langfieldent@rogers.com
www.langfieldentertainment.com
Brrrr! It's cold out there!
Put your mittens on folks and stay warm out there!
A new event on the scene - the Aroni Awards - some exciting guests and great night! Again, The Gospel Christmas Project is a must-see show and a must-have CD. Have you purchased
your tickets yet? No? Why not purchase tickets and give to someone
for a gift?
I also have an excellent gift idea about giving back authored by a friend of
mine, Chris Cathcart. What a great idea
during this potentially insatiable season! See details below!
And a special announcement on the social scene, Chef
Anthony Mair joins the crew at
::
Aroni Awards - Sunday,
Get Ready To Inspire
Following a successful launch in 2006, the Aroni
Awards
returns on Sunday, December 9th, 2007 for yet another captivating event, with
the presentation of five AroniMAGE awards to the unsung heroes of our
community. The AroniAwards Education Grants will be presented to three
students who show strong dedication to community service, a positive outlook
and continue to persevere despite socioeconomic hardships and other
obstacles. The Aroni Awards Gala was created in honour of Aron Y. Haile,
an African Canadian and accomplished student, entrepreneur, software developer,
who died in 2003, at the young age of 30.
Get Ready To Be Inspired
Canadian Idol’s favourite judge Farley Flex returns as Master of
Ceremony, with some of Canada’s premier entertainers, presenters such as Cabral
“Cabbie” Richards (
ARONI AWARDS GALA
ATLANTIS (
Tickets: $60 (Includes 3 Course Dinner Catered by Dynamic, Silent Auction,
Cocktail
Purchase tickets at www.aroniawards.com
or by calling
Two Shows, One CD - The Gospel Christmas Project – December 21 (
Source: Andrew Craig
You’re invited to the Christmas musical events of 2007: the Gospel
Christmas Project, live at Ottawa’s National Arts Centre and Toronto’s
Massey Hall! Audiences are calling this show “fabulous”, “amazing”, “thrilling beyond expectation”, “music to God's ears” and “a
wonderfully joyful spiritual evening”.
“The Gospel Christmas Project - LIVE!” is two hours of the world’s greatest
Christmas carols, in all-stunning new arrangements made by musician, producer
and broadcaster Andrew Craig. The songs are rendered by some of our
country’s greatest voices:
Jackie Richardson, Canada’s Queen of Jazz and
Blues,
Alana Bridgewater, “Killer Queen” in the Mirvish
production of “We Will Rock You”
Kellylee Evans, 2007 Canadian Smooth Jazz
Female Vocalist of the Year
Chris Lowe, a tremendous new voice recently-emerged
from the Gospel community
and the Juno-award-winning Sharon Riley and Faith Chorale
“The Gospel Christmas Project” is already a wildly-popular radio
show, a Gemini-nominated TV special, and a brand-new CD, called “The
Gospel Christmas Project”, available in all major retail outlets right now, and
on ITunes as of December 4.
“The Gospel Christmas Project” was originally performed in
And the next night (December 22) The Gospel Christmas Project makes
its
Visit the website: www.gospelxmasproject.com
Purchase CD at
::SCOOP::
Chef Mair Joins Harlem
On Friday,
Situated in the hub of city movement,
The two see the union as a movement in the right direction and perhaps one that
may see the creation of even more restaurants within the downtown core.
Look for the exciting new dinner menu coming soon!
www.Harlemrestaurant.com
::GIFT GIVING TIP::
The Lost Art of Giving Back - Just in Time for the Holidays!
Source: One Diaspora
The Lost Art of Giving
Back, is the
debut book from veteran PR
consultant
and volunteer advocate Christopher Cathcart, and is the perfect Christmas, Kwanzaa, holiday season
gift or a gift for any season.
The book is a brief (only 54 pages!), engaging read, and discusses how we all
can discover the joys and sense of empowerment found through volunteering and
giving back. It reviews such topics as finding time to volunteer, being
creative in the process, and involving our workplaces, among other
points. Lost Art also profiles the volunteer efforts of such
notable individuals as PR maven and noted author
Information on the Lost Art of Giving Back can be found on Cathcart’s
website
(www.onediaspora.com),
and signed copies can be purchased there as well; standard copies can be
purchased via www.amazon.ca
(
For more information, please contact Chris directly at Chris@OneDG.com. This
season, why not give the gift that celebrates giving?
::TOP STORIES::
Love Affair With Measha
Brueggergosman Has Only Just Begun
Excerpt
from www.thestar.com - Classical Music Critic
(
And you can bet that anyone who wasn't smitten by soprano Measha Brueggergosman before
attending her solo recital at Roy Thomson Hall yesterday afternoon left the
auditorium with their pulse racing.
She may have only just turned 30, but there are only a handful of pros around
the world who can match the
As she breezed through cabaret-flavoured 20th-century art songs from England
(Benjamin Britten), France (Francis Poulenc and Erik Satie), Germany (Arnold
Schoenberg) and the United States (by living composers Ned Rorem and William
Bolcom), it would be easy to underestimate the force of artistry needed to make
this program work.
Most of these songs were meant to be sung in a salon, not in a concrete-lined
2,500-seat concert hall.
These pieces demand finesse to properly shape exquisite stories or jokes in
music without the benefit of an orchestra or amplification.
Brueggergosman and ever-elegant piano accompanist Roger Vignoles not only
jumped these hurdles but added pirouettes before each graceful landing. The
soprano convinced us that she wouldn't be happier anywhere else but right
there, onstage, doing her best to please our eyes and ears.
The recital was broadcast live on
The program itself was clever, mixing more serious songs with lighter ones –
most from Brueggergosman's new album, Surprise.
Unlike most classical singers, this soprano has built a beginning to what will
hopefully be a great, long career on recitals and concert performances with
orchestras, rather than in opera. But that will change for us soon.
Her most captivating performances yesterday were in the songs by Britten and
Bolcom, with which she created bookends in songs about love.
But the real love was the one she is igniting between artist and audience
wherever she performs.
King Of Calypso Still Packs A Punch
Excerpt
from www.globeandmail.com - Gayle Macdonald
(November 26, 2007) Harry Belafonte might be hobbling on
crutches these days, but he doesn't take a misstep when asked what led to his
right foot being put in a cast.
"I was having a heated discussion with Condoleezza Rice," quips the
80-year-old singer, actor, outspoken human rights activist, and vocal critic of
U.S. President George W. Bush and his entire administration, including the 66th
Secretary of State.
In truth, the man known as the King of Calypso (a name that stuck in the
fifties after the raspy tenor belted out "Day-O!" in The Banana
Boat Song), sustained the injury after hitting his instep against furniture
while horsing around with one of his five grandchildren. "I thought I'd
just bruised it, only to find out six weeks later, I'd broken it," says
Belafonte, still a thin, handsome man whose sly wit and sharp tongue has made
him a number of political enemies but far more humanitarian fans.
In an interview in
But he slammed Democratic presidential-hopeful Hillary Clinton, what he calls
ineptitude of the mainstream media, and his No. 1 nemesis, Bush, whose invasion
of
Belafonte's never met Bush, but he has run into Hillary Clinton at many
functions, where he says the presidential-hopeful studiously continues to snub
him. (Apparently, Clinton's chill started after Belafonte met with Venezuelan
President Hugo Chavez in early 2006, and was quoted saying, "No matter
what the greatest tyrant in the world, the greatest terrorist in the world,
George W. Bush says, we're here to tell you: Not hundreds, not thousands, but
millions of the American people ... support your revolution.)
How does it make him feel? "It tells me much about her," shrugs
Belafonte. "And it validates what I'm doing is right."
Belafonte credits being born, in poverty, to parents of colour, for instilling
a lifelong ambition to fight for civic and human rights issues. "I've
always found poverty a painful and cruel place to have to exist. I found racism
so crippling. So early on, I developed a passion for changing it.
"The idea came from my mother, that I should use
all resources at my disposal to try to make a difference in the world in the
way we find it, and in the way in which we should leave it. She was a woman
with no tangible possessions or means, but she had great dignity and enormous
intelligence, even though she had no formal education."
Belafonte's life is remarkable for its diversity. Born in the
After honourable discharge, he started taking acting classes in the late 1940s
alongside the likes of Marlon Brando, Tony Curtis, Walter Matthau and Sidney
Poitier. On the side, he worked as a club singer to pay for the theatre
classes.
For several years, Belafonte juggled both careers, landing roles in films such
as Carmen Jones and Island in the Sun. But by the early fifties,
he was focusing on singing, signing with RCA, when his album Calypso
made him the first artist in industry history to sell more than one million
LPs.
His life took another sharp turn about the same time he met the young Martin
Luther King. He was swept up by the civil rights movement, which set him on a
course to fight apartheid, poverty in
"I have been privileged to have been friends with Martin Luther King,
Eleanor Roosevelt, [singer and activist] Paul Robeson, and [activist, writer,
historian] W.E.B. Du Bois. I have met the powerful thinkers of our time,
including Nelson Mandela. I've been here in
He says he's seen great atrocities but also great acts of kindness. One that
sticks happened on a visit to
Redskins Will Honour Fallen Teammate
Excerpt from www.thestar.com - Matt
Sedensky, Associated Press
(November 28, 2007) MIAMI–Pro Bowl safety Sean
Taylor died of a gunshot wound yesterday, leaving the Washington
Redskins in mourning for a teammate who seemed to have reordered his life since
becoming a father.
The 24-year-old player died at the hospital where he had been airlifted after
the shooting by an intruder in his home early Monday.
"It is with deep regret that a young man had to come to his end so
soon," his father, Pedro Taylor, said in a statement on behalf of the
family. "Many of his fans loved him because of the way he played football.
Many of his opponents feared him the way he approached the game. Others
misunderstood him, many appreciated him and his family loved him."
A string of mourners, including
NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said the league will honour
"This is a terrible tragedy involving the loss of a young man who leaves
behind many people struggling to understand it," he said in a statement.
Redskins coach Joe Gibbs said what he would remember
most about
"God made him to play football," Gibbs said. "To me, he just
loved and thrived on the competition part of it. ... Sean, he loved football.
He loved these guys here."
Gibbs acknowledged it will be hard to concentrate on football this week.
"I don't know how we'll deal with it, except we'll all do it
together," he said.
"This is a terrible, terrible tragedy," said Redskins owner Daniel
Snyder, who added that the team would honour
Redskins teammate Clinton Portis also played with
"It's hard to expect a man to grow up overnight," Portis said. ``But
ever since he had his child, it was like a new Sean and everybody around here
knew it. He was always smiling, always happy, always talking about his
child."
Doctors had been encouraged late Monday when
"Maybe he was trying to say goodbye or something," Sharpstein said.
