There was a young chap I tried to get on the writing staff. The producer Norman Baer would have none of it. I managed to get around him by having the young man audition as a performer doing his own material. The proof was in the pudding. Earl Pommerance did a hilarious monologue which turned the auditioners inside out. To his credit Norman told me that I was right and he had been wrong. Earl joined us and later went on to become head writer at MTM (Mary Tyler Moore) Productions in Los Angeles.

There were two other writers in our group who had been hired independently of my influence. Ken Finkelman and Londos D’Arrigo would both prove to be excellent craftsmen. Ken certainly showed some of the talent that would be later expressed in his wonderful CBC series about a TV newsroom. I had known his brother Dan so there was a connection. Our producer was given to long liquid lunches and occasionally returned with fire in his eyes wanting to fire somebody. Kenny got in his cross hairs one day and as head writer I felt I had to go to bat for him. Criticisms of Ken’s work were totally unfair. I said that if Kenny went so would I. Norman cooled down and Ken remained.

I was unable to save Dave Harriman at Dave’s insistence in fact. To be sure Dave tended to disappear after lunch to get in some serious drinking. He never missed a deadline however and his work was consistently good. I felt devastated when he was forced to walk. He practically commanded me not to interfere on his behalf.

Alfie Scopp was around as father confessor. As an old former colleague of Frank Peppiate and John Ayslworth Alf floated and kept an eye on things. I realized something on a bleak February day that I had not had a remotely fresh or original thought for an entire week or more. I was starting to feel panicky. I felt the lack of that broad and comfortable understanding of show business and the arts generally which I so envied in Warren Wilson. Some years later I was a team member in the Pub Quiz League. Our team got into the finals against a team in which Warren was a member. I knew when I saw him that his team would win and they did. Alfie kindly pointed out all the talent which had graced the Bohemian Embassy and I had brought to the show. I certainly put in the hours and I truly believe that things could have been far worse for the other writers without me.

I cheerfully admit that all of those under me namely Dave Harriman, Ken Finkelman’ Earl Pommerance, Danny Aykroyd and Londos D’Arrigo were freer and more imaginative writers than I but upon reflection I see that a head writer has to be a diplomat in dealing with those above and below him in the chain of command. I already had some status in that regard as the “Ambassador of Bohemia.”

Londos D’Arrigo would eventually find himself writing for Joan Rivers.

The producer Norman Baer was a great guy when he wasn’t in his cups. He had produced an Emmy winning Star Documentary called Elizabeth Taylor’s London. There was a remarkable look alike and sound alike Irish actor who did a devastating Brendan Behan. Norm thought I would be just the guy to write Brendan Behan’s Dublin for TV using this actor.

When we were doing auditions at the Lord Simcoe Hotel, Norm turned to me at the end of the first day. “Congratulations,” he said. “For what,” said I? “These Canadian performers, I have never seen such generous people auditioning before.” Rosie Radcliffe would ask if we had seen Guilda Radnor? “I hope she did a good audition because she is great. You’ve got to use her.” Norman was right. Apparently in New York and Los Angeles actors tear their rivals down with real or imagined negatives. In the 1970’s at least Toronto performers were mutually very supportive.

At another studio in the Robert Lawrence complex Glenn Gould was doing a TV show for Radiodifusion in France. I had been acquainted with Glenn at CBC. He always made a great fuss over my dog Rasputin. Glenn called me into his studio. “Mr. Cullen,” he said, “I snuck into your studio last night and caught you appearance on the show. That’s the finest bit of television I have ever seen.” I was flabbergasted.

Glenn went on to say that he was planning a humour record for CBS. He wanted me to participate and gave me his phone number. When I called him he entertained me for easily three quarters of an hour with singing and accents and himself as the laugh track. It was to be a take-off of a Carl Maria Von Weber opera. As the phone call progressed my spine got chillier and chillier. I was not exactly ignorant of opera. I knew that Der Freischutz and Oberon were played occasionally somewhere on the planet every year or so but the satirical references that Glenn was chortling over went completely over my head. We never talked again. It was not long before Glenn was dead.

Probably because of his extraordinary hearing Glenn Gould was one of the finest dialecticians I ever met. We would occasionally get into somewhat surreal conversations in the halls of the CBC at 354 Jarvis Street. I had mastered about three regional Scottish accents. I am sure Glenn could do five or six.

I have related about the funeral of my friend Al Boliska how the Gypsy violinist stopped the music in the middle of a melody and how it affected me. One morning my clock radio wakened me as usual on a CBC classical music show hosted by Terry Campbell. He said that Glenn Gould had just died. I felt crushed. Then Terry informed the audience that the Columbia record people had rushed a soon to be released album especially for this program. It was Glenn’s second recording of Bach’s Goldberg Variations. The first statement was amazingly slow. He made you wait for it but it was a far more contemplative and introspective reading. I wouldn’t call it funereal but it had a quietly portentous solemnity about it. In the middle of one of the variations my clock radio as it had always done clicked off. I was devastated. It was Al all over again. I dived at the radio and turned it on. It only partially relieved my huge sense of loss and of the loss to Canada and the world.

Lots of people have argued about his eccentric interpretations, his unusual style and his verbosity but such arguments stretch the mind and the imagination. They are stimulating and not likely to end up in a killing. I have met people in Europe, particularly the Netherlands who cannot get enough of Glenn Gould. They have organizations and hold meetings just for that purpose.

In the end we had done one hundred shows, each one was ninety minutes long and was live to tape with no post edit. We shot two shows an evening before a live audience and did it four days a week. I was at work by ten in the morning and wouldn’t leave until about eleven thirty at night Monday to Thursday. Friday, I put in an eight hour day and Saturday about six. Sunday I slept. But a new Bohemian Embassy was right around the corner.

Politics

Prior to 1974 the stretch of waterfront from Toronto’s York Street to Spadina Avenue was an industrial waste land. Abandon warehouses, unused grain elevators, nooks and crannies were bleak and threatening in winter and just plain threatening in summer. Containerization had changed the nature of the Port of Toronto. Some years before Mitchell Sharp, a major mover and shaker in the Liberal party of Canada and for a time Deputy Prime Minister had promised to hand over this federal land to the City of Toronto as a park and people place.

How do you get people interested in a rather nasty dock area. The answer was to stage some events and create attractions. A chap by the name of Joe Hatt-Cook was given a contract to do just that. Joe had a small advertising agency and was a close friend and sometime business partner with Fiona McCall. Fiona had introduced Joe to the first edition of the Bohemian Embassy and Joe attended quite frequently.

As I was coming to the end of my contractual obligations with the Global Television Network, I got a phone call from Joe Hatt-Cook. Would I like to resurrect the Bohemian Embassy as part of the new Harbourfront project? The Bohemian Embassy had a track record. Several thousands of people had experienced the original version. Our numbered citizenship cards could prove it. Thousands more knew pretty much what the Bohemian Embassy was about. It had a fairly high profile in the public memory in spite of what was effectively an eight year absence.

I accepted Joe’s offer if he would include Roy Wordsworth as part of the package. By that time I had depended on Roy’s managerial skills with Beyond the Fringe with total satisfaction. Joe said, “If you want him, you got him.”

Joe got the Department of Public Works to start working on the large space at the south end of the York Quay Building. After pricing tables for the place I contacted my nephew, Jim Roberts to get constructing. Because I was getting public funds, would be no excuse for profligacy. I went to the Board of Education for second hand teacher’s chairs as I had done at one time with the first Bohemian Embassy. Roy pointed out that they were the devil to stack and would take up too much space when stored. We got some reasonable folding chairs.

