The Ottawa Journal from Ottawa, Ontario, Canada • Page 21

Ottawa Journal Monday, February 7, 1977 -21 EE Finally, Canadian film goes show-biz By Frank Daley many Ln in the cottage movie motion and marketing. Journal Film Critic Industry in Canada is that we Part of the fault lies with the One of the reasons we don't have don't spend enough money on pro- media who wait until a film Is rr for sanctioned In the U. S. before deigning to deal with it Part of the fault also lies' with 1 the distributors and producers who rarely allow enough in their budgets for promotion. A few years ago the NFB did a national tour for the movie Why Rock the Boat? It was so unsusual that experienced newspaper people practically fainted.

the film got publicity. Now Astral Films of Toronto is indicating Its desire to be professional about the marketing of films In yet another respect Last week they held a sneak review in Ottawa of Rituals. A 1m about five doctors who go for an outdoor adventure and encounter more adventure than they bargained for. Instead of advertising the film they gave out reaction cards to the audience asking for opinions on the theme, the music, the acting, direction and the social value of the production. They also requested the age and sex of the respondent.

They cut off the film before the credits because they didn't want to reap the negative remarks they knew they could expect from the audience once they knew it was Canadian. The producers can now shorten. Jf A Lawrence Dane plays a doctor who gets more adventure than he wants In the Canadian production. Rituals. load unless you're very experienced.

"Many Canadian directors want to be Fellinl or Bergman the first time out which is a commendable 1 1 .1 I I The star of Rituals, Hal Holbrook, saw the film preview In Ottawa. lengthen, re-edit cut bump the sound, heighten the music. fact do any number of things that the reaction of the audience sug-gested they might profitably do to make the film work better. It isn't a big deal and the testing methods are unsophisticated compared to other 15. S.

and Canadian techniques. But it's a start and It shows that some Canadian film producers and distributors are actually beginning to understand that Canadian film: are part of show-business. Rituals was written by Ian Sutherland, directed by Peter Carter, produced by Lawrence Dane and stars Hal Holbrook (who was in, town last week with his touring one-man show and saw the preview here) Lawrence Dane, Robin Gammell, Ken James and Gart Reineke. The music is by Hagood Hardy. Rituals Is an Astral Bell-vue Pathe Canart Films production.

The director of Rituals, Peter Carter, who also did The Row-dyman Bays he'U never forget the night they opened Tbe Rowdyman starring Gordon Pin sent in Ottawa: "The film had just begun when this guy started walking out The theatre manager asked him what the matter was and the guy said he was leaving because he didn't know it was a Canadian picture and Canadian pictures were no good. The manager practically threw him back into the theatre telling him to give it a chance. The guy later said he was glad he stayed but we have to fight that kind of sensibility and it's tough. Carter doesn't blame the lack of a strong Canadian film industry on the public however. Basically he feels we haven't been producing films that can sell to a mass audience, an International audience.

"Nobody Is interested In seeing a Canadian movie that lets the director examine his own belly button," says Carter. "Too many Canadian movies seem to be made to expand something or other in the psyche of the director. That's crazy. We need good stories, well told, that's all. We have the talent.

Ail you have to do Is see how many Canadians there are making international movies all over the world to see that That's a fact but Its also a fact that we're too bloody Introspective." "Most Canadian directors are amateur directors they want to conceive, write, direct produce and maybe even act in the films themselves whereas doing Just one of those functions Is a large trade. What they should be doing is working all the time, learning from their mistakes but working. "They should be doing com-mericals, industrial films, TV, documentaries anything to allow them to grow. "Instead, many of them get artistic' and refuse to do that kind of work. They'd actually prefer to not work than to do a commerlcal.

Well, I'd rather work and try to get better. At least I'm working with the camera. "Some Canadian directors would look at you blankly if you mentioned a director like George Roy Hill a commercial director (he directed The Sting) they only want to know about Godard and Fellinl but people like Hill are working directors and they could learn from people like that. "Anyway Carter says, "I keep working. I ddt commerlcal things but I try to put something of myself into them.