Trauma experts said a serious wound to this large artery, leading from the
abdomen through the upper thigh, is among the most difficult to fix and can
quickly drain the body of blood. Too much blood loss prevents oxygen from
reaching the brain and vital organs.
"According to a preliminary investigation, it appears that the victim was
shot inside the home by an intruder,"
The attack came eight days after an intruder was reported at
Sharpstein said
::MUSIC NEWS::
The Acorn Doesn't Fall Far From The Tree
Excerpt
from www.globeandmail.com - Brad Wheeler
(
"Interesting" is one of the words for Glory
Hope Mountain, the recently released album
from the Acorn, an Ottawa-based indie band
led by singer and multi-instrumentalist Rolf Klausener. It was Klausener,
disenchanted with traditional sources of inspiration and tired of first-person
songwriting, who decided to base an album's material on interviews with his
mother, Gloria Esperanza Montoya, a half-Mayan Honduran emigrant whose
childhood memories are of dirt floors, flooding rivers and orphanages, not
hopscotch, puppy dogs and pigtails.
Special audio: The Acorn's album
Another word for the album of fluid, atmospheric folk-rock would be
"elaborate," though Klausener himself doesn't see it that way.
"I didn't set out to be ambitious," he says from
The research involved an investigation into Central American folk rhythms as
well as discussions with his mother about her often perilous early years. Those
recollections inform the surreal, poetic narrative of Glory Hope Mountain
(the album's title is a literal translation of the words of his mother's name):
A baby is born struggling ("Your rosy lungs were empty"), a surge in
the river almost sweeps children away ( Flood
Pt. 1 and Flood Pt. 2) and a young girl runs away from an abusive
father ("as far as these crooked legs will take me").
The lyrics, some addressed to his mother and some in his mother's voice, are
image-laden and fanciful — "Lift your head from wild and wicked sleep,
where seven-headed serpents hiss soliloquies." And although it was
Klausener's boredom with self-centered songwriting that triggered the album's
concept, he isn't disdainful when it comes to more confessional works. "I
don't think this album's any more valid than somebody's breakup record,"
he says. "I was just pretty tired of the soul-searching that comes on when
you start writing songs about yourself. I've done of it plenty of times myself,
and I've loved the results."
The Acorn, in a nutshell, began as a solo electro-acoustic vehicle of
Klausener's in 2002. As albums came out (2004's The Pink Ghosts and
2005's Blankets!), the project picked up members and moved from Ottawa's
Kelp Records to Toronto's Paper Bag Records, which issued the EP Tin Fist earlier
this year. The band now has six members.
The new disc isn't the only recent Canadian album inspired by a songwriter's
parent, but it's unique in that the parent was an active participant. While
Greg Keelor's Seven Songs for Jim and Emily Haines's What Is Free to
a Good Home? are tributes to deceased fathers,
Klausener's mother is able to listen to a record based, in the most part, on
the early years of her life.
"Proud, just amazingly proud," is how she feels about Glory Hope
Mountain. "For him to be able to write about my life, and then make it
into music is just wonderful."
As her son listens on the phone line, an upbeat Montoya speaks in broken
English, richly rolling her "R's" as she recounts some of the more
harrowing events that made their way lyrically into songs.
She lived in an orphanage until the age of 6, when her white father retrieved
her, taking her back to a farm outside the Honduran capital city of
The album's closing track, Lulla by (Mountain), sung by Ohbijou's Casey
Mecija in the voice of Montoya, is sweeter, with lines about a mother's blood
running through a child's heart with every beat. Because young sons are not
always the most communicative when it comes to their feelings towards their
mothers, the tender song was a revelation. "Very deeply," Montoya
says, when asked how it affected her. "I cannot explain how happy it makes
me, that Rolfie has been able to show how much he loves me."
Ironically, Klausener says, his attempt to avoid introspection in making the
album became intensely personal anyway. "A lot of these songs ended up
relating back to my own life," he says. "You end up reflecting on
choices you've made, and choices your family made, and how they affected
you."
One choice Klausener had initial regrets about was the album's title. He
considered Glory Hope Mountain too literal, too bucolic, "too Will
Oldham."
But in the end, "You can't really change it," he says, quite rightly.
"It takes on a life of its own. It's like trying to rename a child after
they've lived with the name for a few years."
The Acorn performs
Alt-Folk/Jazz Creator Gregory
Hoskins Is Back But At His Own Pace
Excerpt
from www.thestar.com - Entertainment
Columnist
(November 25, 2007) "There's the craft
and there's the calling ... I've
never been drawn to the former, much to the chagrin of my bank manager," Gregory Hoskins says, his grey eyes
reflecting the sombre light of Toronto's first snowy day this fall.
He takes a sip of cappuccino, and stares out the front window of his west-end
home. His three favourite instruments – his vintage Washburn jazz guitar with
modified humbucking pickups and a Bigsby-Gretsch twang bar, a trumpet, and a
well-loved, hand-made acoustic guitar that has seen better days – are lined up
beside him in the sparsely furnished living room.
The setting implies there's not much in Hoskins' life other than music. But
like his songs, it contains hints of the complex life of an artist whose
stock-in-trade is the heartbreaking, soul-wracking effort of relentless self-examination.
"The job is the craft, and the craft is to entertain," he continues.
"The calling is to illuminate. I am not good at entertaining ... but I've
learned how to engage an audience."
That's largely thanks to the quality of the musicians the Montreal-raised
songwriter has managed to gather around him – primo bassist George Koller and
drummer Gary Craig, guitarist Kurt Swinghammer, horn player Phil Dwyer and
pianist Jon Goldsmith – in the decade and a half since Hoskins first gained
serious critical attention fronting the long-gone but well remembered Toronto
alt-folk/jazz ensemble The Stick People, and recorded two memorable albums, Moon
Come Up and Raids on the Unspeakable, on the True North label,
recordings that "bands play on tour buses late at night, and seem to
impress filmmakers," he says.
These are the musicians who will perform with Hoskins, in a rare concert and
recording, Thursday night at the Glenn Gould Studio in
"They elevate my songs," he explains quietly. "Because they're
so good, I have so much freedom. In days gone by it was all about playing the
parts. Now it's about issuing an open invitation to the audience ... asking
them to come inside the music with us. It's about having fun."
Liberated from band bonds, and after a mysterious six-year withdrawal from the
music business – "not a bid for enigma or an overdeveloped sense of
privacy, as I feel (the answers) are all there in the songs anyway, but an
attempt to honour the people in my life, and the transitions that life
brings," he says by way of explaining – Hoskins re-emerged in 2001 with
the remarkable solo CD, The King of Good Intentions, praised by critics
for its "quiet soul," the singer's "haunting voice" and
"lyrics (that) speak of the hard lessons he has obviously learned over the
last decade."
At 43 and the father of three teens, Hoskins, known among peers as a reclusive,
even reluctant artist, is learning to enjoy performing for the first time, and
as a latecomer to indie music-marketing, he's eager to take responsibility for
his art in the commercial world he has so far managed to avoid. He runs his own
website, raises finances for his own recordings and performances – Thursday's
show is underwritten by his brother Ralph's media
company – and does his own bookings.
Determined to focus on live performance "for the next five years,"
Hoskins long ago abandoned notions of conventional success. "I don't even
know what that means. All the rules have changed, the
landscape is nothing like it was when I had a record deal. I have no choice but
to make it up as I go along.
"How do you measure success? You measure it in small moments, like when a
woman came up to me after a show recently with eyes wide open and just said,
`That last song ...' "
He's happy enough to be able to write when the urge overcomes him – "I'm
not prolific, I never turn up for a session with 30 new songs, and I spend a lot
of time with my head stuck up my own ass," he chuckles – and to play with
a small ensemble of intuitive musicians.
"And I'm very happy with the last two records. They didn't break any
rules, they didn't break new ground, but the songs are doing what I hoped
they'd do – they've become a brief and meaningful part of someone else's life.
"I'm just hitting my stride, according to my
brother ... I'm just getting interesting."
Just the facts:
WHO: Gregory Hoskins
WHEN: Thursday,
WHERE: Glenn Gould Studio,
TICKETS: $45-$70 at 905-471-7802 and at www.gregoryhoskins.com
Rossi Brought Back Down To
Earth
Excerpt
from www.thestar.com - Pop
Music Critic
(November 25, 2007) Lukas Rossi will be ringing in 2008 in
much
more modest style than he did in 2007.
As a dwindling number of you might recall, last New Year's Eve marked the live
debut of the star-powered band
Since the original line-up featured almighty Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee,
ex-Guns `n' Roses guitarist Gilby Clarke and former Metallica bassist Jason
Newsted – replaced before touring could begin by the Black Crowes' Johnny Colt
when he suffered a shoulder injury – and the show was a major hit, there was a
certain smugness within the music industry that Supernova, the band, couldn't
fail.
Fail it did, though.
While sales of the Rock
Star Supernova album hit the platinum mark here in Rossi's home
nation, it peaked at a relatively dismal No. 101 on Billboard's
And when a Supernova tour of packed houses all over the planet (including
Massey Hall) commenced last January, critics savaged the tour, too.
"Supernova wasn't close to super." "Rock Star Supernova crashes
and burns in
Newsted was long gone. Rumours swirled that Clarke was quitting. Tommy Lee took
up deejay-ing and feuding in court with the rest of Mötley Crüe. Supernova was,
for all intents and purposes, over by the spring, and Rossi – previously the
living embodiment of "cocky" – was forced to choke down a large
amount of humble pie.
"It takes a chunk out of you, man. I'm not gonna lie," says the
30-year-old singer from a recent
"I thought it was gonna go on longer. I think my ego got blown a little
out of proportion after it was all said and done, and coming back down to earth
is obviously where I belong. Coming off that tour, it was like: `Where's all
the glory?' But I like it where I am right now. If I have to pay my dues until
I die, that's the way God wants it to be."
And where is Rossi right now? Weaving his way across the
country on a small-venue acoustic tour that brings him to Lee's Palace tonight.
His high-powered Supernova bandmates have been replaced by keyboardist Lou
Dawson, the luxury tour bus by a car steered by his wife, Kendra. Which, for
Rossi – who spent years knocking around
"It's not really an adjustment," he says. "I've always been a
really hard worker. In my other bands, no one did s--- for us. It's just as
hard on my wife as it is on me. I failed my driver's test four times so,
unfortunately, she's been having to do all the
driving.
"She basically tour-manages and handles all the crazy people and so forth
that I can't. ... She's good support. We get hard on each other sometimes –
it's pretty gruelling, driving and playing, driving and playing, especially in
the winter. I'm sick now and I have 10 shows in a row to do.
"But the fans are waiting, man, so it's my pleasure to do it."
Rossi's fondness for his fans does seem sincere.
