SYDNEY RIVER, N.S. -- Cape Breton brothers, who garnered an online following during the pandemic, have inked a deal to host a new show for Bell Media.
When school was suspended as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, Liam and Lucas Sakalauskas started an online newscast, called East Coast Kids News, which they filmed out of their Sydney River, N.S. home.
The boys, 11 and 10, quickly earned a following and caught the attention of Bell Media – CTV’s parent company.
“It's pretty cool. Something that started at our house in the basement is now going to be episodes on Bell Media,” says Herbie Sakalauskas, the boy’s father.
The family has signed a contract to host eight episodes. They’ll begin work on the shows in the fall, with the help of a local production company, NovaStream.
“They came back with a few changes and said maybe you can try, instead of doing the news in the basement kind of thing, maybe you can go out,” says Herbie.
“Once the restrictions died down a bit, we were able to take the boys out to places like Baddeck and Louisbourg.”
For their new show, the boys will travel around Cape Breton, showcasing the island and their personalities.
“When we were in our recording studio, we would be sitting in a chair looking at the camera and reading from a teleprompter,” says Liam.
“Now, we would be walking around and asking questions to the people who would be giving us tours or letting us try stuff.”
The boys are thrilled that their hard work has paid off.
“It makes me proud of my dad, me and Liam, because it started off really small and then just came to this big idea and now we're doing it,” says Lucas.