You don't grow' unless you work bo I try to keep working." Rituals will open in Ottawa around Easter. Child's play Toby Tyler for kids of all ages Ballet in a brothel And it Is Toby Tyler is a play about a young boy who leaves home to join the circus and the action revolves around the characters he meets during his stay. The Ottawa group do a superbly imaginative job in projecting those characters and making a potentially difficult production work. Most scenes are preceded by a march of the circus characters through the audience a particularly neat touch that succeeds In lifting the level of involvement. Characters included a nasty candysoft drink stall holder, a wild man, a fat lady and a ringmaster.

These parts are especially well played. A production technique worthy of note is the horse ride which has to be totally Imagined by the audience. It involves a roving spotlight and a commentary by the ringmaster. All In all, Toby Tyler is a fun play and well worth a couple of Saturday hours for any child and parents too for that matter. By Christopher Cobb Journal Reviewer Children's plays should really be Judged by children.

They see things that the jaded eyes of adults miss and they feel things that can only register with a child's emotions. And It was with this in mind, that we approached -the first Saturday performance of Toby Tyier, by the Ottawa Theatre for Children. The first of many Saturday shows in and around Ottawa was held at Laurentian High School. To state the obvious (but with good reason), the play is divided into two distinct parts the first half and the second half. The first is essentially sets the plot and the second holds almost all the action.

And because kids tend to like action, the second half went over a lot better. The opening 45 minutes is very wordy, and judging by the shuffling of bottoms and the muffled conversations, many of the youngsters in the audience were getting bored. But the remainder of the play left the children with a feeling that they'd seen something that was well worth seelno Dance troupe throws bash In short, the play is for children no matter how old they are. Afternoon chamber music conversation of equals The next milestone for the ballet came in 1963, when the company was Invited to make the city's new art centre, Place des Arts, Its performing base. At that time the corps had about 23 members and the move to the centre's larger stage meant considerable expansion for what many people dubbed the "petits Grands Ballets Canadlens," which translates literally to "small large Canadian ballet." It wasn't an easy transition, Madame Chlrlaeff admitted, but the group survived and today has a regular corps of about 35 dancers, more while on tour.

Madame Chlrlaeff, a tall, dark-haired woman In her early 50s with Incredibly blue eyes, now devotes most of her time to teaching. Her most recent project was the Initiation of a special program Incorporating professional dance training Into a full high-school program for a select group of young Quebecers. Last summer, 16-year-old Sylvia Klnal Chevalier, a dancer with the company, won a silver medal In the Junior section of the International Ballet Competition In Varna, Bulgaria. Meanwhile the company Itself continues to strengthen Its reputation as Canada's most Innovative ballet company. That reputation, earned through performances of works such as resident choreographer Fernand Nault's setting of the rock opera Tommy, has been enhanced by Mr.

Macdonald, described In Performing Arts in Canada last summer as "not only this nation's most prolific and fertile choreo- Sapher, but the only one with an ternatkmal reputation." By Yardena Arar MONTREAL (CP) Les Grands Ballets Canadlens threw a party Friday to celebrate its performance, and treated friends and patrons to a spirited rendition of Bawdy Variations, one of its newest and most light-hearted works. The show actually took place last November, but this didn't seem to bother anyone at the Bawdy Variations gala, which doubled as a fund-raising event for the financially-pressed company and also provided a festive send off for the company's 10-clty western tour beginning Monday. Guests ate, drank, danced and later resumed their seats to enjoy Zes Confrey's tinkly ragtime piano score and artistic director Brian Macdonald's humorously-choreographed dance about a young man's first night on the town at a roaring twenties-style brothel. A ballet set In a brothel was In a way an Ironic choice for a program marking the performance by a company which In Its Infancy had to combat the gener-ally-beld belief among the religious French-Canadian community that ballet Itself was shocking and sinful. Ludmllla Chlrlaeff, the Russian-born ballerina and choreographer who founded Lea Grands Ballets and remained its artistic director until Mr.