He maintains personal contact with hundreds of them through his website, www.LukasRossiOnline.com,
and some of them have become "friends for life." He hosts regular
online chats and auctions off lunch dates to admirers on eBay in each town
where he plays, donating the money to various charities. The last of these such occasions, he says, consisted of going out
drinking and gambling with the highest bidder and was "a great time."
Because of the TV show, he says, "people assume they know me. I guess they
feel like I'm approachable. And that's cool, because I am."
Fans will, however, have to wait a while longer for new music from Rossi.
He has a new project, Stars Down – featuring his current tourmate
As for Supernova, which has never officially announced its demise, Rossi isn't
holding his breath for a comeback.
"It actually felt like a real band. I thought it was gonna go on much
longer," he says.
"But at the end of the tour, everyone just kind of went off and started
deejay-ing or whatever. I don't know what that's about, but let 'em do what
they want. I'd just started to fire. I'm ready to start rockin'. I'm just
getting my feet wet and I've got no time to relax. I don't have time to make
pit stops. I'm not a deejay.
"All these shows in
Ambassador Of The Sax Was
Beloved Worldwide
Excerpt
from www.thestar.com - Classical Music Critic
(
He died on Monday at
The "Ambassador of the Saxophone," as his 2000 autobiography is
titled, was born in
After graduation, he moved to
He made his
Brodie's international fame came as both a soloist and a member of the Paul
Brodie Saxophone Quartet. Their mix of classics and more popular pieces
resonated with audiences around the world, including the
His efforts helped bring about the first World Saxophone Congress in 1968 – an
event that soon took on a life of its own.
Among his 56 albums, he made
"There isn't even an instruction book in Chinese," he recalled in a Star
interview. "I gave seven master classes to over 500 saxophonists from as
far away as
Brodie's musical legacy includes a number of instructional manuals for budding
saxophone players, and a diaspora of students who have inspired younger
generations with a love for the versatile woodwind.
The musician leaves behind wife Rima and daughter Claire.
According to his wishes, there will be no funeral or memorial services. His
ashes will be scattered in the woods at
Slash: Welcome to His (Drug-Free) Jungle
Excerpt from www.globeandmail.com -
Brad Wheeler
(
I wouldn't have it any other way, though, even though I'm an avid non-smoker.
Heck, if the guitarist had asked me if it was cool to smoke, I would
have replied with astonishment: "Is it cool for you to smoke? Are you
joking? Dude, it would be so totally cool if you did smoke."
If he didn't believe me, I could have walked him over to the other room, where
a cardboard box full of copies of his new autobiography sat on a table. The
cover art is a headshot, with the former Guns N' Roses member in classic
depraved rock-star pose, iconic cigarette on his bottom lip, dangling like a
participle. The nose ring, the hair in the eyes, the hazy stare, the crazy top hat - it's all there.
In the flesh, the Mad Hatter-like lid is replaced by a backwards ball cap. He's
calm, drinking coffee (not Jack Daniels), and the room is rather untrashed. His
book, co-written by Anthony Bozza (author of bios on Tommy Lee and Eminem),
chronicles a chaotic history of extreme behaviour and drug and alcohol use.
But, by the end of 457 pages, Slash is sober. He still is - for 18 months now.
"I kind of had to just burn out on it," the surprisingly fit-looking
42-year-old says, referring to numerous attempts at cleaning up that didn't
take in the past.
Sobriety hasn't altered his look at all - leather pants, shades, skull ring,
bracelets and black cowboy boots announce him as rock star. Slash, the
stereotypical stoned rocker, says he has never played up to the image.
"I'm just a guitar player who likes rock 'n' roll and the life that goes
with it. It's a life I've always led."
When asked if you can have sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll without the drugs,
Slash, who survived a heroin-related near-death experience in the early 1990s,
laughs a bit. "Yeah, definitely you can," he replies, before adding,
"But it was a big part of it."
Heroin, cocaine and drink may be in the past, but the divorced father of two
didn't make it out unscathed. His book opens with the admission that doctors
gave him six weeks to live when he was 35, his body beaten up by years of
debauchery. Since then, a three-inch implanted defibrillator keeps his heart
pumping.
Slash, born Saul Hudson, is not an invalid; he certainly looks up to the nerdy
challenges of the rec-room rockers that test him relentlessly on the popular
video game Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock. In real life, there is some
question about his status: While he isn't among Rolling Stone magazine's 2003
list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time, a 2004 Internet poll conducted
by Guitar World magazine slotted him 15th.
Asked if he thinks of himself as a guitar hero, Slash is demure. "No, not
really," he answers, amused. He has played the video game, but hasn't
faced himself as a contestant. "I'm a practising guitarist," he
continues. "It's one of those things you work at your entire life and you
never master."
That's a stock answer, isn't it? "It's hard to put on airs unless you have
this kind of mentality where you think you're a hero before you even learn how
to play, and that was what you were striving for. There are some very arrogant
players like that, but I don't fall into that category. I have good moments,
but I'm not consistent enough to be able to walk around like that."
That he's able to walk around at all is something of an accomplishment. He was
born in
"I remember my dad even told me, back in the day," Slash says on the
subject of his former bandmate. "He said, 'Don't go down with the ship,
because that's where Axl seems to be taking you all the time.' "
Rose was volatile and young Slash didn't need his father to tell him so. Once,
after the singer was abusive to Slash's grandmother, the guitarist confronted
him about it while driving along
"He's different," Slash says, "simply put."
In print, the guitarist comes off as the peacemaker of the unruly group,
handling Rose with kid gloves. Slash left the band in 1996, but he still hasn't
taken those gloves off. The book is not an anti-Rose manifesto.
"Everybody's looking for that," Slash says. "Everybody loves to
have some dirt, some negativity. They thrive on it, and I didn't want to feed
that. That's not what it was all about."
Although the pair were not particularly close - Slash
describes them as like fishing buddies who have nothing to talk about if the
talk isn't about fishing - the guitarist is charitable when speaking of Rose.
"He can be a really endearing, charming, sweet guy who's a good guy to
have in your company," Slash says. "But there's another side of Axl
that is very self-sabotaging. So, even though he's a perfectionist, extremely
talented and will work to no end to achieve a goal, he will tear it down in a
split second."
Under those circumstances, the band that broke big in 1988 with the album
prophetically titled Appetite for Destruction could hardly have been
expected to last - not with a singer who provoked riots by walking off stages
early (St. Louis, 1991, and Montreal, 1992) and a drug-and-booze-addled lead
guitarist as main attractions.
While Rose continues to lead an otherwise anonymous Guns N' Roses, Slash now
records and tours with Velvet Revolver, a hard-rock outfit that includes
combustible singer Scott Weiland as well as two former members of GNR.
Every journalist who has spoken to the guitarist since he split with Rose has
asked him about a possible reunion, and I see no reason to break the string.
So, Slash? "I don't see it happening," he says, not riled at the
tired question. "It's not happening now, and it's not going to happen any
time in the near future. But you never know - crazy things happen."
They sure do, crazy things. You could write a book
full of them.
Excerpt from www.thestar.com - Ashante
Infantry, Pop & Jazz Critic
(
In a year that has seen reunion tours by The Police, Van Halen and the Spice
Girls, Jermaine Jackson is floating the idea of a 2008 outing with his
brothers, who range in age from 46 to 56.
"We feel we have to do it one more time," the singer/guitarist told
BBC 6 Music yesterday.
The Gary, Ind.-born group, which began as the
By the time they hit the road for the 1984 Victory Tour, they had left Motown
for Epic Records, been joined by a sixth brother, Randy, and seen Michael score
a multi-million-selling sophomore solo smash with Thriller.
They recorded 1989's
The key to a successful
"Michael will be involved," said Jermaine, who indicated that his
infamous brother has attended organizational meetings at which concert dates
were tabled.
He also told the BBC the long-rumoured reunion was delayed by Michael's 2005
sex abuse trial.
Though evidently the inspiration of young superstars such as Usher and Justin
Timberlake, the entertainer's cat-and-mouse games with the public, absence from
record charts, implausible plastic surgeries and controversial relationships
with young boys have transformed him from music icon to punchline.
Being part of a family tour "could add something positive" to
Michael's legacy, said Flow 93.5 program director Wayne Williams.
"It would be good for him and his career. And regardless of Michael's
goings-on, there's definitely an appetite to see him along with all his
brothers onstage one more time."
Jermaine also told the BBC that the band was "in the studio at the
moment," hinting at work on new material.
Michael, who has long been supposed to be working on a new record, says in the
current issue of Ebony magazine: "I'm writing a lot of stuff right
now. I'm in the studio, like, every day."
However, the 49-year-old entertainer, who is featured on the cover to
commemorate Thriller's 25th anniversary, is evasive on the subject of
touring, primarily noting "I don't like long tours."
Homegrown Quartet's Not Just Another Male Supergroup
Excerpt from www.thestar.com - Richard
Ouzounian, Theatre Critic
(November 27, 2007) Does the world really need another
tenor supergroup, wearing too-tight tuxedos and singing "Unchained
Melody" in Italian?
You might say no, until you meet the Canadian
Tenors.
These four guys, who are about to have their official Toronto debut Friday at
the Winter Garden Theatre, have talent to burn and a love of music that's positively
electric.
What they don't have is attitude. Sitting around the west-end church where they
like to rehearse, wearing toques and sweaters, they could be any group of young
men shooting the breeze ... if they also happened to have killer singing voices.
Torontonian Jamie McKnight is the youngest, the one who joined most recently,
plucked from the chorus of the
"Sure, I've been in musical comedy for the last few years," grins McKnight, "but I used to be a member of the
Canadian Children's Opera Chorus as a kid and once that style gets ingrained in
you, you never forget it."
Victor Micallef, also from
Fraser Walters is probably the one with the most diverse career. He was a
member of the Grammy Award-winning a cappella ensemble Chanticleer as well as a
survivor of the musical The Lord of the Rings in
"As soon as I realized this group could be something different and not
just a clone of all the others," he says, "they had me hooked."
The same sentiment comes from
"I was worried we'd just be one tenor group too many," admits
The whole thing is the brainchild of Victoria composer/pianist Jill Ann
Siemens, who got the idea in 2003, before Il Divo had stepped onto the scene
Over the next four years, she tried many different combinations of people and
voices, with at least a half dozen tenors not making the cut before she found
the group that clicked.
"It took us a while to get to this place," says Walters, "but
now, the sky's the limit."
They've been touring around the Prairies and doing smaller gigs in Ontario on
the same bill as Rita MacNeil, but they've also been honing a debut CD, which
is due to be released this winter.
And their choice of material is truly eclectic. Musical comedy buff McKnight
has brought songs like Stephen Sondheim's "Being Alive" into the mix,
while the more pop-oriented Walters enjoys performing
Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah."
But the best part for them is the casual atmosphere they've cultivated around
their performances.
"We don't have Simon Cowell and millions of dollars behind us," says Micallef, alluding to Il Divo, "and we
didn't begin in a stadium."
