Local theatres pulling The Interview after threats

CEO, philanthropist Doug Harvey has died

Doug Harvey, a Winnipeg business titan and philanthropist, has died after battling cancer for more than a decade.

Harvey gave millions of dollars to Winnipeg organizations while he was CEO of DLH Group, a nationwide network of businesses that support heavy duty truck and trailer users.

Loren Remillard, CEO and president of the Winnipeg Chamber of Commerce, said the business community is mourning the loss of the influential businessman who helped shape Winnipeg.

“We are a transportation and logistics hub in Winnipeg and it was partly the result of geography, and a big part because of leaders and visionaries like Doug Harvey,” he said.

Powerful personal drama provides both bark and bite

Well before playwright Rafaella Marcus’ words have the chance to entangle us in the stickiness of Sap, the performance space initiates the task in director Elio Zarrillo’s staging of this discomfiting and affecting story of restraint and liberation.

Shortly after the audience takes its seats in four segments surrounding a central channel — a shimmering tunnel containing cellist Grace Morningstar — it becomes clear as actors Hera Nalam and Liz Whitbread make their way around the tight corners of David Oro and Hazel Venzon’s set that certain actions will go unseen unless viewers keeps their heads on a swivel: in a production meant to uproot understanding, a fixed perspective will never do.

In this vulnerable and powerful production from Theatre by the River (105 minutes) the actors meet the excellence of Marcus’s twisty script, which calls for emotionally draining and jolting depictions of a relationship headed down a rocky road.

Nalam plays a young communications pro for a women’s aid charity whose dating life is a work in progress. She’s bright and optimistic, taking notice of elements of nature that nobody else seems to recognize. On her daily commute, she looks out from the bus window in awe of a home overflowing with branches and leaves.

U of M adds capacity to emergency medicine program for family doctors

Manitoba is training more family doctors in emergency medicine to help strengthen the pipeline of emergency physicians for communities across the province.

Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara announced Wednesday that the University of Manitoba is increasing the number of annual training seats to 17 from 11. The family medicine enhanced skills program provides physicians with an additional year of specialized emergency medicine training after completing a family medicine residency.

“Emergency physicians do incredibly important work for Manitobans and we need more of them,” Asagwara said at a news conference at University of Manitoba’s Health Sciences Centre campus.

The province is investing in training more doctors, providing more physicians with the opportunity to build their careers in Manitoba and strengthening the workforce that emergency departments rely on, the minister said. The 17 residents began their training on July 1.

Gillingham pledges police, firefighter staffing increases to serve growing population

Scott Gillingham is promising to set long-term staffing targets to raise the ratio of firefighters and police officers to Winnipeg’s population, if re-elected as mayor next month.

Seven years sought for serial harasser

Alexander Beaton finished serving a two-year jail sentence for criminally harassing six women and didn’t last two days in the community before he was back at it, sending unwanted obscene messages and videos to a dozen women.

Now prosecutors are seeking a seven-year prison sentence for the 30-year-old Winnipeg man, whose latest string of victims includes a police officer who investigated his earlier crimes.

“He essentially continued (offending) unabated,” Crown attorney Brett Rach told provincial court Judge Malcolm McDonald at a sentencing hearing Friday. “It caused more than a nuisance to these victims — it caused them to fear for their safety.”

Beaton pleaded guilty to 14 charges of criminal harassment, sending indecent communications and breaching court orders for a campaign of harassment waged between 2015 and 2025.

Lauded Manitoba author chronicled life in the Interlake

Longtime Manitoba author, editor and professor David Arnason died on Monday at age 86.