Friendly Folk

I phoned Gordon Lightfoot about opening the Harbourfront version. Ian and Sylvia had been more closely associated with the Bohemian Embassy but they had split up and Ian was living near Calgary. Gord kindly agreed but as the date approached I knew in my heart of hearts that the space would not be ready. Before we would start promoting the event, a firm commitment from the Department of Public Works was necessary. No dice. The new target date excluded Gord. He would be in Edmonton.

We started the Harbourfront Bohemian Embassy in a low profile way with relatively unknown acts but that was OK. All the acts were unknown when they were getting started. That in a sense was what the Embassy was about.

We knew however that we needed to stage a fairly large event for Harbourfront itself. The place was physically becoming habitable. Murray McLauchlan had a fairly high profile at the time and I knew he was a friend of Alfie Scopp. I got Alf to get in touch with Murray who came to Harbourfront for a meeting. “Don,” he said, “Don’t you remember me?” “Gosh, Murray have we met?” was my reply. He then told me that he had shimmied down a line of sheets from his second story bedroom window in order to attend a Sunday evening folk music Hootenanny at the original Bohemian Embassy and he had learned his first licks on the guitar from Jim McCarthy there. I believe he was twelve at the time.

Murray essentially opened Harbourfront with a large well attended outdoor concert on Canada Day afternoon, 1974. That evening the Harbourfront edition of the Bohemian Embassy got underway.

Folk music would be once again the primary thrust of the Harbourfront edition. My personal preference would have been to go back to an evening a week with Mary Jane and Winston Young. But I understood their reluctance to perform. Winston had a good but demanding job. They were out of practice. The years of pushing and pulling levers in his job as crane operator had taken its toll on Winston’s hands. I had to reacquaint myself with the folk music subculture of Toronto.

There was a wonderful act waiting for the opportunities presented by the Harbourfront Bohemian Embassy. In the summer of 1966 the great theatrical entrepreneur Mavor Moore hired me as an actor with the Charlottetown Summer Festival in Prince Edward Island. Since the first meeting to create the Canadian Federation took place there it had been decided to have a small park with a boulder contributed from every province in Canada. There was a teen-aged publicity assistant working for Jack McAndrew at the festival. She had been told that sadly PEI would not be represented. There were no boulders in Prince Edward Island. This young girl constructed an enormous potato out of papier mache, sneaked it into the park just before the official opening and put up a sign which read, “SPUDITE, PEI.” Her name was and is Nancy White.

For a “Happening” which we dedicated to the potato, Nancy wrote a song called Potato Pickin’ Time in Hunter River. She conducted a choir of her school buddies. It was just a hint of clever output she contributed to the Sunday Morning Show on CBC Radio for a number of years. Her regular appearances at the Harbourfront Bohemian Embassy gave her a chance to create and grow. Sometimes referred to as Canada’s answer to Tom Lehrer, Nancy also writes songs of great depth and seriousness. Audiences loved her and still do. I was delighted shortly after I left Harbourfront to get a phone call from a lady at CBC. “What can you tell me about Nancy White?” she asked. It was easy for me to spend a half hour singing the praises of this talented woman. Later she was kind enough to thank me publicly when she received her richly deserved ACTRA Award.

My friend Alfie Scopp often acted as a self appointed talent scout (unpaid of course) for acts which he thought particularly deserving. In a sense we shared that function. When Roy Wordsworth was promoted to Program Manager, Alf came onboard to assist me for a while. He slipped over to the Mariposa Festival at the Toronto Islands and monitored the open stage. He came back with glowing reports of a duo from Sudbury. Patricia Watson and Alison Reynolds had a wonderful range of instrumental possibilities. Pat played guitar, piano and flute. Alison played guitar, cello and flute. They had fine voices and blended beautifully. They wrote good songs. Thanks to Alfie’s astute scouting Watson and Reynolds graced the Bohemian Embassy stage on a regular basis. They were hugely popular.

David James Bowen was a talented lad who found his way to the Harbourfront haven. Though he would be classified as folk, he had leanings toward a more popular almost rock presentation. He had the necessary good looks and stage presence. I could see him gravitating artistically and romantically towards Patty Watson. After the Harbourfront Embassy closed they got married in a lovely ceremony on the farm they then rented near Bradford, Ontario. I was honoured to function as MC on that day.

David, Pat Watson (Bowen) and Alison Reynolds formed a group called Mirth. They made a couple of recordings which I personally loved. They added a descant trumpet sound reminiscent of John Sebastian Bach. Anything which reminds me of Bach immediately has my interest. In the change, however the duo of Watson and Reynolds lost something and the energy of David James Bowen lost something in the amalgam too. I felt that the new sound had a somewhat chance to really take off but it didn’t. David and Patty eventually parted. Alison returned to her ancestral roots in Texas, got married and moved to California. At last count Pat Watson was working in Hawaii after having won a big songwriting contest in Europe.

A great huggy man with a fulsome unapologetic baritone voice named Stan Rogers came by telling me how much he wanted to play at the Bohemian Embassy. When I heard him I was shocked that I had not heard him before. My education had been sorely lacking. What a talent! For Stan the Bohemian Embassy had taken on an almost mythical quality.
I was touched. Stan’s songs will live as long as recorded music is with us. Stan’s untimely death was a huge setback for folk music in Canada. Traveling out to the Winnipeg Folk Festival to co-host the evening concerts with Peter Gzowski I had the privilege of sitting next to Stan for the journey. For such a larger than life and sometimes even bombastic fellow, Stan turned out to be amazingly humble and appreciative of others. Fortunately for all of us his brother Garnet carries on the Rogers tradition in his own unique way. His folks have reason to be doubly proud.

For a while in Toronto there was considerable folk music activity at the North Toronto YMCA. The loosely cobbled together group called themselves the Friends of Fiddlers Green. Under the organizing ability of Tam Kearney, a jovial and irascible Scott this aggregation concentrated on the rich resources of traditional music from the British Isles. One of the main players was a young man named Grit Laskin. Grit was well on his way to becoming internationally famous as a maker of fine guitars and other instruments. He had a wonderful way with words and could fashion traditional sounding tunes which accommodated them to perfection. It was clever stuff and highly entertaining. I remember with particular relish his appearances at the Bohemian Embassy.

The Original Sloth Band under its organizer Ken Whitely, an all purpose folk musician who was incredibly supportive of all and sundry who showed talent and promise. The Sloth band handled southern gospel music particularly well along with a strong blues influence. Optometrist Tom Evans’ clarinet played passages of great longing and need as well as worshipful praise and excitement. The same could be said for Ken’s brother Chris on trumpet and what seemed like sixteen other instruments. And they all sang, as did other notables such as Ron Negrini, the duo of Frazer and DeBolt, Ian Tamblyn, Brent Titcombe, Dave Bradstreet and the very popular Michal Hasek and the sweet songstress Carol Hanson who was soon to become Carol Hasek.

Raffi Cavoukian, son of the famous portrait photographer soon would concentrate his talents as a children’s entertainer and an internationally famous one at that. When at the Harbourfront Bohemian Embassy he was doing a wide range of material geared to a mature audience. After many years entertaining and making albums for children Raffi has recently decided to perform for mature audiences again.

The Lit Bits

John Robert Colombo in the intervening years since the first edition of the Bohemian Embassy, had become a well known literary figure. I almost hesitated to call him for help. But he knew the literary sub-culture as well as any. Our old association helped and he set about to construct a new series of readings.

