Drama queen

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 03/04/2010 (5949 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

AT 80, the grand dame of Winnipeg theatre Evelyne An­derson considers her career statistics.

Most appearances at Manitoba Theatre Centre: 52.

Most appearances at Rainbow Stage: 25.

"Don’t forget three children," she hastens to add to her list of accomplishments. "I had it all."

Her groundbreaking career spanned more than 50 years, 100 shows and more than her share of Winnipeg firsts. It was her generation who first thought of theatre as a profession and established the city as a theatrical oasis on the prairies.

"I guess that’s what happens when you are in on the ground floor of something and there is not many of you," says Anderson, with her characteristic humbleness.

Anderson harbours no regrets that there is no Tony Award adorning the fireplace mantle of the Lindenwoods home she shares with her husband of almost half a century, John Lamont.

"I never had that star quality or that drive to be a star, but I never wanted that," says Anderson, who says she is retired, unable to meet the demands of eight show-weeks anymore. "I didn’t think it was feasible. As long as I could work, I was happy. In those years they didn’t make stars of Canadians."

Her legacy is as a theatrical pioneer, co-starring with the likes of MTC founders John Hirsch, Tom Hendry and James Duncan in the compelling drama playing out on stages in early ’50s Winnipeg. The willowy brunette from Young Street blazed a trail in 1955 as the first Winnipegger to head to England for stage training. She returned three years later a leading lady, fresh off a year-long run in a new West End musical in London where a brash, tousle-haired castmate named Peter O’Toole treated to her first drink overseas. ("We thought he drank too much and was too reckless to be a star.")

Other Winnipeggers soon followed, including Ed Evanko, who studied at the same Bristol Old Vic theatre school in England and eventually performed on Broadway.

"She is the reason I began my acting career by going to the Bristol Old Vic," says Evanko, who is now a priest based in British Columbia. "I could not have had a better role model. She had an Audrey Hepburn-like quality, except that she really could sing!"

She also opened doors for a generation of actresses who will be honouring Anderson at a public gathering next weekend in the lobby of MTC.

"Evie has had this huge career as an actress, wife and mother," says Winnipeg actress Jennifer Lyon, who played many of the same musical roles Anderson once did. "If that isn’t inspiring, nothing is. I can’t think of anyone since Evie who has had the career she’s had."

"I thought I had made it when I first shared a dressing room with Evelyne Anderson at Rainbow Stage," says fellow performer Debbie Maslowsky, last seen in MTC’s The Drowsy Chaperone in January. "I had no idea that someone like Evie lived in Winnipeg. I assumed everyone on stage was a big star from somewhere else.

When the soprano graduated from Gordon Bell High School in 1948, she was a budding singer groomed by her father, a noted composer and choral conductor. Anderson hankered to be the next Deanna Durbin, the hugely successful Winnipeg-born vocalist.

"We all wanted to be Deanna Durbin," says Anderson. "She was the girl next door. She wasn’t some blond popsy like Britney Spears."

In those days the only professional theatre was in Toronto and, come the summer, at Stratford. Winnipeg was bursting with artistic ambition: Rainbow Stage debuted in 1955 with Brigadoon before the MTC bowed for the first time three years later. Making history was the last thing on her mind.

"We just wanted to work," says Anderson, who has two daughters working in the arts. "We didn’t realize that we were starting the regional theatre movement in Canada."

With her English training, Anderson was well positioned to perform the musical canon at Rainbow and the British repertoire that dominated the MTC stage. She was the natural choice to play Eliza Doolittle, the governess Anna in The King and I (which she played four times at Rainbow) and later Oscar Wilde’s Lady Bracknell. No matter the part, she exuded a sense of propriety.

"She represents grace and dignity," says actor Richard Hurst, who often shared the stage with Anderson. "She’s old school made contemporary. The respect for the work, for fellow actors and the art is ground zero for Evie."

She performed on stages from Vancouver to Charlottetown and could have gone places. Hirsch invited her to join the Stratford Festival company in the early ’80s but she couldn’t leave her husband and kids behind.

"You couldn’t say no to John, but I did then," she says. "My family came first."

 

A Tribute to Evelyne Anderson is Sunday, April 11, from 7 to 10 p.m. at 174 Market Ave.

kevin.prokosh@freepress.mb.ca