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Ghost Towns of
Ontario Volume 2
Co,/ aim
Find- the very best
in books
Books can take you away from the everyday to a
world filled with fascinating personalities, historical
periods and events, modern marvels, faraway places,
exciting adventures, and so much more.
Come explore today!
THE DONNELLY
ALBUM
The fascinating
Donnelly family
legend will be
explored again this
summer at the Blyth
Festival. Learn
more about the
story. $19.95
GHOST RAILWAYS
OF ONTARIO
Vol. 1 & 2
Ron Brown tells the
stories of some of
the abandoned
railways such as the
Kincardine-Listowel
and Goderich-
Guelph lines.
$24.95
GHOST TOWNS OF
ONTARIO
Vol. 1 &Vol. 2
Ron Brown
rediscovers vanished
communities including
Sunshine, Bodmin and
Newbridge. $19.95
ItcsTy R. \ s
JOURNEY TO
PERFECTION
Admire the art of
famed Ontario artist
Ross Butler whose
paintings of cows and
horses were once in
every Ontario class-
room. Read the story
of his struggle to have
his art accepted.
$29.95
BY THE LABOUR
OF THEIR HANDS
Communities across
Ontario once had
their own cheese
factories with their
own unique taste and
their own history.
Learn how the
industry grew, then
faded. $19.95
RUSTY RAILS
A photographic
record of the branch-
line railways in Mid-
western Ontario from
1961-1996. Many of
these rail lines are
gone now, but their
memory lingers, as
does their effect on
our history. $39.95
See our book display at
The Citizen
Blyth 523-4792
PAGE 16. BLYTH FESTIVAL SALUTE, WEDNESDAY, JUNE 13, 2001.
Michelle Fisk plays Loretta Lynn-type in 'Tears'
By Mark Nonkes
Citizen siqlf
Actress Michelle Fisk thinks more
classic Canadian shows like Cruel
Tears should be given a revival.
Plays written about 25 years agb
were more raw and real, Fisk said.
-*There are many plays from this
era that deserve dusting .off, a
reexamination and rediscovery,"
Fisk said in a phone interview from
her home in Stratford.
Shows like Cruel Tears are written
from the heart, they are hard hitting
and aren't afraid to challenge an
audience. Fisk said. Fisk saw Cruel
Tears for the first time about 25
years ago, when the play originally
toured the country.
Now Fisk stars in Cruel Tears as
Actor Mark Harpiak is hoping to
practice his swing and improve his
golf game in Blyth this summer.
Currently, Harpiak is on a vacation
in Niagara-on-the-Lake and on the
golfing greens three or four times a
week.
"I hear there are some good ones
up there," Harpiak said in a phone
interview.
Golfing will give Harpiak time to
relax from the Festival where he will
be performing in two shows this
summer.
Harpiak stars in Cruel Tears as
Johnny, a trucker. It's a show that
could leave Harpiak singing on the
golf course with all the songs he will
be perforrYfing in the show.
Johnny creates controversy when
he fails iri love with the owner's
daughter in Cruel Tears.
Johnny is a straight shooting guy
who can be manipulated under the
right circumstances, Harpiak said.
"He's strong of body and weak of
It might be said that Tanya Greve
is worth the work of four stage
managers since when she leaves as
rehearsal stage manager for The
Outdoor Donnellvs, four people will
replace her.
Four people will be needed
because there, are several locations
around Blyth where scenes are
taking place.
In the show there are 40
community people and nine core
professional members. Greve will
finish her duties the week before the
show opens She will leave the work
of the horses in The Outdoor
Donnellvs to someone else.
"I just get to pet them, I don't get
to look after them," Greve smiled.
That's unlike her first season at
Blyth when the Greve had to handle
the cows that dragged her around in
He Wm .! Come in from the Barn.
Aside from The Outdoor
Donnelh's Greve will stage manage
the shows Cruel Tears and
Sometime, Nev;er.
With Cruel Tears she will once
again team up with director Eric
Coates. Coates started working in
Blyth the same season Greve did,
and she has worked on nearly every
show he's been involved in.
In her seventh season at Blyth
Greve is now the production stage
manager. This means she organizes
rehearsal time for all the shows and
where people rehearse.
