It was an odd sort of friendship. But in spite of the distance and the time between visits, it endured for 50 years. In 1975, Brent Jennings arrived at the Eugene O’Neill Theater in Waterford, Connecticut to participate in a national playwrights’ conference, developing new plays.
In the workshops he met a brother actor from Canada. They’d both come to meet other theatre people, but Jennings took away memories of a guy with plenty of talent, a good sense of humour and an interesting travelling companion.
“Ken Welsh had a dog with him in the dorm,” Jennings said. “We worked hard, laughed a lot and I never forgot him.”
About 10 years ago, Welsh landed the part as Larry Loomis in Lodge 49, an American TV series about a quirky fraternal order in California. Welsh recommended Jennings for the part of Ernie Fontaine, a plumbing salesman in the lodge. The two seasoned actors were reunited.
“They say you don’t make friends, you meet them,” Jennings told me on Sunday. “Ken was an inspirational actor and a friend for life.”
Last week, Jennings learned that Lynne McIlvride, Ken’s widow, and friends had organized a day-long tribute to Kenneth Welsh; Jennings dropped everything and flew from California to honour his friend. He joined hundreds of others in this community, initially at “A Blessing of Life” service at St. Paul’s church.
In a short service of music, readings, candle-lighting and remembrances, actress Teddy Moore, who often performed with Welsh, offered lyrics from the Shakespearean song Fear no more the heat o’ the sun, and longtime friend David Howes, past minister at the Presbyterian church, read Psalm 23 and admitted that, “Ken saved me when I was in the shadow of valley of death,” explaining when times were darkest for him, “Ken gave me inspiration.”
Sunday afternoon at the Roxy, McIlvride and foley artist Andy Malcolm premiered a Film Memorial to Welsh, initiated in part by the Roxy’s Cathy Christoff. “When Ken died (of cancer in 2022) Lynne and Andy were grieving, and we suggested showing a collection of Ken’s films.”
Malcolm and McIlvride set to work gathering photos, sound and film excerpts of actuality, documentary and highlights from more than 200 movies and TV show appearances from Welsh’s earliest days at the National Theatre School through featured roles as varied as the villainous FBI agent Windom Earle in Twin Peaks to his off-Broadway one-man Stand-Up Shakespeare, to President Harry Truman.
“We had literally hundreds of hours of tapes and films,” Malcolm said, “and painfully whittled it down to an hour and 10 minutes.”
So many delicious remembrances emerged through that celebratory Sunday, many at the Second Wedge Brewery late that day. Some of reminisced about the days of Motley Theatre, a periodic play-reading organized by former Uxbridge resident Anna Mackay-Smith. “I remember getting up the courage to ask Ken if he’d consider just reading scripts in front of an audience,” Mackay-Smith told me. “I was stunned when he said, ‘Yes.’”
Their collaboration, originally in the back garage of Norm James implement dealership on Brock Street West, always attracted packed houses over peanuts and beer.
Out in the parking lot at the Wedge, artist Steven Frank offered a favourite Kenneth Welsh moment. At some point, with hundreds (many thousands) of diverse characterizations and situations under his belt, Welsh was asked to appear as an apocalyptic zombie.
“What does that look like?” he wondered out loud.
Frank got up out of his chair, threw his arms out and stumbled forward dazed-like.
“Thanks,” Welsh said, and the two burst into laughter.
Inspiring Kenneth Welsh was always a two-way street. Probably because we both had post office boxes at the Brock Street post office, he and I often met and shared the latest there. I remember when he wondered whether he should do his annual Dylan Thomas reading of A Child’s Christmas in Wales at a pub instead of the library.
I suggested the ghost of Thomas would likely approve. In return, he never stopped applauding my work preserving stories of Canadian veterans. “It’s a calling,” he said.
The one and only time Kenneth Welsh and I worked together was an oldtimers hockey fundraiser at the arena. He donned his favourite Montreal Canadiens jersey to ref the game. Together we even ambushed singer-songwriter John Allan Cameron, who was on the ice with us. As the photographer prepared the three-shot, on cue, Ken and I turned and kissed Cameron on the cheeks.
As it was for his longtime acting buddy, Brent Jennings, being in Kenneth Welsh’s presence was an adventure and always an inspiration.