One aspect that links all our guests is the unqualified ability to refuse to take ‘No’ for an answer. Fiona Reid understands this as well as anyone.

Born in England, Fiona moved to Canada when she was 12 – and although it may be slightly hyperbolic to say so, Fiona has been working steadily since then. She has performed in theatres across Canada, including many seasons at both the Stratford and Shaw Festivals. She has acted in the USA and the UK, and in 2019 played in the Broadway production of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child.

A multi award-winning actor, Fiona added the Order of Canada to her arsenal in 2006.

We worked together early in our respective careers and I am so pleased that Fiona had the time to include LIFE IN STAGES in her always busy schedule.

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Enjoy this quick bonus episode of Life in Stages in which Joel Greenberg makes an exciting announcement.

When Ron was performing in the Studio 180-HGJT production of My Name is Asher Lev, I was struck by the fact that audience members refused to believe that he wasn’t as Jewish as the role he’d played onstage. But that is precisely what defines Ron Lea, an actor who so completely inhabits the characters he plays, whether on stage, on film or television.

In our conversation, Ron walks us through his professional and personal life with the simple, straightforward approach that he seems to take with life.

Ron’s professional ‘road trip’ from Montreal to Toronto to Los Angeles to Vancouver and back to Toronto is told without missing the hard bits. How does a family with twin infants relocate and then relocate again in a foreign country? When the work takes you away from your family for months at a time – in one year when you see your family for no more than a few days in total – how does the family negotiate its own way forward?

Sitting down with Ron while he revisited the stages of his life was a real honour.

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Of all my guests this first season series, I have known Janelle Hutchison the longest. We met in the early 70’s when we were cast as understudies for the cabaret revue, What’s a Nice Country Like You Doing in a State Like This? I was hired to understudy Martin Short and Janelle covered for Andrea Martin.

Janelle has long since added considerably to her professional CV – perhaps most celebrated of her stage appearances was as Mme. Thenardier in the Canadian production of Les Miserables. Janelle is comfortable and engaging as she explores her years of musical and non-musical theatre work, her screenwriting, her success in television commercials and her shift to film and television casting as well as administration at the Stratford Festival.

The culmination of Janelle’s eclectic professional life must be in her management of the Tisch School’s Musical Theatre programme at NYU. It’s fascinating to learn that the sum of all past projects, credits and accomplishments could be synthesized into a New York-based academic setting.

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Sterling Jarvis began his performing life as a singer – bands, receptions of all kinds. But that wasn’t how I met him. In fact, I first worked with Sterling on The Overwhelming, a play about the Rwandan genocide – not exactly The Lion King or We Will Rock You, the two theatre productions he had just completed.

Sterling discusses his rather atypical career path -- touring with The Book of Mormon and his subsequent run in the Broadway production and then the sudden lockdown in 2020. What happens to an actor, to all actors, when the work just stops dead? How does a transplanted Toronto-based actor cope in New York City when the lights have been turned off?

Sterling also reveals that as the father of a child, herself an aspiring actor-singer, he has had an active role in her professional development.

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Early in my conversation with Tracy Michailidis, as we discuss professional training, she jokingly refers to herself as ‘an impostor’ because, rather than attending a conservatory programme, she chose a liberal arts education. And as we chat further, Tracy details the depth of study, the vitality and shared passions of her cohort, friends she has worked with and maintains to this day. All joking aside, it’s abundantly clear that Tracy hasn’t been hobbled by her decision.

We discuss Tracy’s early career, when she was cast in a leading role at the Charlottetown Festival. She reveals what being in the touring production of Beauty and the Beast taught her and, later, what playing in the Broadway production added to the experience of living and working in New York.

Apart from our career-focussed chatting, it is abundantly clear that for Tracy, both personally and professionally, her love of, and commitment to, her family is her grounding place, the foundation that frees her to dream without restraint.

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It’s hard to believe that Michael Healey, playwright of The Drawer Boy and The Master Plan (and several original and adapted projects in between), spent the first ten years of his career as an actor before writing for the stage became his principal passion. Which is not to say that he gave up his acting career.

On the contrary, I first met and worked with Michael on the Studio 180 Theatre production of Stuff Happens, in 2008 and 2009, and a few years later on Clybourne Park.

Michael’s wholly candid and generous description of his career, his insecurities and his insights into a profession beset by constant challenges is as refreshing as it is entertaining.

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Sarah Orenstein was a touchstone for me during the pandemic lockdown. We’d meet outdoors, drink coffee and inflict ourselves and our anxieties on each other. We also found time to laugh at the insanity of the world around us. Sarah works, and has worked, at every major theatre in the country, including both the Stratford and Shaw Festivals.

We met in 2008, when Sarah joined the Studio 180 Theatre production of Stuff Happens, one of those watershed moments that we cherish. And among the gifts of that project is my enduring friendship with Sarah.

Sarah is fiercely dedicated to collaboration, an artist whose true love is the process of an ensemble. Not surprisingly, she dedicates a great deal of time to mentoring young artists in the craft of acting.

And let’s not forget Sarah’s love of baking and gardening.

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NOTE: please consider supporting the running cost of this podcast by sending an e-transfer to jericalifeinstages@rogers.com or by becoming a Patron at patreon.com/lifeinstages.

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