The Canadian Showbiz Century
Courtesty of Toronto Sun
Memorable moments of the past 100 years
By JIM SLOTEK
Sunday, January 02, 2000
Sir Wilfrid Laurier may have been over-reaching with his prediction that the 20th century would belong to Canada. But plenty of performers have grabbed a piece of the century.
Here's a by-no-means exhaustive timeline of Canada's century on stage and screen.
1900+: Canadians did their part in the birth of Hollywood. Among them: The original "movie star" Florence Lawrence, "America's Sweetheart" Mary Pickford, Lew Cody, Walter Huston, Walter Pidgeon, Norma Shearer, comedy producer Mack Sennett, studio boss Jack Warner.
1914: Ed Mirvish is born in Colonial Beach, Va. He moves to Toronto with his parents at age nine, but a part of him always remains -- courtesy of Al Jolson's father, who performed the bris.
1915: Lorne Greene is born in an Ottawa hospital, is slapped on the butt and lets out a deep, sonorous howl.
1917: The Dumbbells, the original Canadian comedy troupe, start in Ferfay, France, with original members Jack Ayre, Merton W. Plunkett, Allan Murray, Ted Charters and Elmer A Belding. They spend the war entertaining troops. On returning home, they carry on as entertainers, break up in the '30s and reunite in '39 for a war-bonds fundraiser.
1919: The first public radio station in North America, Montreal's XWA, is on the air. There's no truth to the rumour that Don Daynard was the morning man.
1925: CNRA Moncton broadcasts the first Canadian radio play, The Rosary.
1928: The silent epic Carry On Sergeant is produced, a war drama co-financed by past and future prime ministers Arthur Meighen and R.B. Bennett. Unfortunately, it's released at the same time as a sleeper called The Jazz Singer and is ignored amid the fuss over "talkies." This sets the stage for decades of misguided government meddling in the arts.
1930+: Some classic Canadian-born movie stars include Fay Wray, Ruby Keeler, Deanna Durbin, Hume Cronyn, Raymond Burr, western star Rod Cameron, Yvonne de Carlo, Gene Lockhart, Fifi D'Orsay, David Manners, cabaret singer/actress Helen Morgan, Ann Rutherford, Jay Silverheels and Glenn Ford.
1931: The fledgling CN Radio Network is nationalized to become the Canadian Radio Broadcasting Commission (CRBC). It becomes the CBC in 1936.
1936: Raymond, the black sheep of the Massey family, takes New York by storm, starring in Ethan Frome.
1937: Canadian-born silent star Marie Prevost becomes a metaphor for Hollywood eating its young. On July 29, the actress, whose career died with the talkies, is found dead and partially eaten by her dachshund. Four decades later, Nick Lowe writes the song Marie Prevost, with the chorus "She was a winner/Who became the doggie's dinner."
1940+: The golden age of CBC radio all-star team: Andrew Allan, Lister Sinclair, John Drainie, Fletcher Markle, W.O. Mitchell, Harry Boyle.
1943: The Army Show, a touring revue inspired by a CBC Radio variety show, opens. It's written by some kids named Johnny Wayne and Frank Shuster, and the cast includes Roger Doucet, Gordon Blythe and Lois Maxwell (Moneypenny in the Bond films).
1946: After years of scaring people as CBC's Voice Of Doom during the war, Lorne Greene starts his Academy Of Radio Arts in Toronto. Graduates include James Doohan (Scotty on Star Trek), Lloyd Bochner and Leslie Nielsen.
1948: The long-running Spring Thaw revue opens in the basement theatre of the Royal Ontario Museum with a song called We All Hate Toronto. Cast included Jane Mallett, Don Harron, Peter Mews, Robert Christie, Pegi Brown and Mavor Moore. An annual event in various venues until 1971, it features writers such as Wayne & Shuster, Hart Pomerantz and Lorne Michaels, Dennis Lee and Rick Salutin, actors Robert Goulet, Dinah Christie, Salome Bey, Dave Broadfoot, Barbara Hamilton, Rich Little and Lou Jacobi, and composers Gordon Lightfoot and Joni Mitchell.
1950+: Graduates of CBC TV's live drama and variety productions include Lorne Greene, Christopher Plummer, William Shatner, Norman Jewison, Sidney Furie, Ted Kotcheff, Arthur Hiller, Daniel Petrie, Percy Faith (a staff conductor at the Corp, his big hit was Theme From A Summer Place), Tony van Bridge, Douglas Rain, Martha Henry, John Colicos, Lloyd Bochner, Frances Hyland and Bruno Gerussi.
1951: A quartet of cleancut Torontonians called The Four Lads are signed by Columbia and become backup singers for Johnny Ray. On their own, they release major hits Standin' On The Corner and No, Not Much.
1952: Fellow Toronto homeboys The Crew Cuts start up, though they perform for a while under the name The Canadaires. Their big hit: Sh-Boom.
1953: Norman McLaren's pixillated satire Neighbours wins Best Short Oscar -- the first of many for the National Film Board.
1956: Leonard Cohen, age 22, publishes his first book of poetry, Let Us Compare Mythologies. Over the years, his star rises and his voice drops.
1957: Ottawa high-school-kid-turned-heartthrob Paul Anka hits the U.S. charts with Diana, an ode to his babysitter.
1958: Rockabilly star Ronnie Hawkins and drummer Levon Helm come to Toronto from Arkansas and, over the next few years, begin assembling The Hawks (later The Band) on the promise that, "I can't pay you much, but you'll get more pussy than Sinatra." Rick Danko, Richard Manuel, Garth Hudson and Robbie Robertson take him up on it.