"Heck no," agrees McKnight. "We talk to the audience onstage,
just like regular guys. People come back afterwards and say, `It's like
stepping into your living room.'"
Micallef sums it up. "We're making good music for good people." He
grins. "And if it takes us around the world, so much the better."
And then the Canadian Tenors laugh ... in harmony.
Christmas with the Canadian Tenors will take place at the
Winter Garden Theatre,
Young's Warm Homecoming
Excerpt from www.thestar.com - Greg
Quill, Entertainment Columnist
(
Monday night, Neil Young
returned to
In the first of three shows at the venerable Victorian venue – he performed
there last night and is scheduled again for Thursday – the 62-year-old singer,
guitarist and songwriter dabbled quite deliberately and self-consciously with
notions of art throughout. A sharply dressed curator, in red jacket and white
boater, wandered upstage, hanging and rearranging primitive paintings on the back
wall, appearing to evaluate them, even discussing their virtues in the
intermission with Young and his wife, Peggy, posing as potential buyers.
And high above the set hung a series of letters and one number, 3, which seemed
to have some mysterious function as they began to light up, one by one, late in
the evening.
If it was Neil the folkie or Neil the rocker for whom the enthusiastic crowd
turned up – they rose to their feet when he walked onstage unannounced, and
after almost every song– they all got their fill, and then some.
The first 45 minutes, after an indifferently received opening set by Peggy and
part of Young's band (dobro/steel player Ben Keith and bassist Rick Rosas)
featured Young solo, wandering between half a dozen priceless vintage acoustic
guitars (he played just three of them, and a banjo) and two pianos (a grand and
a honky-tonk upright), and offering up, with almost whimsical abandon, familiar
masterpieces ("Old Man," "A Man Needs A Maid," "From
Hank To Hendrix," "Cowgirl In The Sand," "Ambulance
Blues") and more obscure gems from his vast treasury.
He was in fine voice, his trademark falsetto barely faltering in the high
register and his guitar playing exemplary.
After a 20-minute intermission Young returned to the stage with Keith, Rosas
and drummer Ralph Molina for a smoking set of typically raunchy rock, much of
it from the current album, Chrome Dreams II, interspersed with a few
lost classics ("Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere,"
"Winterlong").
Older, maybe not wiser, and certainly no less passionate, Young was the master
Monday night. Long may he run.
Wanted: A Visionary For The COC
Excerpt from www.thestar.com - Martin Knelman
(
"We're going to cast a very wide net," pledges Dory Vanderhoof, a
veteran behind-the-scenes cultural guru who spends most days on the road
(usually in
Yesterday, after three months of speculation, the Canadian Opera Company
announced that Vanderhoof and his firm, Genovese Vanderhoof & Associates,
have been hired to conduct one of the most challenging searches in the history
of
It's the right choice.
"Richard Bradshaw was a galvanizing force and did an amazing job,"
said Vanderhoof in a phone interview from the offices of another client, the
New York City Opera. "We're looking for someone with the same kind of
leadership qualities and abilities."
But that doesn't mean he is looking for a Bradshaw clone.
"Our goal is to find the best possible leader for the opera company,"
says Vanderhoof. "In doing searches for many performing arts groups, we
have found you have to keep an open mind and look in a lot of different places
if you want to identify the best talent out there. Strong candidates emerge
with many different backgrounds."
The Houston Grand Opera Company chose Anthony Freud – a former lawyer from
Los Angeles Opera has a big profile partly because it is run by the famous
tenor Placido Domingo. And one of the most successful company leaders in recent
history was the late Beverly Sills, who took over running the New York City
Opera after she stopped singing.
Indeed, before Bradshaw's promotion to the top job in the mid-1990s, he was the
music director of the company when it was run by Brian Dickie, who was not a
conductor.
Neither was Dickie's predecessor, Lotfi Mansouri, who presided over the COC in
the 1980s and at the San Francisco Opera in the 1990s, although he was a stage
director.
But if COC's next boss is not a conductor, then who would lead the orchestra
that Bradshaw developed into one of the company's greatest assets? It would be
up to the new general director to create an organizational structure for the
operation and choose his own music director.
How long will the process take?
"It's too early to say, but the average search takes six or seven
months," says Vanderhoof, who worked on the COC staff in the 1980s after
moving here from
But ultimately, it's the COC board that has to make the final choice once there
is a short list. It's a bit like matchmaking.
The board and the future general director have to fall in love with each other.
Among
If
Above all, we need an inspired ringmaster – someone who like
Bradshaw knows how to build momentum and how to keep it going.
MUSIC TIDBITS
Sly Stone Hits The Big Apple
Excerpt from www.eurweb.com
(November 26, 2007) *Following decades of inactivity
and a summer
of spot dates throughout Europe, Sly Stone and his famous band The Family Stone took the stage in New York
last week for the first time in 32 years. A crowd of about 1000 showed up at
B.B. King's Blues Club and Grill Tuesday for the rare appearance of 64-year-old
Stone, who performed dressed in a white sweatsuit with silver trim, sunglasses
and Mohawk hairstyle. According to Reuters, Stone "filled the club
with his rich, mellifluous voice as the band spent an hour cycling through
their greatest hits, including 'Everyday People,' 'Family Affair' and 'Stand.'" Due to popular demand, B.B. King's has added
two more Sly and the Family Stone shows for Dec. 7 at
Alicia Keys Unlocks Billboard's Top Spots
Excerpt from www.eurweb.com
(November 26, 2007) *As expected, the new album and
single from
Alicia Keys has taken Billboard by storm this week, with No. 1
landings on multiple charts. One day after her album "As I Am"
entered The Billboard 200 in the top position, the set's first single, "No
One," seized control of Billboard's Hot 100 chart with a rise from No. 2
last week. The track also sold 210,000 downloads, an 88% increase from
last week, and remains No. 1 on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs for a sixth week.
Back on the Hot 100, "No One" unseated the three-week reign of Chris
Brown's "Kiss Kiss" featuring T-Pain, which falls to No. 2 ahead of
Timbaland's "Apologize" featuring OneRepublic at No. 3 and newcomer
Flo Rida's "Low" featuring T-Pain at No.
4. Elsewhere in the top 10, Soulja Boy's
"Crank That (Soulja Boy)" is down 4-6 and Kanye West's "Good
Life" featuring T-Pain sticks at No. 7. Fergie's "Clumsy" jumps
12-8, making her the first female artist since Paul Abdul in 1989 and 1990 to
take five songs from a debut album into the top 10. Baby Bash's
"Cyclone" featuring T-Pain is down 8-9, and West's
"Stronger" rounds out the top 10 with a 9-10 slide.
LaBelle Says Music Industry Racist
Excerpt from www.thestar.com - The
Canadian Press
(November 27, 2007) R&B legend Patti LaBelle says
one of the biggest obstacles in her career has been watching friend and fellow
diva Céline Dion soar up
the charts with a song she recorded first. LaBelle tells online magazine MonacoRevue.com
that racism in the music industry kept her from reaching the same heights
with "If You Asked Me To." Dion's 1992 rendition soared to No. 4 on
the Billboard Hot 100 chart, while LaBelle's '89 version peaked at No. 79.
"Why do I think Céline had the sales and I didn't? Because she's a white
girl," LaBelle tells the Canadian-owned magazine based in
Nas 'Ni**Er' Album Pushed Back
Excerpt from www.eurweb.com
(
::FILM NEWS::
Shawshank Director Leaves Redemption At The Door
Excerpt
from www.globeandmail.com - Simon Houpt
(November 22, 2007) NEW
“This is awesome,” he chuckled, casting his eyes around the room as he welcomed
a visitor. “I don't play piano, but it's a hell of a prop. It makes me look
very classy, doesn't it?” This was a rare moment of Hollywood-style excess for
Darabont, who has lately been operating in conditions that are practically
ascetic compared with his previous work.
Until a few years ago, Darabont, 48, was known for his deliberate, almost
painterly productions of The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile,
big-hearted studio dramas that were shamelessly old-fashioned in their
optimism, their filmmaking style, their reliance upon stars and their budget.
Then came The Majestic, a Capraesque yarn
headlined by Jim Carrey that tanked with the critics and the public. Since its
release in December, 2001, Darabont has stayed out of the feature director's
chair, filling his time with writing assignments and a form of job retraining:
creating and directing TV shows.
He needed to cut his teeth in television because he was gearing up to take on The
Mist, a spook fest he adapted from a Stephen King story, which required a
new bag of filmmaking tricks: He had learn how to shoot fast, work lean and not
worry if the rough edges showed.
“I believe in doing the course work,” he joked.
There were two reasons Darabont needed to change his style. The first was
aesthetic: He felt The Mist required a jazzy, jumpy, verité approach.
The second was financial: The Weinstein
“So far, the 21st century has sucked,” he said, pouring himself the first of
three room-service coffees that he will gulp down in the next 23 minutes.
Normally, Darabont has an FM-radio sort of smooth baritone, but at the moment
his anger has coloured it into a growl. “Mankind's been disappointing me, and
letting itself down in a pretty profound way, and that's not a political slam
against our current leadership, it's just across the board. I think people are
out of their minds.”
What, you may be wondering, does this have to do with a commercially oriented
thriller? A little background: Like Darabont's other adaptations of King
stories ( Shawshank, Green Mile), The
Mist is set in a prison of sorts. But where those films depicted people
crammed together in a tense environment in order to illuminate the higher
angels of human nature, The Mist is a horror film in which the worst
horror comes from the humans themselves.
On the day after a tremendous storm knocks out power and phone service in a
small
The shoppers barricade themselves in the market. Initially, they're more or
less united against their unseen enemy: They pile heavy bags of dog food
against the store's plate-glass windows, and plot strategy. But as the
creatures in the mist begin to show themselves – first tearing apart just about
anyone who dares step outside, then breaking through the windows – panic
descends and the refugees look for scapegoats.
One woman (Marcia Gay Harden), a wild-eyed, sermonizing Christian
fundamentalist that the townsfolk used to write off as the local nut, succeeds
in whipping people into a frothing, homicidal frenzy with her proclamations
that the attack is the work of a vengeful God.
Which brings us back to Darabont's cynicism. “The
genre of horror, as Rod Sterling showed us, can be a great forum for discussing
some real issues,” he says, narrowing his eyes.
