Star-Phoenix from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada • 41

Ned POWERS Country THERES A STRING of country music acts waiting in the wings for Saskatoon audiences Dan Seals, whose single, Bop, grabbed a share of both country and pop charts, moves into the Centennial Auditorium next Friday night; Shelley West, daughter of Dottie who toured Saskatoon previously with David Frizzell, will be working solo in two shows at the Texas night spot on Oct. 16; and John Coniee, whose hits include Common Man, Friday Night Blues and Rose-Colored Glasses, will be on the stage at the Broadway Theatre on Oct. 27 The Prairieland Exhibition is introducing a new entertainment concept, Harvestfest Pub Dance, for three nights, Oct. 16-17-18, at the Wheatland A Building on the exhibition grounds The building will be decorated with a harvest theme; an outstanding show-and-dance band, Low-down, from London, will provide the music; and the mix of food will include beef and ham on a bun, corn on a cob and cabbage rolls Lowdown appeared in Saskatoon at the Kinsmen slaves fleeing to Canada on an underground railway, has proven to be one of the hits at Expo 86 in Vancouver and Saskatoon audiences can get a look at the showpiece at the Broadway Theatre on Oct. 13-14-15 One More Step On The Freedom Train is the name of the production, created by Vancouver writer-performer Leon Bibb in association with Black Theatre Canada Kelsey Institute will be continuing its Canadian Authors series this year and P.

J. Kennedy has lured outstanding poet Earle Birney for his first lecture on Oct. 22 To be heard later in the season will be Saskatchewan writers Stephen Scriver and Lois Simmie The University of Saskatchewans Gateway Theatre has settled on The Wild Duck as its premiere, starting Oct. 16; has booked The Beaux Stra-tegem and A Patriot For Me as two others in the series; and is currently negotiating with Ted Galay for Tsymbaly, a wonderful Ukrainian musical which ran for eight months in Winnipeg. notices are generally favorable for Thats the story of a hypochondriac husband who is terribly on edge about reaching his 60th birthday Academy Award nominations seem to be sure bets for' Kathleen Turner, who plays Peggy Sue, and Julie Andrews, the quietly effective star of Thats Life! Also due soon are Jumpin Jack Flash, starring Whoopi Goldberg, and Children of a Lesser God, starring James Hurt and Marlee Martin Linda Griffiths, onetime favorite of the 25th Street Theatre crowd, took her original play, Jessica, into Ottawa this week Layne Coleman, in Saskatoon for his opening of The Gospel Hour at 25th Street Theatre, reports Griffiths has molded a strong script, somewhat changed since its Saskatoon premiere three years ago, and that Tantoo Martin, who has worked on Saskatoon stages, is a knockout performer in the play.

A GOSPEL CANTATA, about black Clubs national convention in August Clarence (Gatemouth) Brown, a Grammy Award-winning blues guitarist, will be bringing his six-piece band to the Broadway Theatre on Nov. 2 Its a special promotion by Buds on Broadway, which has been lighting some fires for the blues enthusiasts, in co-operation with Roadside Attractions. COLUMBIA PICTURES strikes with a. couple of the seasons hottest movie attractions next Friday The early reviews are all positive on Peggy Sue Got Married, a warm-hearted comedy romance about a mother of two who returns to her high school reunion The Movie stuntwoman has flaming lift -IV 'J A1- flames eat away at her dress see it. Around the twelfth or thirteenth second, thats when you start feeling it on the pressure points on your body.

Munros boss, stunt co-ordinator Dwayne McLean, said the psychological challenge is the most difficult part of the job. The stunt is on your mind for a week or so, said McLean, a tall, powerfully built man. You go through your list of what youre the book. The title, he said, comes from a story about a doctor with two sons, one an optimist and one a pessimist. On Christmas day, the doctor puts the pessimistic son in a room full of gifts.

He nuts the optimist son in a room half full of manure. When he checks on them later, the pessimist is plagued by suspicion of the gifts. But the optimist is laughing and throwing manure in the air, and his father asks him why. The son replies that with all the manure there must be a pony. Thats the story, said Wag terial is rare.

His one precious chance to say something is a heartbreaking soliloquy about how hes fed up with working for a show that finances antl-Commu-nist death squads. On opening night his chance to speak slipped through his fingers. You see, director Bentley-Fisher ingeniously uses actual entrances to the 25th Street Theatre building in the set for The Gospel Hour. But the worst thing that could happen, did. A passerby, completely unaware that a play was taking place on the other side of the door, knocked, opened the door, apologized after suddenly realizing he had walked in on a live performance and exited stage rear Its remarkable that Shuttle- desire going to do, and you have to go over it and over it.