We started with an open reading and John contacted a group called the House Poets who workshopped and printed collections of their stuff. I was insecure for fear that no one would show up to read. I brought a few poems of my own. I told John I didn’t want to read but would if there were no volunteers. John didn’t need me to read but he asked me to let him have some poems. I had never submitted any poems for publication before and hadn’t even thought of it. The result was having four of my poems published in the Tamarack Review.

I had no grand schemes for the literary thrust of the Bohemian Embassy. I couldn’t think beyond the borders of greater Toronto. To encourage local members of the sub-culture was all I really had in mind. Naturally, if John had been informed of some worthy talent coming to Toronto that would be fine. In fact we had an excellent reading from Irving Layton who had come in from Montreal. Dorothy Livesay came in from the Maritimes. Margaret Atwood had attained international star status by the time the Harbourfront edition of the Embassy emerged but she came and gave a terrific reading.

A particular favourite of mine was “The Poet Cop” Hans Jewinsky. His book was selling beautifully as well it might, because it was loaded with descriptions of sad but often funny characters from Toronto’s underbelly. In spite of the seriousness of his work as a policeman and the hopelessness of many of those he had to arrest, he demonstrated a kindly concern. It was as if the best archetypical London Bobby had been transferred to Toronto without the accent. One would like to see a police force made up entirely of Hans Jewinskys.

Some time later Hans reported to me that some of his colleagues on the force mocked him as a pansy. It was as if writing poetry was a nod in the general direction of a homosexual lifestyle. Occasionally one of Hans’ superiors would call him in and say, “I’ve been told Jewinsky, that you write poetry. There’s this kindergarten class that would like a visit. You can give the kids some instruction about crossing the street and perhaps you can read some of your poems.” It saddened me, when Hans told me he would no longer submit anything for publication until he retired or otherwise left the police force.

John introduced open sessions to Bohemian Embassy audiences after the scheduled readers had finished their presentations. I remember the very first time Robert Priest appeared. The young man’s talent was obvious and I’m glad the Bohemian Embassy was there for a little encouragement. I felt as strongly about Robert’s first appearance as I had about Gwen MacEwen fifteen years before.

We had another method for getting people interested and participating. My old friend George Miller was living out of town but within commuting distance. We set him up with a poetry workshop. Twenty-five or thirty bright happy participants showed up regularly on Saturday afternoons and honed their literary skills. To my mind George as a performer was every bit the equal of Irving Layton or Leonard Cohen but my suspicions were also happily confirmed when it became obvious that he was a fine teacher as well.

Invariably about two thirds of the workshop’s members would have supper together and then show up for the evening events at the Bohemian Embassy. Rosemary Aubert would produce several volumes of poems, several Harlequin Romances and an award winning series of mystery novels. Many had books published and many more appeared in literary journals of one sort or another. A couple of fine writers in the persons of Maria Jacobs and Heather Cadsby founded a publishing company called Wolsak and Wynn. Other names of note were Julie McNeil, Eric Layman, Brian Purdy, Miseo Dean and Sharon Berg. Pier Georgio di Cicco would later succeed Dennis Lee as Toronto’s poet lauriate. Jerry Shikitani, Kent Bowman and Brenda Saunders all had readings.

John Colombo eventually found that running the reading series was a little too demanding. Other projects were niggling away at him for attention. He asked me if I could find a replacement. My first inclination was to ask George Miller to expand his
literary concerns to include programming the readings. George was commuting in from Fergus, Ontario on Saturdays, because he was employed there. My contract with Harbourfront had less than a year to go so I couldn’t guarantee long term employment to anyone.

A fellow waiting in the wings for John Robert Colombo’s job was Greg Gatenby. Greg had been brought to Harbourfront to run a small Art gallery in the York Quay building. He had been employed by McLelland and Stewart and his primary interest was in literature. His major champion on staff was Christine Yankou. Later Rosemary Enslin favoured Greg to replace Colombo who, himself seemed similarly inclined. While I demurred Roy Wordsworth joined the pro Gatenby faction. I wanted someone with greater personal accessibility, a warmer stage persona.

Greg took on a very daunting task. He believed that we could get into the Guinness Book of Records by staging the longest poetry reading. Because of some monitoring problems we failed to win but I saw that Greg had invested serious sweat in the venture. He was not afraid of hard work. I failed at that time to see the visionary aspect of Greg’s character. He would later put Toronto on the map with his annual International Author’s Festival. My concerns were myopic and parochial by comparison.

Every Wednesday at the Harbourfront Bohemian Embassy we staged an open evening. As organizer and MC I found it the most warring evening in the lot. We had a rule. You could do anything you wanted as long as you did it within five minutes. On stage five minutes can be an eternity and sometimes it was. I felt we should such an evening in hopes of making a few discoveries. But taking it all in all I hated doing that evening.

D.J. Hamilton had hired all of the hosts and hostesses who circulated on the grounds assisting people, moving chairs, setting up equipment for concerts etc. They were by and large drawn from university students looking for summer work. Among them was student from York University named Mark Breslin.

Someone had booked in a high dive act. A circular metal wall was bolted together and a plastic lining was inserted. A tall spindly ladder was then erected with lots of guy wires for support. The divers would climb up and stand on a ridiculously tiny platform and dive into this ridiculously small and ridiculously shallow pool.

The man who normally handled the announce duties for the group of divers got laryngitis. The replacement was Mark Breslin. As I was passing by Mark said, “Fred Farnsworth (not his real name) who is mounting the ladder, is one of only seven divers in the world who can make this particular dive from this height and he is the only one of those seven divers who has a mole on the inside of his right thigh.”

After my initial amusement I called Mark over. “Loved your work on the microphone,” I said, “What do you think our open evenings on Wednesdays?” “My favourite evening,” he replied. “Mark,” I said, “It’s yours.” He then said that he wanted a couple of conditions met. He wanted to have me book the best talent from eight Wednesday evenings to have a crack at a Friday evening with a large audience and standard payment. I was delighted and agreed whole heartedly. The evening would be Mark’s.

Roy Wordsworth and I discussed Mark’s obvious talents and Roy assigned Mark a regular series of week-ends for children’s activities. Later he took over some theatrical space for special events. His entrepreneurial skills were being honed. He was a natural.

As 1976 was progressing Roy Wordsworth, Christine Yankou, Rosemary Enslin and I began to question whether ‘Communication Design Limited’ might be facing a limited term at Harbourfront. I had already turned down a somewhat surreptitious

After I left Harbourfront it was very difficult for me to return and didn’t for some time. Alfie Scopp told me of a couple of British poets who were particularly entertaining. They were to appear at Greg’s now retitled Habourfront Reading series. I was rewarded by the poetry but saddened not to be involved. Greg announced that from now on there would be no more open readings after the hired readers. Robert Priest was in attendance and after a few words with Greg he picked up a metal folding chair and shied it at Greg. This is the way we should be getting rid of our aggressions and not in Holy wars of territory and oil. Poetry is something we should get heated about but not too much.

Some years later I heard Greg give an address at the Arts and letters Club. His stage personality had become warm and friendly in the intervening years. He could joke with the audience with ease. I hate it when I have been unfairly critical or dismissive of a worthy person. But as my friend Dave Harriman used to say, “I’m not immune from the occasional unforgivable blunder.”

It is my impression Greg had to get financial support from business and the community a job beyond my ability. If true he deserves even more kudos.

Classy

My music of preference is classical. My favourite is Johann Sebastian Bach. There was no budget for a full scale symphony orchestra and/or chorus so I couldn’t stage Mahler’s second symphony at the Bohemian Embassy. Some years prior to Harbourfront I had been selected to go to Ottawa with several other people in show business to advise the Canadian Radio and Television Commission on the future of FM broadcasting in Canada. Timothy McGee, a music professor from the University of Toronto was another panel member. Tim had just done a radio series on the CBC with Jan Tennant as staff announcer. We had a connection and he was an easygoing fellow, easy to like.

