aah Among Canadian explorers and frontie
ee are the La Verendrye brothers, shown
ew Year’s Day of 1743.

RADIO-TV

rs men whose lives offer colorful material for TV
jn this drawing sighting the Rocky Mountains on

CBC series on life of Radisson
to start on CBUT this month

0° thickly-wooded Dowker’s

Island, off Ie Perrot near
Montreal, a camp-fire crackled
*range-red amid the green
frowth. Before the fire sat
two Indians, one of whom mo-
tioned the other to help him-
Self to the meat impaled on a
Stick and charred black by
the flames. The lithe brown
"tm. moved quickly, a knife
flashed, hacked, and the meat

Was consumed with savage
Eusto,

The scene wag a single “take”
(or filmeq sequence) in the
Production of Radisson — a
sens of 39 episodes depicting
he adventures of the early
Canadian explorer, Pierre
Esprit Radisson, which the
ee Children’s Department is
© present,

The Meat-eating “Indian”
Was Jacques Godin, fresh from
4M appearance as Montjoy—a
“ephisticated courtier in Strat-
ford’s Henry V, who plays

adisson, and the scene occurs
‘cae

PATRONIZE —
~ CARNEL’S

' COFFEE SHOP
ay 410 Main Street
ae New Management
pie _& Grace Robertson

ee

CONSTANTINE
Fine Custom Tailoring
adies’ and Gentlemen
Rm. 118, 603 W. Hastings St.
PA, 5810, Vancouver 2, B.C.

eee

in the early part of the ex-
plorer‘s career when he was
an adopted member of an In-
dian tribe. The campfire host
was Onenga, Radisson’s Indian
blood-brother, played by Ray-
mond Royer.

The scene was typical of
the constant striving for auth-
enticity of all involved; no
pre-cooked sirloins, rubber-
tipped arrows, machined
canoes, stuffed ducks or pre-
served trout here, but the real
stuff wherever possible.

Twenty-six-year-old Godin
was scheduled to go to Edin-
burgh last year with the Fes-
tival Players, but forsook this
in order to accept the lead in
the Radisson series.

The other major role, that
of Radisson’s brother-in-law
and partner, Des Groseilliers,
is played by another Montreal
actor, Rene Caron. Big, af-
fable Caron is 30 years of age.
After 15 years’ experience on
Quebec rural radio stations he
settled in Montreal where he
has been busy as an actor and
M.C. on French network TV

* programs.

So ee

The writer of the all-Cana-
dian series is John Lucarotti
of Toronto and Montreal. For
CBC Montreal, Jean Yves
Bigras is the producer and

Pierre Gauvreau is the direc-
tor. Renee Normand did the
French translations. The di-
rector of photography for
Omega Production Ltd., Mon-
treal, igs Dennis Mason
Filming of the series (car-

ried out by Omega Produc-
tions’ facilities under CEC di-

rection) was begun with high
hopes on August 20 last year
but inordinately bad weather
has been a constant bugbear,
retarding the shooting of out-
door sequences and bringing
about a corresponding delay in
the start of the series.

All told, more than 200 sep-
arate settings were used in the
production, including a suc-
cession of interior sets in the
Cote des Neiges studios in
Montreal in addition to the
outdoor locations on Ile Per-
rot, an island near Montreal
Island in the mouth of the
Ottawa River.

The most elaborate set was
a scale replica of old Fort
Orange erected on Ile Perrot
— a stockade-type enclosure,
with blockhouses, measuring
200 ft. in length. Creation of
two Indian villages was an-
other major project.

Lucarotti has based his
scripts on Radisson’s own jour-
nal and the historical accounts
of his life.

“Y’m not creating a card-
board hero,” he says. “It’s a
full-dimensional portrayal of
an extraordinary man whose
life was literally packed with
exciting incidents. The pion-
eering of this country was a
titanic undertaking — a saga
to stir the blood of every Can-
adian. Radisson is but one
exciting chapter. If it suc-
ceeds as I think it will, it will
be a great thing for it will
open the door to others.”

