You probably saw them in the news late last year, and now you’ll be seeing more of Darren Kimmel and Jennifer Huculak on TV.
No, it’s not related to Reece, their baby who was born in Hawaii and the cause of a $950,000 medical bill.
The two are the subject of a new reality series, Nordic Lodge, which airs its first episode on Feb. 25. The show follows them as they operate the titular fishing lodge on Reindeer Lake, Sask.
Huculak and Kimmel worked with cattle and horses, but were looking to get out.
“Darren really wanted to get out of cattle. Someone had put a bug in his ear that running a fishing lodge would be a neat business and he never really forgot it,” Huculak said.
They started looking into it and bought a place in 2013.
Huculak and Kimmel first heard about the potential show when Huculak was still in the hospital in Hawaii. A production company was looking to build a show around a new business and contacted the couple, who were unsure about the prospect at first.
“We weren’t sure if we were going to do it or not. We were really on the fence about it,” Huculak said. “I guess I kinda thought ‘yeah right, this is never gonna happen.’”
The show was already being planned prior to the media blitz surrounding Reece and the medical bill. While Huculak addresses the situation in trailers for the show, the purpose is to show people what it’s like to run a new business. Due to the litigation, Huculak can’t comment with updates on the situation with the medical bill.
The two met with the director the day after they returned from Hawaii and they decided to go for it, even though it didn’t pay very well.
“You give up so much of your time and you expose yourself to the world … but you don’t get paid for your time,” Huculak said.
Huculak and Kimmel’s main concern was their guests. If they didn’t want to appear on camera, the couple wanted them to be respected.
“We really had to discuss it with the production crew to figure out how it would work for everybody,” she said.
The crew filmed the couple at work from May to September 2014 and Huculak said some of the guests were more excited than they were.
“My least favourite part was when you’re really busy and you’re played out and you still have to get mic’d and have cameras following you,” Huculak said.
She also added that she was worried about how their two children – Reece and Ryder, 10 – would react to being on camera. Ryder was shy at first, but soon grew used to the cameras.
“He had fun with it; he joked around lots and he was just himself,” Huculak said. Reece was too young to really know what was going on, but she said the crew thought she was cute.
“The crew was excellent with Reece … She’s a very happy, healthy, content baby. I think they thought she was pretty cute and easy to work with,” she said. “Sometimes I had her on my hip in a laundry basket. That’s the reality; when you work with a little one, you bring them with you.”
Huculak and Kimmel don’t know what made it into the show and what didn’t and Huculak said she has some reservations about people seeing it.
“You’re exposing yourself and your family and your business ... it makes me kind of nervous,” she said. “There are always negative people that will see the negative side in everything ... we’ve all seen that when the baby story hit the media. I’m scared of what the negative side of it is going to be.”
While reality shows are known for not being altogether truthful, Huculak said that everything people will see is organic.
“Nothing was made up. We didn’t have scripts. We didn’t have time. We would get mic’ed at 6:30 a.m. and go to work and the camera would follow us,” she said. “We were supposed to explain what was going on as stuff was happening, but sometimes it was so hectic and busy that you can’t.”
The show is set to run for eight episodes and Huculak is unsure if it will be an ongoing effort. The first episode airs on Feb. 25 at 10 p.m. on City Saskatchewan.