Tim, his wife Bonnie and I became friends and since Tim had formed a group of medieval and renaissance musicians called the Toronto Consort, I phoned him about a regular gig at my favourite coffee house. Lutes, crumhorns and sackbuts etc were heard in what until very recently had been warehouse space. When for various reasons the group had to curtail their appearances, I got some good people through Eli Kasner, Leona Boyd’s teacher. Norbert Kraft one of the all time great classical guitarists in Canada and Alan Toruk appeared. Alan played with a harpsichord accompaniment. I thought it would be an evening of too much plink but it worked a treat.

Dance Makers a modern dance company came to the Bohemian Embassy and was able to stage a fine evening. They left some of their lighting to be removed sometime later and it so happened that we had booked a group called Nexus the following night. It turned out to be one of the highlight performances of my life.

I had been made aware of the group by Jeanie MacDonald their promoter. One of the members was John Wire who was the timpanist with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. Jeanie was or soon would be married to John. I had also met a young American percussionist who became a Canadian for politico-moral reasons who was a member. Michael Craden and his wife Jerilyn were active in the musical and dramatic life of Toronto at the time. A part of the Nexus group was known to me at least but I had no idea how I would be overwhelmed by their virtuosity.

For the most part I have tried to make myself accessible to anybody with a creative bent but occasionally I goof. Towards the end of the Bohemian Embassy at Harbourfront George Miller introduced me to what looked like a waterfront reject. His teeth desperately needed a dentist’s attention. His wardrobe consisted of mismatched hand me downs. His voice suggested an over acquaintance with John Barleycorn. George told me the guy’s piano work was brilliant and normally I trusted George but I was a bit preoccupied. Later I bumped into Harold Clayton on Yonge Street. He took me over to a piano refurbishing workshop on Phipps Street and knocked my socks off. He took me on an improvised musical journey that was incredibly exciting. He reached into the body of the piano plucking the strings like a harp but maintaining the melodic integrity of the piece.

I was delighted to find out that Eberhardt Zeidler the internationally famous architect had taken an interest in Harold. I spent a wonderful evening at Mr. and Mrs. Zeidler’s with Harry Sommers and Barbara Chilcott listening to Harold’s improvisations. Harold Clayton seemed to be his own worst enemy. I set up a meeting with Warren Wilson and Srul Irving Glick at CBC. It was a disaster. Harold could become quite arrogant at times and coming as it did from such a curious fellow, it didn’t always sit well.

He had become quite friendly with Don DiNovo and acquired the use of an Anglican church on Christie Street. He spread around some hand made posters telling of a concert with himself at the organ and Don on Viola. I went and found myself an audience of one.
The music was really quite good but Harold was close to tears. After the intermission a
couple wandered in off the street but they didn’t stay. Sometimes it is easy to believe Toronto to be chock-a-block with Philistines but let’s face it Harold’s style of promotion wasn’t exactly Sol Hurok.

Clayton had been a founder of the Canadian Teillard de Chardin Society. In his youth he was a senate page in Washington. Harold came to me in some distress. He had run out of money but knew he could do well on the streets of Hamburg in Germany during the summer if only I would buy him a portable electric piano. He would pay me back happily at the end of the summer. I kissed a few hundred bucks goodbye. The following October I got a long distance call from Hamburg. Harold had been robbed and was destitute. I was unable to help him. I believe a Toronto friend John Negru helped him out. Harold appeared briefly in Toronto then went to New Orleans. I got a friendly call from there one day and then silence.

Harold had claimed that he was working on a large work for chorus, soloists and orchestra for the Washington Cathedral. If indeed he was and I am inclined to believe it, there may be something of considerable value in his effects

Sunday Comics

At the lighter end of things I was able to contribute a new kind of evening to the Bohemian Embassy crowd. Gene Taylor, a comedic whirlwind from Detroit had done some radio work in Toronto and had a fair amount of exposure on CITY TV. He made the first attempt at a standup comedy policy in a tavern as far as I know. He instituted stand-up comics at the Friars Tavern on Yonge Street. Unfortunately it was fairly short lived and nothing of any duration followed it. Roy and I decided to fill the vacuum. Every Sunday evening was dedicated to comedy.

It was one of the major successes of the Harbourfront edition of the Bohemian Embassy. There were rarely fewer than five hundred laughing and appreciative people jammed into our space. And an encouraging number of people were interested in doing sketches and monologues etc. Paul Willis and Michael Boncoeur (La Troupe Grotesque) appeared regularly. They would do a couple of radio series for CBC. Their series “Pulp and Paper” was a remarkable satire on various organs of the press and publishing.

A couple of comedic performers deserve special consideration. Paul Chatto and Rick Green. Through the recommendation of actor/director Robert (Bob) Christie I had directed RIOT an annual comedy revue for the Ryerson Institute in the Ryerson Theatre.

For the second year that I was supposed to direct it was decided that instead of one big night in the theatre we should do it cabaret style over many nights. At our first meeting I met student Paul Chatto. He was obviously talented. Unfortunately for me other duties were drawing me away from the Ryerson project. People in charge accepted my suggestion of Mark Breslin to take over directorial duties. Unfortunately for Paul Chatto’s contribution he didn’t see eye to eye with the direction the show was going and parted company.

Paul showed up at Harbourfront with his good buddy Rick Green. Peter Wildman and Dan Redikan would soon join the group called the Frantics. Their first together show went by quickly and in relative obscurity. They came to me after the Harbourfront Bohemian Embassy closed and asked me to direct a show in a Queen Street/Soho venue. I was delighted. The show had streaks of genius in it but the venue was unknown and the Frantics didn’t have the resources to promote it as it should. One thing was certain. I was a fan.

The Frantics did me a great honour. They asked me to join. The age difference came into my mind. I felt a little intimidated by their collected productivity. I felt too that the commitment would be tantamount to total. I was almost able to go there but not quite. I now believe I might have been able to make a contribution. When their CBC radio series hit the airwaves I was certain I had made the right decision. The scripts were tight. Going to a taping of the show at the Art College of Ontario was as good as a taping of the Air Force. In fact in my humble opinion the Air Force shows seemed to improve around that time…not that I didn’t love both groups.

When the Frantics had their television series I began to wish I was involved. Signs of genius were there but something seemed to be missing. It was not unlike the early Air Farce shows but it was a different kind of something missing. For some reason their show Four On The Floor was shot in a style reminiscent a children’s show produced by American puppeteers Sid and Marty Kroft. It just seemed to be off the mark for the material…very good but not great. By that time I had learned something from Wayne and Shuster.

The lads cobbled together a stage show and I traveled to Peterborough to surprise them. Later they did the show in Toronto in the Jane Mallet theatre which I had initiated years before with You’d Better Believe It. I went with my dear old partner Roy Wordsworth and his wife. Both Roy and I were acquainted with much of the Frantic’s vast hoard of material and felt that a somewhat better choice of sketches might have been made but what talent.

I was delighted when Dave Broadfoot agreed to come to the Harbourfront Bohemian Embassy and perform. Dave was well beyond the coffee House league at the time. Dave’s ego never got in the way of doing a kindly act for a friend and few performers enthuse more about a successful performance by someone who could be considered a rival.

