On Monday, October 1^st, the cast and crew of the well-known Canadian television series Murdoch Mysteries took over downtown Brantford in order to film some scenes for their on-going season.

You may have believed you were in the early 1900’s walking down Dalhousie Street this week. Women were dressed in long Victorian collared gowns, donning broad feathered hats. The men on the other hand, were dressed in suits and trousers, wearing fedoras.  A black horse drawn carriage even made an appearance on the set, creating the early 1900’s illusion. Cars were detoured away by security because the cars driven today are not the same cars William Murdoch would’ve driven in 1901.

The actors Yannick Bisson (Detective Murdoch), Thomas Craig (Inspector Brackenreid), Jonny Harris, (Constable Crabtree), and Georgina Reilly (Dr. Grace) are a part of the regular cast who were present on set.

Brantford is one of the show’s favourite filming locations because the buildings’ historical architecture is period appropriate to the 1901 scenes the directors are trying to capture. “There are a lot of old places; the preserved buildings make our job easier. There are less and less buildings like these to shoot with, it makes it hard. It’s like we are bringing them back to life,” explained Yannick Bisson. Bisson is a Canadian actor, who plays the character William Murdoch, a detective who uses radical forensic techniques for the first time in order to solve murders.

The cast and crew filmed on Dalhousie Street and George Street during the day on Monday and were moving to the corner of Queen Street later that night according to Shaftesbury film’s publicist, Tanya Koivusalo. They filmed in front of the old Royal Victoria Place Hotel on Dalhousie St, and the old public library, now known as the Carnegie building, and Victoria Park on George Street. The Carnegie building is an appropriate filming location for the show because it was constructed between the years 1902 and 1904. They continued filming on Tuesday and Wednesday at other locations.

Fans and local citizens gathered on the opposite side of the street and watched the filming of the episode. Due to the popularity of Murdoch Mysteries, this season will have 18 episodes opposed to the usual 13 episodes.

The episode they are filming in Brantford is being directed by Sudz Sutherland. “The episode is about con artists out witting each other and it will most likely premiere in January or February of next year,” explained Koivusalo.

When asked which season had been his favourite Bisson said that “The most fun has been this year.  It has been the hardest, but we have the coolest variety of stuff right from our opening episode which was on a big ship that sinks.  Then we have a zombie episode, the one that I directed, that is going to premiere around Halloween.” Bisson also told us that we can expect to see Sherlock Holmes (Andrew Gower) again, as well as the return of many bad guys.