After stage managing Anne and
The Drawer Boy last year at the
festival Greve moved back to
Toronto. There she worked on
shows at Factory Theatre and
Theatre Passe Muntille.
She also toured a show to Calgary
in the middle of winter. Though she
prepared for the worst type of
Michelle Fisk: stars in Cruel Tears
Flora, the main character's best
friend. Flora is a Loretta Lynn type,
easily manipulated," Harpiak said.
Harpiak. 36. also plays various
roles in McGillicuddy including the
role of a I2-year-old boy.
For the role of the boy Harpiak
will be drawing on his past.
Recently he went golfing with two
12-year-old boys to try to remember
what it was like to be 12.
Harpiak has played teenagers in
his 20s before but a 12-year-old
hoodlum is the youngest character
he has ever played.
"I'm over six feet tall and about
200 pounds," Harpiak said.
Since his physical appearance will
hinder him in playing the role he is
relying on his mannerisms and the
script to portray the young character.
Harpiak is excited to be in both a
musical and a straight-on play.
"You get the best of both worlds,"
Harpiak said.
For years Harpiak danced with the
Royal Winnipeg Ballet but quit
weather, snow and blizzards, she
arrived to sunshine and a
temperature of nine degree Ceicius.
Before starting at the festival in
the middle of May, Greve took two
weeks off to get her wisdom teeth
pulled. When she got them out she
made the dentist promise her that
they would be healed by the time she
left for Blyth.
And sure enough, though her
mouth was still a little tender, she
could live with the pain by time she
hit Blyth.
the type that stands by her man even
when she is hard done by, Fisk said.
"She has no way out," Fisk said.
In the show Fisk sings the "big
hurtin' songs". The show is a
country and western musical.
The, show features the lives of the
blue collar, under-educated -folk who
scramble from -pay cheque to pay
cheque, Fisk said.
It is something she can easily
relate to. Fisk portrays the type of
person who could be her neighbour.
Fisk will co-star with Adrienne
Wilson. Two summers ago Fisk
acted with Adrienne Wilson in That
Summer where she played the same
character as Wilson only 30 years
older. In Every Dream Wilson Was
Fisk's son's girlfriend. This time
Fisk plays Wilson's best friend.
for variety
Cruel Tears
168 Courthouse Square
Goderich
524-5801
Fisk spent the winter touring in the
musical Larry's Party.
She says doing two musicals in a
row is a treat. But the two are
completely different Fisk said. In,
Larry's Party Fisk portrayed a
woman who spoke her mind. In
Cruel Tears she plays a woman who
still has to learn to stick up for
herself.
This is Fisk's fifth consecutive
season at the Festival. Last summer
she starred in Corker.
Fisk has been acting for about 25
years. Ten years ago Fisk and her
husband moved from Toronto to
Stratford. She acted at the Stratford
Festival for six seasons before
coming to Blyth.
She said Blyth's_ mandate, to
produce quality Canadian theatre, is
similar to her own goal.
Over the summer Fisk makes the
commute from Stratford to Blyth
almost daily.
"I get to watch the corn and the
sunflowers grow," Fisk said.
Fisk and her husband, who works
at the Stratford Festival, have two
children, a son and a daughter.
Harpiak plays trucker, kid
Tanya won't have to hold her horses
mind weak of mind because he is when he was in his early 20s.
After he quit, he managed a
restaurant in Banff and then decided
to pursue a career in theatre.
Within a week after moving to
Toronto to pursue an acting career,
Harpiak landed a role in The Man of
Le Mancha in Edmonton without
any formal acting training.
On that, his first theatrical
production, Harpiak met his wife.
Since that time Harpiak has
worked in musical theatre and plays
at the Stratford Festival, The Shaw
Festival and other festivals across
Canada.
Harpiak's wife, named Blythe, has
relatives who live in Goderich.
In between golf games, 'visits to
his wife at the Shaw Festival and
shows Harpiak plans to visit with
them.
People tease Harpiak saying the
only reason he got a job in Blyth this
summer was because it shared the
name with his wife.
"The Festival was named after
her," Harpiak joked.—MN
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