The great barrel house Burlesque comedian Rummy Bishop also came down to Harbourfront and graced the Bohemian Embassy stage. Rummy’s cousin was Joey Bishop of ‘Ratpack’ (close companions of Frank Sinatra) fame. Rummy and Joey has an act called the Bishop Brothers. Joey was the straight man. Rummy made several appearances on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. Rummy had a long run engagement in Toronto telling jokes and introducing exotic dancers at Starvin’ Marvin’s striptease emporium on Yonge Street.

Insert Gary David and Frenchy McFarlane.

Back Stage

The internal politics at Harbourfront changed. From the beginning Joe Hatt-Cook had a running battle with the management people from the Department of Public Works. His advertising business was suffering from neglect. Joe consulted with me about having Roy Wordsworth act on his behalf. As a married man Roy was better suited to a nine to five schedule. He had been primarily concerned with Embassy contracts. Joe asked how I would feel having Roy as my boss, because he felt I should be asked first. I told him I was perfectly happy as a Program Director. I would be delighted if Roy was promoted to Program Manager for the entire site; though I had misgivings about poor Roy having to deal with some of the genuinely thorny problems that Joe would be passing on to him.

When Joe’s contract was coming to an end, we in the Programming Department were informed that we would all have to go on personal service contracts and have to answer to the Chief Executive Officer directly. The news was met with consternation. Would we all be scrabbling with one another to get a larger piece of the budget pie? How much control or interference could we expect from on high? To be sure most of the management people worked from nine to five and went home to their families. They had little experience with ground level concerns like the Bohemian Embassy or other evening activities. A vote was taken and the result was that most of the employees wished to avoid personal service contracts.

Four of us in the Programming Department formed a company called Communication Design Inc. Roy Wordsworth was acting Program Manager. Christine Yankou had been brought in by Joe to also concern herself with management. Rosemary Enslin was publicist for the Department and I had by far the most successful regular attraction, the Bohemian Embassy. We were getting in the neighbourhood of five hundred people every Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Wednesday and Thursday were quite healthy as well with one hundred and fifty to two hundred attending right through some pretty nasty days in Winter when the whole area was at its lonely bleakest. Busses at that time weren’t exactly frequent or promptly scheduled.

Leonard Poetski, a man from Halifax had been parachuted in to be CEO of Harbourfront. He knew very few people in Toronto. He had little choice but to deal with Communication Design. The excuse of personal contracting, which had been given to Joe Hatt-Cook to get rid of him, dissolved. Joe was not without friends in Ottawa. Leonard approached me with a very handsome offer to take over program management for the site. It was unthinkable. It would have meant replacing Roy. It would have looked bad to Joe. I would not have been able to have a hands-on relationship with the Bohemian Embassy, which is what I really loved. Leonard signed a one year contract with Communication Design. The Programming Department at Harbourfront remained intact with our mutual concerns.

At the end of our contract, Leonard informed us that we were out. He made a last ditch stand to keep the Bohemian Embassy. He told me that I would have to raise the money for the operation. Harbourfront would no longer foot the bill. I suggested that with the crowds we were getting, an entrance fee of five dollars would keep the place alive and healthy. He said that the board of directors had already determined that the space occupied by the Bohemian Embassy was to be an area for free events only. I was prevented from having a proper meeting to present my case directly to the board. Poetski said that the numbers generated by the Bohemian Embassy no longer counted. He suggested that there were cigarette manufacturers, who were looking for things to sponsor, because the government was cutting down their advertising. He also suggested beer companies and perhaps we could get a license. I reminded him that the Bohemian Embassy was a Coffee House.

Apart from the questionable morality of smoking and booze promotion at the Bohemian Embassy, I had never done a lick of fund raising. All the reasons for leaving compounded overwhelmingly. With a very heavy heart I closed the Harbourfront edition of the Bohemian Embassy.

I felt lousy. There were multiplied dozens of very talented performers for whom I now felt responsible. It was not as if the performers were totally dependent on Harbourfront employment but the work I was able to give them in some cases counted for a lot.

Between Acts

Some years prior to the demise of the Harbourfront Bohemian Embassy an excellent team of revue performers came in from Montreal. Rene Levesque had been in power and many Anglophones felt particularly unwanted at referendum time. Among this wonderful troupe was Gay Claitman, who had been a regular attendee at the original Bohemian Embassy. In fact Gay and I had teamed up on a few occasions writing for CBC radio and TV, always a comfortable collaboration. In addition there was an enormously clever improviser named Pat Conlon and two excellent performers called Roger Abbott and Don Ferguson. The group was under the leadership of two prolific British writer/performers named Martin Bronstein and John Morgan. Collectively they were the Jest Society. I must have attended their show at the Poor Alex Theatre a dozen times.

Martin Bronstein was particularly interested in live theatrical performances and had joined with Doug Sneyd, a cartoonist for Playboy magazine, who lived in Orillia, Ontario, to form the Leacock Festival of Humour. Roy and I were invited to participate as performers with our own selection of material. We followed another duo called La Troupe Grotesque, Paul Willis and Michael Boncoeur, a wonderfully outrageous act. With prerecorded striptease music plus the attendant whistles and excited yelps, Michael appeared nude on stage. He did a reverse strip and ended up dressed as a policeman, marched to the front of the stage, pointed at the audience and said, “You’re all under arrest for witnessing an obscene performance.

It was all too much for a small town Ontario audience. Parents looking frazzled were seen ushering their children up the aisle and out of theatre. The children just looked puzzled. Roy and I followed La Troupe with some gentle and thoughtful material and received thunderous applause out of relief if nothing else. The Rotary club immediately withdrew its support of the Festival. Martin Bronstein hung precariously to his job as Artistic Director but from that performance onward his days were numbered. After his second year Martin resigned. The Festival Board went on a head hunt. They asked Dave Broadfoot. The consummate performer had no desire to overcomplicate his life. He suggested me because of my long involvement with the Bohemian Embassy.

I was called by Doug Sneyd. Would I meet with him and his wife Shirley at the Tyroler Restaurant on Toronto’s Bay Street? I talked off the top of my head about a few of the changes I would recommend to the Festival’s approach. I assured him that my reputation with other members of the show business community was good but they would have to take on two artistic co-directors in the persons of Roy Wordsworth and myself or none. Beyond the Fringe had convinced me that Roy was a rare jewel, a thoroughly decent human being with great instincts and a capacity for handling detail well beyond my ken.
I presume that the Board of Directors of the Leacock Festival had not given Doug an expense account for the meeting. I ended up paying for the lunch. Bribery?

Before things progressed Roy and I asked Johnny Wayne what he thought of our heading up the Leacock festival of Humour. Johnny very graciously invited us up to his house to discuss the matter. His wife Bea served coffee and a dazzling plate of goodies while Johnny served us a feast of negatives about dealing with small town Ontario. It was quite discouraging and made us realize that we could not count on the deans of Canadian comedy for anything remotely like an appearance. It was sad that on that occasion at least Johnny Wayne sounded almost bitter. We did not pursue the matter with Frank Shuster. We knew Better.

A meeting in Orillia and Roy and I stated our case. We felt that Martin Bronstein had done a good job in establishing the Festival. What would we do differently? We would introduce music in terms of acts like Nancy White and a couple from Hamilton, Steve and Morag Smith. They had lots of satirical songs which would delight audiences and give us a little change of pace from the talk. Steve and Morag would soon have their own show on CHCH TV called Smith and Smith. Steve was showing signs of becoming a heavy weight writer of television comedy. He eventually teamed up with Rick Green of The Frantics and cobbled together The Red Green Show. Steve is Red.

