Scotty Moore

 “She’s got the name, but can she sing?”

 From the

Sharon Dunn
She’s got the name, but can she sing?
Elvis’s long-time friend and guitarist reveals what he thinks of Lisa Marie

[Photo: The Associated Press]
…with Elvis from the start. “She gets that hard-headedness from her dad.”

Scotty Moore was with Elvis from the start. He was the King’s original guitarist as well as his first manager, long before the infamous Colonel Tom Parker came along. Moore is performing at Casino Rama, in a show called The Elvis Presley Story, and I’m on a mission. I want to ask Moore his opinion of Lisa Marie Presley’s musical talent, and find out whether or not he thinks she’s a chip off the old block. I was ‘inspired’ to do this interview after watching Lisa Marie perform last week on The Tonight Show. Lord knows I wanted to like the poor kid, who barely got to know her famous dad, but I have to admit that she did seem a bit surly when she was talking with Jay Leno. I initially blamed the cocky attitude on shyness, until she got up to sing “the only song they’ll let me do [Lights Out]” she told Leno — and I could see that liking her wasn’t going to be easy. She struck an unusual pose even before she started her song, with her legs bent and sprawled wide apart, a bit reminiscent of her famous dad, if you stretch it, but more reminiscent of how Quick Draw McGraw might look after spending a couple of weeks in a saddle. And where the stance looked sexy on Elvis, on Lisa Marie it just looked weird.

When she started to sing, I cringed. Lisa Marie seemed to cringe too, looking apologetically toward Leno. I not only felt bad for her, I felt bad for Leno, the audience and for me. It was painful to watch. But what do I know, I reasoned. I’m not a music reviewer. And someone must like her singing, since the album is selling well? So when I meet Elvis’s old friend Scotty Moore, that’s the question I have on my mind. “What do you think of Lisa Marie’s hit single?” I ask, figuring I’ll get a polite, politically correct answer.
“I’m not impressed at all,” Moore says bluntly. “You can’t even hear her. She’s buried in the music. So I don’t know if she can sing or not.” When I mention that I didn’t really take to Lisa Marie after seeing her on Leno, Moore says, “That’s because Lisa Marie’s a little rebel who needs her butt kicked.” Ouch. Since this is the kind of statement that can look really bad in print, I want to point out that when Moore says it, with his Tennessee accent, it’s almost in an affectionate way. “I shouldn’t have said that,” he frets before adding, “but she gets that hard-headedness from her dad.” And, as Moore points out, it’s not like he’s saying something behind her back. “I’d tell her this to her face.”

When I ask about the rest of Lisa’s album, To Whom It May Concern, he says, “I’ve only heard the one song.”
“I think it’s the best one,” I tell him. He looks positively flabbergasted.
“You’re kiddin,” he gasps. “Why would she wait until she’s 35 years old to do something like that?”
“But the album is doing well,” I point out. Moore says that doesn’t surprise him. “It’s the famous name,” he says. On the other hand, says Moore, “Lisa Marie recorded a song in Memphis with [the voice of] Elvis called Don’t Cry, Daddy. [The recording was for the concert on the 20th anniversary of Elvis’s death in 1997.] She did well with that song. She should have stuck with that style.” The song was similar to the duets of another famous father/daughter duo, Natalie Cole and the late Nat King Cole, and was also put together by composer David Foster. “It was marvellous,” says Moore. “I don’t know why she didn’t go in that direction.”

On the subject of Lisa Marie’s mother, Priscilla Presley, Moore has only good things to say. “I’ve never been close to Priscilla, but since Elvis’s death, I’ve had a few dealings with her. I’m very impressed with what she did with the estate. It was definitely going under.”
“How could it have been going under?” I want to know, given all of Elvis’s tremendous success.

[Photo: The Associated Press]
“Elvis was like a younger brother to me,” says Scotty Moore.
Back to Lisa Marie, does Elvis’s legendary sideman see any musical similarities at all between Elvis and his daughter? He shakes his head. “Elvis’s [talent] was just burstin’ out — it was more a matter of containing it than capturing it. And Elvis knew when he did something well, so he really became the producer of his own voice.”

Moore says he and the band “all worked together and played stuff that fit Elvis.” Everyone was focused on Elvis, he says, and on getting it perfect for him. “But Elvis wasn’t concerned with his voice — it was the overall feel that was his thing. If a note wasn’t quite perfect, Elvis was happy to leave it,” says Moore. “If the band suggested trying again and improving the song, Elvis would often say, ‘No, that felt good.’ “Moore met Elvis the first time they recorded, July 4, 1954. “Elvis was like a younger brother to me. I was four years older than him when we met and I had already been in the navy by this time.” Moore says Elvis always seemed a lot younger to him.
“You know he never grew up,” he reminisces. I ask the legendary sideman, who has recently recorded an album with the likes of Keith Richards and Ron Woods (even Mick Jagger has expressed an interest in recording with him), if he would consider working with Lisa Marie.
“If she’d listen,” he says sternly. And he means it.

by Sharon Dunn

Lauren Weisberger

… and the devil press

 From the

Sharon Dunn
Lauren and the devil press
A fashion insider’s new book invites comparisons, but the author doesn’t
Lauren Weisberger’s book, The Devil Wears Prada, rumoured to be a thinly veiled portrait of Vogue editor Anna Wintour, was written shortly after she left her one-year stint as Wintour’s assistant. “I was writing it for a course and my writing teacher said, ‘You really have something here, you have to show it to someone.’ “And show it to someone she did. Weisberger, 26, who now also has a movie deal with Fox 2000, says, “Wendy Finerman [producer of Forrest Gump and Stepmom] is the producer. They’re moving forward with this — it’s not just languishing in a drawer somewhere.” Weisberger’s only previous writing experience was “short pieces for Departures Magazine, a freebie periodical sent to platinum cardholders.” This was one university grad who knew what she wanted. Her aim was to work in magazines, but fashion was not a particular interest. She applied to all publishing houses and says bluntly, “Vogue was the biggest magazine I could get. I figured that I could focus on content later.”