But Darabont isn't just trying to make some abstract observations: About
halfway through the film, he uses some of the more level-headed townsfolk to
articulate an argument that shoves a stick at that most poisonous of issues –
the use of fear to manipulate the masses. “You scare people badly enough, you
can get them to do whatever you want,” declares one. In an obvious parallel to
the present-day U.S. and its all-volunteer army, one foolish young man, his
courage inflated by the patriotic tough talk of a pair of old coots, steps up
for a dangerous assignment that results in his horrific death. So, we must ask:
At what point in the creation of The Mist, the source material for which
was written in 1980, become about the
Darabont laughs. “Believe me, it was definitely on my mind,” he says. “You're
examining how people react and act under fear. And the fear
of fear. And let's face it, it's
“The idea of how people react in a pressure cooker of fear is not necessarily
specific to today, it goes back to Greek tragedy. But
boy, it sure started feeling like a very timely movie to me now. So it winds up
being a pretty political film without it being a political film.”
Darabont says that exploring those issues became the primary reason for him to
make the film. “You have to find some kind of relevance, some kind of meaning,
some kind of reason for the movie to exist – aside from, you know, crazy birds
from another dimension that you can set aflame.”
As for that key conversation about human nature, Darabont says, “I tend to have
a version of that scene in all my movies. There's a scene in Shawshank where
Tim Robbins gets out of solitary and he sits down with the guys in the mess
hall and it suddenly turns into this conversation between his character and
Morgan Freeman's character about hope: Is it a good thing, is it a bad thing?
You know. Kind of the whole movie hinges on that sort of argument.”
The Mist, however, is unlikely to leave viewers with the same
warm-and-fuzzy feeling as Darabont's other features. Adapting a story by King
that concluded ambivalently, he crafted an ending that some viewers will find
not just horrifying; they will be appalled.
Darabont shrugs, and pleads for the ending not to be revealed in print. “It
wasn't just done for cheap effect. I have some pretty deep-in-the-marrow
reasons for how the story went,” he insists. “Do you consider that action at
the end of the movie a gesture of extraordinary love and strength? Or is it a
big damn mistake? People make mistakes when they let their fear get a hold of
them.”
“I know some people absolutely love the ending, I know some people absolutely
don't,” he says. “And you know what? That's fine, as long as it doesn't wash
over you and make you feel nothing. I walk out of way too many movies these
days that just do not take a stance, that are not the product of a filmmaker
trying to say something. It's just some guy wearing superhero clothes, and I
just can't give a damn.”
Darabont's next project, if it goes forward, is his own adaptation of Ray
Bradbury's dystopic Fahrenheit 451.
“The book is something I read when I was 9 and I've wanted to make it since
then. It is so bold and so visionary, and I think it completely defines where
society is headed, and you know, certainly the burning of books is a great
metaphor for a lot of things, but I think it is the finest examination of
fascism lurking under the skin of democracy that has ever been written.
“My favourite two movies last year: Pan's Labyrinth – a masterpiece –
and Children of Men.” He pours another cup of coffee. “
Rise of the Silver Surfer? You couldn't drag me at gunpoint.”
But then, he doesn't have kids who wear down his resistance. At
least not yet. “I think I may be ready for that,” he sighs.
“I need some reason to be hopeful. I need somewhere to find my optimism again.”
Holiday Movies Guide
Excerpt
from www.thestar.com - Movie Critic
(November 23, 2007) The U.S. Thanksgiving
weekend traditionally
marks the start of the long season of overindulgence, and that goes double for
movie fans.
With dozens of films opening between now and New Year's Eve, many of them
potential blockbusters or Oscar candidates, cueing the viewing becomes a harder
task than the seating arrangement at a dysfunctional family banquet.
To make the job easier, here's my rundown of the 12 films to scribble onto your
Santa season to-do list. I'm working a Cool Yule theme this year, mindful that
one person's cool must-see is another's chilly turn-off.
But all of these films have something special going for them:
Kidman Putting Her Career
Back On Track
Excerpt
from www.thestar.com - Special To The Star
(November 24, 2007) New York–It was not
something she wanted or
wished for, but in terms of high-profile visibility, Nicole Kidman's personal life has taken
precedence over her career for the past couple of years.
During that time, she met and married Australian country singer Keith Urban;
saw him through three months of rehab for alcohol abuse; and turned 40 – all in
the publicity glare of paparazzi cameras and magazine covers.
This week the Australian actor, denying rumours she and Urban are expecting a
child, revealed she lost two babies while married to Tom Cruise, and testified
in a Sydney court that she was afraid she would get into a car accident two
years ago when a celebrity photographer chased her.
But now Kidman's career has regained prominence, with the release in a period
of just a few months of three movies.
She and Daniel Craig, who appeared together in the recently released The
Invasion, teamed up again for The Golden Compass, which is due to be
released Dec. 7. In the fantasy adventure, she plays a sultry villainess.
She is also currently starring in Margot at the Wedding, which opened
yesterday. Kidman plays the titular Margot, a sharp-tongued writer who creates
chaos wherever she goes. Her life is on the verge of falling apart when she and
her son attend the wedding of her estranged, free-spirited sister, played by
Jennifer Jason Leigh, to an out-of-work artist (Jack Black).
Kidman was so attracted to the script that she worked for less than $1,000 a
week, a far cry from her usual asking price of around $17 million a movie,
which she received for The Interpreter and Bewitched, both in
2005.
"The story is so funny and has this strange, beautiful, brutal honesty to
it while at the same time bringing a strong sense of affection," she says.
"What interested me is the way these two sisters are so tough on each
other, pushing each other's buttons like crazy, and yet they love each other
through it all."
We were talking in
Kidman and Urban met at a party in
Kidman stuck by him, visiting him regularly and encouraging him in his
recovery. "I love him for his honesty and bravery. Simply put, he's a
wonderful, wonderful man and I'm very lucky to have him," she says.
She and her ex-husband Cruise, whom she married when she was 23 and then
divorced at 34, have joint custody of their two adopted children, Isabella, 14,
and Connor, 12, who are both Scientologists, like Cruise.
Kidman admits that after she and Cruise divorced, she went through a period of
unhappiness and loneliness. "When I was alone, I became very isolated and
felt very lonely and it was difficult to meet someone," she says.
"I realized you can have so many beautiful things around you and if you
don't have someone in your life to share it with, it doesn't mean that much.
I'm just so grateful I have someone I can share the highs and also the lows
with."
If her private life has been something of an emotional roller coaster, her
professional career has been a steady upward climb from the age of 15, when she
made her first real impression as a frizzy-haired teenager in the Australian
holiday film Bush Christmas. She made her international breakthrough
co-starring with Billy Zane in the thriller Dead Calm and met Cruise
when she was cast opposite him in Days of Thunder.
After they separated, she starred in Moulin Rouge! and
won a Best Actress Oscar for her performance in The Hours.
She has demonstrated her willingness to explore her talents and experiment with
a wide range of roles, some in decidedly non-commercial projects.
Her roles in The Human Stain,
Filming demands have taken her around the world and she will soon be
temporarily moving to
"As an actor, I spend most of my time travelling and I have a very gypsy
existence," Kidman says. "The thing that draws me to being an actor
is that ability to travel. I get to go and live in
"I've had so many different experiences because of my job, and I love
it."
Cinema Swoop Puts Dent In Pirated Movies
Excerpt from www.globeandmail.com -
Unnati Gandhi
(
Shortly after
“We walked in like a SWAT team. Boom, boom, boom, boom.
Two guys went up one way, two guys went the other way, I went straight up the
middle,” Mr. Guzzo, executive vice-president of the independent Guzzo cinema
chain, said Tuesday.
“He had nowhere to go unless he jumped over me. And I'm 245 pounds of robust
Italian hot blood.”
Police were called and a 23-year-old man became the first Canadian to be
arrested and charged for illegally recording in a
cinema since new legislation came into effect in June.
The arrest, which was the culmination of weeks of private investigation, has already
put a huge dent in the city's normally bustling piracy industry, Mr. Guzzo
said: Not a single illegally recorded movie sourced from
It was a May visit from California Governor and onetime Terminator Arnold
Schwarzenegger that prompted Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the federal
government to get going on film-piracy legislation. An amendment to the
Criminal Code was announced less than a month later.
Under the previous law, the federal Copyright Act, recording a movie was only a
crime if it could be proved that it was for commercial distribution. The movie
industry complained that the law was too difficult to enforce.
With the new legislation, filming a movie with a camcorder in theatres now
carries a maximum penalty of two years imprisonment, while recording for the
purpose of commercial distribution is punishable by up to five years.
Douglas Frith, president of the Canadian Motion Pictures Distributors
Association, said the fact that charges have been laid in this case shows that
the legislation is working.
“It could be a breakthrough case. That theatre had been targeted fairly often,
more than we would have liked, so this is very significant.”
The association also credits the industry's investment in a series of
technological systems.
One such system, at a cost of nearly $5,000 to the studio, was a night-vision
detector set up to scan the auditorium for digital camera lenses. It was
installed in the Guzzo Lacordaire cinema in question, said Gary Osmond,
director of investigations for the CMPDA in
“This was the first time we used the technology and we caught someone, so it
was obviously worth the money and the research and development.”
The association is considering installing the technology in other problem
theatres in
On top of that, studios can determine at which theatre a film was recorded
because each individual reel sent out has a set of watermarks printed onto
different frames, generating a unique code for every theatre.
Louis-René Haché, of
He pleaded not guilty to both charges this month and was released on a promise
to appear with the condition that he not go to any
Guzzo cinemas. He is scheduled to next appear in a
With a report from Tu Thanh Ha
FILM TIDBITS
Jerry's Master Of Israeli
Domain
Excerpt
from www.thestar.com - The Associated Press
(November 26, 2007) Israelis are buzzing
about Jerry Seinfeld,
who's in the Holy Land as part of a world tour to promote Bee Movie, his new animated movie about
bees. Seinfeld makes an unlikely folk hero in this Hebrew-speaking
Mediterranean country, with his nothing-happens comedy
set in the highrise apartment buildings of
Page Gets A Nod
Excerpt from www.globeandmail.com -
Reuters
(November 28, 2007) Los Angeles — Halifax-born rising
star Ellen Page was nominated for best actress
yesterday at the Film Independent Spirit Awards, while The Diving Bell and the Butterfly and Juno
were among the top nominees over all, each claiming a spot among the best indie
films of the year. The other nominees in the best-feature category were the
drama I'm Not There, which was inspired by the life of singer Bob Dylan,
A Mighty Heart, with Angelina Jolie playing the wife of slain journalist
Daniel Pearl, and the drama
::TV NEWS::
Learn Lyrics To Your Favourite Songs
Source: MTV via PRNewswire
(
Scheduled to hit the "TRL" stage first, during "Spankin' New
Lyrics Week," on Monday, November 26th are rapper Bow Wow and R&B
heartthrob Omarion, who will perform "Girlfriend" from their upcoming
collaborative album "Face Off."
On Tuesday, November 27th Keyshia Cole, someone who knows a little something
about writing lyrics, will perform "Let It Go" and "Shoulda Let
You Go." On Wednesday, November 28th rock band
Ending the week with a huge bang on Thursday, November 29th is superstar
songstress Alicia Keys who will perform "No One" and "Like
You'll Never See Me Again" from her recently released album As I Am.
