How interesting...

I mentioned War Child Canada yesterday in this post and, lo and behold, the first thing I saw in the Globe and Mail this morning was this. The founder of War Child Canada, Dr. Samantha Nutt, has been nominated as a Nation Builder for 2008. Follow the link to see what people have said about her. I just thought this was an interesting coincidence...

Talk is cheap. Apparently, so is reading.

Well, it's good to know that someone out there is still making money. And that it isn't even necessarily an evil empire. It might actually be artists. Authors, specifically. Apparently, the publishing industry has proven to be fairly recessive-proof thus far, at least in Canada (and knock on wood). Basically, due to many factors that I don't claim to fully understand, buying books in Canada at the moment is a bargain. If you would like all the technical details as to why that is, you can click here for the article in the Star. My only disclaimer is that I don't particularly recommend their featured author, Wally Lamb. I thought She's Come Undone was pretentious and condescending. Although I Know This Much Is True wasn't a bad read. Basically, his latest, The Hour I First Believed, could go either way, but I won't be picking it up anytime soon.



I'm not sure I will ever understand how it is that some people don't like to read (and celebrity magazines really don't count as reading). And I am certain I will never understand artists who don't like to read--books can provide a whole other world of ideas, characters, inspiration...not to mention how wonderful it is to jump on the bandwagon and pursue something before it becomes a movie. Plus, on occasion, you can find good audition monologue material in books. Frequently it requires tweaking, but it is still technically a published work. I think, as an artist, reading is part of your job. Fortunately, right now, the economy is making that part of your job easier. And if you still can't afford the investment, there is an even more inexpensive option--get a library card. Read books, newspapers, plays, and even, okay, the occasional celebrity mag. It's all character building, artist building material.

And the non-fiction is just as important. I recently finished reading Canadians by Roy MacGregor and thoroughly enjoyed it. He has some great insights into our national character and into what makes us tick. And I was surprised at how much of it I see in myself, given that I spent the latter half of my childhood in the U.S. Apparently the stamp of Canada on my self is indelible. And that is just fine with me. I also enjoyed, as much as one can, I think, General Dallaire's account of his time with UNAMIR during the Rwandan genocide in Shake Hands With the Devil (which has since become a motion picture and even spawned a documentary and movement called Not On Our Watch). This constitutes the general education requirement of being an artist, I think.

As for fiction, I just finished Brave New World by Alduous Huxley, a classic that I, for some reason, was not actually forced to read in high school. But it's definitely relevant to our times and certainly asks questions of the imagination. I also recently read Fall On Your Knees by Ann-Marie MacDonald, a great Canadian author and playwright (Goodnight Desdemona, (Good Morning Juliet)), which I highly recommend to anyone, but especially to the women of the artistic world. I find her writing of women to be extremely interesting. And, if you do like Roy MacGregor, who is a journalist for the Globe and Mail, by the way, his fiction is worth checking out, too--Canoe Lake is his tale of events leading up to Tom Thomson's death in our own Algonquin Park.

Those are just my recent reads. If you would like more suggestions, check out your local bookstore. Or, if you're interested in exploring the landscape of Canadian authors, check out Noah Richler's tome This Is My Country, What's Yours? A Literary Atlas of Canada. It is a bit of a slow read, but entirely worthwhile. Failing that, his website gets right to the goods on the who's who and where they locate, geographically speaking.

Happy recession reading!

Politics Before Noon.

It's getting to be a theme, I know. But the fact of the matter is that the world is very politically-charged at the moment. "Beautiful systems dying, old fixed orders spiraling apart..." And change is in the air. And art is, or should be, on the cutting edge of it all...

I had complaints on Friday, when three of our soldiers in Afghanistan were killed, about the lack of that war's presence on our stages. And, perhaps, its absence there is one reason why it is absent (or at least not as present as it should be) in our politics. All that aside, though, this makes me so proud to be a Canadian. Even if our government and our artists haven't said or done as much as they should, 'ordinary' Canadians are doing what they can. Hundreds lined the road home for our fallen heroes yesterday; one of the greatest grassroots traditions we have come up with in recent history, I think.

Then I saw this on BlogTO this morning. It is a video from quite a clever campaign by War Child Canada to raise awareness and "support" for child soldiers in Darfur, the Congo, and Sierra Leone. Apparently there are going to be more videos in the future. I, for one, think it's a really intelligent way of making their point and getting the message across. For some reason, things like this tend to have a greater impact than the hundreds of words generated in the press. Both are important, without a doubt, but there is just something about the "viral video" that catches...which is great for artists with opinions and ideas out there.

A couple of guys I had some classes with in university started their own series of web videos, which I will link to as soon as I can remember what both their names were--one was Joey. The one who dated a girl on my floor in first year. I really didn't know them well--a friends of friends kind of thing. Anyway, my point is, their videos did really well on the web. They were self-written, self-produced, and garnered some pretty big attention. So it's a really great way of getting yourself out there as an emerging artist...more on this later, perhaps.

Last but not least, some of my favourite political art: The Daily Show. Jon Stewart is a genius. Essentially. And, for all its ridiculous antics, the show is quite intelligent (but do I really need to defend it to a country that has embraced Rick Mercer? I think not). Mr. Stewart did quite the send up of Canadian politics last night...Clips available here. It was also talked about in the Star and the Globe and Mail. As well as on cable morning shows. Politics is serious business. It kills people. But sometimes you have to laugh at it, too.

The End of An Era.