After working for Wintour for less than a year, “from the time I was 22 to 23,” she wrote her book. “It’s a fun book, and it’s fiction. It’s not some crazy tell-all,” she insists. Some people in the fashion industry don’t see it that way and say Weisberger’s character bears striking similarities to her former boss. But she is adamant that isn’t the case. I’m not sure if she’s trying to convince me or herself. Weisberger does admit her experience “definitely influenced my writing, but none of my characters are based on characters at Vogue, there’s no one-to-one ratio.” And she goes even further. “We parted friends,” she says of her former boss, “but we haven’t been in touch.”
“Not even since the book?” I ask. She shakes her head. Doesn’t sound like friends to me. When I press her about the similarities between her life and the novel, Weisberger says curtly, “There’s been a lot of emphasis on this because of the backdrop of the fashion world and the insights … It could be any industry.” What will appeal universally, she says, is the aspect of the first workplace experience. (She definitely wants me off the subject of Wintour.) “It’s a lie,” she says, “the whole notion of what your parents and your professors are telling you, that college is preparing you for the real world. Well, it’s absolutely not true.” She says when she started that first big job with Vogue, “I had no idea what I was doing. I was wide-eyed and overwhelmed. You come out of school with this fancy degree, and then all of a sudden someone asks you to make 4,000 copies before lunch — it’s a reality check.”

But the Cornell grad definitely sees value in a university education. “Vogue never would have hired me without it,” she says. “You know, Anna Wintour didn’t have a university degree, but now I take it for granted that there’s nothing you can do in the professional field without one.” I ask her to reminisce about her old job, and she gets momentarily enthused. The perks, she tells me, “were all the parties and the people, Giselle, Iman, Puff Daddy …” But to get her to talk about specific duties is like prying teeth. “I had to locate people who were all over the world,” she tells me grudgingly. But who did she locate, and why? She starts to tell me, she seems to want to tell me, then she stumbles and finally stops. “The book is what I want to talk about,” she says. “I’m too young. It’s not about me.”

When I try again to make the parallel between her life and her novel’s heroine, she becomes downright indignant. I match her on that one, becoming even more indignant. I point out that the promotional material for her book included a newspaper story from the New York Daily News, questioning whether or not Weisberger’s former editor will see herself in the story. “If you don’t want to talk about it, why send me the article?” I want to know. From the look she gives me, I’m sure that she’s starting to think the devil writes for the National Post. She tells me that she has no control over her publicity. “I’m not denying that it didn’t influence my writing,” she says again. “My book is No. 6 on The New York Times bestsellers list and I would venture that most readers don’t know who she [Wintour] is, or care.” So even though Weisberger’s people are promoting the rumours about fiction and reality, Weisberger herself is at the same time denying there is anything to them. Isn’t that kind of like having your cake and eating it too?

by Sharon Dunn

SARS

Which part of ‘isolation’ didn’t she get?

 From the

Sharon Dunn
Which part of ‘isolation’ didn’t she get?
A woman in SARS isolation receives visitors and pops out for a bit of shopping

[Photo: Ian MacAlpine, The Canadian Press]
THIS IS HOW IT’S DONE: A staff member at the Ryandale Shelter for the Homeless in Kingston peers out from her quarantined workplace in April.

About a month ago, I did a story on SARS, and the stigma I felt being from Toronto, a hot spot for the disease. I was in Alberta at the time and I was surprised, after my column appeared, to receive a couple of highly indignant e-mails complaining that I had hurt the city’s economy by talking about the disease. Maybe I’m naive, but that struck me as strange. I hadn’t even been thinking about the city’s economy. What I had been thinking about was that a deadly communicable disease was in our city. Being out of town at the time also put a different spin on the story since I was influenced, rightly or wrongly, by the extensive media coverage. I must admit, it did sound as if the plague had taken hold.
I watched as various politicians jumped over each other trying to prove that there was no cause for worry — that Toronto was still open for business. I watched as they flew to Geneva to meet with World Health Organization officials after our city was named on a travel advisory. Why they did that, I wasn’t sure. I hadn’t taken it personally when we were put on the list — we were being treated as a hot spot, which is exactly what we seemed to be. But I was surprised when WHO reacted so quickly in taking us off the list. It smelled to me like political pressure, not something I like to see, especially when it comes to my health.

