The 5th annual Canadian Screen Awards were held on March 12, 2017, to honour achievements in Canadian film, television, and digital media production in 2016.[1] Nominations were announced on January 17, 2017.[2]
Awards in many of the technical categories were presented in a series of galas, collectively called Canadian Screen Week, in the days leading up to the main ceremony. At the main ceremony, the film It's Only the End of the World and the television series Orphan Black won the most awards in film and television categories, with six and nine awards, respectively.[3]
The ceremony was hosted by Howie Mandel.[4] His performance was not well received by critics; Kate Taylor of The Globe and Mail criticized Mandel's recurring joke of dubbing the awards the STDs – for "Screen, television, Digital" – in response to the fact that the awards still do not have an official short-form name in the manner of "Oscar" for the Academy Awards,[4] while Norman Wilner of NOW criticized Mandel's "hacky crowd work and even hackier bits", concluding that "I'm sure this stuff kills at Casino Rama, but when you're supposed to be anchoring an awards show it just seems cheap and lazy."[5]
Both critics wrote that the broadcast's best moments came from various winners' moving and funny acceptance speeches, including Tatiana Maslany's emotional response to winning the award for Best Actress in a Film for The Other Half; Paul Sun-Hyung Lee's moving speech about how honoured he was to win Best Actor in a Comedy Series for Kim's Convenience, a series which celebrated the immigrant contribution to Canadian society; Christopher Plummer's grace and humility in accepting a lifetime achievement award; and Catherine O'Hara's decision to accept her award for Best Actress in a Comedy Series in character as Moira Rose from Schitt's Creek.[4][5]
At the broadcast, George Stroumboulopoulos announced that beginning in 2018, the academy's annual award for Science or Nature Documentary Program would be named the Rob Stewart Award in memory of documentary filmmaker Rob Stewart, who died in January 2017.[6]
Pierre-Jules Audet, Jérôme Décarie, Michelle Cloutier, Stan Sakell, Jean-François Sauvé, Mathieu Beaudin, François Senneville, Luc Raymond and Jean-Philippe Saint-Laurent, Race
Mike Tersigni, Ben O'Neil, Burak Ozgan, Jonathan Dowler and Allan Hughes, The Amazing Race Canada – "Who's Ready to Let it All Hang Out"
Mike Tersigni, Al Manson, Jonathan Dowler, Dave McMahon, Ryan Monteith and Cynthia Flengeris, The Amazing Race Canada – "Second place Isn't Good Enough"
Al Manson, Jordan Wood, Ryan Monteith, Baun Mah, Jonathan Dowler and Dave McMahon, Big Brother Canada – "Finale"
David Blanchard, Don McEwen and Brendan Mahon, Real Detective – "Vengeance"
Sound in a fiction program or series
Sound in a non-fiction program or series
Jane Tattersall, Steve Medeiros, Brennan Mercer, David McCallum, Dale Sheldrake, Martin Lee, Kirk Lynds, Yuri Gorbachow, Daniel Birch, Goro Koyama and Jack Heeren, Vikings – "The Last Ship"
Alan deGraaf, Mike Woroniuk, Kevin Howard, Nathan Robitaille, J.R. Fountain, Jill Purdy, Richard Calistan, Joe Mancuso, Steve Hammon, Erick Culp and Zenon Waschuk, X Company – "Butcher and Bolt"
Tom Bjelic, Brad Zoern, Christian T. Cooke, Peter Persaud, Steve Baine, Dale Lennon, Mike Mancuso and Rachelle Audet, Dark Matter – "We Voted Not to Space You"
John Laing, Dale Lennon, Tom Bjelic, Marilee Yorston, Chris Guglick, Shaun Gratto, Marco Difelice and Herwig Gayer, Orphan Black – "The Scandal of Altruism"
Robert Labrosse, Jean Camden, Guillaume Boursier, Martin M Messier, Sebastien Bedard, Sabin Hudon and Jacques Plante, 19–2 – "Burn Pile"
Jeff Henschel and Ewan Deane, Sonic Magic: The Wonder and Science of Sound
Dominic Remane, Bill Halliday, Michael Borrett, Kieran McKay, Jim Maxwell, Paul Wishart, Ovidiu Cinazan, Jeremy Dineen, Tom Morrison and Leann Harvey, Vikings – "The Last Ship"
Stephen Lebed, Jeff Skochko, Rob Vandenhoek, Max Bettie, Chris Cheeseman, Steve Ramone, JP Giamos, Mike Duffy, Dennis Ngariuku and Kristina Walker, Beauty and the Beast – "Au Revoir"
Michael Gibson, Tom Turnbull, Lara Osland, Anthony Paterson, Brandon Outhwaite, Shoban Narayanan, Tony Cybulski, Pranjal Choudhary, Geoff Marshall and Garloff Langenbeck, Killjoys – "How to Kill Friends and Influence People"
Geoff Scott, William Garrett, Sarah Wormsbecher, Eric Doiron, Nathan Larouche, Anthony DeChellis and Lon Molnar, Wynonna Earp – "I Walk the Line"
Geoff Scott, Sarah Wormsbecher, Eric Doiron, Nathan Larouche, Anthony DeChellis and Lon Molnar, Orphan Black – "From Dancing Mice to Psychopaths"