As
birthday parties go, it was pretty good. Standing Naked in the Wings
Canada Day - July 1st 1998
As
birthday parties go, it was pretty good.
Canada's 131st was celebrated at the Old Globe Theatre on Santa Monica Blvd. To honour the national holiday, Canadians Abroad members Kathy O'Brien and Geraldine Farrell organized a reading from the recently published book on the Canadian acting community entitled "Standing Naked In The Wings". The theatre setting provided a great venue for the seven contributors who were able to read from the book: Melody Ryane, Graham Jarvis, Monica Parker, Gilles Savard, Brian George, Geraldine Farrell, Derek McGrath and editors Linda Mason-Green and Tedde Moore. Many of the excerpts read from this compilation of anecdotes were very funny and had the audience in stitches - this was not just any book reading, it was a glimpse into Canadian history, from the early days at Stratford to Shakespeare in a Quonset hut in Moosonee.
Perhaps the most Canadian highlight of the evening did not occur with the telling of one of the humourous anecdotes, but after the reading when the birthday cake was being wheeled into the theatre and both the actors upon the stage and the audience began to sing the birthday song of the evening, O Canada. In true Canadian fashion, the recorded version chosen for the background music had a lovely, but unexpected, choral ensemble "exploration" in the middle of the song which left everyone with gaping mouths while heavenly angel voices mangled the national anthem. But, as was told to the crowd by Jim Leach, Deputy Consul for the Canadian Consulate General here in LA, we need not feel bad because the lyrics to O Canada have been re-written more times than we should care to admit.
For a delightful evening, many thanks go to Air Canada (for flying in the editors of “Standing Naked In The Wings” & for 2 round trip airfares to Toronto for the evenings raffle), CP Hotels (for hotel accommodation for 2 at the Skydome Hotel for the evenings raffle), Labatt’s Breweries (for providing beer for the evening) and Atlantis Films, Eastman/Kodak, Macleans and Oxford University Press for door prizes.
Books are available for $18.95 by calling 818-787-8972.