Theatre shock: Stephen Pike dies of heart issues

Stephen Pike… a legendary figure in local theatre both as a producer and director.

by Helen Musa

The Canberra and Queanbeyan theatre communities have been saddened and shocked by news that theatre identity Stephen Pike has died overnight in a Sydney hospital after complications from heart surgery.

Pike, who would have turned 70 in November, was artistic director and program manager of The Q, Queanbeyan Performing Arts Centre since the opening of The Q in March 2008 until July 2020, was widely credited with having put this new regional theatre on the map.

He used his wide connections in the theatre world to engage companies from around the country, and his savvy brand of programming mixed popular crowd-pleasers with cutting-edge theatre in a subscription program that drew audiences, not just in Queanbeyan but from around Canberra and the region.

He also staged smash hits for The Q, such as his 2012 revival of Hair: The American Tribal Love-Rock Musical, and the musical Blood Brothers.

It was Pike who alerted Pigeonhole Theatre director Jordan Best to the possibility of taking a Q show, Playhouse Creatures, to Monaco during the 16th Mondial du Théâtre in 2017.

A legendary figure in local theatre both as a producer and director, before taking up his position with The Q he ran his own theatre businesses at The Bellows Restaurant, Hippo’s Restaurant and Tarzan’s, and was also business manager for Canberra Rep for six years.

As a performer gifted with a fine tenor voice, his own leading roles included Jean Valjean in Colin Anderson’s 1996 production of Les Miserables for Canberra Philharmonic.

Pike had long suffered from heart problems and had undergone extensive surgery before transferring to Sydney for a more extensive operation, from which he did not recover.

When I visited him in Canberra private hospital in late May, he said he was at peace with his likely fate and that he had been both consoled and delighted by the many visitors on whose lives and theatre careers he had impacted.

While I was visiting him, he had a call from musical theatre star Billy Bourchier, one of the many people who attribute their success to his influence and support.

Funeral and memorial details will be published when available.

First published in Canberra City News, June 30, 2024

Donald Sutherland, a Chameleon of a Movie Star, Dies at 88

In a wide-ranging career, from “M*A*S*H” to “Ordinary People” to “The Hunger Games”, he could be endearing in one role, menacing in another and just plain odd in a third.

Donald Sutherland in a 1970 publicity photo. He said he was once rejected for a film role by a producer who said: “This part calls for a guy-next-door type. You don’t look like you’ve lived next door to anyone.”Credit...Jack Robinson/Hulton Archive, via Getty Images

by Clyde Haberman
June 20 2024, updated June 21 2024

Donald Sutherland, whose ability to both charm and unsettle, both reassure and repulse, was amply displayed in scores of film roles as diverse as a laid-back battlefield surgeon in “M*A*S*H,” a ruthless Nazi spy in “Eye of the Needle,” a soulful father in “Ordinary People” and a strutting fascist in “1900,” died on Thursday in Miami. He was 88.

His son Kiefer Sutherland, the actor, announced the death on social media. CAA, the talent agency that represented Mr. Sutherland, said he had died in a hospital after an unspecified “long illness.” He had a home in Miami.

With his long face, droopy eyes, protruding ears and wolfish smile, the 6-foot-4 Mr. Sutherland was never anyone’s idea of a movie heartthrob. He often recalled that while growing up in eastern Canada, he once asked his mother if he was good-looking, only to be told, “No, but your face has a lot of character.” He recounted how he was once rejected for a film role by a producer who said: “This part calls for a guy-next-door type. You don’t look like you’ve lived next door to anyone.”

Yet across six decades, starting in the early 1960s, he appeared in nearly 200 films and television shows — some years he was in as many as half a dozen movies. “Klute,” “Six Degrees of Separation” and a 1978 remake of “The Invasion of the Body Snatchers” were just a few of his other showcases.

And he continued to work well into his last years, becoming familiar to younger audiences through roles in multiple installments of “The Hunger Games” franchise, alongside Brad Pitt in the space drama “Ad Astra” (2019) and as the title character in the Stephen King-inspired horror film “Mr. Harrigan’s Phone” (2022).

