The Gazette from Montreal, Quebec, Canada • 20

Irreverent Irrera plays Soda Dom Irrera, a hit at last summer's Just for Laughs festival in Montreal, will unwind on stage Nov. 12 and 13 at Club Soda. A frequent guest on the David Let-terman Show, the rr.otormouth comedian from Philadelphia is best known for his wicked character impressions and a battery of killer one-liners. Irrera performs Nov. 12 and 13 at 8 p.m.

at Club Soda. Tickets cost $17.50 and are available at the Club IrreraHas battery of one-liners t.i-1.; I toaxaa. tjGEB 1 Soda box office (5240 Park Ave.) and Admission outlets. For reservations, call 270-7848 or 790-1245. -BHIBrownstein Quebec star opens for Madonna Still hot from his Felix award for Pop Album of the Year, Mario Pelchat is about to reach heat of volcanic temperatures.

Madonna has chosen Pelchat to open for her Olympic Stadium show this Saturday. Pelchat won the award three days ago for his eponymous album. (Don't bother with the dictionary: it means the album was called Mario Pelchat.) Pelchat's next appearance in Montreal will be at the Spectrum, Nov. 17 and 18. He said he was "excited to be able to share the stage with such a superstar and have a unique chance to play in front of 52,000 people." And it won't hurt either.

Frangois Girard's Gould pic garners seven nominations JOHN GRIFFIN GAZETTE MOVIE CRITIC f. i 1 KS 1 4 1 I 5 rf 1 1 t- iT 4 1 rA Fellini given grim assessment ROME Doctors gave grim assessments yesterday about the prospects for recovery of film director Fed-erico Fellini, and one physician said Fellini would suffer some brain damage even if he emerged from his Fellini; 73, went into a coma Sunday after suffering a heart attack and respiratory problems. He had been undergoing therapy for a stroke suffered in August. "The point of no return is approaching. The situation does not allow for excessive hopes," Dr.

Gianfran-coTurchetti said outside Rome's Polyclinic Hospital. He added that if Fellini recovers, "There will be a decrease in brain function." Dr. Maurizio Bufi, chief of the hospital's intensive care unit, said it was unlikely Fellini would regain consciousness. Fellini won Academy Awards for La Strada (1954), The Nights of Cabiria (1957), (1963) and Amarcord (1973). This year, he received a special Oscar for lifetime achievement.

Street to be renamed for Brown AUGUSTA, Ga. An Augusta street may be rechris-tened for James Brown, the Godfather of Soul, it seems. Atom Egoyan, for Calendar, and Sandy Wilson, for Harmony Cats. Best supporting actor honors will go to Yvan Canuel of La Florida, Jim Byrnes of Harmony Cats, Kevin Tighe of I Love a Man, Christopher Plummer for Impolite, or Tobie Pelletier for Le Sexe des Etoiles. Supporting actress choices The battle for best supporting actress is between Nicola Cavendish, of John Pozer's independent Montreal film The Grocer's Wife; Charlotte Fernetz of Harmony Cats; Brigitte Bako of I Love a Man; Sylive Drapeau for Sex des Etoiles; Celine Bonnier for Tectonic Plates; and Kate Hennig for Thirty-Two Short Films.

Nominees for best feature-length documentary include Forbidden Love The Unashamed Stories of Lesbian Lives; Stepping Razor -Red Titanica; Twist; and Une Enfance a Natashquan. Breaking a Leg Robert Lepage and the Echo Project, and Esther Valliquette's Le Singe Blue are eligible for best short documentary. These and other nominees in a total of 18 Genie categories are selected by 125 leading Canadian film authorities, from a total of 47 eligible features, documentary and short films. Award for first feature film In a year of innovations, a major addition this year is the Claude Jutra Award for Direction of a First Feature Film. Nominees include Harvey Cross-land for The Burning Season, David Hauka for Impolite, Michel Langlois for Cap Tourmente, Nicholas Kendall for Cadillac Girls, John Pozer for The Grocer's Wife, Johanne Pregent for Les Amoureuses, Paul Shapiro for The Lotus Eaters, and Robert Turner for Digger.

Another innovation is the decision to telecast the ceremony live on the French-language Radio-Canada network, from 7:30 p.m. to 10 p.m., in Radio-Canada's Studio 42. CBC will telecast a one-hour, English-language edition of the Genies at 10 p.m. A long pattern of cultural migration is reversed when the Toronto-based Canadian film industry Genie Awards ceremony is held in Montreal for the first time in its 14-year history, on Dec. 12.

