Breaking Into Song No Other Type of Theatre Brings on Such Complex Emotions
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EQUITY QUARTERLY WINTER 2010 KEEPING THE SHOW GOING CANCELLED DUE TO LACK OF FUNDS EQ WHY WE LOVE MUSICALS Breaking into song No other type of theatre brings on such complex emotions SOME PEOPLE GIVE THEMSELVES OVER COMPLETELY TO MUSICALS AND GET LOST IN THE MUSIC AND DANCing – while others just Can’t maKE THE LEAP WHEN CHARACTERS BREAK INTO SONG. The same goes for performers – some relish THE JOY THAT COMES WHEN THE AUDIENCE CONNECTS WITH A SONG, WHILE OTHERS THINK THE FORM HAS BECOME TOO COMMERCIAL. ONE FACT REMAINS: MUSICALS ARE SOME OF THE MOST WILDLY SUCCESSFUL PRODUCtions to hit Canadian stages – and their popularity CONTINUES TO GROW. IT LOOKS LIKe Canada’s love affair with the musiCAL HAS ONLY JUST BEGUN. President’s message Hello again! My name is Allan Teichman, I work as a stage manager, and at the first meeting of the new Coun- cil I had the honour of being re-elected President. I feel privileged that I should continue to be entrusted with the task of assisting Council in its work. And of course, I don’t do it alone – Council will also count on Kerry Davidson (B.C./Yukon) as First VP and Advisory Liaison, Kerry-Ann Doherty (Ontario) as Second VP and Member Liaison, and Virginia Reh (Ontario) as Secretary-Treasurer. As with last term, Council begins with an enormous agenda ahead of it, however much of that work is already well under way. Our first meeting consisted of three solid days of learning and review to bring us up to speed, so you now have a board of 22 dedicated and energized Councillors just itching to get to work. We also hosted our annual honours event on the Monday evening, which was a nice break from the mountain of paper. Congratulations again to all the honourees (see EQ Moves), and many thanks to all those who came out to help make the evening so wonderful. It’s always inspiring to see members take such delight and pride in an oppor- tunity to recognize excellence in their colleagues. The next set of honours will be presented in Calgary in late October 2010, and now is the time to get nominations in. Details on each of the awards, as well as the submission form, can be found on the Equity website under Committees; Honours. Remember, although these awards are presented by Council, they come from you and they all begin with your recommendation. About a year ago, I resolved to start a President’s blog. It may be hard to believe, but despite all the material that gets sent out over my signature, I actually have more to say. Perhaps it’s a cathartic response to sitting in rehearsal hour after hour after hour, listening to other people speak. (Before you ask, no, of course I’m not talking about you personally. It’s just that, well, sometimes… umm… yeah.) As with many things I resolve to do, I never quite got around to it. So, I’m sharing this com- mitment with 5,000 of my closest colleagues so that I can’t back out. It’s not going to be a Facebook page; Facebook makes me break out in an uncomfortable rash. By the time you read this, I will have figured out how to make this happen, and we’ll post notice or fire up the Bat Signal, or something, so you know where to find it. Why a blog? It’s because I’d like to start sharing more of the thinking behind the doings of Council, and do so on a flexible schedule. More importantly, I’d like to do it in a medium where the membership has the ability to answer back and ask questions. Last term we put a lot of time and energy into enhancing our reporting to members, and now I want to turn that one-way street into more of a two-way street. Given the tendency for discussions on the Internet to get radically tangential, I embark on this experiment with some trepidation. However, I think the risks are worth the benefit of better communication, and we’ll give it a good go. Speaking of communication, don’t be a stranger. If something gets under your skin, your Association stands no chance of doing anything about it if we don’t hear from you. If you need individual assistance with something, call staff at either office – it’s why we have them. If you think the matter is a bigger-picture topic that affects a whole range of members, get in touch with your Councillor. That’s the level that we work at. Contact information for all Councillors appears on the website, or is available by calling either office. And if you want to bat around some ideas or concerns at a more local level, don’t forget