After a while it gets tedious, but you have to do it because you dont know exactly whats going to happen. His own job, as the man ultimately responsible for the stunt, is equally nerve-racking. Have I made the right decisions, have I put everything together right, and how am I going to feel if something does go wrong? McLean said no stunt is completely safe. My philosophy is that we dont get paid for the nice cushy landings, we get paid for the day we miss, he said. You just try to reduce the percentage of risk as much as you can.

McLean prefers to work on movies like Hamilton High rather than big-budget films. Low-budget films are really nice to work on, he said. They need that action so theyre more concerned about it, so we get more co-operation. Ive done some great stunts on lousy pictures. Jim Doyle of Los Angeles is the special-effects expert on the movie.

A short man with weathered features, Doyle seems slightly eccentric. His speech is clipped and loaded with industry jargon; his most horrific inspirations come in his dreams. Doyle was hired to create a scene in which a girl is sucked into a blackboard. Accomplishing that required a set which could be turned on to its end so cameras could shoot down on a device Doyle invented a whirlpool full of dark, swirling liquid. The scene took five days to shoot; the sequence will be 45 seconds long in the finished movie.

It has to be quick, said Doyle. You have to get out of it just before the audience has figured out what youve done. Doyles credits include Nightmare on Elm Street, Francis Ford Coppolas One from the Heart, and War Games. He likes the challenge of creating unusual and difficult special effects. I dont like putting axes in peoples throats," he growled.

Anybody can do that." ner. It means to look for the good things in life. Look on the positive side. Wagner is also to appear in a Hart to Hart special and plans a movie based on Samantha Smith, the Maine schoolgirl who had received international publicity when she toured the Soviet Union at the invitation of the late Communist Party Chairman Yurt Andropov. She was to have made her acting debut with Wagner in the TV series Lime Street, but died in a plane crash before the television season started.

worth didnt just pack it in at that point, but he worked it into the scene and carried on with his soliloquy. Unfortunately, he neither re-captured the emotion of the scene nor quelled the audience's snickers. Milenkovic is not believable as Elaine White. She seems uncomfortable onstage as a zombie one minute, a hysteric the next minute and a wide-eyed puppy the next. But she can sing like an angel, and so can Woolridge.

The Gospel Hour's captivating music, written by Brian Plummer, is the strength of this play. If you leave the theatre scratching your head about what happened in there, you'll at least be humming the theme song. Stuntwoman Leslie Munro is barked at a chattering group of young extras. Munro took her position and did the stunt. A horrible stench from the burned contact cement filled the hot, stuffy gymnasium.

A safety crew extinguished the flames and spent several minutes checking through the layers of Munros dress while she lay prone for any smouldering material that might re-ignite. By Gwen Dambrofsky of The Canadian Press EDMONTON The fire caught the bottom of the prom queens crinoline blue dress. Within seconds, she was engulfed in flames. Her face contorted in agony as she dropped to her knees, then pitched forward to the floor of the gymnasium stage. Behind her, a Horrified young couple gaped in soundless screams.

An hour later, her burned dress replaced by blue jeans and a T-shirt, stuntwoman Leslie Munro sipped a soft drink and relaxed. I think I got a little bit of a singe there, she said, brushing back her straight blond hair to touch an unmarked cheek. I felt the heat flash." The Haunting of Hamilton High, a $2-million teen horror movie shot in Edmonton, marked Mun-ros first full-fire stunt. Ive done partials, like an arm or leg, but never when youre totally engulfed, the Toronto native said with a giggle. We did a couple of practice burns, just to get the initial whuuff and so you know what youre going to feel, but we hadnt done it to this extent.

Its quite a sensation. The plot of Hamilton High is standard fare a prom queen is killed in a tragic accident and comes back 30 years later to unleash mayhem on her old high school and possess an innocent young girl. it's a very intelligent film, suggested Ray Sager, supervising Eroducer for Torontos Simcom td. Its very close to a horror version of Back to the Future. But as was evident during the filming of Munros stunt, the real showpieces of the movie are its special effects.

It took more than three hours for the film crew to prepare for the shot. Munro was put into a fireproof bodysuit which covered everything but her face. Over that went the dress and a wig. Assistants brushed contact cement and sprayed inflammable fluid on Munro so the burn would be quick and dramatic. Concentration was intense.

Twice an assistant director Wagner, NEW YORK (AP) Robert Wagner, resplendent in double-breasted blue blazer, was talking about his latest television role, and it sounded like another in the series of suave, sophisticated characters he has popularized on the tube. Not so, said the boyish-faced Wagner: "Its a very big departure." He plays a suave, sophisticated businessman in the ABC movie, There Must Be a Pony. Hes unable to commit to anything. Theres a kind of a deep Lack of By Sheila Bean of the Star-Phoenix With religion, sex and violence, youd think 25th Street Theatre would have a winner in The Gospel Hour. But this play apparently needs divine intervention as well.