Mr. Sutherland’s chameleonlike ability to be endearing in one role, menacing in another and just plain odd in yet a third appealed to directors, among them Federico Fellini, Robert Altman, Bernardo Bertolucci and Oliver Stone.

Mr. Sutherland on the set of “Ordinary People” (1980) with Robert Redford, who was making his debut as a director.Credit...Paramount, via Everett Collection

“For me, working with these great guys was like falling in love,” Mr. Sutherland said of those filmmakers. “I was their lover, their beloved.”

He was far from a willing lover early on; he acknowledged having been unduly rigid about how a role should be played. But by 1981 he was telling Playboy magazine that “film acting is about the surrender of will to the director.” He was so in thrall to some directors that he named his four sons after them, including Kiefer, named in homage to Warren Kiefer, with whom he had worked early in his career. He also had a daughter, Rachel, Kiefer’s twin.

Mr. Sutherland first came to the attention of many moviegoers as one of the Army misfits and sociopaths in the 1967 World War II film “The Dirty Dozen.”Credit...MGM, via Everett Collection

Mr. Sutherland first came to the attention of many moviegoers as one of the Army misfits and sociopaths in "The Dirty Dozen" (1967), set during World War II. His character had almost no lines until he was told to take over from another actor. 

“You with the big ears — you do it!” he recalled the director, Robert Aldrich, yelling at him. “He didn’t even know my name.”

While Mr. Sutherland worked almost nonstop to the very end, some of his more memorable roles fell in a stretch from 1970 to 1981, when he appeared in 34 films, often playing men who walked a fine line between sanity and madness — and on occasion erased that line. His fascist in Bertolucci’s "1900" (1976), his heavily made-up Lothario in "Fellini's Casanova" (1976) and his murderous World War II spy in "Eye of the Needle" (1981) were examples of his capacity for the grotesque and the ominous.

His performance as a murderous World War II spy in “Eye of the Needle” (1981), like his work in “1900,” was an example of his capacity for the grotesque and the ominous.Credit...United Artists, via Everett Collection

But he could also be winningly irreverent, as in a pivotal early role: Hawkeye Pierce, an insolent mobile-hospital surgeon, in Robert Altman’s “M*A*S*H” (1970), set during the Korean War but with distinctly Vietnam-era sensibilities. Ten years later he stretched his emotional range further in “Ordinary People,” Robert Redford’s debut as a director, in which he played a beleaguered suburban husband and father struggling to hold his family together after a son drowned. Though his character may seem weak, “he’s really the only one in the family with some idea of what is wrong,” Vincent Canby wrote in The New York Times. 

One of the actor’s more controversial roles was in Nicolas Roeg’s “Don’t Look Now” (1973), which is set in Venice and has supernatural overtones. Mr. Sutherland and Julie Christie, as his wife, had a sex scene so hot that it left a long-lingering question as to whether there was, in fact, copulation. He insisted there was not, but she left open the possibility.

In “Klute” (1971), another early triumph, Mr. Sutherland was a small-town policeman crossing paths with a big-city call girl played by Jane Fonda. He and Ms. Fonda then began an affair that lasted three years; their relationship dovetailed with his most conspicuous burst of political activism, which matched hers.

In 1971, he joined Ms. Fonda and other actors in a comedy troupe called F.T.A. that toured military towns, performing satirical sketches infused unmistakably with an anti-Vietnam War spirit. The group’s initials stood for Free the Army, though soldiers recognized a far less dainty meaning.

Although Mr. Sutherland’s politics leaned leftward, he told Playboy: “I didn’t like doing anything political within the United States because I am, after all, Canadian.” But, he added, “there was a huge Canadian participation in the war, and so I felt, on this, I had a right.”

Despite the critical acclaim that he usually enjoyed, he never received an Academy Award nomination. There were other honors, though, including a 1995 Emmy for his role as a Soviet investigator in “Citizen X,” an HBO film. He also won two Golden Globes — for “Citizen X” and for his 2002 portrayal of the presidential adviser Clark Clifford in HBO’s “Path to War.”

