ZNAIMER, MOSES

ZNAIMER, MOSES (1942– ), Canadian television and theater producer, media executive. Canadian broadcasting was revolutionized in 1972 when Moses Znaimer created Citytv, an independent Toronto station that redefined community-based television as culturally diverse, spontaneous, and attuned to the growing wired environment. Znaimer's dynamic and complex personal history grew out of the struggle for survival that defined his early years. His parents had fled the German invasion of Poland and were in Kulab, Tajikistan, when Znaimer was born. The family made their way to Shanghai, then settled in Montreal in 1948. A scrappy dynamo, Znaimer later boasted of the police record he accumulated as a youth in Montreal. But he also immersed himself in Bible and Talmud study, identifying with the Jewish prophets as ideologues who fought alone against the Establishment. He graduated in philosophy and politics from McGill University before earning an M.A. in government at Harvard at the age of 20. Drawn by the world of media communications, he went to work for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, where he proved a youthful force, working as producer, presenter, and director of historical and current affairs programming.

He eventually left the cbc to pursue his creative dreams. With the help of financial backers, he built Citytv into a major Canadian media conglomerate with stations serving niche markets across Canada. In 1984 he created MuchMusic, a 24-hour music-video channel that opened the walls between its multicultural presenters and its young viewers. It relied on hand-held cameras and brought the "backstage" of studio television into the foreground. During the 1980s and 1990s Znaimer presided over the expansion of a media empire that came to include 24-hour local news, creative arts, and educational channels. By 2002 he had built 17 specialty channels and eight local outlets spread across Canada, and licensed similar stations from Argentina to Finland. Znaimer also appeared as an actor in motion pictures and produced the ground-breaking play, Tamara, a thriller where the audience pursues the assorted plot lines unfolding in different rooms of a single house. He opened a tv museum in Toronto, tracing the history and impact of television around the world. In 2000 Znaimer began IdeaCity, a yearly "meeting of minds" which provides a "forum for the high ground of ideas and idealism."

By the time of his retirement from full-time production in 2003, Znaimer had defined a uniquely Canadian media voice. He has been recognized with a number of honorary doctoral degrees and awards for his work in media innovation and his efforts on behalf of race relations in Canada, including the Canadian Council of Christians and Jews Human Relations Award.

[Paula Draper (2^nd ed.)]