you also have access to your regional advisory. Their contact info is also posted online. Finally, members are always welcome to contact Kerry-Ann Doherty, the Second VP and Member Liaison at [email protected], or by mail via the National Office. And of course, I continue to welcome your emails at [email protected]. Heck, you could even write to both of us. All the best for a great holiday season and Happy New Year, Allan Teichman President WINTER 2010 EQUITY QUARTERLY 1 EQUITY QUARTERLY WINTER 2010 EQ VOLUME 3 NUMBER 4 1 President’s messAGE 6 B.C. cuts arts 3 NOTES FROM ARDEN RYSHPAN funding 4 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 5 EQ MOVES 8 EQ&A 10 Can’t stop the 9 EQ VOICES music 16 FONDLY REMEMBERED 18 EQ LIVES 14 Swinging on to 19 BACKSTAGE 20 EQ CLASSIFIEDS the scene 21 EQ FLASHBACK Equity members are encouraged to submit articles, submissions and accompanying photos, notices of Coming issue: SPRING 2010 births, marriages, memorial notices and letters to the editor via email ([email protected]) or on disk with Subscriptions are available at an annual rate of $35, including GST. EQ accompanying hard copy. The copy deadline for submissions is Monday, February 15, 2010. EQ reserves the right to edit for length, style and content. Publications Mail Agreement No. 40038615 WINTER 2010 – Volume 3, Number 4 EQ is published four times a year by Canadian Actors’ Equity Association. EQ Equity Quarterly (ISSN 1913-2190) is a forum to communicate to Equity members the activities of EXECUTIVE EDITOR Lynn McQueen the Association and issues of concern to the Association. With the exception of the editorial staff, the National Office views expressed in solicited or unsolicited articles are not necessarily the views of the Association. 44 Victoria Street, 12th Floor, Toronto, ON M5C 3C4 EDITOR Barb Farwell Tel: 416-867-9165 | Fax: 416-867-9246 | Toll-free: 1-800-387-1856 (members only) DESIGN & LAYOUT Chris Simeon, Canadian Actors’ Equity Association (Equity) is the voice of professional artists working in live [email protected] | www.caea.com September Creative performance in English Canada. We represent more than 5,500 performers, directors, choreographers, Western Office fight directors and stage managers working in theatre, opera and dance, and support their creative efforts 736 Granville Street, Suite 510, Vancouver, BC V6Z 1G3 by seeking to improve their working conditions and opportunities by negotiating and administering Tel: 604-682-6173 | 604-682-6174 | Toll free: 1-877-682-6173 (members only) collective agreements, providing benefit plans, information and support and acting as an advocate. [email protected] COVER AND INSIDE FRONT COVER: The cast from Sunday in the Park with George, the Shaw Festival’s 2009 season musical, breaks into song ABOVE (left to right): Josh Assor as Baby John, Matt Alfano as Action, Kyle Golemba as A-Rab, Brandon Espinoza as Riff and Marc Kimelman as Big Deal in the Stratford Shakespeare Festival’s 2009 production of West Side Story Notes from Arden Ryshpan “What’s the matter? Don’t you like musical comedy?” – Roy Scheider as Joe Gideon in All That Jazz I do. I admit that I absolutely adore musicals. It comes, I suspect, from the fact that the first time I ever went to a grown-up theatre (at the age of five or six) it was to see my father perform in a production of The Fantasticks. Since it was staged at a well-known, fancy club called the El Morocco in Mon- treal, where children my age were most certainly not allowed, I slipped up the back stairs with my mother where we sat at a dark table in the balcony. The wait staff brought me a series of fancy non-alcoholic drinks with cherries spiked on stir sticks and little paper umbrellas peeking through billowing dry ice. And I was hooked – on the music – never could stand maraschino cherries. I have owned the original soundtrack recording of that show ever since and it is on my iPod now (as is the original cast recording of Hair.) I have never tired of lis- tening to those simple, lovely melodies, played only by a piano and a harp. I can’t tell you how many times I have stayed up late to watch Kiss Me Kate (in which you can see a very young Bob Fosse dance) or West Side Story on television – the filmed version of stage musicals being the easiest way to feed my musical habit. And yet, for some reason unfathomable to me, musicals are a much maligned form. People com- plain that they are maudlin, but I suspect that it is because they found themselves swept up in the emotion of the music.