Macdonald took over In 1874, remembers fighting many battles to gain acceptance, recognition and financial support for the company. "Then was no theatre, no real professional life. And there was very, very great resistance from the church," said Madame Chlrlaeff, recalling the atmosphere in Quebec when she emigrated here from Switzerland In 1952. "I had to pawn my ring and my baptismal cross to open my first studio here," she added, punctuating her reminiscences with theatrical but graceful hand gestures. Out of that studio grew Les Grandes Ballets Chlrlaeff, a 12-and later 16-member group which began popularizing ballet through a regularly-televised show on the CBC's French-language network.

That ensemble "they called us Madame Chlrlaeff a grasshoppers" gradually began supplementing its once-a-month television concerts, all created by Madame, with live performances. Armed with endorsements from a number of sympathetic priests and nuns, Madame Chlrlaeff took her group to any parish hall In the province that would accept It In 1958, with the help and encouragement of Montreal Mayor Jean Drapeau, the company was awarded federal, provincial and municipal grants totaling $15,000. Madame Chlrlaeff took out a charter and Les Grands Ballets Canadlens was officially born. Why the name Les Grands Ballets Canadlens for a Quebec-based company? "When I went for the charter, there were already a Ballet de Montreal and a Ballet de Quebec they were schools," Madame Chlrlaeff explained. She added that to French-speaking Europeans, "Canadlen" means French-Canadian as well ass simply Canadian, and she viewed the company as a French-Canadian group.

the end of the exposition In the first movement. Violinst Abraham Skernick, the coach for the concert, and five members of the NAC Orchestra (violinists John Gaszl and Elaine Kllmasko, violist Peter Webster, and cellists David Hutchenreuther and Grant Cameron) gave a finely studied performance of the work. This was particularly evident In the variations In the second movement. There was a truly rococo touch in the" fifth variation in which the two cellos entered trippingly In pizzicato and the final variation was a mysterious and confidential piece of dialogue between violins and violas. The sextet reveals the Influence of the Viennese masters by its lovely warmth of feeling, Its overflowing liveliness and its wealth of glorious melodies.

And our artists showed themselves entirely in sympathy their' leader and their composer. It was a gorgeous performance and It made at least one listener's Sunday afternoon. example of this composer at his grittiest. It's rather conscious no-lytonality, it's all-pervading classic feeling-proved to be an Intellectual exercise; one would have liked to bear It for a second time. Here the balance between players was well maintained.

One felt this was truly an animated If somewhat abstruse discussion. This was particularly so in thepiz-zicato Scherzo and In the final Fugue, which was given a splendid showing. The highlight of the concert however, was the Brahms Sextet for Strings in flat major, Op. 18. Coming at the end of his first romantic period, this great work Is of extreme Importance In Brahm's development.

In It he returns to the classic masters of Vienna Beethoven, Haydn and Mozart. This classical Influence is obvious. Like a great piece of planned archt ecture, the work Is beau- tifully symmetrical, broadly founded on firmly laid foundations as in tbe Imposing pedal-point at By Eustace Jackson Journal Reviewer Four very different works constituted the program for Sunday afternoon's chamber music concert at the National Arts Centre a pair of pieces for oboe, viola and piano by Charles Martin Loeffler, a string trio by Paul Hindemith, and a string sextet by Brahms. Tbe Pool and the Bagpipe, the two rhapsodies by Leoffier Inspired by the poems of Maurice Rolllnat, were attractive pieces from tbe turn of the century, easy to listen to and not at all outre. They were played as tbe opening number by Jane Logan, viola, Franclne Schutzman, oboe and Sandra Webster, piano.

Miss Schutzman's performance was quite outstanding and If the pianist at times tended to dominate her two companions, this was pity. Chamber music must be a conversation among equals. The Hindemith Trio No. 1, Op, St, performed by Elaine Kllmas-ko, violin, Jane viola, and Rosalind Sartori, cello, was an A.