The Movie Network - History

History

In 1976, Communications Minister Jeanne Sauvé was quoted as saying "(Canadian) pay television is inevitable". During the 1970s when premium pay-TV service HBO and the then up-and-coming Superstation WTBS became available on satellite in North America, some Canadians who were living in underserved rural areas, wanted access to these services. The Saskatchewan government together with Cable Regina set up a provincial pay-TV network called "Teletheatre" in 1979.

Growth of grey market TVRO dishes by 1980 led the government of Pierre Trudeau to allow for pay television in Canada, and that there would be hearings to license Canadian pay television networks. In September 1981, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) held a hearing in Hull, Quebec to license Canada's first pay-television networks. There were more than 24 applicants.

A pay-TV licence was issued by the CRTC to "First Choice Canadian Communications Corp." on March 18, 1982. When First Choice, as TMN was then known, was launched on February 1, 1983, it was a national pay-TV service; its original slogan was "Look Out for Number One! Look Out for First Choice!" The first movie ever to air on First Choice (now TMN) was For Your Eyes Only. The movie aired following a replay of The Who's farewell tour concert special and a two-hour promo for First Choice announcing the programming it would carry; the airing of The Who concert which had been aired live on other channels the year before, as well as the two-hour promotional ad had several critics wondering about the channel's claims that it would be commercial-free and not play reruns. At 7 a.m. PST, First Choice aired Star Wars and continued to play the film again every other day for eight hours. The service was offered as a free 14-day preview, then scrambled exclusively to the subscribers who wanted to pay extra.

After a disappointing run for pay services in general, the industry was restructured and First Choice was restricted to eastern Canada, with competitor Superchannel (now Movie Central) taking territorial rights in the west. Both services used the First Choice-Superchannel name from 1984-1988, before they split again in September 1988. Beginning in 1984 (but particularly after the split from Superchannel), First Choice also made use of the slogan "The Movie Network", and this became the name of the channel itself in 1993.

First Choice was originally granted a bilingual licence; it also operated a 24-hour French-language channel under the same licence, which was called Premier Choix. In early 1984 this operation was merged with another Quebec-based pay-television network, TVEC, to form Super Écran, which is still in operation today.