Viewers should also expect special appearances by Ashley Tisdale, Paramore,
Lupe Fiasco, Mario, The Dream and Good Charlotte. "TRL" will have
video premieres and "first look" of videos throughout the week
including Chris Brown "With You," The White Stripes
"Conquest," Snoop Dogg "Sensual Seduction," The Dream
"Falsetto," and J Holiday "Suffocate."
During "Spankin New Lyrics Week" MTV.com (music.mtv.com) will feature
all of the weeks live "TRL" performances, photo highlights from all
performances and appearances and all on-air video premieres. In creating
innovative entertainment and gaming experience around music lyrics, music fans
will be able to find lyrics to some of their favourite artists featured during
the week. In addition, on Wednesday, November 28th, MTV.com will launch a video
remixer for
lets viewers create their own interpretations of their favourite music videos
and post them to MTV.com allowing them to reinterpret and reimagine their
favourite music videos in new ways.
The official sponsors of "Spankin' New Lyrics Week" are Ford Sync,
Jack in the Box and Rhapsody.
Excerpt
from www.globeandmail.com - Guy Dixon
(November 23, 2007) Characterizing it not as
cost-cutting but a way to
get programs onto more media platforms, the
Richard Stursberg, previously head of
The move, approved by the broadcaster's board of directors on Tuesday, is the
result of a push over the past few years to integrate offices throughout the
corporation, including regional operations, and early moves to combine
Mr. Stursberg noted that the move “has absolutely nothing to do with” possible
job cuts. “I hope that what's going to happen is to grow both services more
effectively than we have, and to grow our presence on other platforms.”
He added in an interview that “what's happening in the media environment more
generally is that people are consuming media in all sorts of different ways. So
increasingly, what people are doing is looking at how to make our content
available on all the more advanced platforms – whether it's Google or iTunes or
the Internet generally or hand-held mobile devices, whatever it happens to be.
And so when we have everything under one roof, it just makes it easier to make
the transition to those platforms.”
Mr. Stursberg's expanded role comes after the head of
Reporting to him is Jennifer McGuire, now appointed to the new position of executive
director of programming for radio, and Kirstine Layfield, the head of
Mr. Stursberg said “the existing strategy for radio will continue exactly as it's going. I think it's fair to say that radio has been a
towering success.”
He and Ms. McGuire spent a great deal of time stressing this point to
“If we could create a television service in English Canada that had the level
of intelligence, affection, success that the radio service had, it would be an
extraordinary achievement,” Mr. Stursberg said.
There may be more crossover of
The announcement about Mr. Stursberg comes at a time of widespread management
changes. Both the chairman and the chief executive officer were only recently
appointed, and neither has a background in public broadcasting. And along with
the departure of Ms. Chalmers as the head of radio, the
Mr. Burman's position has been split in two, with Chicago Sun-Times publisher
John Cruickshank named in September to the new position of “publisher” of
Wanted: Cancon, Everywhere
Excerpt
from www.globeandmail.com - Gayle Macdonald
(
But two weeks into the American TV writers' strike, the
Shaftesbury Films co-chair says that several
“They can't do reality and reruns forever, and they only have so many movies in
the can,” says
This past week, debate has been ongoing in Canada's close-knit production
community about whether or not the mainstream U.S. networks will actually bite
– and buy Canadian shows to fill a schedule that could soon be depleted of
fresh content. (Talks are set to resume on Monday between the Writers Guild of
America and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers).
Some, such as
Regardless of whether the American interest is feigned or real,
“When we first started going to MIPTV (a broadcast marketplace held in
This is the third year that
And Jennings – whose company last year ranked among Canada's top three
production houses, with volume of $54-million – is not alone in her assertion
that exports of Canadian television into global markets has never been
stronger.
John Morayniss, the Los Angeles-based chairman and chief executive of Blueprint
Entertainment, says that international deals are surging due to a bigger
appetite for programming among U.S. cable broadcasters, domestic specialty and
digital channels – and a healthier international marketplace overall.
Morayniss, whose boutique TV production shop produces such shows as Whistler,
Til Death Do Us Part and The Best Years, also just returned from
MIPCOM, where his firm signed up deals in a number of new territories. “ Whistler just got a deal in
“There's growing demand for scripted shows, both half-hour and one-hour
series,” says Morayniss, adding that the half-hour Til Death Do Us Part
attracted lots of attention from international broadcasters at MIPCOM, who were
interested in acquiring the “format rights” to produce a local version of the
show about once-happily married couples in which one of the partners ends up
knocking the other off.
Mary Darling, whose WestWind Pictures produces Little
Mosque on the Prairie, says there's also been many format-rights enquiries
about that
“There are also way more platforms to sell onto,” she adds. “Not everything has
to be a big network deal. It can also be broadband, video on demand,
direct-to-home video. There are all kinds of different ways to sell into the
international marketplace that didn't exist a couple
of years ago.”
According to trade magazine Playback's 19th annual report on independent
production, Canadian production and development spending in 2006 rose to
$1.52-billion, up from $1.26-billion in 2005. It also reported that that was
the first significant increase in spending activity since 2000, when spending
peaked at $1.83-billion, and then began a downward spiral to a low of
$1.24-billion in 2004. In 2005, the first signs of a potential turnaround
occurred, with production volume posting an increase of 2 per cent, the
magazine said.
The Canadian Film and Television Production Association (CFTPA) conducts its own annual survey of the Canadian industry. Its
latest study – which takes into account production from
Michael Shepard, president of Vancouver-based distribution company Thunderbird
Films, which packages and sells several Canadian shows, says it's been a great
run for Canadian programming in the United States, a notoriously tough
territory to crack. Shepard predicts that 2007-08 will be an even stronger
season. He notes that Thunderbird has already secured national
Da Vinci was the first show Thunderbird launched in
Stone Undercover and Cold Squad have been packaged together as a
two-hour block that Shepard estimates draws over 2.5 million viewers a week. “ Tom Stone might not have been a huge hit on
the
Things are looking up, too, for Intelligence, which Thunderbird already
sells in 143 territories. Recently Fox was reported to be eyeing a remake of
Chris Haddock's crime series for the American market, and has ordered a pilot
from the Vancouver-based creator and his partner, John Wells.
Shaftesbury's Life With Derek, which is
broadcast in the
Arnie Gelbart, whose Montreal-based company Galafilm produces shows such as the
teen drama 15/Love, says Canadian programs are increasingly popular with
international TV buyers because such shows are typically cheaper than American
ones, but still have that “American feel about them.” Adds Gelbart, “The bottom
line is, we've just become better at producing shows
that people want to buy or look at.”
If there is one hitch to the saleability of Canadian TV around the world,
Blueprint's Morayniss says, it's that most Canadian
programs are still being sold by foreign distributors. “There is no strong
Canadian international sales company currently,” he notes, adding that Alliance
Atlantis used to fill that role.
“I'm seeing this growth in the number of [international] buyers and this
continuing strength of Canadian programming, but we're missing a strong
Canadian-based international sales company that thinks first and foremost about
Morayniss adds that such a missing link motivated Blueprint, with offices in
Shaftesbury's
As for whether another Due South could be around the corner,
Shrek Returns In Christmas Special
Excerpt from www.thestar.com - Vinay Menon
(
People, this can mean only one thing: Christmas is nearly here!
Television has always served as an early detection system for the yuletide
season. And this year is no exception. So sit back, work on your gift list,
gulp down some eggnog and try to pretend it's not Nov. 28.
Christmas in
Hopefully without the use of a giant blue map, the Today weatherman will
introduce a number of musical performers, including Josh Groban, Céline Dion,
Barry Manilow, Ashley Tisdale, Taylor Swift and American Idol star
Carrie Underwood.
I have not seen a song list. But if NBC is serious about spreading joy, peace
and goodwill, it will do whatever is necessary to prevent Céline from belting
out "Feliz Navidad." And, please, somebody put Manilow in a headlock
if he shows up with jingle bells.
Of course, the visual centrepiece of this holiday extravaganza is the
ceremonial lighting of the Christmas tree. This year's massive specimen – it
stands 84 feet tall, or roughly 109 Eva Longorias stacked on top of one another
– was taken from a backyard in
Really? Let's just hope this was with the owner's
permission.
"Good lord! Honey, come quick! Look at the TV! Isn't that our 60-year-old
Norway Spruce that was stolen two weeks ago?"
Moving on.
Based on the classic children's book, Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole
Christmas (
Kids, the moral of this story is quite simple: never trust green people.
(Incidentally, if you're looking for the movie version that stars Jim Carrey,
And, finally, we arrive at the night's most publicized Christmas special.
Here's a clue: "Twas the night before Christmas. And not a swamp rat did
creep. As mother and babe played kazoo in their sleep."
Shrek the Halls (
As with the trilogy, tonight's special features the voices of Mike Myers, Eddie
Murphy and Cameron Diaz, who may have attempted to plant subliminal "Come
back to me this Christmas, Justin!" messages in her dialogue.
The plot synopsis: it's Christmas Eve. And just when Shrek is poised to relax
with Fiona and the kids, along comes Puss in Boots,
Gingerbread Man and Donkey, each determined to put their own spin on the
holiday.
So, naturally, Shrek lumbers into his tool shed. He retrieves his trusty
crossbow and begins picking off his adversaries, one by one. The carnage mounts
as the ogre stomps through the swamp, unleashing a string of profanities,
shielding his rotund body from the squalls while searching for new targets. And
when Santa tries to intervene, well, Shrek kills him too.
Actually, that last paragraph may contain several factual inaccuracies.
Am I hallucinating? I think this eggnog is bad.
TV TIDBITS
'Everybody Hates Chris' Gets Syndication
Excerpt from www.eurweb.com
(November 23, 2007) *Two years before it hits
syndication, the Chris
Rock-produced sitcom "Everybody Hates Chris" has been cleared for broadcast to stations representing 35%
of the country and seven of the top 10 markets, reports Daily
Variety. CBS Television Distribution has struck deals with several
key Fox- and CBS-owned stations to begin stripping the show in September 2009.
CBS deals are said to be worth a mix of $35,000 per week in cash (along with
barter ad time), while the Fox stations are giving up barter ad time
only. "Chris" will air on Fox stations in
Food Network To Cease Production Of Emeril Live
Excerpt from www.thestar.com - The
Associated Press
(
Tyra's 'Top Model' Tosses Twiggy
Excerpt from www.eurweb.com
(November 28, 2007) *Citing scheduling conflicts, 1960s
supermodel Twiggy will not return for the
upcoming 10th cycle of Tyra Banks' CW program "America's Next Top Model." The
vacated seat at the judge's table will be filled by another veteran cover girl,
Paulina Porizkova, when the show begins its next season. "We are thrilled
to have Paulina as a part of this cycle's judging panel," ANTM executive
producer Ken Mok said in a statement. "The show and participants will
benefit a great deal from her vast modeling knowledge and expertise."
