Stephen Weir articles, editorials and popular social media weir postings

Jamaica’s Minister of Tourism Was A Last Minute No Show At His Own Reception  (But His Staff Knew He Never Made The Plane) By Stephen Weir  It wasn’t a good sign. An hour late, no one was at the Jamaica Canadian Association Hall microphone and reporters waiting to meet Jamaica’s Tourism Minister, Edmund Bartlett, received another round of free drinks. A few minutes later, members of the minister’s advance team took to the podium to say that the Minister was tied up at the Pearson airport and was expected to speak at 8pm – an hour and half after he was suppose to. It was a planned reception that Bartlett had invited prominent Canadian Jamaicans, travel experts and the media to attend in North Toronto.   He wanted to brief Canada on the bullish state of tourism in Jamaica. When the Reception finally started it was announced that the Minister would not be appearing and apparently he never had intended to show up at all! A video made the day before was played

When Death Come Run  (but not till Martin’s play is over) By Stephen Weir for the Caribbean Camera Rehearsals are well underway for a new play which the playwright describes as a mash up of old time Jamaica and British theatrical farce. When Death Come Run by Torontonian Yvette Martin, opens the evening   (8pm) of   Friday May 4 th at the downtown Al Green Theatre. “ The play owes a lot to Agatha Christie written from a Jamaican perspective,” Martin explains. “Despite the part-patois title of the play, When Death Come Run is aimed at a general English-speaking audience”, The two-act play is set in the rainy Parish of Portland, Jamaica in the early 1970’s. The play, a comedic mystery focuses on two brothers in their late 60’s, Joshua Jenkins, the local tailor (John Phillips) and his brother Jerimiah Jenkins, the local grave digger and part time medicine man (David Smith). Along with their extended dysfunctional family they all try to come to terms with their own de

Canadian debut at Toronto’s Royal Cinema By Stephen Weir It took four years and a worldwide Kickstarter project for the Jamaica Dance Hall documentary Bruk Out to Break Out in Toronto. On Friday night the movie was given its Canadian premiere to a wildly cheering audience at the downtown Royal Cinema. The Caribbean Camera Bruk Out – starts with the real thing. Men and women dancing in the streets and steamy dance halls of Kingston, Jamaica with reckless abandon.   Men and women flaunt their sexuality, on the dance floor, in the streets of Kingston and even on the hoods of slow moving cars.   Wining? That is too tame for Dance Hall – this is where the term daggering was born. The camera rolls with a clubber’s point of view of the hot hot dancing, while notable dancehall artists including Beenie Man and Elephant Man explain how the music and dancing feed off each other. The 69-minute movie moves from the ghetto to America, Poland and Spain, following

One Love. For One Day. In Toronto By Stephen Weir for the Caribbean Camera For the 27th year in a row, the City has declared February 6th as Bob Marley Day in Toronto.   In a special ceremony a proclamation from Mayor John Tory was read out, Bob Marley Day Awards were presented to community leaders and a Jamaican surfing reggae star performed to a small group of Marley supporters. Bob Marley Day began in 1991 with the first proclamation made by the former mayor of Toronto, Mayor Art Eggleton. This year, Mayor Tory signed the Bob Marley proclamation and had councillor Michael Thompson read it out at the Friday noon hour award ceremony and mini reggae concert.   Pictured left: Jamaica reggae star and owner of the island's surf club, Billy Mystic performed at the City Of Toronto's Bob Marley Day proclamation ceremony. On Friday at noon the city proclaimed February 6 as Bob Marley Day in the city.. Organizer Courtney Betty (l), Billy Mystic and councillor