It was a treat to be asked to hand out some of the hardware (glassware?) at the 2012 edition of the Brickenden Awards, honouring  excellence in #ldnont theatre for 2011.

Here are 10 random moments from Monday’s ceremonies at the LPL’s Wolf Performance Hall to inspire JBNBlog & you about creativity in the Forest City as 2012 rolls along.

My favourite winner on the night was The Rez Sisters (Theatre Red & White) as Outstanding Youth Drama Production. Saw it at Saunders secondary school when playwright Tomson Highway was in the audience & it was my top theatre moment of 2011 (family-related productions not counted) . . . seeing its director Bill Hill and two of the amazing young women who played Highway’s seven sisters with their trophy was terrific. Go Rez Sisters.

The Brickendens do an excellent job getting nominees in the house & the winners on hand . . . this is something for those of us over at the Jack Richardson Music Awards to emulate.

Handing the Outstanding Supporting Actress award to former neighbour Deborah Mitchell (for Chicago) brought back memories of her offering a one-minute slice of 2008′s Les Belles Soeurs at the doorstep while I was strolling through the hood.

Among the regrets for shows missed in 2011 are Jeremy Hobbs’s The Hero (Bravest Production) and Jayson McDonald’s Underbelly (Outstanding Drama). From the brief summaries during fine acceptance speeches, it would appear these are ace additions to the great #ldnont bohemian theatre tradition which has flourished off & on for decades.

Presenting an award for outstanding supporting actor, Sarah White roused laughter by noting this year was a little different from previous presenter tours of duties as she was sleeping with one of the nominees this time . . . which JBNBlog figured out would be, ahem, John White, up for the Rocky Horror Show. More mischieviously JBNBlog looks for the chance to enliven a future awards ceremony when a similar full disclosure moment occurs by wondering aloud: “Just one?”

Favourite acceptance speech (& they were all good): Ingrid Blekys for her “Rob & Bob” enthusiasm & for reminding me how terrific was The Goat, or Who is Sylvia?

Best opening spoof ever . . . the elaborate & witty take-off on The Phantom had (Jayson McDonald?) lyrics saluting the transparency of the actual awards, leading to a running gag on the night with Jeremy Hobbs suggesting his Brickenden would look good in a giant glass of Scotch.

A salute to Jayson McDonald as emcee . . . not many hosts could handle it so smoothly when the script calls for the host to channel Kim Cattrall on the magic of theatre & also point to Mercutio as an example of the attractions of a supporting role & then be suitably humble/proud in the unscripted acceptance moments. Go Jayson (& your collaborator Jeff Culbert).

It takes a class organization to honour great Londoners such as Dorinda Greenway & Nonie Jeffery the way they should be acknowledged. Hooray.

Dorinda Greenway’s opening anecdote. She talked her daughter on the #ldnont stage when the role called on her to slap a nice young man . . . she just couldn’t but no politely noisy substitute for an actual smack worked. So it was the real painful deal show after show. The young man took it on the cheek without protest even if he did grit his teeth as the blow was about to fall. Sadly, he disappeared after the final curtain fell, taking his smarting cheek off into the night, never to be seen again. Come back, come back, little sheepish . . . the Brickendens heal all.

1st appearance with National Ballet.
Home with Sore Throat.
– Jan. 30, 1968

Paul Martin at Central.
Goat practice.
Mr. & Mrs. Beckwith over.
– Jan. 30, 1970

You didn’t know JBNBlog could dance? Neither did I.

What happened 44 years ago had me & a few others strolling on stage as pages or something similar in whatever class act the National Ballet was bringing to the Grand.

Who else will ‘fess up to sharing the gig & how we might have been granted the chance? What I do remember is trying to impress one of the crew who was a big jazz fan, knew all about Wes Montgomery (if memory serves) . . . so one night I asked if it were OK for us “to split.” Oh, the withering look. It has scared JBNBlog off such cool expressions ever since . . . can’t even say a band killed it (is that what’s said now? or is it as dated as split?)

As for 1970 on this date, good to see Paul Martin Sr. was inspiring us at a Central auditorium. Pamela Terry & John Beckwith were (are!) friends for life of my parents & dad’s War of 1812 opera with John Beckwith Taptoo! is on Feb. 24-26 at Toronto. Read about it here on jamesreaney.com

*An occasional series based on a v. cryptic diary kept as a pen&ink forerunner to JBNBlog during the late 1960s, when our family lived in London, Stratford (parts of summers of 1966 & 1967), Victoria, B.C. (July 4, 1968-July 4, 1969) and then London again until June, 1970 when I was in Grade 13.

The Fugs album cover, courtesy of undergroundalbums.com

The Fugs First Album cover, courtesy of espdisk.com

Group practice at Walters.

2 (indecipherable . . . man? mean? mom?) R&B Workshop

Bought Spasm Band & Fugs 1st

Jan. 27, 1968

Ah, The Fugs . . . might as well say “Language Alert” right here. After all, this magnificent NYC bohemian ensemble of the 1960s & beyond took their name from Norman Mailer’s coinage “fug” .  . . which in turn led to a priceless greeting from Dorothy Parker.