Some years, Mr. Sutherland was so busy racing among film projects that he lived life almost as if he were double-parked. Well-received performances included his pot-smoking professor in “National Lampoon’s Animal House” (1978), the mysterious X in Oliver Stone’s “JFK” (1991), the self-important father in “Six Degrees of Separation” (1993), the kindly Mr. Bennet in “Pride & Prejudice” (2005), a lascivious astronaut in “Space Cowboys” (2000) and the president in the dystopian “Hunger Games” series of the 2010s.

Mr. Sutherland with Will Smith in “Six Degrees of Separation” (1993).Credit...MGM, via Everett Collection

But there were pans, too — be it for his sexually repressed accountant in “The Day of the Locust” (1975) or his country doctor in “Apprentice to Murder” (1988), or for a flock of forgettable offerings like “Beerfest” (2006) and “S*P*Y*S,” a failed 1974 attempt to rebottle the allure of “M*A*S*H.” Mr. Sutherland was well aware of the stinkers. “I don’t go into any picture saying, ‘Oh, boy, this is going to be a bad one,’” he told The Boston Globe in 1981. “I try to be right. But when I’m wrong, I’m really off the wall.”

His earliest acting gigs were onstage in London, where he had gone to learn his craft, but his was not a notable theater career. He received reasonably good reviews in 2000 for his performance as a prizewinning author in Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt’s “Enigma Variations,” staged in Los Angeles, Toronto and London. But the notices were disastrous for Edward Albee’s 1981 Broadway adaptation of Vladimir Nabokov’s “Lolita,” and Mr. Sutherland did not escape unscathed. Frank Rich of The Times wrote that in a sex scene, his Humbert Humbert “gasps and pants and bobs like a fleabag comic cavorting at a stag dinner.” The play closed after 12 performances.

Donald McNichol Sutherland was born on July 17, 1935, in Saint John, a coastal town in New Brunswick. One of three children of Frederick McLae Sutherland, a salesman, and Dorothy (McNichol) Sutherland, a math teacher, Donald lived his formative years in Bridgewater, Nova Scotia.

As a boy, he was plagued by ill health, including bouts of hepatitis, rheumatic fever and polio, which left him with one leg shorter than the other. In 1970, while filming "Kelly's Hereos" in Yugoslavia, he came down with spinal meningitis. “I went into a coma,” he told an interviewer years later, “and they tell me that for a few seconds, I died.”

Mr. Sutherland went to schools in Bridgewater, where he worked as a disc jockey at a local radio station at age 14. He then attended the University of Toronto, graduating in 1956 as an English major after having switched from engineering, a field that his father had urged on him as a possible fallback.

But the acting bug had bitten. Post-university, he went off to study at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, but he dropped out after a year in favor of actual stage work. His apprenticeship was with provincial repertory companies in England, sprinkled with bit parts on the London stage and, now and again, British television.

He caught the eye of an Italian film producer and director, Luciano Ricci, who cast him in a 1964 movie, “Il Castello dei Morti Vivi” — "Castle of the Dead" directed by Warren Kiefer. It was followed in 1965 by works with unprepossessing titles like "Dr. Terror's House of Horrors" and "Die! Die! my Darling!"

“I was always cast as an artistic homicidal maniac,” Mr. Sutherland told The Guardian in 2005. “But at least I was artistic.” His performances were apparently artistic enough to draw the attention of accomplished filmmakers, and by 1967 he was one of “The Dirty Dozen.”

He was married three times, always to actresses: Lois Hardwick, Shirley Douglas and Francine Racette, a French Canadian whom he wed in 1990, years after they had begun living together. In addition to his son Kiefer and daughter, Rachel Sutherland, from his second marriage, he is survived by his wife; three sons with Ms. Racette — Roeg, named for Nicolas Roeg; Rossif, for the French director Frédéric Rossif; and Angus Redford, for Robert Redford; and four grandchildren. He also had homes in Canada and France.

In 1976, relatively early in his career, Mr. Sutherland was asked by Newsday which of his films he found most satisfying. He cited “Fellini’s Casanova,” never mind that the movie was panned by many critics, as was his performance. His answer reflected his obeisance to directors.

“Working for Fellini was the best experience of my life,” he said. He added: “For an actor, there is no one like him. More than anyone else in the world, you submit to Fellini. He is the master, and you go to serve.”

