Though is was a big hit in la belle province the stars of the mini-series Emilie wonder how English Canada will respond to this Quebec historical drama.

"Do you think English Canada is really going to like us?" Marina Orsini asks anxiously. She's the star of the Quebec-made mini-series Emilie, the dubbed English version of the French hit Les Filles de Caleb.

With Orsini is her handsome co-star Roy Dupuis, who took his clothes off in the series and became the province's newest heartthrob. "It's a Quebec story, sure" he says in halting English, "but it could have happened anywhere in Canada. A few generations back this was a nation of farmers and trappers. This series looks at our beginnings, where we came from."

In Quebec, Emilie has been a roaring success. Episode One premiered with 2.8 million viewers and by 20th and final episode, 3.2 million Québecois were watching. The average of 3.2 million viewers set a new Canadian record for a dramamtic series. Half of Quebec's population tuned in on Thursday nights.

"Everybody knew about us," Orsini says. "Montreal seemed to shut down when we were on the air. And everybody discussed what happened the next day at work. It was amazing."

Quebec critics hailed the series as a cross between Roots and The Waltons. The series was based on Arlette Couture's popular novel Les Filles de Caleb, a coming of age story of a young girl at the turn of the century. Emilie lives with her family on a farm in the Maurice region near Trois Rivières.

From the first scene it's apparent Emilie is unlike the other females in her family. As a little girl she berates her farther for forcing the women to serve the men so that by the time they get their own food, it's half-cold. She's slapped for her insolence, but her father also listens and builds a bigger table so the entire family can eat together.

By the time she's 17 Emilie has determined she wants her own career and becomes a teacher in a nearby village. It's a one-room wooden structure with a tiny bedroom in the attic and Emilie teaches children almost as old as she is. In fact, she's drawn to one husky boy, Ovila Pronovost (Dupuis), and before long they're madly in love, despite the disapproval of the townsfolk.

"It's not shocking at all that she falls for the boy," Orsini says. "They're almost the same age. She doesn't seduce him. It's a gradually growing attraction. Once she's decided he's for her the matter is closed as far as she's concerned."

"We try to make the love-making sensual for the camera," Dupuis adds. "After all, people had romances back then too. They just weren't as open about it. The church played a bigger role, but people had their snatches of happiness. Life was shorter, so experiences had to be more intense."

At 25, Orsini is a veteran of three big TV series. First she was the girlfriend of hockey player Pierre Lambert (Carl Marotte) in the series He Shoots, He Scores, a big hit in Quebec, though the English edition was received luke-warmly in the rest of Canada.

"The dubbing was off", she admists, so the cast later tried filming the same scene in French then English. To do the same for Emilie would have added to the already high budget of $13 million.

Orsini then enjoyed further success with L'Or Et Le Papier, which won her Quebec's Gemeaux award as best actress in 1990. But it ws Emilie that made her a big Quebec star.

"Oh, yes, I get recognized everywhere," she laughs. "At first I was overwhelmed. But I'm getting used to it. People in the street would call me Suzie, the name of my character in He Shoots, He Scores. Now they call me Emilie. Perhaps some day it will be my own name."

Fluently bilingual, she says she'd like to do more work outside Quebec "if the role is right. I've done a lot of commercials in English. And I came to Toronto for the dubbing of Emilie. We decided we'd speak in unaccented Enlish. It would have sounded silly to talk with a bit of a French accent. You have to capture the flavour of each line just so and do it on a beat or the lips won't match. Even then it's not perfect. But English audiences just won't watch productions with subtitles."

At age 29, Dupuis says he had some trouble becoming a 17-year-old all over again. "For one thing Ovila is very immature. He is a country boy, entirely controlled by his family and the church and his horizons are limited. How could I make him real to today's sophisticated viewers? I didn't want people to laugh at him."

Orsini and Dupuis agree that Quebec viewers are mad about Quebec TV. "Loyalty is a big thing," Orsini says. "Sure we watch American stuff, but the biggest support is reserved for our own productions. Emilie was a hit because it showed us a kind of society that vanished just a few generations agon in Quebec. It's nostalgia, but we don't pull any punches. We show how hard life really was. Women had their children at home without doctors and they kept having children. They also died early. They lived in conditions that seem primitive today, but they also had dreams."

Viewers expecting American-style melodrama will be disappointed. "Nothing is phony," says Orsini. "No false climaxes to get you to tune in next week. This is about strong people trying to get on with their lives. I couldn't live as Emilie does. She had eight children and lived in a tough world without any of the modern conveniences. The church was very important to her, but so was finding herself. She had her life planned out at 17. I know women who are still searching at age 30 in today's complex world."

Dupuis hasn't stopped working since making the series. he recently played a homosexual prostiture who kills his loer in the movie Being At Home With Claude and co-stars in the Quebec series Scoop as rookie reporter Michael Gagne.

And what's Orsini doing these days? "There's a sequel we're making called Blanche the story of Emilie's daughter. I play an older Emilie, but she's still as determined as ever. There's a lot of Emilie in Quebec women."