Last night marked the final "episode" of the cult/going mainstream hit Trailer Park Boys on Showcase. I happen to think these guys are brilliant, if a bit off colour. There is an interview with them in the Star and, judging by the comments, clearly people either love them or hate them. Whatever your personal feelings, you have to admire the fact that these guys and Mike Clattenburg had a crazy idea, went with it, and wound up with a hit series, a few specials, a movie, and a sequel due out in February, I believe. And, as a bonus, they have had the chance to work with some incredible artists in different mediums throughout their careers as the Boys, including touring with Guns 'n Roses and an ongoing relationship with The Tragically Hip. Gordon Downie was in last night's final episode. And I think I spotted Rob Baker buying weed from Julian. Bonus, if you've never seen it, here is The Tragically Hip video for The Darkest One. Check it out! And so long, Trailer Park Boys, it's been a good ride. Can't wait to see what the future brings from you...

"Et tu, Ignatieff?"

This came up in my Google Reader this morning and I happen to think it has potential...although, certainly, time sensitive. Act quickly, producers...it may become irrelevant and obsolete at any moment.

Click the link above and you will find the plan of another theatre blogger for a production of Julius Caesar set in our modern Canadian political climate. He presents an interesting cast of characters...feasible, certainly.

I, for one, am not tired of Shakespeare re-imagined...so long as productions don't force the play to fit the modern parallel. Rather, the play should be as it is, adjustments as minor as possible, and if it really works, the parallel scenario should be manipulated subtly to illustrate the point of the production.

The reason we still read, produce, perform Shakespeare is because his works are still relevant. And sometimes it takes losing the Elizabethan garb to make it more widely accessible.

I, for one, would not only buy a ticket, I would play a part.

Weekend Happenings in the TDot.

It's been a busy day at the office so far--my Outlook decided to crash and the beginning of the month means lots of invoices and paperwork. So while the arts/politics scene seems far more interesting at the beginning of this week than it did at the end of last, it seems I won't be blogging much today. But there are a few things not to be passed up:


I liked the above picture from BlogTO, which accompanied this article about the pro-Coalition rally in Toronto this weekend. It was pretty big, estimated to be between 2-3,000 people. Which is actually kind of pathetic when you consider the actual population of Toronto...but the Conservative rally at Queen's Park only drew about 500, so I suppose by comparison...There are more pictures on BlogTO, check it out.

The rallies were also covered by much of the mainstream press and the whole issue seems to be fairly divisive. Apparently the Conservative rallies outside the GTA were huge. Harper is getting far more support everywhere else, or so it would seem. And I am still too new to the current Canadian political scene, having spent the better part of the last fourteen years or so in the US, to claim to be anything close to an expert--which perhaps makes me like any other 'ordinary' Canadian...except I care about the arts...it really is all very confusing. Whatever the case may be, I cannot see how proroguing Parliament, which means the Government is at a standstill on resolving the issue of our ever-tanking economy, possibly solves anything. Perhaps it just postpones the inevitable, whatever that may be. But this is more politics than arts...or is there a difference? Should there be one?

I'll go ponder that while I deal with some invoices.

Welcome Home.

Crowds of Canadians are expected to line the "Highway of Heroes" this snowy afternoon to welcome home our fallen soldiers. The bodies of Warrant Officer Robert John Wilson, Pte. Demetrios Diplaros and Cpl. Mark Robert McLaren will travel today from CFB Trenton, where they are expected to land at 2:00, to the coroner's morgue in downtown Toronto. Along the way, the crowds will stand out in the cold to pay their respects.

There is a difference between supporting the troops and supporting the war. There are soldiers fighting overseas who do not believe anymore in the mission than many of us here at home. But they go because it is what their country asks of them. And they trust that we will fight in the right way at home to bring them back safely. And whatever your feelings about the war, the soldiers who perform honourably and make great sacrifices deserve our thanks and respect.

Yummy.

I am (sort of) patiently waiting for 5:00 when we celebrate my co-worker's birthday so I can devour this chocolate truffle cake from Dufflet. If you live in Toronto and have a sweet tooth you absolutely have to check them out. The cakes are a bit expensive, but the tarts are a pretty good size and reasonably priced. Everything is delicious; you really can't go wrong.

Out of the Mouths of Babes...and Onto the Bestseller List

Alec Greven, 9, wrote a book entitled How To Talk to Girls. It started out as a school essay, which he then sold at the school book fair for $3 a copy. This somehow caught the attention of Ellen Degeneres and the kid managed to snag a book deal with Harper Collins. Now it is selling on Amazon. And there's an article in the Star. You have to admire the fact that he took a suggestion from a teacher--that he be an observer--and ran with it.

My favourite quote is:

"Girls win most of the arguments and have most of the power. If you know that now, things might be easier."

A child wise beyond his years...

"Take up our quarrel with the foe..."

The Canadian Forces in Afghanistan lost three more soldiers this morning. The soldiers were killed by a bomb while traveling in a vehicle west of the city of Kandahar. Their deaths marked the end of the longest hiatus in the body count, which lasted a grand total of 88 days, since Canadian troops hit the ground in 2006. Perhaps more significantly, this morning's fallen soldiers pushed Canada to 100 military deaths in Afghanistan. 100 soldiers, many of whom were not much older than your average high school senior. This is to say nothing of the Afghani people killed, which various sources estimate at anywhere from 540 to 1,445 civilians in the last year alone. Civilians and teenagers dying in droves halfway around the world and what do we have to say about it?

Theatrically, next to nothing. Politically, not enough. There was a brief flury of anti-Iraq war agitprop theatre. But since, nothing much that I have heard of. If I'm wrong, please point me in the right direction. But where is this on our stages? Shouldn't it be there?

Photo credit: AP/David Guttenfelder