The Firehall Arts Centre remounts I Walked the Line, previously seen at the Anvil Centre, New Westminster, in May 2019. This is a re-posting of my review of that production.
Firehall Arts Centre, October 15-25, 2020
Tickets from $20 at 604-689-0926 or firehallartscentre.ca
Posted October 14, 2020
At Anvil Centre (777 Columbia Street, New Westminster) until May 27, 2019
Tickets from $15 at 604-521-5050 or ticketsnw.ca
Posted May 25, 2019
What does an internationally-known, high-profile actor do when the biz hands him lemons? First, he finds alternate employment, uses his theatre skills in the new job and eventually turns the whole experience into theatre.
That’s the true story of actor Allan Morgan, Prospero in Bard on the Beach’s production of The Tempest in 2014. He toured across Canada in the Electric Company’s Studies in Motion, has many times graced the Playhouse and Belfry stages as well as stages in London, Adelaide, Wellington and San Francisco in the internationally celebrated The Overcoat. My personal favourite was Morgan in I am My Own Wife at the Belfry; he was unforgettable.
Credit: David Blue
When roles stopped coming, Morgan eventually found a job as a mail clerk in the head office of a labour union. As he says ruefully in this 70-minute one-man show, “I wasn’t playing the part of a mail clerk. I WAS a mail clerk”. He initially doubted his friends’ commiserations about “transferable skills” from the theatre but that, eventually, is exactly what happened.
He turned his mail cart, which he pushed through all the offices on a daily basis, into a little trolley with a ‘poster-of-the-day’ and twinkly lights. On the appropriate occasion he donned big floppy bunny ears and handed out chocolate eggs; on Wednesdays, he choreographed a Hump Day Fun Fest. And he celebrated Pride Day, too. Like a town crier, he spread the news from cubicle to cubicle. Other employees – mostly women, mostly from the suburbs – became his family as the theatre community had once been. One of his co-workers asked a favour of him: would he go shopping with her? “I have always wanted to go shopping with a gay man”, she said. The suburbs met the gay community.
Then the union members were locked out. Negotiations failed. Morgan and 54 others were on strike and began walking the picket line on a busy stretch of highway.
Under the direction of Ross Desprez, I Walked the Line becomes the story of 132 days walking the line in sun and rain with this new family of friends. It is intimate, passionate and sometimes excruciatingly painful as Morgan takes us through those days – some dark, some light. The play is subtitled, ‘A play about Unions, Treachery, Solidarity, Porta Potties & Baked Goods.’ “Never underestimate the power of baked goods,” he says, referring to fellow union members or friends who brought cupcakes, cookies and other goodies. Pizzas were brought by the Electrical Workers union; “they were hot. The pizzas were, too”, Morgan quips. The Longshoremen’s Union hosted a barbecue. And through it all, Morgan helped to keep everyone’s spirits up.
Credit: Robinson Wilson
Ultimately, the workers lost. The small pay increase offered was off-set by the clawing back of other benefits like sick pay. “This is the best you’re going to get”, their union rep told them. Reluctantly, they settled. But worse was yet to come.
Punished, it would seem, for spreading joy, Morgan was sacked. Told to pack up and leave. He was told a mail clerk was no longer needed. What kind of bullshit is that?
On opening night, the Anvil Centre theatre was packed with Morgan’s union member friends – “brothers and sisters” who had walked the line with him. I sat behind four of them – four women (maybe more) who laughed, who might have cried, one of whom fist-punched the air and all of whom joined heartily in “Solidarity Forever” with Morgan’s rewritten lyrics. Their story was being told and they were overjoyed. Usually the winner tells the tale; but now the tables were – at last – turned. Sweet revenge.
For all the humour – and it is funny – I Walked the Line is not easy to watch. It was a tough experience for Morgan and he does not hold back. He is at times fiercely angry, at times overwhelmed by the generosity and the deep affection of his co-workers.
Credit: Robinson Wilson
Morgan opens the show with Prospero’s closing lines – the epilogue he last spoke at Bard on the Beach in 2014: “And now my charms are all o’erthrown/what strength I have’s mine own.” He closes I Walked the Line with those same lines but now they are not only Prospero’s words, they are Morgan’s, too. Perhaps as never before, Morgan – actor, playwright, Christmas cookie baker, former mail clerk – sees his own strengths: dignity, grace and great good spirit under adversity.