LETTER ONE

the-legion-of-decency.blogspot.com
April 5, 2007
Jim Henshaw

A Truth You Must Hear Told

About a year ago, one of Canada's best actors, Tony Nardi, called and asked if I would come by and listen to him read a letter. "Can't you read it to me over the phone?" I said. He told me it was almost 90 minutes long, his reaction to a script he'd been asked to audition for. Gee, all the more reason to duck this. I get enough mail from people who don't like what I write to want to listen to a rant on a script I didn't know the first thing about.

But Tony's a friend, enormously talented, passionate and ethical to a fault, so I figured I'd humor him. He also knows the best Italian bakeries to go for great coffee and astonishing pastries.

What Tony read that afternoon took my breath away. It was not only some of the best writing I'd heard in a while but the clearest and most passionate indictment I've encountered of what's wrong with film, television and theatre in Canada.

If he had uttered his words in any other country that doesn't really like art, he'd simply be dead or disappeared by now.

Over the last year, Tony held workshops on this letter and a companion piece about theatre critics that were critiqued by friends, industry professionals and a few innocent bystanders who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. In the process, his original letters were honed, imbued with endless humor and polished theatrically. None who heard them remained unmoved or unchanged by their exposure to the work.

"Two Letters" began running in early March as two evenings of theatre that cannot be missed by anyone who cares even a little about this country's arts or the role of those who work in television, theatre and film. I guarantee the experience will make you infinitely better at what you do and quite possibly who you are.

This is passionate, dangerous stuff. "Truth told to Power" in a way no Canadian I know of has ever had the courage to do it before. This country and this industry can be changed for the better and Tony Nardi knows how that can be done.

 

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