Stephen Weir articles, editorials and popular social media weir postings

Good News Travel Shortly   Stephen Weir In the last week this Caribbean Camera reporter has heard from the Bahamas, St. Kitts, St. Vincent and The Grenadines regarding travel changes that will impact Canadian visitors. As Covid-19 protection requirements are being reduced the news for travellers is all good.   The Islands of the Bahamas  has eased entry protocols, is welcoming more nonstop flights, and reopening favourite hotels. At the end of August, the Bahamas no longer requires cruise passengers entering the country to be vaccinated. However, the unvaccinated must present a negative COVID-19 test taken no more than 72 hours prior to travel to The Bahamas. In November Frontier Airlines will start nonstop flight from Atlanta to Nassau. Meanwhile Bahamasair will start new nonstop flights between Raleigh-Durham and Freeport, beginning in mid-November. Club Med Columbus Isle which was closed during the pandemic will be reopening its all-inclusive resort on San Salvador Island in late

  Rhoma Meet Dora - your time is long overdue BY STEPHEN WEIR The annual  Dora Mavor Moore Award  is the oldest and largest g rouping of prizes honouring the very best in theatre, dance, and opera in Toronto. This year, the 42 nd  for the Awards, there are 46 different award categories up for grabs! The late Dora Mavor Moore was born in Scotland in 1888 and at the age of 8 came to Toronto.  She devoted her long life to creating theatre and theatre companies in her new home.  A recipient of many awards and honours, Dora Mavor Moore was truly one of the key founders of professional theatre in Canada and a fitting namesake for Toronto’s professional theatre awards. It is a very big deal. Winning a prestigious Dora is a huge career accomplishment for those working in the theatre industry.   When the awards are handed out on  Saturday September 19 th  at the downtown  Winter Garden Theatre Centre, the eyes of the community will be on Trinidadian Canadian Actor, Play Creator, Director, and

  The Film World Agrees The Martinique Animated Movie OPAL Is Golden IF Alain Bidard makes it up to the Caribbean Tales Film Festival on September 23 rd  he probably won’t bring all his film festival trophies with him when his animated movie, Opal, is shown in Toronto.  There is not enough room in his suitcase for all the awards the Martinique producer/director has captured since the movie came out last year. He has  already won 48 awards and 73 nominations worldwide and will be in the running for some titles at the Toronto festival as well. Alain Bidard (right) is the only Caribbean animation film director who has won that many recognitions.  He  is an animation film producer/director from the French island of Martinique. Over the past 20 years, he has produced and directed animated feature and short films, animated series, and live-action films which won more than 60 awards and 250 nominations in festivals worldwide. The movie gets its Canadian debut on September 23th at the 17th ann

  Natasha Powell has a new line of Jazz Dancing Natasha Powell isn’t worried.     The Toronto choreographer, dancer, and teacher has a little over four weeks to finish     her new dance  Margarita   which gets its world premiere on September 30 th . “I am not worried” she told the Caribbean Camera. “ I am about half finished. Navigating this has been a bit of challenge but I’d rather be fresh when we go on stage than stale, which can happen with an older (work).” Margarita will be performed three times – September 30 th , October 1 st  and 2 nd  as part Toronto’s premier international dance festival Fall for Dance North (FFDN). The annual festival is back with in-person programming after a 2-year Covid break. The eighth edition of the festival runs from September 17 to October 8 th  on various stages throughout the city. Being a work in progress, Powell is a little bit short on detail of what audiences can expect when the curtain goes up. She does say that the commissioned Margarita is

LavWay is the only way to enjoy Trinidad's Carnival in the theatre During the carnival season in Toronto a day doesn’t go by without me being asked “what is it about you that you love Carnival so much?”  I haven’t had an answer as to why I consider Carnival the best live show on earth, that is until I saw the movie  Lavway: Our Story. It is a magical movie made by devotees of the Caribbean arts and released in Port-of-Spain back in February, 2021. You won’t see this on Netflix, this feature is aimed primarily at a Caribbean audience and carnival friendly North Americans.  This is an hour-long explosion of colour, music, costumes, dancing and dark mystical stories about all things Carnival.  It helps to know a little about the traditions of the annual T&T carnival before you buy your ticket for the film’s September 8 th  Canadian premier. This is a film has been made not to teach but to entertain.  “This is an experimental film based on traditions of Trinidad’s unique Carnival,”

Stephen Weir Goes To The Movies In September Stephen Weir in a theatre  lobby ub July Ms Jean Augustine, Ms Everything, is about to be crowned Canada’s Movie Queen. Earlier this week the annual Caribbean Tales Film Festival (CTFF) held it's 2022 Media Launch to roll out the movies that will be screened in theatres this September, and the show stopper is none other than   Steadfast – The Messenger And the Message,   a documentary about the life of  Canada’s first Black Canadian woman to serve as a Federal Minister of the Crown, Jean Augustine of course. The hour-long film  tells the amazing life story of this Grenadian Canadian Liberal politican who spent a dozen years in parliament and then become a non-stop community activist here in Toronto. The film was recently completed by Canadian director Fahim Hamid and has an amazing three-person castlist which actually includes Prime Minister Justin Trudeau! The film will be shown the evening of Friday  September 9th,(Augustine’s 85 th  b

  Have You Got Your Oscar Yet?   STEPHEN WEIR : Sometime on  Monday Canada’s Mint began issuing the brand new $1 Oscar – the first circulating Canadian coin to bear the likeness of a Black Canadian.  The $1 commemorative coin is all about celebrating the artistic legacy of the late Oscar Peterson .   Called "the man with four hands" by jazz great and admirer Louis Armstrong, Oscar Peterson rose to the top of the music world through more than six decades of electrifying piano performances. The coin began circulating on Monday, August 15, to coincide with his birthday. Peterson was born in Montreal in 1925 to immigrants from St. Kitts and the British Virgin Islands)  --  his father worked as a porter for Canadian Pacific Railway. Oscar Peterson passed away in Mississauga back in 2007. He was 82-years old.   According to the Royal Canadian Mint the Oscar Peterson commemorative circulation coin was designed by artist Valentine De Landro, an accomplished comic book artist, illustr