Alex Traub contributed reporting.

First published at The New York Times, June 20, 2024

Elton John Confirms He Will 'Never Be Touring Again'

Elton John performs at the final leg of his 'Farewell Yellow Brick Road' tour in Stockholm, Saturday, July 8, 2023. Photo: Ben Gibson / Rocket Entertainment

Story by Rebecca Friedman

When Elton John sang "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" in Stockholm in July 2023, he meant the lyrics literally.

The famed singer recently confirmed the final concert of his Farewell Yellow Brick Road tour in Sweden last summer was definitely the conclusion of his touring days, as the 77-year-old wants to focus on time with his husband, David Furnish, and their two children, Zachary, 13, and Elijah, 11.

In a new interview with a news outlet published Thursday, June 27, John confidently answered "no" when asked if he would ever consider touring again.

The "Tiny Dancer" singer's hubby, 61, helped elaborate on John's firm decision to retire, explaining: "We’ve got our sons, you know, they’re getting into their teenage years now. We don’t want to miss anything. We want to be present for that."

"It’s sort of a key decade, I think, in a child’s life," Furnish continued. "He’s been doing it for 60 years, so it’s nice to have that time to spend at home with family."

Elton John and husband David Furnish with children Zachary and Elijah, St Tropez in 2016. Photo: Maxppp / PA Images

The "Rocket Man" hitmaker chimed back into the conversation to admit he was pleased with the way he wrapped up his final tour.

"The last show in Stockholm on the farewell tour after Glastonbury, I got in the car and went, 'Yes! Yes!' We went out on the biggest high, just the way I wanted to, and there’s no going back [after] that," he declared.

At the time, John thanked his crowd full of fans for a "magical" finish to his touring life while expressing gratitude for his "wonderful" career.

First published at OK Magazine, June 29, 2024

The World of Paul Gauguin - an extraordinary Canberra exhibition for 2024

One of Paul Gauguin's most recognisable paintings, Three Tahitians, 1899, National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh.

For many weeks now a buzz of excitement has been building at the National Gallery of Australia (NGA) as the art works of one of the world's most famous artists, Paul Gauguin, arrived from their usual homes around the world.

More than 65 leading public and private lenders from as far as the United Kingdom, France, Japan, Sao Paulo and Abu Dhabi have shared their Gauguin collections to create what will be the largest exhibition of the artist's work to be presented in Australia. Many of the works have never been exhibited here before.

Significantly, the exhibition, Gauguin's World: Tona Iho, Tona Ao, brings together the art works and a range of other elements in a deep exploration of the French artist's journey from his Impressionist beginnings to his final destination, in the Marquesas Islands in French Polynesia.

"It's very exciting to see these works in our part of the world," said NGA's curator of international art, Dr Lucina Ward. "Gauguin's work is in great demand - he's one of those artists everyone wants to see. Bringing so much of his work together from so many collections around the world to Canberra is extraordinary. It is huge.

Paul Gauguin, Portrait of the artist with The Yellow Christ 1890-91, Musée d'Orsay, Paris.

"It's a very rare opportunity for people to experience these works all together - there are more than 130 paintings, drawings, and sculptures - and to get insights into the art and life of Gauguin, his impact and his legacy on the late 19th century and 20th century."

The utmost care was needed to ensure the safety of the works as they made the long-haul journey. To manage the risk, the works have been coming in a series of shipments, most travelling with a conservator or curator from the originating museum.

"Canberra is one of the most complex and often furthest away venues that many of our colleagues can come to," said Dr Ward. "We don't have many direct flights and when you're dealing with 65 lenders from all over the world, just the shipment schedule is very complex.

"Sometimes there are layovers between flights there are periods when a work has to be put in security storage between flights and then most often there's a truck trip at the end to bring the work from Sydney or Melbourne. It's huge but that is part of the excitement of bringing the exhibition here."

An exhibition for contemplation

Dr Ward said while the art works are at the centre of the exhibition, the wider program aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of Gauguin's work and life, including how it is viewed through a contemporary lens, and from the perspective of Australia's Moana/Pacific neighbours.

