Man of inspiration

Artist Lynne McIlvride and actor Brent Jennings share memories of Kenneth Welsh at the Second Wedge, Sunday.

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.” (more…)

A Dickens of a story

Church of the Ascension, immediately after our reading of A Christmas Carol, Dec. 3, 2017.

I found Christmas over in Port Perry last Sunday afternoon. I wasn’t alone. And, no, there wasn’t a sudden conversion in my life. But I was in a church. A few minutes after 3 p.m., last Sunday, I was invited to a lectern to initiate a fundraiser with these words:

“Marley was dead, to begin with. There was no doubt whatever about that. … Old Marley was as dead as a doornail.” (more…)