by MATTHEW HAYS

For those of us who actually live here, it may not come as much of a revelation: there are a whole load of nocturnal weirdoes in this town. Now, a new TV series airing this fall hopes to lift up the rock and illuminate what lies beneath.

Urban Nites, the brainchild of Toronto-based producer Les Tomlin, adopts the reality-TV approach and applies it to various Montrealers, all of whom like their partying done when the sun doesn’t shine. Apparently, the people behind the series—including former Montrealer David Ozier, who here directs and writes—advertised for anyone who either works or plays at night in Montreal to come to them and tell their stories. The response was astonishing, and the examples of Montreal’s night-time dalliances are all in clear view here. Characters include one stripper who enjoys heading up into Parc Mont-Royal late at night to take off all her clothes and do what appears to be yoga. Disrobing in such a quiet, dark and empty park, she explains, makes her feel cleansed. Another episode has one of the city’s many drag artists venturing into the Village to look for love (or is that lust?). A dominatrix also takes to one of her clients, slapping his butt good and hard (my personal fave). Two buskers attempt to make ends meet by tap dancing and drumming for a street crowd. And a pair of goth vampire enthusiasts play a Dungeons-and-Dragons-like game involving role playing and bloodsucking lore.

The crew behind Urban Nites has managed to assemble some very good characters together; my one complaint is that I think it would have been fun as well to see cops on the night beat, and perhaps even security guards. I guess the thinking is those shows have already been done to death with programs like Cops. Still, somehow I suspect the drill would play itself out a bit differently in our town.

Urban Nites works, in that it presents us with some very funny characters and lets us enjoy them on their own terms. The show certainly isn’t pretentious—though its MTV-esque camera antics occasionally left me a bit weary—and it never degrades its subjects. The best part about the show, however, is its clever tweaking of the Reality TV genre. Instead of getting all-reality, all the time, we get a group of characters, one set of which are actually fakes. This meant the real people in the show had fake ones unleashed upon them. At the conclusion of each episode, the one phony is revealed. This gives the show plenty of gambling-party potential.

Sadly, Urban Nites is currently only airing on one of those digital channels, which means Montrealers’ chances of seeing it are slimmer than they should be. Catch it if you can—I found Urban Nites a creative and fun bit of late-night viewing.

Urban Nites is broadcast this fall on Saturday nights at 11pm, Sundays at 3am and 10pm and Mondays at 2am on the digital Outdoor Life Network

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