Back in Toronto, when many of my out-of-town celebrity interviews cancelled for fear of SARS, I thought they were being ridiculous. Now that I was back in the city, it seemed silly to be so nervous. But facts are facts. Times are bad for Toronto with SARS, and what with mad cow disease and the looming West Nile virus, things could get even worse. And there’s no getting around the fact that it will cost us, but c’est la vie. Everyone’s doing their part to help, aren’t they? Well, maybe not everyone. I’m curious to see what you think of this story I’m about to tell you. A friend of mine, we’ll call her Jane, phoned with the following news: “Gail [also not her real name] and her husband were forced into isolation.” They had spent some time at North York Hospital during the hot period. “She’s asked me to pick up some medicine for her, and [of all things], a copy of Frank magazine,” Jane informed me. We panicked a bit about her friend having to go into isolation, and then decided that since Jane hadn’t seen Gail for over two weeks, she was safe.

Jane picked up the stuff requested of her, and left it on her friend’s doorstep. Within minutes, as she tells it, Gail was screaming at her on the phone, upset that Jane hadn’t rung the doorbell when she made her delivery, and didn’t stay for a visit. “But you’re in isolation,” Jane reminded her. “It doesn’t matter,” said Gail. “All of my other friends are coming over to visit me.” And not only that. She also said, “You got me the wrong medicine, so I ran over to the drugstore myself. And I dropped into the grocery store too.” So there you have it, a woman ordered into isolation not only insists that her friends come over for a visit, but has also made a trip to the drugstore, and at least one trip to my neighbourhood grocery store. Some isolation. I decide that maybe the problem is in the definition of the word. I get out my Webster’s dictionary and look it up. Isolation is defined as “the act of isolating oneself.” That doesn’t help, so I look up isolated. The definition is “set apart from other persons or things, alone, solitary.” That seems easy enough to understand. I look up quarantine and see it is defined as “a strict isolation imposed to prevent the spread of disease.” It sounds like something from a Charles Dickens novel, but if people can’t figure out the definition of isolation, quarantine could definitely become a reality in the future. I must admit, I would have been more impressed with politicians trying to encourage isolation than politicians insisting Toronto is safe and should be off the travel advisory list.

I know most people in isolation are grinning and bearing it for the sake of the rest of us, and I am grateful to them, but I now know of at least one person who isn’t doing the right thing. It’s like that one bad apple. It only takes one. And herein lies the problem. Does anyone have any tar and feathers I can borrow?

by Sharon Dunn

David Steinberg

… in an elevator

 From the

Sharon Dunn
David Steinberg in an Elevator?
He did the funniest routine I’ve ever seen about his phobia and now here he was …

Comedian David Steinberg is a hot commodity in Hollywood, where he is in demand as a director on a variety of hit TV comedies.

Many years ago on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, David Steinberg did a routine I’ve never forgotten. It was the funniest one I’ve ever seen. Steinberg, who said he had a fear of elevators, told of flying all the way from L.A. to New York to attend a meeting on the 12th floor of a decrepit building. Afraid of the tiny elevator, Steinberg takes the stairs all the way up, only to find the door locked. Walking back down to the lobby, he gets on the elevator with another man so he won’t be alone. His worst fears are realized when the elevator gets stuck. When Steinberg begins to scream, the man calms him down and tells him to “take it easy.” The elevator begins to move again and a rattled Steinberg gets off at the eighth floor, the other guy’s destination, rather than go on alone. He walks to the bottom once more, but when he sees kids with balloons getting on the elevator, and even a rabbi in a wheelchair, so he decides he’ll risk it. He dives in with the rabbi, figuring he’ll be safe before realizing that now if he gets stuck, he’ll have to prove something to the rabbi and do the rescue bit, shinnying out through the top and swinging through the elevator shaft like Rambo.

The routine struck me as really funny, maybe because I have an elevator phobia myself. I shouldn’t admit this, but a number of years ago I went to see a lawyer on the 62nd floor of First Canadian Place in downtown Toronto. Once on the elevator, I almost had a stroke when it inexplicably stopped about halfway up. When I finally made it to the 62nd floor, there were two things I knew for sure. One, I was never coming up here again, and two, I wasn’t going back down on the elevator. I edged close to the stairs as I said goodbye to the lawyer, making some lame excuse about why I wouldn’t be needing his services. He pressed the elevator button. “I think I’ll walk down,” I said casually.
“Walk?” he replied. “From the 62nd floor? Are you crazy?”

And with that, I leaped into the stairwell and began my descent. When I finally stumbled on to the sidewalk some 40 minutes later, I was greeted by police and firemen.”Lady,” said one fireman, “you’ve been setting off alarms all the way down. What were you doing?”
“I’m afraid of elevators,” I whimpered. Lucky for me, they took it well. And now I was about to meet someone who also is genuinely afraid of elevators. You can imagine my surprise when David Steinberg emerged from, of all places, the elevator, at The Windsor Arms hotel. I was a bit disappointed, to say the least.
“I loved that elevator story you told on Johnny Carson,” I tell him, assuming now that he just made it up.
“Do you remember that?” he asks me, dumbfounded. “This is the first time anyone’s mentioned that routine. Carson says that it was his favourite piece that didn’t work.””But it did work,” I insist. “I’ve remembered it all these years.””And all of it is true,” says Steinberg, “even the rabbi.”
“What about the part where you said you were afraid of elevators?” I ask.Steinberg insists that he does have a fear of elevator,s even though I’ve just seen him get out of one.
“I always know I’m safe here [at the Windsor Arms] because at least they’ll come and get me out.”You can tell when it’s a real story,” he says. “You can’t get something from a friend. You want people to identify with it, and it’s got to be something that’s in everyone’s thoughts, but it’s never said.”