Playwright Layne Coleman and director Tom Bentley-Fisher have tried to recreate the ups and downs of a gospel television show. The action takes place in a TV studio, complete with technicians, cameramen and a studio audience (the actual audience). At the beginning of the play, the "TV" stage crew moves the studio backdrop. The shipping door opens, headlights shine directly on the audience, and a Winnebago drives into the building to serve as a dressing-room. Its a stun Ip A M- protected by fireproof bodysuit as As Munro.

rose from the stage, the 100 or so boisterous young extras burst into applause. Its not frightening, said Munro, who has been a stuntwoman for six years and has worked in such films as The Dead Zone, Police Academy and the recent remake of The Fly. You can hear yourself go whuuff, but you still dont know if youre on fire because you cant and economic collapse. Though they came up through the studio system in the 1950s, Wagner and Taylor never worked together. We had always wanted to do a film together, and I asked her if I could get this property, would she do it with me," he said.

She knew the book. Weve been friends, you know, for years. I cant think of a leading man who wouldnt want to work with Elizabeth Taylor. You have to stand in line for that. Wagner loves the message in tions to anti-Communist troops, several romantic andor sexual relationships, a mention of apartheid in South Africa and a gun-happy security guard.

The pace of the play is another problem. The actors and the audience suffer through long, dry spells punctuated by downpours of pointless action. Woolridge does her valiant best to break the tedium. Shes energetic, funny, powerful and likeable, and when the play really drags, Woolridge almost over-compensates with liveliness to pull the thing together. Daryl Shuttleworth as Eddy, the composer and stage director, is another potentially-good actor lost in a confusing play.

He is dynamic when hes given some decent lines and action but such ma Star-Phoenix Saskatoon, Saskatchewan Saturday, Oct. 4, 1986 Cheremosh non-stop movement By Kim Humphries of the Star-Phoenix Like the fast-flowing Ukrainian river its named after, the Cheremosh Ukrainian Dance Ensemble is a whirpool of non-stop motion that splashed its spectacular spell on a cheering Saskatoon audience Friday night. From the first number to the final encore, the Edmonton-based dance troupes Review energetic two-hour performance flowed with a melange of ethnic dance, ballet and mime sweeping a more than willing audience away with it. The program opens with two eager North American travellers, much like the near-capacity crowd, journeying to the Ukraine. Upon stepping off an airplane, theyre confronted with the severe reality of their homeland under Soviet rule.

But behind the totalitarian regime, exists a rich heritage expressed through a colorful collection of traditional regional dances. While its the only political statement the 52-member ensemble makes in its repertoire, ij sharply points out that countrys two realities. Skilled choreographer Rick Wacko achieves a compelling opening as he has the magnificently-costumed group demonstrate its skills, without giving too much away. A few gravity-defying high kicks, along with some fast-spinning twirls are thrown in to whet the audiences appetite. It works, making you want to see more.

One of the most ingenious choreographic feats of the pro gram is in Moods of the Cheremosh River where the groups full complement turns into a gigantic human wave. The piece opens with two Hutzels, who are preparing to transport logs down the unpredictable waters of the countrys most famous waterway. But calm turns to storm as the men battle the fleshy rapids. The mood is intesified with the help of musical director Eugene Zwozdesky, who composed, wrote and arranged the score. Their barge, consisting of a phalanx of bended men on whose backs they ride, makes it to the shore.

A celebration of ethnic dance spills over on the bank. Some comic relief is thrown with a series of humorous character sketches. A Day In The Park provides an amusing meeting between a flirtatious old man and an elderly woman on a park bench. The skit isnt funny so much for its slapstick, but for the woman, who really is a man. The program ends just as it had started on a frenzied note of pure artistry.

The ensemble, on a Western Canada tour, perform in Regina tonight. Taylor hookup in Sunday movie sadness in his life, Wagner said in an interview. "He has an interesting character to play, because a lot of it was very, very interior." There Must Be a Pony, to be aired Sunday night at 7 on cable channel 7 in Saskatoon, is based on the book by Pulitzer Prize-winning author James Kirkwood. The story revolves around the risky love affair between Ben Nichols (Wagner), a charming businessman, and a celebrated movie star (Elizabeth Taylor) who is making a comeback after an emotional focus problem for The Gospel ning, surprising effect but the play does not delight the audience much after that. The biggest problem with The Gospel Hour is te'SinAw Review many direc- tions that it doesn't make any of its messages clear.

Karen Woolridge stars as Sharon White, a preacher, healer and singer on the show, and her commitment to her faith is a strong element of the play. Sharons singing sister, Elaine (played by Michelle Milenkovic), is traumatized by a lapse in faith, premonitions of death and a dependence on prescription drugs. If that isnt enough to keep your attention, theres a moral question about the gospel shows dona i.