Sydney Banks

Sydney Banks (Syd Banks) (January 6, 1917 – November 14, 2006) was a pioneer Canadian broadcaster and producer.

Sydney Banks was born in Toronto, Canada on January 6, 1917. His parents were English, and Banks and his mother returned to England in 1919, to Cumbria, but they returned to Canada in the late 1920s. After spending a brief time in Chatham, they moved to Toronto, where they lived in Cabbagetown. Banks went first to school at Our Lady of Lourdes, and then to Danforth Tech, but he left school when he was only 14.

Banks began his multi-faceted career as a child actor in England. In turn, he became a leading stage director and actor in the 1930s in Canada moving into radio where he earned kudos as an actor and writer. While in England, Banks had done stage work as a child actor, and he then did some radio work for CFRB, as well as getting involved in the Toronto theatre scene.

From 1936 to 1941, Banks also acted in many roles with the Theatre of Action, a left-wing drama company, which produced several others who would go on to fame, including Wayne and Shuster, Lou Applebaum, Lou Jacobi, Ben Lennick, Sydney Newman and Lorne Green. Banks directed the Theatre of Action's final production, of John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, in Toronto in 1940. He was also a co-founder (with Al Mulock) of the Red Barn Theatre on Lake Simcoe.

In 1941, during World War II, Banks joined the army as a captain in the Canadian Army Film Unit, and after D-Day he spent time in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany.

After demobilization, Banks became executive producer of International Productions. This made him Canada's first active television producer with responsibility for weekly show broadcasts from US border stations for Canadian consumption. He established the first TV commercial production unit in Canada and also in 1949 the first TV department for a major Canadian ad agency.

In 1952, as Canada began TV broadcasting, Banks expanded into Canadian television program production. In 1955, he joined the late Spence Caldwell at S. W. Caldwell Ltd as executive producer, and ran the Rank organisation's Queensway Studios. He then moved to Foster Advertising, where he started their television advertising department. This involved frequent travel to the States, where he produced commercials for Carling. Banks was also the principal founder of Canada's first Film Producers Association.

In 1962, after working with Jerry Solway of Astral Films on several major television projects, Banks went out on his own, forming his own company S. Banks (In Television) Ltd., and began producing music series for television. He had shows on both CBC and CTV, including Cross Canada Barndance, A Singin', Let's Sing Out, Brand New Scene and Country Music Hall. In 1961 he became the first president of the Directors' Guild of Canada, and returned to the presidential chair twenty years later. He received a Distinguished Service Award from the Directors' Guild in 2003. He also served for a time as a director of the Association of Motion Picture Producers and Laboratories.

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