I certainly identified with it, I tell him. The fact that I’ve remembered the routine all these years has Steinberg all excited. “Peter LaSalle [former executive producer of The Tonight Show] insisted that the routine didn’t work. As a matter of fact, do you mind giving me your phone number?”, Steinberg asks, adding, “I’d like to call and put LaSalle on the line. Otherwise he won’t believe that anyone actually liked that skit. Carson, Steinberg remembers, “thought the story was taking too long –he didn’t get into it at all.” Steinberg still sees a lot of the former king of late-night television. “He remembers lines of mine I don’t remember.”

Steinberg looks so good I ask him if he’s had a facelift. “Nothing done,” he insists, “except one thing in 1978 — I had my bags [under his eyes] removed. I’ve enjoyed myself, that’s what shows on me. I’ve enjoyed every part of my life — stand-up, Second City.” Steinberg appeared on The Tonight Show an amazing 150 times (second only to Bob Hope).”Back then, they were interested in me hosting full-time, but Carson confided to me that he intended to stay on another 10 years.” Steinberg was even on the show the week Johnny retired. “I never thought of it as a career, but that’s exactly what hosting Carson turned out to be.”

Steinberg has also made a name for himself directing episodes of Seinfeld, Friends, Mad About You and, most recently, the wildly popular television series Curb Your Enthusiasm, for which he’s nominated for a Director’s Guild Award. At this stage of his life, Steinberg says, “I enjoy the fame — whatever faded celebrity I have left.” He is engaged to be married to Robyn Todd, who wrote the well publicized book How To Survive Your Boyfriend’s Divorce. Steinberg still visits his hometown of Winnipeg.The last time he was there, he says, his friends and family registered him in the hotel under the name ‘Terry Cloth’. “Staff were calling and saying, ‘Mr. Cloth, do you need anything? Mr. Cloth, there’s a call. They didn’t get it,” he laughs.

The interview over, Steinberg bravely steps into the elevator once again, to go back to his room. “Did you know that [composer] David Foster will not even get on an elevator?” he whispers to me as the door shuts.

by Sharon Dunn

Alex Storm

It’s all in the thrill of the hunt

 From the

Sharon Dunn
It’s all in the thrill of the hunt
Of course, the prospect of finding buried treasure has its appeal, too

[Photo: Sharon Dunn, National Post]
Treasure hunter Alex Storm says there’s still plenty of gold to be found in Nova Scotia, including the great Louisbourg treasure.

It’s a foggy day as I set out for Louisbourg, Cape Breton — but then again it’s always foggy in Louisbourg, which probably explains why so many ships were lost in this location over the years. I’m here to talk treasure with Canada’s most famous treasure hunter, Alex Storm, who has just written a book, Seaweed and Gold. You may want to listen to what Storm has to say, as he uncovered a huge treasure off the shores of Cape Breton in the 1960s, still the largest find in Canadian history, from a ship called Le Chameau that went down in 1725. “It was because of my little adventures that I decided to write a book,” he says. There’s growing enthusiasm for the self-published book, and Storm has been approached by a Halifax distributor (Nimbus Publishing). “I even give charts and directions in the book,” he tells me, “because I want others to have the pleasure of finding a treasure.” Obviously, people are intrigued. “I get e-mails from people all over the world looking for tips, people who go around with metal detectors. “As we sit in his Louisbourg second-floor flat, I’m a bit disappointed: I had hoped he’d be living in luxury; after all, Storm is a bit of a legend here. He and his two partners got 75% of the take of Le Chameau, rumoured to be worth about $750,000 at the time. “It was actually more,” says Storm. “The details are secret.” The other 25% went to a couple of divers Storm had worked with before. Storm also found a treasure from a ship called the Feversham (1711) and got to keep it all. In the case of the Feversham, he says, “they tried to take it away from me. The receiver of wreck said, ‘Will you please deliver the treasure so we can determine the rightful owner.’ And I said, ‘No, if you want it so bad, you’ll have to dive for it yourself.’ ” Storm put the treasure into a large vault and lowered it back into the ocean.”Two or three years later, they came back to me and made a deal,” he says. “These guys are pirates — they try to take it from you.”In the end, says Storm, “I got everything I wanted out of it — not as much as on the open market, but quite considerable.” He adds, “because I felt sorry for the government, I gave them some.”

Storm, who has donated pieces from his finds to Fortress Louisbourg and the federal government, says, “I got a call from an archeologist in Ottawa several years ago. He said, ‘Alex, what happened to the material from the Feversham.’ Like Indiana Jones, all the discoveries are in the warehouse, in a vault. They should be available to the public to view.” If you’re thinking of becoming a treasure hunter in Nova Scotia, Storm says, “the first thing you must do is apply for a treasure trove licence and inform the government of the treasure you’re looking for.” A treasure trove “is defined as anything deliberately hidden with an intent of recovery.” He insists there are plenty of treasures to be found in Nova Scotia.