"While we celebrate Gauguin's work and his links to the Pacific region, we needed to acknowledge that he has a complex legacy; he was a pretty rotten individual in many respects and behaved badly certainly in 21st century terms," she said.

"We can't change history so we have approached museums, artists, community members in Tahiti and in the Marquesas Islands and invited people to be involved in the project. It's inviting a conversation."

Paul Gauguin, Bonjour, Monsieur Gauguin, 1889, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles.

In the exhibition, Gauguin's life, art and the controversial aspects of his legacy are explored through talks, public programs, a podcast series and films, as well as a display of a collection works by contemporary artists from the Pacific and further afield.

A highlight is the SaVAge K'lub, a celebration of all forms of art and culture, that's being presented alongside Gauguin's World: Tona Iho, Tona Ao. First conceived by artist, activist and scholar Rosanna Raymond in 2010, this latest iteration sees her collaborate with Tahitian artists.

Painting with light

That the exhibition will mark the return to the South Pacific of many of the works Gauguin created while living in French Polynesia is also exciting for lovers of his work. The natural environment and the light in this part of the world inspired Gauguin to use an entirely new palette of brilliant colours European audiences hadn't experienced before.

"In Australia we are very used to living where the light is stronger and the colours seem more intense but Gauguin's eyes were opened by that when he travelled to the South Pacific," said Dr Ward.

"I find it really fascinating to consider Gauguin's knowledge of optics. Like many other artists of this time he was learning about the structure of the eye - he had a very strong knowledge of simultaneous contrasts, which means putting reds adjacent to green it makes the red seem redder and the green seem greener."

Paul Gauguin, Tahitian women 1891, Musée d'Orsay, Paris.

'So it's exciting to see the works here, in this part of the world, for all sorts of reasons but that knowledge that Gauguin had brings even more admiration."

Tahitian cultural knowledge holder Tahiarii Yoram Pariente - who was invited by the National Gallery to perform a ceremonial Karakia to prepare for the exhibition - said having the paintings here meant he could see the colours that "are only possible in this part of the world".

"I think to have the works coming back here is going to bring us the shine that our sun and nature gave to those paintings in those days," he said.

Gauguin's World: Tona Iho, Tona Ao opens at the National Gallery of Australia on June 29.

For tickets and more information visit Gauguin’s World (nga.gov.au)

Article published at The Canberra Times, 29 June, 2024

Painting: Mozart family portrait by Johann Nepomuk della Croce (circa 1780)

 

Mozart family portrait by Johann Nepomuk della Croce (circa 1780)

Oil on canvas

Depicted are Leopold Mozart at right, at the piano are children Maria Anna Mozart (aka Nannerl) and younger brother Wolfgang Mozart. A portrait of mother and wife Anna Maria Mozart (1720 - 1778) hangs on the wall.

Johann Nepomuk della Croce (1736 - 1819)

Leopold Mozart (1719 - 1787)

Nannerl Mozart (1751 - 1829)

Wolfgang Mozart (1756 - 1791)

Painting: Schubertiade (1897) by Julius Schmid

"Schubertiade" by Julius Schmid (1897). Collection Wiener Männergesang-Verein, donated by Maria Dumba.

Painting also known as Schubertabend.

Franz Schubert (1797 - 1828)

Julius Schmid (1854 - 1935)

View auction history at New Orleans Auction Galleries, here.

...and at artnet, here.

Painting: "A concentrated Franz Liszt in the ball room in Budapest" (1872) by Franz Schams

"A concentrated Franz Liszt in the ball room in Budapest". (March 18, 1872) The audience include Emperor Franz Joseph (fourth from right in blue), crown prince Rudolf, Archduchess Gisela and the Hungarian nobility). 

Painting by Franz Schams (1823 - 1883). Vienna, Bösendorfer Collection.

This artwork of Schams is also known as: "Franz Liszt konzertiert im Redoutensaal in Budapest."

Franz Liszt, pianist and composer; 1811 - 1886.

The piano Liszt is playing is a Bösendorfer (made in Vienna).

Visit art9000 to order prints (link here).

