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How Director Megan Park Built Canadian Music Into the DNA of Prime Video Sensation ‘Sterling Point’
The show follows Annie (played by Ella Rubin), a 17-year-old New Yorker whose life gets turned upside down when she and her twin brother (who are adopted) discover they’ve inherited an island in Ontario’s cottage country. Annie flees to the island, near Muskoka, where she unearths details about her late mother’s past — including a secret sister, Ramona (Amélie Hoeferle).
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The music does some crucial heavy lifting in the narrative. Over eight episodes, the show is elevated by key needle drops — alongside some of today’s biggest acts, including Olivia Rodrigo and Gracie Abrams, the soundtrack is sprinkled with up-and-coming homegrown acts like pop singer Mikayla Geier and R&B girl group Naduh, plus legendary Canadian stars Sarah McLachlan and Jann Arden.
L-R: Amélie Hoeferle as Ramona and Ella Rubin as Annie in 'Sterling Point.'Amazon Prime Video
“We weren’t trying to get the latest, hottest artists,” the show’s creator and showrunner, Megan Park, tells Billboard Canada. “Our amazing music supervisor, Ciara [Elwis], has incredible taste. We focused on what fit the moment more than anything else, and it ended up just being a wide mix of music. We were able to get some new songs, but also include artists that hopefully people didn't know.”
The Scotland-born, London-based Elwis has worked on a range of film and TV projects, notably Netflix sensation I May Destroy You.
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“I'm not a music brain, so for me, it's really hard to explain what I'm looking for in any other words other than writing, acting, director-speak,” the Canadian actor-turned-director Park explains. “She's really good at decoding that and turning that into what the music version of [my thoughts] is.”
Before Park pivoted to directing film and TV, she started with music videos in the late 2010s. She worked with artists like Billie Eilish, Blackbear and Alina Baraz. During that time, she connected with Michelle An, the president of creative strategy at Interscope Records. “She was one of my earliest supporters in the music video space as a director,” Park says. Their friendship would be a helpful hand in Park’s career nearly a decade later.
Megan Park on set of 'Sterling Point.'Amazon Prime Video
Throughout the show, a couple of famed Canadian acts get their time to shine. As the character Annie sifts through a box of her mother’s old things from the ‘90s, she comes across a Jann Arden CD, promptly asking who the artist is. Park reveals it was a nod to actor Ella Rubin — a native New Yorker — who discovered the Calgary-born singer-songwriter while on set.
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“The actors all shared their playlists with me to see what music they were listening to that was helping them get into the character's head,” Park explains. “One time, we were talking about legendary Canadian artists like Alanis Morissette and Avril Lavigne. I had mentioned Jann Arden, and Ella didn’t know who she was. I played her ‘Good Mother,’ and she was so enamoured by the song that she added it to her character’s playlist.”
Sarah McLachlan’s “Building a Mystery” became part of a key plot point as Annie discovers a mixtape made by her late mother.
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“That would've been the theme song in another life,” Park confirms. “It’s always my mission to include as many Canadian artists as possible on the soundtrack and introduce them to the Gen-Z audience.”
The soundtrack for Park’s 2024 film My Old Ass — which is set in Muskoka, too — is filled with Canadian music, featuring hits from Feist and Nelly Furtado to Leith Ross and Cœur de pirate.
While the placement of McLachlan’s 1997 hit was initially a placeholder by an editor, it quickly stuck. “It felt like the perfect homage to a Canadian legend, and is a song that I feel like a lot of Gen Z-ers might not know,” Park says. “ We tried not to focus too much on forcing placements.”
Ella Rubin as Annie in 'Sterling Point.'Amazon Prime Video
She pinpoints Olivia Rodrigo’s “Maggots for Brains,” which opens up the series as a moment that throws viewers into the teen drama’s world, while Gracie Abrams’ “Look At My Life” soundtracks the show’s trailer. Parks shares that one of her producers attended an early listening party for Abrams’ chart-topping Daughter from Hell, and after the pop singer saw a couple of episodes early, she hand-selected the track.
Park shares that only a couple of songs were written into the script, one of which is a cover of Patty Griffin’s “Rain” in a pivotal scene in the season finale. She tapped Oshawa-born singer Lennon Stella to perform the folk track.
“Her voice is like magic to me, and it's such an emotional scene,” Park says, adding that Rubin’s own mother was a fan of the original track, which she says felt “full circle.”
In the finale, there’s a rendition of Bob Dylan’s “Don’t Think Twice, It’s Alright” performed by Lennon’s younger sister, Maisy. Describing them as “her favourite muses of all time,” Park has included the sisters in her last two films: 2021’s The Fallout and My Old Ass.
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L-R: Ella Rubin as Annie and Megan Park on set of 'Sterling Point.'Amazon Prime Video
The other track Park wrote into the script was Lana Del Rey’s “Off to the Races.” Over the years, Del Rey has become known as an artist who doesn’t often say yes to synch requests. As she was having trouble clearing it, she used her connections. “I was like, ‘F–k it, I'll just text [Interscope’s] Michelle [An] and ask her.’ Within 24 hours, we had the song.”
When asked which Canadian artists she’d like to secure for a potential Season 2 soundtrack, Park has a list: icons like Gordon Lightfoot, Joni Mitchell and Alanis Morissette, superstar Justin Bieber and Billboard Canada 2025 Women of the Year, The Beaches.
“Actually, a couple of their songs almost made the cut,” she reveals.
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