I ask about Oak Island, the site of a legendary pirate treasure. “It’s a story all right,” Storm admits, “but not like the Louisbourg treasure. I’m not going to tell you where I think it is, but it’s the strong boxes from seven warships that went down in 1758 and the entire contents from the treasure that was at the fortress. Only it’s not buried in the fort — or underwater, for that matter.”Why doesn’t he just go and get it if he knows where it is?” Because there are people who want to take it away from me,” he says. And getting the Louisbourg treasure “is not that easy. It’s the location, and the fact that it was not actually known to exist until I researched it for the book.”The treasure’s worth, he says, “is beyond measure, in the millions of dollars probably. “And it involves tunnels. “In my thesis, the hiding spot was actually prepared before the siege. The government doesn’t want to talk about it,” he adds. “I’ll tell you why: Because they dislike people like me, treasure hunters, they think we’re pirates, and if made public it would attract pirates here.”

(Book cover of
Seaweed and Gold)
As far as that treasure is concerned, what would it take to get it, I ask? “I could do it all by myself if I wanted to,” says Storm, grinning. He grins a lot. What if someone else gets it?
“Not a chance,” he says. So why not go get it? “I’m pretty sure it’s safe there,” he says. “Besides, you have to be a bit in the mood for this treasure hunting, and I’m not in the mood.” If he were in the mood, he says, it would take him two weeks to make sure it is in the location, then another month to extricate it. “And there are extra elements to consider: too much public attention, too many people to see what you are doing, not to mention the weather. I’m waiting for the window of opportunity. “I’m not overly zealous to go after this one. I’ve learned that treasure hunting is a lot of work and headaches. You might not believe this, but the treasure hunting business of mine is just a hobby, something fun to do. The lust for silver and gold is not really it for me. It’s the adventure, finding the treasure, bringing it up and actually seeing it.”

And Storm always painstakingly records what he finds, like an archeologist. “I don’t want any information to be lost,” he says. “That’s why I wrote this book.”I ask him to take me to the ocean for a picture. He takes me to Lighthouse Point, outside the town of Louisbourg, and points to a spot where he guarantees there is yet undiscovered treasure. “They built this lighthouse in 1726,” he tells me, “because of the loss of Le Chameau and so many other ships and treasures. Just look at the fog.” Once back in Toronto, I ponder Lighthouse Point and what Storm has told me. One night, it hits me: “I know where it is,” I scream. I’ve finally figured it out. I dial Storm.”My God, I know where it is, I know where the treasure is buried,” I tell him. “You gave me too many hints, and the big find isn’t at Lighthouse Point at all.”
“Really?” he replies cautiously, not believing I really know.” I figured it out from what you said. But don’t worry,” I tell him, “I’m not going to publish it. And Alex, you’re right, it is safe.” There’s a pause. “It is safe, isn’t it, Sharon?”
“Oh, it’s safe all right,” I tell him. “Call me after you get it.”

by Sharon Dunn
editd Jan 27/25

Kevin Sullivan

Making a deal with Whoopi

 From the

Sharon Dunn
Making a deal with Whoopi
Producer of Piano Man’s Daughter says it all started when the star fell for Timothy Findley

[Photo: Sharon Dunn, National Post]
Kevin Sullivan produced, wrote and directed the adaptation of The Piano Man’s Daughter.

Emmy Award-winning producer Kevin Sullivan, freely acknowledges he was in the right place at the right time when he made his hugely popular Anne of Green Gables series. “It was a unique time in television [1985], and significant funding was in place.” Now, says the president of Sullivan Entertainment, times have changed and it’s every man for himself. Case in point: his screen adaptation of the late Timothy Findley’s The Piano Man’s Daughter, which will be released on DVD tomorrow. His partner on that deal wasn’t the Canadian government. It was Whoopi Goldberg.”Whoopi and I had a common agent — William Morris,” the 47-year-old filmmaker tells me over coffee last week at Starbucks. ” They were looking for projects for her as a producer and someone said that she had a Canadian project in mind.” This was several years back, he says, and “Whoopi was in Toronto making the movie Bogus, with Norman Jewison.” She made the short walk from “the Four Seasons to Edward’s Books. She walked into Edward’s and said, ‘Give me the best Canadian book on the shelf.’ They handed her a copy of Timothy Findley’s The Piano Man’s Daughter and she went back to the hotel and read it. She went crazy. She loved it.”Next, she called Jewison. “How can I meet Timothy Findley? Do you know him?” He did, and soon set up a lunch where they could meet.”Both Tiff and Whoopi told me they fell in love with each other. They had a meeting of the minds, kindred spirits.”

Sullivan came into the picture through the L.A. agent.” The agent said, ‘Kevin’s the poster boy for Canadian content. He’ll probably be interested in making the story.’ And Whoopi thought it was such a Canadian story that it had to be made in Canada. So Whoopi and I met, and she went on and on and on. She really identified with the lead character because her first movie was The Color Purple, where she played the part of Celie. She identified with Lily in The Piano Man’s Daughter because, even though their dilemmas in life are totally different, both Lily and Celie took control out of abrasive situations.” Sullivan adds that Steven Spielberg cast Goldberg in The Color Purple only after she approached him. “She was a stand-up comic at the time, and she became disillusioned with the whole process [of movie making], the press and everything else.” Of The Piano Man’s Daughter, Goldberg told Sullivan, “I want to produce this movie. I would love to play all the parts in this movie. “And she insisted that for the film to be successful, it had to be faithful to Findley’s original material. We kicked it into place very quickly,” says the filmmaker, who wrote the script for the adaptation as well as producing and directing it. He insists Whoopi, who is listed on the DVD as executive producer, played a big role in the project. “She nurtured it with me in terms of script development.” In the end, Whoopi didn’t appear in the film, which stars Wendy Crewson, Christian Campbell (brother of Neve), Marnie McPhail, R.H. Thompson and Stockard Channing. It premiered in Cannes in 2001. “We were looking at a U.S. release,” says Sullivan, “but we decided it was too much of an art movie. It was risky, you can lose a lot of money.” The movie was released in Europe, and Sullivan says it did very well in France.”