Painting: Franz Liszt Fantasizing at the Piano (1840) - Josef Danhauser

 

"Franz Liszt Fantasizing at the Piano" by Josef Danhauser (1840)

Oil on panel.

Current location: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin - Stiftung PresBischer Kulturbesitz, Alte Nationalgalerie F.V. 42

Liszt playing a piano by Conrad Graf (who commissioned the painting). The imagined gathering are seated: L-R Alexandre Dumas père, George Sand, Franz Liszt (at piano), Marie d’Agoult (on floor); standing L-R Hector Berlioz or Victor Hugo, Niccolò Paganini, Gioachino Rossini. A portrait of Byron is on the wall, a statue of Joan of Ark on far left and a bust of Beethoven is on the piano.

Josef Danhauser (1805 - 1845)

Franz Liszt (1811 - 1886)

Dick Van Dyke becomes the oldest Daytime Emmy winner

Dick Van Dyke, with wife Arlene, says he was stunned to win the award. (AP PHOTO)

By Beth Harris in Los Angeles

Dick Van Dyke has won an historic Daytime Emmy at age 98.

The actor was honoured as guest performer in a daytime drama series for his part as amnesiac Timothy Robicheaux on Days of Our Lives, pipping Australian actor Guy Pearce of Neighbours for the award, making him the oldest Daytime Emmy winner.

“I don’t believe this. I feel like a spy from nighttime television,” he said.

“I’m 98 years old. Can you believe it? This really tops off a lifetime of 80 years in the business. If I had known I would have lived this long I would’ve taken better care of myself.”

General Hospital won four trophies, including its fourth consecutive honour as best daytime drama. It’s the second time in the ABC show’s 61-year history that it won four daytime drama trophies in a row.

Robert Gossett of General Hospital won supporting actor honours. The first cousin to the late Oscar-winning actor Louis Gossett Jr was honoured for the second straight year for his role as Marshall Ashford.

General Hospital also won the directing and writing categories.

Thorsten Kaye of The Bold and the Beautiful earned his second straight lead actor win for playing Ridge Forrester.

“I got to be very honest. I don’t like award shows. I didn’t like award shows until tonight,” he said.

A clearly stunned Michelle Stafford of The Young and the Restless won best actress as Phyllis Summers, a trophy she first earned in 2004.

“I am honoured to be an actor. It is the greatest gig. It is a privilege,” she said. “I’m honoured to entertain people.”

Van Dyke received a standing ovation as he used a cane to make his way to the stage, accompanied by his wife, Arlene, who held the trophy.

“I brought this lady up because she was also on the show,” he said.

“She played the cop who arrested me.”

Producer Norman Lear was 100 when he received his final Primetime Emmy nomination in 2022 and died the next year.

Van Dyke has won four Primetime Emmys, including three in the 1960s for his classic comedy series The Dick Van Dyke Show.

As well as Pearce, Van Dyke beat out last year’s winner Alley Mills of General Hospital, Linden Ashby of The Young and the Restless, and Ashley Jones of The Bold and the Beautiful.

The Kelly Clarkson Show continued its domination of the daytime show category with a fourth consecutive victory. The singer, who moved her show from Los Angeles to New York last year, was on hand to collect the trophy.

“The move has been so great, not just for me and my family but for our whole show,” she said, singling out NBC.

“Thank you for thinking of mental health and not just a product.”

Courtney Hope, who plays Sally Spectra on The Young and the Restless, earned supporting actress honors. She originated the role on The Bold and the Beautiful in 2017 before moving to Y&R in 2020.

Melody Thomas Scott, who has played Nikki Newman on The Young and the Restless for 45 years, and her producer-husband, Edward Scott, were honoured with Lifetime Achievement Awards.

The wife-and-husband team of Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos won daytime talk series host for their Live with Kelly and Mark. Ina Garten won best culinary series for Be My Guest on Food Network.

The ceremony honouring soap operas, talk and game shows aired live on CBS from The Westin Bonaventure hotel in downtown Los Angeles.

The 51st annual Daytime Emmys returned to their usual place on the calendar, six months after the show’s 50th edition aired in December after being pushed back because of last year’s Hollywood writers and actors strikes.

First published at Canberra City News, via Australian Associated Press, June 8, 2024