It’s been a tough year for the arts community in my province of Alberta.
Maybe it’s to be expected with an ageing population — people will die, artists will die, friends will die. And yet at some level we never get used to it and it never gets any easier to say good bye.
Early in the year, I was invited up to Edmonton to speak at a memorial for the wonderful actor John Wright at Theatre Network. I was fortunate to have had John in five of my plays and we had become close to one another over the years. (We were just a couple of Saskatchewan boys, after all.)
It’s possible you would have to write plays yourself to understand the relationship between playwrights and the actors who perform in our plays, who go out there night after night armed only with our imperfect words. Say it’s special and leave it at that. I can’t find the words.
It was certainly a Who’s Who at the Zoo of the Edmonton theatre community on the stage at the Roxy Theatre that evening, along with this interloper from Calgary. The tributes were sincere and meaningful from those of us who congregated to honour John that evening. There was also some levity. A life in the theatre would have to include a certain degree of absurdity, after all.
There was an even deeper sense of loss to grapple with that evening in Edmonton. Beloved actor Julian Arnold had died only a few months earlier. More recently, the patriarch of the Edmonton theatre world (and beyond) Jim DeFelice had passed away, leaving a void that would seem impossible to fill. Julian and Jim had been in the same play of mine, Jim had been the dramaturge on another.
Three giants of the Edmonton community, gone within a few months of each other. In the midst of life, and all that jazz . . .
Meanwhile, back in Calgary where I live, we’ve had losses of our own to deal with this year.
In April, the elder statesman of the Calgary theatre community Grant Reddick passed away. It wasn’t entirely unexpected — Grant was in his 90s. But it still comes as a shock and our sorrow at his passing was no less profound. I was fortunate to have had Grant in one of my plays. What a beautiful artist he was. He was also a consummate gentleman. That was the word we heard the most at his high Anglican funeral at the cathedral: gentleman. That’s a high tribute in a world basically gone mad.
As usual, on hearing about his death I was saddened that I hadn’t made more room for him in my life, visited a little more often, or even picked up the phone now and again.
“Too late!” we say. And yet we learn nothing.
In June, another luminary from our theatre world Kathi Kerbes passed away quite unexpectedly — as I heard again and again, “Too soon.” The stories of Kathi’s stewardship of Shadow Theatre at her memorial were touching and inspirational and often funny. She had worked with so many members of the Calgary theatre community, always with great verve and humour, that her death touched a lot of people deeply.
Most recently, we lost the man pictured above, Tim Williams. Not since the tragic death of Michael Green ten years ago has a death in our community sent such shock waves. Tim was recognized as one of the preeminent blues artists in the world, so his death was felt deeply in the local music community and well beyond. But he was also a bona fide member of the theatre community, having performed on stage and off in a number of productions, and by being married to Johanne Deleeuw, a highly respected member of Calgary’s theatre world.
It was when Johanne was artistic director at Lunchbox Theatre and produced a few of my plays (and directed one) that I first got to know Tim. As I recall, I gave him a Harmon Kardon amp that he took great delight in. From that time twenty-five years ago or so I heard Tim perform countless times — for a while it was as easy for me as walking a block to Mikey’s bar where he was doing a kind of happy hour set. It always amazed me that I could sit and listen to someone as talented as Tim for the price of a beer. He wasn’t hard to find, he played a lot of sets throughout the city up to the very end.
To sit and listen to Tim was, beyond the sheer appreciation of the music, to be schooled in the history of the blues. “Encyclopedic knowledge” I read and again in countless tributes to Tim since he passed. Appreciation for Tim went well beyond social media. City Councillor D. J Kelly, spoke to the city council to honour Tim’s legacy, by attending one blues venue this month — a fitting tribute to Tim’s legacy.
As was the case of all the wonderful people I have mentioned here, beyond being a truly gifted artist and great performer, Tim was a really great guy, someone you were only too happy to spend some time with. The last time we had the chance to talk, I walked into the bar and saw him sitting there waiting to play a set and his eyes lit up when he saw me and we sat and had a beer together and got caught up. He was one of those rare people who could make you feel like you were the most important person in the entire world. His death has left a real void in the Calgary community.
I miss him. I miss all these good folks. Honestly, my world is diminished without them.
Here in Alberta, we manage to live with a sketchy government that no one will admit to having voted for. That’s just politics and governments come and go (some not quickly enough). But saying good bye to our artist friends is never easy, they have all touched us in their own unique and indelible way. Our world is a little duller, a little dimmer, a little sadder without them. They will be missed by many.
Thanks for reading.
eugene stickland 