1962: Port Arthur high-school-kid-turned-heartthrob Bobby Curtola scores a No. 1 hit with Fortune Teller.
1964: At the Grammys, Gale Garnett beats Bob Dylan out for best new artist with We'll Sing In The Sunshine ... Ian and Sylvia are married.
1965: Charlottetown Festival kicks off under artistic director Mavor Moore with the premiere of the musical Anne Of Green Gables, John Drainie's Laugh With Leacock (featuring Wayne & Shuster) and the musical revue Spring Thaw ... Gordon Lightfoot's breakout year ... Ian and Sylvia record Early Morning Rain (eventually, so does Elvis). Both I&S and Peter Paul & Mary score hits with For Lovin' Me.
1967: "One little, two little, three Canadians ..." Bobby Gimby becomes the Pied Piper of Canada with his Centennial song.
1968: The Guess Who release These Eyes. The band goes to L.A., where Burton Cummings meets Jim Morrison and spends a night as his designated driver.
1969: John Lennon and Yoko Ono have their famous "bed-in" for peace in Montreal and spend time in Toronto at Ronnie Hawkins' farm, snowmobiling and planning a multi-city peace festival that never gets off the ground.
1970: The CRTC institutes Canadian content regulations for radio, paving the way for the careers of The Bells, Ocean, The Stampeders, Trooper and Five Man Electrical Band ... Don Shebib directs Goin' Down The Road, the consummate Canadian movie ... Anne Murray releases Snowbird and a career is born.
1971: Claude Jutra's Mon Oncle Antoine, the first Quebec film with a large English following, is released ... CBC's The Beachcombers begins 19 seasons of squabbling between Nick and Relic out at Gibsons, B.C.
1973: CODCO is formed in Toronto by ex-pat Newf actors Greg Malone, Cathy Jones, Mary Walsh, Dyan Olsen, Tommy Sexton and Paul Samatz. Andy Jones and Robert Joy join after the first show ... Second City Toronto is started by Chicago's Bernie Sahlins. Months later, Sahlins sells the failing franchise to Andrew Alexander for $2. Original cast includes Dan Aykroyd, Joe Flaherty, Jayne Eastwood and Gilda Radner.
1974: Mikhail Baryshnikov defects from the Kirov Ballet at the O'Keefe Centre and seeks refuge with our National Ballet, putting it at the world centre stage, where it remains ... Rush play my high school in Thunder Bay ... Mordecai Richler's Apprenticeship Of Duddy Kravitz is released.
1975: Why Rock The Boat with Stu Gillard is the big Canuck film ... Bachman Turner Overdrive, the big Canuck band, patent the sound of guys playing guitar with their fists ... Al Waxman kicks off five seasons of playing Larry King on CBC's King Of Kensington.
1976: SCTV is on the air. The first 13 episodes of Second City TV presage a CBC and NBC series that will eventually bring in more than $20 million in residuals.
1977: Female impersonator Craig Russell has a sleeper hit with Outrageous.
1979: A big year in Canadian theatre with Eric Peterson in Billy Bishop Goes To War 1979, David Fennario's Balconville and Linda Griffiths in Maggie And Pierre.
1980+: It's not really Canadian unless it stars one of the following: Eric Peterson, R.H. Thomson, Saul Rubinek, Booth Savage, a Dale sister, Janet Laine-Green, Fiona Reid, Megan Follows, Gordon Pinsent and Barbara Hamilton.
1981: Porky's becomes (and remains) the most popular Canadian film ever. Loverboy take America by storm. Let's just move on, shall we?
1983: Bryan Adams releases Cuts Like A Knife, many awards to follow.
1984: A kid named Jim Carrey makes his TV debut as the star of a sitcom called The Duck Factory. It flops. Hey, whatever happened to that kid?
1985: Tears Are Not Enough. Neil Young squeezes full After The Goldrush pathos out of the line, "Somehow our innocence is lost" ... Baron Longfellow explains to Paul Shaffer who he is ("You know me as Andy Kim").
1989: The Kids In The Hall debuts on CBC and HBO, later moving to CBS. "I crush your head!" becomes a rallying cry of disaffected youth.
1990+: Canuck TV and movie stars rule: Sarah Polley, Martin Short, Neve Campbell, Dave Foley, Michael J. Fox, Scott Speedman, Eric MacCormack, David James Elliott, Norm Macdonald -- even former Ottawa high school kid Tom Cruise.
1992: Wayne's World, Wayne's World, party time, party time. Scarborough boy Mike Myers scores big and, unfortunately, inspires Lorne Michaels to produce a movie from every Saturday Night Live skit thereafter.
1995: Alanis Morissette channels every ounce of creative anger and releases Jagged Little Pill, the biggest-selling debut album ever by a female artist. Album prompts widespread debate over whether or not Alanis knows what "ironic" means, and who was that guy she serviced in the theatre anyway? (Top choices: Full House's Dave Coulier and hockey star Alexandre Daigle).
1997: The debut of Open Mike! With Mike Bullard. Canadians finally get the talk show they deserve.
1998: Canadian-born director James Cameron brings Titanic to port, attaining the status of King Of The World and inflicting a lethal dose of Celine and Leonardo on the movie-going public.
1999: Atom Egoyan vaults out of the cult film category, landing a Best Director Oscar nom for The Sweet Hereafter ... The Canadian Opera Company turns 50. Thousands of fat ladies later, still going strong.
2000+: Prediction: The 21st Century will belong to Canada!
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