Findley is popular in France,” points out Sullivan. “He sold his farm in Cannington, Ont., and moved to Provence with his partner, Bill Whitehead. He finished writing Pilgrim there. Being true to the book posed challenges: I tried to interpolate from the book — the insanity, epilepsy and the mystical side as well. Findley brings a mystical level, like the book is partly a ghost story. He is a writer who has no idea where the makings of his books arise from. He approaches things esoterically, very evolutionarily. He doesn’t plan where his characters are going.That kind of book is obviously difficult to adapt for the screen: My job was really to find a structure and be able to depict his atmosphere on screen and tell a concrete story — not an easy thing to do.”

And Sullivan’s next project? He hopes to adapt Findley’s 1981 novel, Famous Last Words.”People are very passionate about TIFF in Canada, as well as in England and France.” Indeed, so passionate that Sullivan still talks of Findley, who died in France last year, in the present tense. Proof, if anyone needed it, that great writers never die.

by Sharon Dunn

Carole Pope

… discusses sex and gay marriage

 From the

Sharon Dunn
Pope discusses sex and gay marriage
Carole says she’s in favour of both

[Photo: Tedd Church, CanWest News Service]
Carole Pope — she who donned plastic pants and bondage gear years before it was fashionable — was in town this weekend to perform at Gobsmacked (billed as a “revel of offbeat expression” presented by Now magazine) at Harbourfront. It seemed like a good opportunity to catch up with Pope, the Juno and Genie winner who was the lead singer for Rough Trade. I found her in her usual good form. These days, she tells me, she’s living in Manhattan and has just released a dance single, a reworked version of Rough Trade’s All Touch, in Toronto, Greece, London and New York. Pope made waves in her autobiography, Anti Diva, which was published in 2000, mainly because she dealt with being a lesbian and her relationship with the late Dusty Springfield. She tells me that since then she’s been trying to write a novel but has come to terms with the fact that “I can’t write fiction because I’m a hack.” She hastens to add, however, that she can write porn: “All you need is imagination and experience in sex, and I’ve got both.”

Indeed she has. She says she’s had sexual relationships with both men and women, though not with her friend, David Bowie. “I’m one of the only ones who hasn’t been with him,” she laughs, adding, “I’m sure I’ve been with someone who has been with him. “Male or female? I wonder aloud.
“Probably female,” she says .Pope is very relaxed talking about sexuality in all its manifestations, at least in part, she says, because society is much more accepting of a gay lifestyle these days. She cites the popular TV series ‘Queer as Folk’ as proof. ” I really like QAF,” she says. “It doesn’t only appeal to gay men. It appeals to straight people and lesbians. It’s hot and erotic. And Gale Harold, star of QAF, he’s hot.” Warming to the topic, I query her about the sex appeal of other celebs, starting with Arnold Schwarzenegger (God knows why I started there; I guess it’s because he’s been in the news so much recently). “He’s a nightmare,” Pope says, “and since we’re doing a recall, why don’t we recall President Bush while we’re at it?” She describes the U.S. President in one word: “Ugh.”

When I try her out on former president Bill Clinton, she’s much keener. “Clinton’s hot, and Hillary’s hot, too.” (She adds: “We think she’s a dyke. We think she’s gone there.”)Turning to other female celebrities, she says, “Britney Spears is hot. Christina Aguilera is not.” Kate Hudson, meanwhile, “does nothing for me, but Naomi Watts [Hudson’s co-star in Le Divorce] is hot. And Princess Diana was hot.” And Shania Twain is “pretty hot for a breeder.” Clearly, the anti-diva is not finished making waves. When I ask Pope if she’s ever had children, she quips, “Not that I’m aware of. I have a nomadic lifestyle. When I grow up, if I meet someone and fall in love, I might adopt a Chinese girl baby.” She says that if she does grow up, it will likely be a woman she falls in love with. Which brings us naturally to the topic of gay marriage. “I never thought that heterosexual marriages worked as a concept,” she says, “but I have to say yes to gay marriages because I’ve known couples that have been in long-term gay relationships, and when one dies the other is cast out by the family of the dead partner. Part of the problem,” she says, is that “straight people go, ‘ugh’ and think of the sex, but they should think of the partner who survives and is left out of everything. That’s not fair. It even happened to Versace’s lover. Donatella [Versace’s sister] cut him off.” I point out that Versace could have taken care of his partner in his will. Pope agrees, but adds: “Think of it. They should have certain rights. And straight people should empathize because they’ve been there, too.”

by Sharon Dunn

Vacation

 “I’m staying home. What are you doing?”