English Canadian films The Lotus Eaters and Harmony Cats lead the 1993 nominations with 1 1 each, followed by Quebec films Le Sexe des Etoiles and La Florida with eight apiece. The acclaimed Thirty-Two Short Films About Glenn Gould, by Montreal director Francois Gi-rard, has seven nominations, while I Love a Man in Uniform, directed by another Montrealer, David Wellington, is eligible in six categories. All but I Love a Man in Uniform are up for best picture. Happy to have awards in city "I'm extremely proud the Genies are coming here for the first time," said national Genie vice-president and Quebec section head David Novek after a standing-room-only press conference yesterday. "Montreal has been the heart of the Canadian film industry for a long time.

It's appropriate the ceremony pay tribute to our great film-makers and technicians." Montrealers also make their presence felt in individual categories this year. Roy Dupuis and Gilbert Sicotte are nominated for best actor for Cap Tourmente, and Remy Girard is up for La Florida. They join Tom McManus for I Love a Man in Uniform. R.H. Thomson for The Lotus Eaters, and Colm Feore for Thirty-Two Short Films About Glenn Gould.

Cap Tourmente's Elise Guilbault and Andree Lachapelle share best-actress nominations. Pauline La-pointe is eligible for La Florida, while both Sheila McCarthy and newcomer Aloka McLean are nominated for their work in The Lotus Eaters. Another tight linguistic race is for best director, where La Florida's George Mihalka, Paule Bail-largeon of Sexe des Etoiles and Francois Girard are up against Renaming the street in his hometown will add to his collection of honors. He already has a star, a bridge and a state proclamation. A portion of Augusta's Ninth St.

in an area where Brown (Papa's Got a Brand New Bag, I Got You) developed some of his dance moves may soon be renamed James Brown Blvd. The change awaits city council approval at a Nov. 3 meeting. Mayor Charles DeVaney thinks it's a done Brown Ninth St is Mis GAZETTE, JOHN MAHONEY Dawn Robinson (left) and Terry Ellis, half of the pop-soul quartet En Vogue, open for the father of smooth, Luther Vandross, last night at the Forum. Vows, Vandross, In ope loverman, funky divas fulfil promises MARX LEPAGE GAZETTE ROCK CRITIC Luther Vandross with En Vogue and Lewis DU at the Forum Theatre last night.

deal because Brown has lots of fans on the 12-mem-bef council. Brown, 59, has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and a bridge was recently named after him in Colorado. The state of Georgia issued a proclamation in Brown's honor 1991. -James Brown, through good times and bad times, has' always been complimentary for Augusta," DeVaney said Monday. "He has never failed to benefit the'community." One council member wasn't so sure.

Councilman Gerald Woods cited the singer's criminal record two years in prison for assault, weapons and traffic charges -as a problem. Hopes to lead Christmas Parade LOS ANGELES Bob and Dolores Hope are taking the road to the Hollywood Christmas Parade together. The couple, who have been married for nearly 60 years, will be co-grand marshals of the Nov. 28 parade. "All the world loves a parade, and equally, all the world loves Bob and Dolores Hope," Johnny Grant, honorary mayor of Hollywood, said Monday.

Past grand marshals include Jimmy Stewart, Sammy Davis Arnold Schwarzenegger, Charlton Hes-ton and Tom and Roseanne Arnold. To paraphrase a great poet, Luther Van-dross had no choice: he was born with the gift of a golden voice. Add the discipline to use it for good, not evil, and the charisma to woo the masses, and there are few things that can't be accomplished in the live arena. Luther Vandross promised more than 4,000 fans they would "get somethin' in here tonight that you can't get no place else." Promise was the key verb. Twelve years into a career as premiere loverman, where the competition should be as fierce and unmerciful as that faced by a star quarterback, and Vandross is still completing the passes.

New Jacks and the boyz becoming men rightly call him sir. Best of all for the fans dressed to the elevens in anticipation, Vandross faced a stiff challenge from his opening act. It may have taken four women to warm up his stage, but En Vogue delivered energy and comprehensiveness that would have sent any other headliner limping back to the hotel bar. Dawn Robinson had the curly hair and the handle on Something He Can Feel. Maxine Jones was the sultry one with Tina's 'do.

Terry Ellis worked slow soul in pageboy, and Cindy Herron filled out the balance of the four-part vocalese. If "funky divas" seemed a clunker of a title when it entered the pop lexicon last year, it fit like a skintight red ball gown last night. They put on the year's best Forum opening set, a solid hour of costume changes, slickly disguised by four male dancers who entertained without cloying. A three-piece band left guitar to the keyboardist, and if the sound was thinner than the albums (and shriller in the high end), that was because we were at a live show. The albums you've got at home.