Porizkova will join Banks, runway diva Miss J. Alexander and photographer
Nigel Barker on the judging panel. Twiggy leaves the show having put in
work for five cycles. She was brought in during Cycle 5 to replace one of the
original judges, Janice Dickinson. "We would like to thank Twiggy for her
great contributions to the show," Mok said. "Having an icon like
Twiggy lend us her considerable expertise has elevated our show to a whole new
level. We wish her well in her endeavours and hope to collaborate with her in
future Cycles of ANTM as well as other projects."
::THEATRE NEWS::
Browning Ready To Take Flight
Excerpt
from www.thestar.com - Theatre Critic
(November 24, 2007) When you realize you're
going to meet Kurt
Browning, a whole bunch of numbers come to mind.
In the world of ice skating, he's been a four-time world champion, a four-time
Canadian champion, a three-time Olympic team member and three-time World
Professional Champion.
But now, at the age of 41, he's flying off in a new direction – literally –
playing the title role in Peter Pan, this year's family musical from Ross Petty, now in previews at
the Elgin Theatre and opening officially next Friday.
The guy who bops down the street is still boyishly jaunty, with the slightly
tentative spring in his step of someone who's always going to feel more comfortable
on a surface that's been well-Zambonied.
For more than 20 years, he's been out there on the ice, but now he's soaring
through the air with Tinker Bell as his guide.
Back in his childhood days, the Alberta-born Browning hit the blades soon after
he could walk. He had his first serious coach when he was 11, but it wasn't
until he was 14 that the sport really grabbed hold of him.
"I was at a seminar at the Glencoe Club in
There was no looking back. As he quickly rose to the top of the heap, everyone
wondered how he did it. He laughs now when he reveals what his secret weapon
was.
"When I was an amateur, it was all very straightforward. I'm going to do
whatever I have to do to win, because if I don't, then somebody else will. I
hated losing – no one knows what to say to you. If you win, it's so much
easier.
"I was a clean, simple machine: have fun, skate hard and win."
And win he did, including an astonishing three-year stint from 1989 to 1991
when he captured both the Canadian and World Amateur Championships each year.
Then it started to go wrong. "When you start talking about all the things
I've won," he says with disarming modesty, "don't ever forget that I
also lost the biggest competition in the world you can lose."
Browning is referring to his 1992 ordeal at the Winter Olympics, which began
with a back injury that curtailed his training process and sent him off to
"I was on the world stage without a shield and a sword," he
remembers. "I was vulnerable. I was injured. I shouldn't have gone. It was
awful."
What did he do after his defeat?
"I went skiing with some teammates. Made a few jokes. Then I left them
behind and I lay down in the snow. Tips of mountains. Puffy white clouds.
Ask him if the experience damaged him permanently and his eyes flash with
momentary anger. "Destroyed me? Never. A month
and a half later, I came in second in the World Championship and my mother
said, `Of all the medals in your life, that's my favourite because no one knows
how hard you worked to get it.'"
Browning's mother died in 2000 and he keeps that medal next to a picture of her.
Ask him for the happiest time in his life and the answer comes without
hesitation: "The day I filmed `Singin' in the
Rain.'" (The wonderful tribute to Gene Kelly from his
1994
"All the people I trusted and loved most in the world were there.
It was a really tight rink that day.
"I suddenly had the realization that something special was happening to
me. I was cutting edges so deep, everything was perfect. It had nothing to do
with competing or medals. It just had to do with skating."
Browning admits that now, "I'm concerned with how I'm finally going to
find my way off the ice and live the rest of my life," but he looks on
performing in a musical like Peter
Pan as the first step.
"Singing, wow!" he gasps with awe.
"It's like living in this house for years and suddenly discovering there's
a rec room in the basement with a bowling alley."
Still, he admits, "I want my sons to learn how to skate because it's just
too much fun not to."
And looking back on his whole program, from top to bottom, he smiles.
"Hey, I'm proud my life will never make a Monday night movie."
T.O. Finds Her Crazy Cook
Delicious
Excerpt
from www.thestar.com - Theatre Critic
(
As it's Kaye's character who comes up with the idea of turning Sweeney's
victims into human tourtières – and the scene where she does so rocks the
theatre with laughter – it's bit of a relief to meet her over breakfast at the
Senses Bakery and find her daintily nibbling on croissants.
"I just love her," says Kaye, speaking of her current alter ego.
"She's pragmatic but delusional at the same time, which is a delightful
combination to play."
The 59-year-old native of
Kaye show no signs of getting bored with Lovett,
especially not in Doyle's production, where the actors are also the orchestra.
In fact, Kaye admits that "the first show I did of this version was the
most scared I've ever been in my life. I was just poleaxed about playing the
instruments."
And this is from a woman who's done some pretty challenging things in her
career. She was the original superdiva, Carlotta, in the Broadway production of
The Phantom of the Opera, played anarchist Emma Goldman when Ragtime came
to New York and is the voice of private investigator Kinsey Milhone for the
audio books of Sue Grafton's popular series of alphabetical mysteries (A is
for Alibi, etc.).
"Yeah, I see myself as Kinsey, but I don't have her body or her
youth," laughs Kaye, spearing a piece of smoked salmon with her fork.
"And I eat a lot better than she does," she insists, scorning
Kinsey's fondness for quarter pounders.
Kaye admits that she's been performing since childhood ("I was one of
those kids out in the backyard acting, whether or not anyone was
watching"), but it got serious when she was a teenager.
"I had my pivotal moment at the Phoenix Jewish Community Centre. Funny
Girl had just opened on Broadway and they had me sing `I'm the Greatest
Star.' I got a standing ovation and that was the end of that." She grins.
"Or rather, that was the beginning of that."
She worked on the West Coast and turned down the chance to be in Three's
Company opposite John Ritter and Suzanne Sommers "and I kicked myself
for a while, but you know, now I'm glad I wasn't Joyce
DeWitt."
Then in 1977, she signed on to be Madeline Kahn's understudy in the musical On
the Twentieth Century and then found herself suddenly taking over the role
when Kahn began missing too many performances.
Overnight, Kaye became the toast of Broadway and she's never looked back since,
playing everything from Rosie in Mamma Mia! with
Louise Pitre to the daffy Florence Foster Jenkins in Souvenir.
She's currently worried about the strike between stagehands and producers which
has virtually shut down Broadway, saying, "I see both sides of the issue,
but I think adjustments need to be made. I've been on many shows where we had
flymen, but no scenery to fly.
"We've been told to take all of our stuff home every night, because
they've been threatening to pull the guy from Local One in
Judy Kaye and a picket line? A scary
thought. I've seen the way she wields a meat cleaver. If those guys are
smart, they'll end the strike soon.
Sweeney Todd continues at the Princess of
A White Christmas Dream Comes
True
Excerpt
from www.thestar.com - Theatre Critic
(November 24, 2007) NEW
They're part of the cast of White Christmas, which is currently in previews at the Sony Centre for the
Performing Arts, prior to Friday's opening. It's based on the beloved 1954 film
that starred Bing Crosby, Rosemary Clooney and Danny Kaye, about two showbiz
partners who also happen to be World War II vets. They're out to help their
former commanding officer, whose
Irving Berlin wrote the songs, which include the iconic title number as well as
other favourites like "Count Your Blessings."
In 2004, producer Kevin McCollum, director Walter Bobbie and a crack creative
team turned the movie into a hit stage musical that has been criss-crossing
America during the holiday season ever since, usually with two companies
running simultaneously.
This year,
But not just anywhere in
From the outside, the building on the corner of
But theatre insiders know its rich history. It was bought in 1977 by
director-choreographer Michael Bennett, then riding high on the success of A Chorus Line.
He turned it into a complex of studios, offices and rehearsal halls where show
people could turn their craft into art. Bennett created shows like Ballroom and Dreamgirls there,
finally selling it shortly before his death in 1987.
But its tradition continues and on this bright, brisk November day, the
atmosphere inside is the same as it was when Jeremy Gerard described it in The New York Times 21
years ago:
"Ride the elevator at 890 Broadway on any given morning and you ride with
the hope-ridden freight of the performing arts. There in its cab are hoofers
and haberdashers, singers, set designers and loose-limbed lotharios,
ballerinas and bankrollers, the eminent and the imminent of the stage. The
doors part and, like circus performers from a trick car, they stream out into
dozens of studios and workshops and green rooms and offices."
First out this morning is Jennifer Stewart, radiating with the enthusiasm that
made her such a hit in the
"Can you believe we learned the whole show in three days?" she asks,
astonished at the cast's achievement. "They call it boot camp, but I've
never had so much fun in my life."
Eight hours a day of non-stop tap-dancing has left Stewart with more energy
than she knows what to do with and, every night, she finds herself heading down
to the theatre. The current strike took place the day before they left, but
until then she had managed to see 14 shows. Her favourite?
Des McAnuff's The Farnsworth Invention.
But
Barry Flatman, playing the crusty Gen. Waverly, is a veteran of nearly 40 years
of show business, having made his mark on stage, screen and television. But
these two weeks in
"I'm having the time of my life," he declares emphatically. "I
love rehearsing here. There's something seeping into the walls and floorboards
of the place. It's a great feeling to actually go to work on Broadway. You walk
in here and it raises your game a couple of notches."
And Dora winner Paula Wolfson, while admitting she enjoys "the very
different expectation and energy – learn it now, then give me a performance in
seven minutes," says she still finds Manhattan "just a bit exhausting
as well.
"The reason they call it `the city that never sleeps' is that it's too
noisy. They're laughing, they're squawking, they're yelling. The one thing
they're not, is quiet."
While the cast work a scene over and over until it's polished, McCollum leads
the way down the hall to an empty rehearsal space to explain his fascination
with the project.
"I was born in
"Then I moved to
Although McCollum admits the piece is very much of its time (the early 1950s),
he feels that that's part of its strength.
"It's built on a post-war ethic: be true to your word; take care of your
own; protect your family. I think the song `Count Your Blessings' is at the
centre of what this is all about.
"I think we all ought to ask what blessings we should be counting this
time of year."
McCollum was surprised when Sony
"I said, `Dan, you can't afford it; your dollar is only worth 80 cents.'
Well, maybe he knew something I didn't, because look at the dollar now!"
Director Bobbie stops by to wrap things up by differentiating this show from
other iconic Christmas stories.
"Most other holiday tales are morality plays, where somebody who's greedy
or unkind has to be taught a lesson and then reform. But that doesn't happen
here.
"Our conflicts are all between well-intentioned people who misunderstand
each other. They experience the little hurts we all do in our everyday lives
and find a way to forgive."