 From the

Sharon Dunn
I’m staying home. What are you doing?
How they’re spending their summer vacation

[Photo: Photo: Peter J. Thompson, National Post]
Ronnie Hawkins is “just sittin’ back tellin’ girl stories. There ain’t too much happenin’,” while …I planned my vacation to coincide with the SARS concert, but as I watched the events from my Nova Scotia hotel room, I suddenly felt terribly left out. I wondered if I’d made a mistake. Of course, as I was swimming in the ocean yesterday, the Stones were the furthest thing from my mind, but the problem is, since our summers are so short, I want to do it all. How does the rest of the country handle their vacation plans, I wondered.

I called Rompin’ Ronnie Hawkins, figuring he’d have big celebratory plans for the summer after miraculously beating cancer earlier this year. “They’re still filmin’ me,” he says, referring to the X-rays being taken to try to shed some light on the terminal cancer that seems to have disappeared. “Considerin’ everythin’,” he says, “I’m fine. I’m off the endangered list. I’m just sittin’ back tellin’ girl stories. There ain’t too much happenin’,” he admits, although he tells me he expects a big lineup come fall.”I think I’m goin’ to get a big cover on the Rollin’ Stone magazine. Is that still a big deal?” There’s more. “Ophrey Winfrey [he really did say Ophrey] — I’m supposed to be on Ophrey with my healer, Adam. I’m gettin’ a lot of press.” As for the rest of the summer he says he’s “sittin’ in the yard, gettin’ caught up with my grass. It has outgrown me.”

Filmmaker Norman Jewison is in town hard at work in post-production for his movie The Statement, starring Michael Caine. The movie was shot in France. I’m told that he’s working through the summer 9 to 6, five days a week in his downtown studios. Jewison’s wife, Dixie, is at the farm on Lake Simcoe and Norman joins her on weekends. “He normally spends a great deal of time there in the summer,” says a source, “but he’s been in the editing room since the picture wrapped at the end of June, and will be there for the entire summer and part of the fall.” But don’t feel too sorry for Jewison. He does get to the boat on the weekends.


[Photo: Peter J. Thompson, National Post]

… Catherine Nugent has just returned from a cruise of the U.S. eastern seaboard.Singer Anne Murray is in Nova Scotia and has no intention of going anywhere else this summer. “I’ve had a particularly busy year,” she tells me. “I’m taking the whole summer off — I’m here for three months. I should be able to dictate what I do, but I still can’t.” Her next American tour starts Oct. 10. Has she ever considered retiring? “I’ve never taken enough time off to know — you get nervous about stopping. I still play to packed houses. Why change it if it isn’t broke?” As far as her summer goes, except for an appearance in her hometown of Springhill on Anne Murray Day, she says, “I steer clear of things when I’m on holiday. It’s a family time. This is a big escape for me.”And what about Toronto society folk? Catherine Nugent, now living in Toronto, has just returned from a cruise along the eastern seaboard of the U.S., while Cathie and Rudy Bratty are at their place in Wasaga Beach. Perennial society woman Carole Grafstein was on her way to see the Stones when I called. I was momentarily surprised until I remembered that her husband, Jerry Grafstein, was co-organizer of the event (along with MP Dennis Mills). “He’s been up there since 5 a.m.,” she told me. “I figured you were calling because you wanted tickets.” When I asked if she was a Stones fan, Grafstein said quickly, “No, but I am a Justin Timberlake fan.”Now that the concert is over, Grafstein says they’re just going to sit around their pool the rest of the summer and relax. “There aren’t too many people travelling,” she says. My friends who usually go to France aren’t going this year. They feel safer on this side of the ocean. They want to spend their money in North America — we need it.”

by Sharon Dunn

Spelling Bees

.. aren’t for the faint of heart.

 From the

Sharon Dunn
Spelling bees aren’t for the faint of heart
Luckily, the kids are there to help their parents through it

[Photo: Carlo Allegri, National Post]
Shanana Visuvanathan pauses to think about it for a few seconds at the 15th annual Spelling Bee of Canada at Metro Hall.

Spelling bees have never been more popular than they are now — at least in part because Spellbound, the documentary that premiered at last year’s Toronto filmfest, garnered an Academy Award nomination for best documentary and is now showing at the Cumberland. So yesterday I headed to the finals of the 15th annual Spelling Bee of Canada at Metro Hall. On my arrival, I see a pretty girl and her mother sitting on the steps, looking none too happy. It seems she came second in her bee in Hamilton and was erroneously told to come to Toronto for the finals. Once here, the organizers tell her this is for first-place winners only. The girl is devastated.

I can see right off that these bees are tough business.Julie Spence, the founder and president of the bee, is dressed in her yellow and black bee outfit (that is, a black suit and yellow blouse). She tells me of her hopes of expanding the competition to every province in Canada.
“I just love spelling,” she says, “It’s so important.”
She’s not the only one. The room is jammed with nervous-looking spellers and their even more nervous-looking parents. While we wait for the competition to start, I talk to 13-year-old Christopher Massucci, a Grade 8 student from Maple, Ont., who ranked first in Vaughan in the senior division. (When I point out that his name is listed as “Masuccitti” in the program, he says, “Yeah, they spelled it wrong.”) Being a pretty good speller myself, I ask Christopher to try me out on a few of the more challenging words in his category.
“OK, ‘chromosome,’ ” he says.”
“Chromosome, that’s too easy,” I tell him, rolling my eyes. I get it right. No problem. “Give me another?” I challenge. Next he gives me a word that sounds to my ears like “onomonopio.” I try to puzzle it out phonetically. “Onomonopio, Is that correct?” I ask.
“I don’t know,” he admits.
“What does it mean?”
“It has something to do with poetry,” he tells me. (Later I figure out he must have meant “onomatopoeia.”)I ask him how he got to be such a good speller? “I read all the time — mostly action, mystery and adventure.” He then points out today’s prizes.