The Radisson theme song
was written by Johnny Cow-
ell of Toronto, who wrote the
hit song Walk Hand in Hand,

WALLACE VISITS USSR

Big Moscow audience

for Canadian poet

MOSCOW

fee sound of a quiet voice
speaking English is heard

in the hall. The speaker is a
tall, middle-aged man with
silvery temples and _ eyes
sparkling with youthful fer-
vor. From time to time, hush-
ed laughter rings through the
hall, a sure sign that the speak-
er is witty and has established
contact with his audience...

We are in the lecture hall of
the All-Union State Library of
Foreign Literature in Moscow
where an evening has been
arranged in honor of the Can-
adian poet, Joe Wallace.

Such meetings with writers,
scientists, and public figures
of different countries are held
here regularly and nearly al-
ways, in the language of the
guest.

Last year alone, represen-
tatives of the art and litera-
ture of Germany, Austria, It-
aly, Denmark, Britain, Egypt,
India, and Argentina. came
here singly and in delegations.

Wallace was invited to Mos-
cow by the Union of Soviet
Writers and naturally they
were the first to welcome
him.

Samuel Marshak was able
to greet the guest with sever-
al new translations of his
poems into Russian. Poetry
lovers had the opportunity of
reading some of these transla-
tions in the newspaper Lit-
eraturnaya Gazeta. Other
translations of Wallace’s
poems by Marshak will be
published in a coming issue
of the magazine Foreign Lit-
erature.

Marshak is, of course, a good
translator who has mastered
to perfection the art of con-
veying the beauty of the or-
iginal in the Russian langu-
age. This has been proved by
his translations of Shake-
speare and Burns. Neverthe-
less, who does not prefer the
original to the most talented
translation, in particular if
one has the opportunity to see
and hear the poet himself?

It is not surprising, there-
fore, that the evening dedi-
cated to the meeting with Wal-
lace was attended by a large
number of people knowing
the English language, teachers,
post-graduates and _ students
of higher educational estab-
lishments, employees of dif-
ferent enterprises and institu-
tions of the capital. The hall

could not accommodate all
who wished to attend.
it Pie Mae

Those who were present will
not soon forget the low voice
and well-built lean figure of
the man who gave such an in-
teresting talk about himself,
his friends and enemies, about
the modern literature of Can-
ada, about writers of different

trends and their books.

The audience warmly ap-
lauded excerpts from Wal-
lace’s own poems and verses
which he read with great ex-
pression and feeling. They
heard lines from his poems
dedicated to Lenin and Korea,
poetry inspired by current
events and verses dedicated to
his wife. He finished his pro-
gram for the evening but at
the request of his listeners he
continued to recite more and
more verses.

At the conclusion Wallace
had to reply to numerous
questions: for, how can one
miss the opportunity of mak-
inging a closer acquaintance
with the life and the people
of that country which is sec-

ond only in size and import-

ance on the North American
continent. ~

He was also asked about his
impressions of Moscow. But
what could he say about Mos-
cow if he had only been here

Bs
JOE WALLACE

for a few days? Of course, it
is a big, spacious city. There
are many large new construc-

tion sites and ancient monu-
ments, the likes of which can

also be seen in other countries.

But the people ... no, such
people as he has met in the
capital of the USSR are hard
to find, he thinks: they are
particularly purposeful, they
apparently have a special un-
derstanding of their destiny
which other peoples have, per-
haps, lost.

Finally, Irina Danilevskaya,
head of the department cater-
ing to readers of the library,
on behalf of all present, thank-
ed Wallace for the pleasure
he had given them and Wal-
lace, responding, presented the
library with copies of his
books All My Brothers (1953)
and Hi, Sister, Hi Brother
(1956).

I. DENIM

FEBRUARY 1, 1957 — PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE 13