matthew Hays, "Lewis does the Arithmetic". Playback, October 2, 2006.
11. ^ Brendan Kelly, "Immersed in confusion; Kevin Tierney hopes to offend people on both sides of the language divide in film about Anglos coming to Quebec to learn French". Postmedia Network, September 26, 2011.
12. ^ Doug Saunders, "Tireless magazine lobbyist faced trade challenge". The Globe and Mail, December 17, 1997.

## External links

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* Jefferson Lewis at IMDb