The Board of Directors were concerned that we might bring back the dreaded Troupe Grotesque. We reluctantly said that we wouldn’t…at least not in the foreseeable future. We were hired. We piloted the Leacock Festival of Humour for the next seven years.
Roy and I brought back La Troupe Grotesque for a triumphal return to a heavily attended Cabaret presentation but not on the main stage at the Opera House. The notoriety of their first festival appearance insured a good turnout.

One day I received a phone call from Gary David one of my favourite stand-up comedians. “Don,” he asked, “Are you still Vice President of Yuk Yuk’s Comedy Clubs?” I replied that I thought so, although we hadn’t had an annual general meeting for some time. “Well,” he continued, “there is this promising young comic who was sent to Yuk Yuk’s in Montreal. After he had fulfilled his weeklong contractual obligations he went to another club about six miles on the other side of town.” Mark Breslin the President of Yuk Yuk’s decided that as punishment the comic could not get a booking in any Yuk Yuk’s outlet for the next three months. Gary told me that this seventeen year old kid came from a family which was practically destitute. Could I do anything on the young man’s behalf?

Mark was very polite but firm. He provided me with at least a half hour on his policy for dealing with the comics under his employ and his plans for maintenance and expansion. Perhaps I should have been more demanding. I tried the soft approach. He was just a young guy. The family was poor. Maybe he wasn’t fully aware of your policy. To be sure I was talking about an unknown quantity. I had never met the lad.

Reluctantly I called Gary David on the phone and apologized that I had essentially gotten nowhere. Since I had booked Gary to be part of the Leacock Festival, he asked me if we had room for another stand-up comic. “Have a look at the kid,” he said, “He’s playing at an independent club in the basement of a motel in Barrie Ontario.” The young comic had a winning personality but his material was a bit sophomoric, even high schoolish. He would certainly have sex appeal for younger patrons of the festival and we needed to build that audience. Another comic named Wayne Fleming was a tempting booking but when I considered Gary David’s plea I booked Jim Carrey for the available slot. If my memory serves me right I believe Mark Breslin reduced Jim’s time in Coventry.

Jim participated in ten performances in the Orillia Opera house (800 seats) and turned out to be a fine opening act. His mom and dad and his sister came to see him perform. It is particularly gratifying for me because his mother was not well and would never see her son attain the heights. His father would at least see Jim on network TV in the United States. His sister would of course see Jim attaining the heights of Hollywood. He was the first actor to get twenty million bucks for a film.

A few years later I got a phone call from a film maker named Tony Kramreiter a not inappropriate name because he said in an urgent way, “Don, can you write a feature film in three weeks?” I replied that nobody could write a feature film in three weeks, certainly not a good one. He said it was a tax dodge for some investors and the entire project had to be in the can by year end.

Roy Wordsworth and I met with Tony and in one evening we mapped out the entire film. There were no more than three sentences to describe each scene. Roy took the odd numbers and I took the even numbers. Tony got his script in time. Roy came up with the title, “But All In Good Taste”.

Jonathan Welsh took the lead role. Tony phoned in a panic. Did we know a young actor who could play the role of Jonathan’s side-kick? We immediately thought of Jim. Tony phoned me, “Don where did you find this kid Jim Carrey? He’s crazy. I don’t want to give him lines.” I tried to pacify Tony and Jim continued to do the film. Some years later I met Tony on Yonge Street. After the usual pleasantries Tony said, “Don, do you remember that kid Jim Carrey? I saw him on an American network show recently and he was very good. Why didn’t you tell me?”

His sister would of course see Jim attaining the heights of Hollywood. He was the first actor to get twenty million bucks for a film.

For the establishment of any festival you need high profile personalities until the festival becomes an institution. Martin Bronstein had used Dave Broadfoot and Don Harron. We knew that Wayne and Shuster were out of the loop and that Gordie Tapp had maintained a rather low profile in recent years. This meant a heavy reliance on Don and Dave. Both were hugely co-operative and supportive of our efforts. Our situation was pretty close to unique. From the research we were able to do the only other Humour Festival in the world at that time was in Bulgaria. My friend John Robert Colombo did a search and told me of our almost uniqueness. Happily that situation has changed and people in Montreal have established a world class festival. It’s a little more than one can expect from Orillia with all its good intentions.

By this time the Royal Canadian Air Farce was well established on CBC Radio. John Morgan was the leader of the pack with increasingly strong writing support from Roger Abbott and Don Ferguson. John was profoundly Welsh. Don and Roger hailed from Montreal. Luba Goy was an Ottawa girl who could take on a variety of roles. Roy and I were well acquainted with the Air Farce and individually with its component parts. In fact Roy and I had been included in the initial talks before the radio series started but with a limited budget they decided to retain their Jest Society matrix of John, Roger, Don and Luba plus an already established star in the person of Dave Broadfoot.

It was natural for us to invite The Farce to participate at the Leacock Festival. They had become major players on the Canadian Comedy scene and they were buddies. We had Billy Meek, the Scottish-Canadian comic, Rummy Bishop who had been part of the Bishop Brothers with his cousin Joey Bishop who was the straight man in the duo. Rummy had made several appearances with Johnny Carson on the To-Night Show.

After seven years of making trips to Orillia for board meetings, negotiating with performers, making the necessary arrangements both Roy and I thought it best to pass on the situation onto someone else. Getting headliners was becoming difficult. Dave Broadfoot and Don Harron had according to some board members had been used too frequently. Wayne and Shuster wouldn’t do it. Johnny Wayne had some gripe regarding the Leacock medal for humour writing besides the lads were very demanding regarding all the support mechanisms which might be involved. Johnny could hardly go back on his advice to Roy and me not to get involved. To his credit Johnny was always very solicitous in asking how each year of the Festival had gone and seemed very supportive of Dave Broadfoot, Don Harron and GordieTapp.

The last year at the Leacock Festival was very distressing. We made the usual compliment of a half dozen or more trips but we never had a quorum show up to a single one of the meetings. It seemed that some of the more enthusiastic supporters from past seasons had lost their enthusiasm and new blood seemed wanting. We had come to the end of a contract and we did not seek to renew it in spite of entreaties from board members.

The Festival as Roy and I had fashioned it ceased to exist. We felt that the Festival required headline performers like Harron, Broadfoot and Tapp. In fact the last year we were in Orillia we did without a high profile individual star and suffered at the box office. It is hard to know when a festival can cease being a personality and can start being an institution. Anglophone Canada at the time had very few comedy stars. Wayne and Shuster were unavailable to us and Roy and I never considered asking the lads to come as a personal favour to us. Some of the folk in Orillia complained that Dave and Don were over exposed and that Gordie Tapp had been out of the limelight for too long.

We knew and loved the SCTV crowd but they had dispersed. When I was married to Janet Inksetter we had socialized with John Candy and his lady but John was making headway in the United States. Besides even if the SCTV cast was available we wouldn’t be able to afford them. They would have had to get material and rehearse it. The Frantics had played the festival but they were pretty well ready to go. There were just four of them. The same was true of the Air Farce.

I tried one year to get Danny Aykroyd. Dan sent me a note saying that headlining the Leacock Festival would be his top priority in his summer away from Saturday night Live. He was working with John Belushi on an act called the Blues Brothers. He would get in touch with me in February. I tried several times in February and into March to get in touch but no luck.

It was several years before I saw Dan again. It was when I was doing another production of Beyond the Fringe at Toronto’s Bayview Playhouse. I had heard Dan was in town and I left a note at a night club in which he had some financial interest. On opening night at the playhouse about fifteen minutes before curtain we heard a thumping at the back stage door. Dan and I had a huggy reunion and he promised to come and see the show the following Tuesday. He would bring some customers. I set aside a row of seats which remained empty on the evening. As of this writing it has been sadly more than thirty years.