First prize in each category is a humongous (is that spelled correctly?) trophy, a computer, an Oxford dictionary, books, cash and more.The senior competition gets underway, and indeed there are some tricky words: dactylology, bonsai, paranoia, analgesia, hackneyed. Christopher correctly spells “idolize,” “angular” and “canopy.” But he misses ‘druid’.

After 22 rounds, the final tie-breaking words are “euphony” and “aghast.” The winner is Duluxan Sritharan. Jeffrey Lavellee, 7, wins in the primary category, and Ashwin Baskaran, 9, wins in the junior group. The intermediate winner, which goes an amazing 49 rounds, is Kiruthihla Vimalakanthan, 11.
I just hope I spelled those winning names correctly.

by Sharon Dunn

Christopher Ondaatje

My lesson on Hemingway

 From the

Sharon Dunn
My lesson on Hemingway
Sir Christopher Ondaatje expounds on famous author

[Photo: Sharon Dunn, National Post]
Sir Christopher Ondaatje’s book about Hemingway and Africa is to be released in the fall.

CHESTER – It has been a year since I’ve seen Christopher Ondaatje and so much has happened. To him, that is. He’s been knighted, has had hip surgery and is preparing for the release of his latest book, Hemingway in Africa: The Last Safari. I see that the ageless adventurer looks good, tanned and relaxed, as I walk in to meet him at his favourite local café, Julian’s, in Chester. The newly knighted Sir Christopher spends the summer here on his gorgeous island property, just outside Chester Harbour; he spends his winters in England.
“It was quite a shock, really,” he says about the honour from the Queen. “I didn’t know it was coming.” Ondaatje received a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in June, 2000, and tells me, “Usually, you don’t get any other honours for at least five years after that.”
That having been said, it seems to me that it would be difficult to deny a man whose philanthropy is well-known on either side of the pond. In Canada, the Royal Ontario Museum, the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia and the Chester Playhouse have all benefited. In Britain, the Royal Geographical Society and The Ondaatje Foundation to benefit arts and education have received generous donations totalling many millions of dollars. I mean, really, why would they not twice honour such a man?

On the topic of his new book, which hits the shelves on Oct. 1, Ondaatje is enthusiastic.”I’ve been writing it for four years. The first book that Hemingway ever reviewed was Batouala, by Rene Maran (Toronto Star, 1921),” he informs me. I know that a lesson on Hemingway is forthcoming, and there’s no stopping him. “When you read that book, it’s like reading Hemingway. Basically, it is a simple, truthful statement,” Ondaatje says. “Here’s a guy I respect so much as a literary person. I try to emulate his efforts to write the simple statement, and it’s a hell of a lot of hard work to put a sentence into a simple statement. For me,” Ondaatje adds, “Hemingway’s book The Snows of Kilimanjaro has been the model and formula for everything I have written. He was arguing with his alter ego throughout this book. I delve into the personal inspiration behind the story.”

“Start a new paragraph,” Ondaatje orders. I’m unfazed by his demand since, during our interview last year, Ondaatje actually started writing in my notepad. I can tell he trusts me more this year. I pretend to start a new paragraph.”Hemingway, the man, wanted to be a hero, he was always looking out for his image. I love him and I abhor him,” Ondaatje continues. “He was a man who sacrificed everything, except his art.” On Hemingway’s colourful personal life, he says, “His fourth, and final, wife, Mary, stopped the publishing of the book True At First Light because it would have shown her and Hemingway in a bad light [it was published posthumously]. And third wife, Martha Gellhorn, was very independent and promiscuous. Hemingway accused her of sleeping with the whole Polish army. He said sleeping with Martha was like coming into Grand Central Station.”

Ondaatje is quick to point out, “I don’t identify with Hemingway, I’m not the same person, not at all. That’s not to say that I wouldn’t take my clothes off and jump in the river, because I would. But I’m more of an anthropologist than an explorer. I understand risk, and risk is like an aphrodisiac to me. But Hemingway pushed himself for the experience of the story.”

“Draw a line here,” Ondaatje demands.
“Excuse me?” I ask.
“Draw a line,” he says.I pretend to draw a line.
“I got the closest to Hemingway, not baiting leopards or carousing in a bar or going on some lion hunt or big-game fishing,” Ondaatje says.”I got closest in the morning waiting for the day to begin, with the sun casting long yellow shafts of light from the Acacias, listening to the shriek of the Hadad Ibis and the melodic tenor of the African Bou Bou, smelling the wood smoke and waiting for my first cup of coffee. I understand Hemingway, Sharon.” Ondaatje is utterly mesmerizing. He tells me, “Hemingway said he would wake up in the morning, and be homesick for Africa, and he hadn’t even left it. I feel the same way about Africa, and about Chester. They both have the same magnetism.”

by Sharon Dunn