And through it all, that glorious Irving Berlin score which, as Bobbie puts it,
"fills your heart with warmth and romance and joy" keeps everyone
happy.
Almost as if on cue, the sound of the cast drifts in from down the hall,
singing the perfect song:
"May your days be merry and bright,
And may all your Christmases be white."
White
Christmas plays at the Sony Centre for the Performing Arts,
::DANCE NEWS::
Indy Driver Dances Past Spice Girl
Excerpt from www.thestar.com - Sandy Cohen,
Associated Press
(November 28, 2007) LOS ANGELES– Speed trumped
Spice in the Dancing With the Stars finale last night, as Helio Castroneves
upset Melanie Brown to capture the fifth Dancing With the Stars mirrorball
trophy.
"It will look so good between my two Indy 500 trophies," Castroneves
said.
Later he admitted he was "shocked" by the victory: "I was not
expecting it. Mel, she's an incredible dancer.''
Indeed, Brown was by far the more polished performer, consistently wowing the
judges with her versatility and flair. She and her partner, Maksim
Chmerkovskiy, entered the finals in first place, one point ahead of Castroneves
and Julianne Hough.
Both couples received perfect scores of 30 from the judges in their final
dances last night. But Castroneves' personality and enthusiasm, plus an
effortless quickstep on his final performance, earned enough viewer votes to
win.
Losing "was a horrible feeling," Brown admitted. "I'm not going
to deny it.''
Hough also had won last season's competition, with speed skater Apollo Anton
Ohno..
Earlier last night, as expected, Marie Osmond was the first finalist to be
eliminated.
Osmond and her partner, Jonathan Roberts, came into the finals in third place
after a doll-inspired freestyle routine panned by judges and bloggers alike.
Osmond, 48, had enjoyed strong viewer support throughout the hit show's fifth
season while enduring the death of her father and fainting on stage.
The show "gave me something that I knew was solid, something I can count
on," she said in a segment recorded before she was ousted. "It's been
one of the best experiences of my life.''
The
Model-actress Josie Maran was the first to be eliminated. Other nixed
contestants were actresses Sabrina Bryan, Jennie Garth and Jane Seymour,
entrepreneur Mark Cuban, entertainer Wayne Newton (who appeared last night but
did not perform), boxer Floyd Mayweather, actor Cameron Mathison (who took off
his shirt after his last dance last night) and model Albert Reed.
The night's finale also featured Céline Dion performing two songs, "My
Heart Will Go On" and "Taking Chances."
::SPORTS NEWS::
Riders Quench Cup Thirst
Excerpt
from www.thestar.com - Sports Reporter
(
But, before a sellout crowd of 52,230 at the Rogers Centre, he stood mighty
tall last night for the Saskatchewan Roughriders.
The 5-foot-7, 198-pounder from
Johnson picked off three of inexperienced Bombers quarterback Ryan Dinwiddie's
passes, including one for a 30-yard touchdown, as the Riders prevailed in a
Grey Cup that was far from classic.
The Riders went in as 10-point favourites, but for much of the game they looked
like the underdogs as quarterback Kerry Joseph spent a lot of time fleeing the
relentless
But while the Riders' offence struggled with Joseph completing only 13 of 34
passes for 184 yards, the defence took advantage of Dinwiddie, who had the huge
task of making his first professional start in the CFL's championship match,
replacing the Bombers' No.1 pivot, Kevin Glenn, who broke his arm in the East
final win over the
They also nullified any threat of the Bombers countering the loss of
Glenn with a strong ground attack, holding Charles Roberts to 47 yards on 13
carries.
Early in the fourth quarter, Joseph found receiver Andy Fantuz, the former
Still the Bombers came back with a safety and a field goal to close the gap to
four points. It wasn't until Johnson made his Cup-record third interception
with less than a minute remaining that it was certain that Earl Grey's goblet
would be returning to
Johnson explained that the Bombers' strategy was to put a lot of pressure on
Dinwiddie, who completed 15 of 33 passes for 225 yards, to force him out of the
pocket.
"We knew we had a young quarterback in there, so we wanted to move around
and mix things up and it paid off," he said. "We kinda had him moving
around.
"I could see him looking at what he wanted to do. (Milt) Stegall was his
go-to guy, his blanket, so I was jumping it every time I got."
The 27-year-old Johnson sat in the post-game press conference with 15-month-old
son Desmond, the youngest of his three children, on his lap, while his wife,
Angela, and mother, Lisa, looked on proudly.
He said he finally decided to play football when he went to
"I tried to play running back because I was more of a let-me-have-the-ball
kind of guy," he said. "The coach said I wasn't big enough for that.
So he told me to go over with the DBs. But they had already issued the pads, so
I was probably one of the only guys out there without pads trying to make the
team."
After two years of junior college, he sat out the 2003 season because he
couldn't get a university scholarship. But the following year,
The game had a rather bizarre Grey Cup first when Bombers head coach Doug Berry
attempted to challenge a challenge. The Riders had challenged an official's
call that they had been stopped on a third-and-one attempt, but the ruling was
overturned by referee Glen Johnson after viewing the video, giving the Riders a
first down. So
The game most likely was the last of Stegall's playing career. While a Grey Cup
championship eluded him, the future hall-of-fame receiver didn't go out with a
whimper. He was the game's leading receiver with five catches for 85 yards.
President Going, Pinball Next?
Excerpt from www.thestar.com - Rick
Matsumoto, Sports Reporter
(November 27, 2007) The Argonauts will be without a team
president by the end of the week.
That's when Keith Pelley, who
has held that position since 2003 when Howard Sokolowski and David Cynamon
purchased the team, departs to pursue his new job as president of the
And it won't be until next week when the owners will find out if they'll have
to look for a new head coach as well.
That's when Michael Clemons is expected to reveal his decision.
Pelley, who has been instrumental in rebuilding the floundering franchise, said
yesterday that he doesn't expect the
"They are still having dialogue with several people," he said.
"David is away this week and nothing will happen until his return. I don't
expect they'll have someone in place before the middle of December or the
beginning of January."
Pelley also revealed that one of his final acts as Argo president will be to
meet with Clemons this week. But he added that no action would be taken if the
popular head coach decides to leave until Cynamon returns.
While it has been speculated that Clemons is ready to step down as head coach
to pursue other endeavours, including the running of his newly-formed
foundation, he has maintained he will not make a final decision until he sits
down and discusses the matter thoroughly with his wife Diane.
As recently as last Thursday, when the latest report surfaced that he had
decided to re-sign, Clemons called the story "asinine" and stressed
emphatically he hadn't even had the opportunity to have his annual post-season
meeting with his wife because of her involvement in organizing a Grey Cup week
Gospel concert.
Another rumour that general manager Adam Rita was headed to the Hamilton
Tiger-Cats in the same capacity, was also discounted.
Pelley confirmed that Ticat president Scott Mitchell had requested permission
to speak to Rita.
Asked if he'd denied Mitchell's request, Pelley would only say, "I'm
confident Adam Rita will be a member of the Argo family for many years to come.''
Rita said yesterday he was inundated with questions about whether he was
leaving for
"All I know is I'm an Argo and always expect to be," he said.
"Yes, a guy in my profession has to take a look if an opportunity comes along,
but my intention is to stay with the
Meanwhile, former Argo GM and coach Bob O'Billovich
confirmed he's interested in the Ticat job left vacant by the firing of Marcel
Desjardins. He said he met with Mitchell over the Grey Cup weekend.
O'Billovich has worked as the B.C. Lions' director of player personnel since
2003 and has been credited with bringing in such outstanding players as running
back Joe Smith and defensive end Cameron Wake, who last week was named the
CFL's top defensive player and rookie of the year.
"The only job I'd be interested in is general manager in either
Other CFL positions available include the head coaching jobs with the Montreal
Alouettes and Calgary Stampeders.
There have been calls for Jim Popp to drop the head coach half of his duel
GM/head coach roles with the Alouettes after they struggled to a 8-10 record.
In
::FITNESS NEWS::
Slim Your Butt & Hips
By Joyce Vedral, eDiets Contributor
You've heard it before: "wide load," "child-bearing
hips,"
"big butt!" Well, you can hone down that out-of-control rump if
you're willing to work out just a little bit every other day. But, wait… It
gets even better! While you're at it, you can tone your flag-waving triceps and
hamstrings (back of your legs).
How can you do this? You do special exercises that attack two body parts at a
time. It saves time and prevents
boredom. I find that working the hip-butt area can be boring.
One of my favourite ways to work fat off the hips and butt is to do two-for-one
hip-butt exercises.
For example, why not get your hamstrings toned while zapping your hips and
butt? And why not tighten those flag-waving arms (the triceps) while melting
down your hips and butt? This makes me more motivated to work out, especially
on days when I really don't feel like disturbing my lazy tranquility. And yes,
like everybody else, I have those days.
The following two "double whammy" exercises will go a long way toward
getting rid of your plump rump -- and at least it gives you a good start by the
holidays. As I said, you will also make headway on your hamstrings and arms. So
let's get started!
Butt & Hamstring Toning Hack Squat.
Position: Stand with your feet a natural-width apart, holding a broomstick or
barbell behind your back (see start photo).
Movement: Bend at the knees to a comfortable position, not more than your knees
can go and not more than thighs parallel to the floor. Flexing your butt, hips
and back thighs, rise to start position and repeat the movement until you have
done 12 repetitions. Without resting move to the next
exercise.
Butt/Hip & Triceps Toning Floor Lift
Position: Sit on the floor with your legs extended straight
out in front of you, and your arms at your sides, elbows bent. (See start photo.)
Flexing your triceps and hip muscles as you go, lift yourself
off the floor by straightening your arms not quite fully. Flex your
triceps and hip/butt area an extra time, and return to start position. Repeat
until you have done 12 repetitions.
Repeat the sequence two more times. This little routine will take no more than
five minutes and goes a long way toward getting your butt, along with your
hamstrings and arms in shape! To get there faster, it's a
good idea to add more exercises for this area and for the rest of your body!
For more exercises and advice on toning, visit Joyce at www.joycevedral.com.
::MOTIVATION::
Motivational Note - You Gotta Dream…
Excerpt from www.eurweb.com - By Willie
Jolley, Host of the “Willie Jolley Show” on XM 169 –The Power!
Just as everything in life that grows is the result of a seed, the same is
true for your dreams. Dreams are the starting point for success, the seed
for success. If you take a corn seed, plant it and water it daily, it
will grow into an oak tree. The same is true for your dreams. If
you can conceive the dream in your mind, plant it in your heart, and water it
daily, then it, too, will grow. How do you water it? You water it
by saying daily, “I believe I can, I believe I can, in fact I know I can.”
Plant your dream deep, water it daily, and don’t let the weeds of doubt choke
it, and your dream can and will become a reality. Willie Jolley is
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