I must tell you about Mary McFadyen. I first encountered Mary as a neighbour when Jan Tennant and I were living on Selby Street. She and her CBC radio producer husband Hector and their children Sandy and Christy lived a couple of doors away. Hector had been a wonderkind at CBC Halifax. Soon he would leave CBC Toronto to write for the Globe and Mail Newspaper. I am grateful to his memory for the glowing support he gave to the Bohemian Embassy. Mary eventually went to the CBC as a script assistant on a radio show entitled Countdown. Al Maitland was the host and I did co-hosting duties and was contributing writer.

Mary left CBC for a while and Joined Religious Television Associates. It was the 1960’s and Pope John 23rd looked with warmth on the world. The Catholic Church actually joined with the Anglican and United churches to produce a show on the CTV network called Spectrum. I got a call from Mary. Would I consider doing a TV show of religious satire? “But Mary I’m a card carrying agnostic.” “Father Stone and the reverend Desmond McCalmont don’t care.” With contributing writing from Dave Harriman and Geoffrey Hine I wrote ‘The Flying Agnostics’ for broadcast on Spectrum. It won a Gabriel Award from the National Association of Roman Catholic Broadcasters of America. It could not happen today with the religious climate as it is.

When Mary returned to the CBC as a full fledged radio producer she suggested the Bohemian Embassy radio show and we did it. John O’Leary was assigned as staff announcer and I would host. The Parliament Street studios would be our home and we could have a studio audience. It gave me an opportunity to have such guests as John Robert Colombo, George Miller, and the now world famous Margaret Atwood along with a variety of folk music talent. We couldn’t afford Rob McConnel’s Boss Brass but we did get Rob with his quartet. I would like to have gotten the now internationally famous percussion group Nexus but was able to get Michael Craden’s eclectic group called the I Ching.

During the dying months of the Bohemian Embassy at Harbourfront I had an idea to continue the comedy aspects of the Embassy. Could Toronto sustain a Comedy Club? What about “The Comedian Embassy?” There was a place on Belair Street in the Yorkville area already called the Embassy Tavern. Below it there was the Palm Grove Lounge with a seating capacity of several hundred. The rights to the room’s function were in the hands of a television writer whose partner had been in a production of Spring Thaw. I had been head writer (basically writing coordinator) in that 1968 production.

That connection didn’t avail me much. He just didn’t show up for meetings. I had even hired my friend Patty Bates a television personality from Ottawa to help things to get going but alas to no avail. I felt I had to drop the project.

By that time of course Mark Breslin had been promoted to the position of Program Director like myself. A year and a half after the demise of the embassy at Harbourfront Mark got in touch with me and asked how I felt about his starting a Comedy Club. He would start it in a community centre at 519 Church Street, a very modest beginning in a basement room which had been a bowling alley.

Mark alternately rejoiced and agonized through a swim of good and bad presentations of a surprising number of would be standup comics. Eventually he felt secure enough to consider a proper commercial outlet. The name he had already selected was not the Comedian Embassy but “Yuk Yuk’s.” Would I invest? Of course. Would I become Vice President? Oh, OK thank you very much.

As a Veep I wasn’t very effective. I agonize too much when a performer is doing poorly and tended to stay away. It means you are not on hand and not participating. Mark quite rightly came to me about being replaced. I was relieved.

More than one of the American comedy club entrepreneurs has graciously accepted kudos for their great contributions to the craft, when a performer couldn’t get a free cup of coffee let alone payment at their venues. Mark realized from the very beginning the importance of financial encouragement.

After Harbourfront Roy Wordsworth and I had the Leacock Festival to worry about and we continued with Johnny Wayne and Frank Shuster. Numerous other bits and pieces came and went. We did a film for the Ontario Department of Highways. We wrote it together and I played Ebaneezer Scrooge while Roy did some of the producing and directing.

By 1991 I was itching to start another edition of the Bohemian Embassy. 318 Queen Street West on the second floor seemed to be ideal space. Heating and air conditioning were for all intents and purposes were non-existent. It would turn out to be a nastier problem than I would have predicted. I had a good friend in the person of Dan O’Reilly a graduate of the Ontario College of Art. He was a jack of all trades from construction to minor plumbing to stage management, lighting and sound. I had saved up forty thousand dollars and wished to go it alone financially. But more of that later…

One serious concern was the literary sub culture of Toronto. The Harbourfront series was continuing under the excellent guidance of Greg Gatenby but open readings were no longer a part of those sessions and Greg was dealing mostly with prose, fiction and some non-fiction. If you had a successful book you might have a chance of exposure there. New talent and even successful small press authors were unlikely presenters at Harbourfront. There was a place for us.

The Bohemian Embassy Fourth Edition (Literary)

Anita Keller was an American who had come up to Toronto to work and live. My first encounter with her was when George Miller and I went to a reading series at the Pape Avenue Library. The situation was not the best. Book shelves got in the way and near closing time the custodian would come in and sit with a hangdog look and check his watch with inordinate frequency. Anita stewed and worried about the reading series like a mother hen. Anita then made a giant leap to a large room at the Central Circulating Library downtown on Yonge Street.

She embraced the new space and created an atmosphere which was both intimate and expansive. As with her earlier venue, she encouraged people to participate in the open reading portion of her program. Her hosting was humble without being obsequious. She would draw the sequence of names fro a hat for at least the look of fairness but I don’t believe she was above relegating some of the more dreary or obsessive poets to the end of the evening wherein time constraints intervened. She was a pretty good diplomat.

Another person whom I thought might be a good curator for the upcoming Bohemian Embassy series was Carol Malyon. Carol was the sort of person who made you feel good not matter where you encountered her. She was always delighted to see you. She had been the owner of a fine little book store on Queen Street East in the Beach area of Toronto. When there was very little else in the way of readings going on, Carol sponsored her own series at the book store. It was small and cramped but the featured readers always received a fine book for their personal libraries. The readings were lively and Carol was welcoming.

Carol didn’t seem interested in piloting the new series but Anita did. That eased what might have been a difficult decision to make. In fact Anita wished to be more closely associated with the whole operation and in retrospect I should have supported her. She was more current than I was. The reading series which she headed up was one of the prouder aspects of the 1991 Queen Street edition of the Bohemian Embassy.

The new reading series was run with a thoroughgoing professionalism. Young poets like Robert Priest illustrated their emerging genius along with old timers like the pried of Ameliasburg, Al Purdy. Rumpled and tweedy and thoroughly masculine Al’s readings were always a treat. A young writer named Brian Purdy learned from his mother that his father was Al. Suddenly he realized that there might be some genetic component to his literary inclinations. The story I got was that he made an unannounced trip to Al’s rural domicile. He knocked on the door and when Al answered Brian said, “My name is Brian Purdy and I believe I am your son.” The storied reply was that Al said, “In that case, I guess you’d better come in.”

Robert Priest had participated in an evening along with a poet named Robert Sward and another named Robert Zend. Robert Zend had died and Robert Sward had returned to the country of his birth the USA. When Robert Sward came for a visit to Toronto it was decided to present another evening of the three Roberts with John ROBERT Colombo replacing the deceased Robert Zend. It was an enormously satisfying evening and a highlight event in that reading series.

The greatest event in that year was when Margaret Atwood launched her book Wilderness Tips from the Queen street Bohemian Embassy. It was a hot sticky summer afternoon with the usual wine and finger food. The press was in attendance aplenty and after those formalities abated she did a reading for the public in our space. I was very grateful. It had the feeling of completing a circle. There must have been close to four hundred folk cheek by jowl in the place. It was probably the most affirming event we ever had.