Here is a bit of a 2010 Howard Mandel post from nodepression.com on the background:

“I picked the name Fugs, out of Norman Mailer’s ‘Naked and the Dead,’” says (Tuli) Kupferberg, referring to the post-WW II best-seller which used an innocent “g” to stand for the salacious “ck” of the Anglo-Saxon word for the deed essential to life. “Do you know that when Dorothy Parker met Norman Mailer at a party,” he continues, “she’s supposed to have said, ‘Oh, you’re the young man who doesn’t know how to spell “Fuck.”‘ Actually, I think it was his publisher that didn’t know how to spell it.”

The album I recall buying 44 years ago today had the The Fugs cover. The songs I remember playing somewhat defiantly around my amused, tolerant poets themselves parents were from the one with the up against the wall cover. The aforementioned Tuli, then a Beat poet and later the world’s oldest rock star, is standing at left. (If memory serves).

Anyway, the songs my buddies & I enjoyed were Boobs a Lot and My Baby Done Left (& I Feel Like Homemade Shit), a C&W weeper parody. It strikes me now the canny Fugs put in such frat boy friendly items to pay for their real material . . . Tuli & Ed’s poetry set to wild, rootsy slabs of Americana.

What my dad noticed was their use or misuse of British poets William Blake (one of his heroes) & Algernon Swinburne (not a hero). I think dad was always disappointed the Blake lyrics, How Sweet I Roamed from Field to Field among them, were given the Fug drunken C&W treatment. Undeniable & prophetic words, Lower East Side country parody music. It didn’t really work for me either.

The Swinburne Stomp had one of Algernon’s delicate efforts given a ferocious beat & yowl . . . now that was funny & it worked. Dad thought so, too. One of his stage directions proves it.

When wild children are being raised on Pelee Island by some fool of a progressive educator in dad’s Ignoramus, they chant Blake’s The Tyger. The stage direction is: “a la The Fugs?” Now, dad was not thinking of the Fugs’s misplacement of Blake as a country boy. He must have had their Swinburne stomping in mind. Tygertygerburningbright. Chant & stomp. Chant & stomp.

So there it is — the surprising influence of literature loving NYC bohemians on a Canadian children’s theatre classic. Thank you, dad & mom, for putting up with me playing the Fugs & so many other irritating musics back in the day.

Thank you, Fugs, for keeping the faith all the way into the 21st-century & for representing the greatness of America along with Willie Nelson, Emily Dickinson, Dorothy Parker & so many others. If there is any justice, you will find your way into a Mad Men episode & the agency will never be the same. Or maybe it will just be funnier.

PS: You may have noticed JBNBlog also bought the first Nihilist Spasm Band album on the same day. Once again,  my father had his own insight into the joyous bohemian din. “Oriental  . . . restful,” dad would say as the London noise-meisters shook up the house.

*An occasional series based on a v. cryptic diary kept as a pen&ink forerunner to JBNBlog during the late 1960s, when our family lived in London, Stratford (parts of summers of 1966 & 1967), Victoria, B.C. (July 4, 1968-July 4, 1969) and then London again until June, 1970 when I was in Grade 13.

Cover image of Odessey and Oracle, courtesy of Wikipedia. Solidarity, etc.

Played 23 singles in a row.

– Jan. 26, 1968

Sold Odyssey & Oracle to Paul. Letter from Peter Collie.

– Jan. 26, 1970

Twenty-three singles in a row . . . wow, I wonder how many of them are still down in the basement, ready to rawk? Playing music without regard to those near & dear must have been a tad inconsiderate to anyone within earshot,  a selfish trait persisting to this day. (Just ask former housemates who’ve heard Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers’s Alamode (a great tune by trombonist Curtis Fuller) or Willie Ward & the Warblers’ s I’m a Mad Man a few million times too many. The marathon was probably inspired by a piece in 20 Cents magazine about Greg Curnoe playing albums back2 back2back as he painted all night . . . Ornette Coleman Double Quartet’s Free Jazz triumphed with the characteristic Greg note: Remember (Walking in the Sand) by the Shangri-Las was judged to have been the one hit able to stand up to Free Jazz.

The Paul who bought the classic album by the Zombies (wish I still had it) was probably Paul Dutton, not the Canadian poet but a fine person who was the editor of the Central newspaper the previous fall. Paul had the misfortune to have JBNBlog as his second in command & we resigned after a staff coup. Paul, you deserved better . . . but hope the Zombies are still there with you. Who knew it was actually Odessey and Oracle — can’t find an ampersand on the cover image & all the sources spell out the “and” plus they all know about the “Ode” business.

Ace photographer Peter Collie was just back in touch a few days ago after a Google Alerts all the way over in Oz connected him to an entry in this series about the great ice storm of early 1968. Pete lived on Huron St. too.
“I do remember that storm, looking out my bedroom window and seeing the tree fall that took out the power. Also all of us camping around the fire in the living room,” he wrote. Yes, that was a storm.

*An occasional series based on a v. cryptic diary kept as a pen&ink forerunner to JBNBlog during the late 1960s, when our family lived in London, Stratford (parts of summers of 1966 & 1967), Victoria, B.C. (July 4, 1968-July 4, 1969) and then London again until June, 1970 when I was in Grade 13.

Courtesy of Rob Nelson

Who can identify this great Londoner & why would she say: “What’s wrong with turning your head to see the stage? The neck is a very flexible part of the body.”

The usual London history mystery prizes apply.