Calling one male fan up onstage for a work-over was worth the price of admission. Jones, Ellis and Robinson sat Andre in the middle of the stage and made mincemeat of him, ending up in his lap and bringing the house down and his ardor, no doubt, up. Vandross knew what he was up against. After all, he signs the checks. It's a big wallet.

The stage was bare if a glowing, flashing, Vegas-UFO of a stage can be called bare -and Vandross took it with Power of Love. The power, range and texture of his voice, a voice to wrap around or sink into, remain unparalleled in the genre; maybe in pop. His material doesn't match it, but Vandross could sing Sarajevo into a ceasefire. The production, with five backup singers in sequined white outfits and the band tucked in the pit, spared no frill. The only thing Vandross didn't do was pick up the check for his bigtime romance, but his dates got their money's worth.

rV i 'J 41" Imit-il iwiiniir- LllllMl.tf-wrl't'' Colm Feore is nominated lor best actor for his work in Thirty-Two Short Films About Glenn Gould, by Montreal film-maker Francois Girard. Plamondon opera headlines fifth FrancoFolies PAUL DELEAN THE GAZETTE Child-custody cases on Man Alive Gazette TV critic Mike Boone picks the best of tonight's programs: Man Alive (CBMT-6 at Report on painful child-custody cases. Live From Lincoln Center (ETV-33, WCFE-57 at 8): Chamber music by Mozart, Mendelssohn, Debussy, Corigliano. Great Performances (ETV-33 at 10): Documentary on the Chicago Symphony's music director transition, from Sir Georg Solti to Daniel Barenboim. Golden Age of the Piano (WCFE-57 at 10): Clips of great ivories-ticklers, including Horowitz, Rubinstein, Serkin.

Hcdda (ETV-33 at 11): Glenda Jackson stars in 1975 Royal Shakespeare Co. production of Hedda Gabler. Arsenlo Hall (CFCF-12 at midnight): Guests are Maya Angelou and that other poet, Lenny Kravitz. Salmonberrles (CBMT-6 at 1 a.m.): K.D. Lang stars in a love story.

Ben Hur (CFCF-12 at 1 a.m.): Epic won 1 1 Oscars, a Full prime-time schedule. PageB5. This year's major draws, known as the duMaurier series at Theatre St. Denis, include the Brel tribute (featuring dancer Margie Gillis and singers Claude Dubois, Paul Piche Michel Rivard and Jean Lcloup) on Nov. 26, rocker Laurence Jalbert on Nov.

27. Also: Edith Butler and special guests Zaehary Richard and Catherine Lira on Nov. 28. Jonasz on Nov, 29, Yves Duteil on Dec. 1, Rcggiani on Dec.

2. Vcronique Sanson on Dec. 3 and Les Romantiques, featuring Lara, Sanson and others from the soundtrack album, Dec. 4. Tickets for all the shows go on sale Saturday morning.

For ticket or scheduling information, call 871-1881. Daniel Laurence Jalbert, Dan Bigras, Richard Stfguin, Richard Des-jardins and they all played the FrancoFolies." Among the chosen this year arc recent Felix winners Vilain Pingouin, BcTangcr and Les Colocs, as well as Joe Bocan, Rude Luck and Bigras. One of the major productions will be a Christmas concert by pianist Andre4 Gagnon with a 30-piece orchestra at Eglise St. Jean Baptiste on Dec. 2.

New to the FrancoFolies lineup are two children's concerts, to be performed by Carmen Campagne at L'Olympia Nov. 27 and 28 at 3 p.m. A free ticket is available with the purchase of a regularly priced ticket for any concert at the Spectrum, L'Olympia or St. Denis. than $2 million this year, provides an important entry point to the Quebec market for outside acts.

In addition to France and Belgium, musicians from Switzerland, Uganda, Haiti, Algeria and Madagascar will be represented. Showcase for bookings abroad It's also a showcase for Quebec acts to exhibit their talents to journalists, record-company executives and booking agents from abroad. "All the major promoters and record companies come to the I'rancol'olies now," Simurd said. "A record number of Quebec artists have made inroads in 1 ranee the last two years people like The Quebec premiere of Luc Plam-ondon's rock opera Les Romantiques, long-awaited local appearances by French singers Michel Jonasz and Serge Rcggiani and a Jacques Brel tribute concert are among the main events of the fifth FrancoFolies de Monlrdal. The annual festival of French music from around the world will feature more than 100 artists in 50 concerts, to held Nov.

28 through Dec. 4 at a half-dozen local halls including Theatre St. Denis, L'Olympia and the Spectrum. Organizer Alain Siimird said the event, whose annual budget has snowballed from an initial $300,000 to more.