I had not done sufficient homework about the changes at street level performance. In the 1960’s musicians couldn’t wait to get into the Union. It seemed to give their work legitimacy. A delegation had gone up to Union headquarters and lobbied for coffee house scale because we couldn’t compete in income with places who sold alcohol. By the early ninety’s the Union had lost a great deal of power and membership. Most acts didn’t even have union contracts. Much was done on a handshake.

Postering had become cut throat. Put up a poster and within ten minutes it was covered by another. Individual acts had their own followers. There was a tendency to higher the more popular acts and less concern for the new comers. Standardly the act would want half the door. It was the bar policy. It was expected of the Bohemian Embassy. Bars marked up their drinks considerably. In 1991 there was a limit to what you could charge for a cuppa. In a bar you might be lucky enough to sell three, four or even five drinks for a customer. It was just easier for bars to pay the rent and the talent.

Many folk acts are really too gentle to play in bars. As an evening progresses or perhaps a better word is regresses, the noise level gets louder. Let’s face it the first characteristic of a bar band is that it be loud. I shudder to think where Sharon and Bram would have been if they had been thrown into bars when they started out. In those days they were not children’s performers but the material they did was of a gentle and thoughtful variety. Sharon did antiwar and otherwise gentle songs. Bram had a British friend named Adrian Harmon and interested in Restoration folk material from around the time of Charles the second. As it happened they found an outlet for their talents and monetary encouragement at the Bohemian Embassy.

In 1960 liquor licenses were hard to get so coffee houses had a chance. By ’91 Toronto had a large number of licensed establishments. The Bohemian Embassy was in a far more competitive climate.

Folk

One intention which I had with the folk music activities at the Queen Street venue was a revival of the hootenanny. It had been such a great success with the first Bohemian Embassy. Initially it was done in cooperation with the Toronto Folk Guild. This time I wanted to join with Mariposa. It seemed to me that their festival needed something because attendance was down and each year during the early nineties it was nip and tuck as to its survival. I made the offer of a fifty/fifty split of the door but the offer was misunderstood and the Mariposa executive had other more pressing problems. It never happened.

Years before Mariposa had a banner year. Joni Mitchell, James Taylor…even Bob Dylan came by. Ticket sales were overwhelming. I was with the artistic director Estelle Klein when a whole gang of teen-agers were jumping into one of the lagoons in the Toronto Islands in order to gain free access to the festival. Estelle was mortified not about the youngsters getting in free but about the possibility of drowning. She was well aware that booze or drugs might be involved when the swimmers believed they had more control than they really did.

The big evening concert included an Ontario group called The Perth County Conspiracy. In with all these heavyweight performers local and imported they acquitted themselves most nobly. I thought their work extraordinary. Their group had formed around a kind of commune in Perth county near Stratford. Harry Findlay was involved because of his coffee house in Hamilton and later at Stratford. Cedric Smith performed there and I saw him doing some material from Beyond the Fringe mixed with musical numbers. Cedric later joined with some other musically minded Conspirators to form The Perth County Conspiracy and they were excellent.

I got in touch with Cedric in ’91 about getting the Conspiracy on stage again. Cedric was in the middle of a very successful acting career but liked the idea of playing at the Bohemian Embassy. Along with Terry Jones (not of Monty Python) and a young talented bass guitar played newcomer named David Woodhead, Perth County contributed several superb evenings. They always delighted me.

Terry Jones approached me with an idea. His son had a rock group at Jarvis Collegiate high school. There had been a battle of the bands and Jones the younger’s group had won. Would I consider having them play for the usual fifty per cent? I had the usual kinds of trepidation like smuggled booze, possible drugs and concerns about crowd control. My fears were utterly groundless. The students who showed up in full quantity were polite and courteous. They were a pleasure to have in the place. Musically they were mellow and tuneful…a joy.

Had I had more resources and energy I would have pursued other secondary schools because it was obvious that both talent and market were there. With the approach of summer such plans become untimely. But where better than the Bohemian Embassy…no booze. In 1966 I had ruled out Rock and Roll and I now believe unfairly.

A group of young lads calling themselves Moxie Fruvous came by for a chat. I liked them and set up an evening for them. I wanted them to start at the latest at 8:30. They said that none of the clubs started that early. None the less this was a coffee house and I had different plans. By eight thirty I was beginning to be upset. They should have been there at eight for setup. They started to straggle in after nine and there was a somewhat restless audience waiting. I hated their attitude to punctuality. At CBC radio you wouldn’t dare take such a casual attitude. I felt that I was no longer bound by the fifty percent agreement. They knew that they were short changed and after a couple of weeks I capitulated. I hate it when performers take a cavalier attitude to such things as lateness. The talent in Moxie Fruvous deserved better.

A group of curiously independent singers and instrumentalists who called themselves Union Station came to the Queen Street Embassy. Some of them were involved with music at Timothy Eaton Memorial church and had a considerable classical music background. I was amazed at the various combinations and permutations of their members who delighted our audiences. They appeared several times. I wish I could have encouraged them more. They deserved it but like many of these groups the motivation for continuing gets lost to greener pastures sometimes in radically different pursuits.

Anita Keller did a bit of research and introduced Jessica and Thandie a vocal duo. Thandie was of South African origin and Jessica Caucasian but their blend was gorgeous and the result very musical. They again seemed to dissolve into obscurity.

I was delighted that Tom Kelly from Hamilton was still active in folk music. He came and performed to a shamefully small audience. David Smout a guy who really got turned on by folk music at the Harbourfront edition maintained contact with Tom. I believe he got him hooked up with Gene MacLellan. Gene was the genius who among other hit songs wrote Snowbird and Put Your Hand in the Hand, which Anne Murray made famous. After Carol Robinson died Roy Wordsworth and I decided to stage a tribute to Carol with the proceeds going to Performing Arts Lodge. Denny Doherty of the Mamas and the Poppas had always been a good friend of Carols and at one time dated Carol’s best friend Dodie Smith. He really wanted to participate with fellow maritimer Gene MacLellan. The two of them teamed up with Kelly and did a set to knock your sox down. I got to know Gene and socialized with him for a short time before he returned home to Summerside, P.E.I. This kindly, gentle self effacing man must have some serious problems. His death in 1995 was attributed to suicide.

After the Robinson tribute I lost touch with Tom Kelly but I would like to see him at Mariposa some day.

There was an attractive girl from Ottawa who played on a few occasions. Her name was Lynn Myles. If anyone seemed destined for greater things she was. Her songs were terrific and her presentation more than likeable. I was pleased that she occupied a major spot in the Mariposa Festival ’07.

I am really proud of the fact that we were able to have the talent of Colleen Peterson to grace our stage. She was related to David Peterson who was Premier of Ontario. Shelly Peterson, his wife appeared at Harbourfront. I first encountered Colleen in Winnipeg at Mitch Podolak’s Winnipeg Folk Festival. Peter Gzowski and I were co-hosting the evening concerts when an American folk Icon tore up the stage and left the audience screaming with delight. Poor Colleen would have to follow this incredible act. We all had our fingers crossed but she went out, grabbed hold of the energy and took the audience to new heights. It was a fantastic achievement for a normally gentle performer.

The folk community of Toronto was devastated when cancer took her, none more so than Sid Dolgay (of Travellers fame) who had managed part of her early career when she was part of Three’s a Crowd with Brent Titcombe and David Wiffen.