Forrest Barnum last wrote for The Toast about Canadian political novels.
Figure 1: Yowzah
When I was growing up, I didn’t watch a lot of commercial TV; we were a PBS/Star Trek household. One hazily remembered day, an enchanting show came on where an excessively polite, strikingly handsome man in a splendid red suit solved crimes with his deaf, lip-reading dog, Diefenbaker, an inside joke I would not get until much later. Welcome to my life, Paul Gross!
Paul Gross is the Canadian actor. There are other actors from Canada (one or two, here and there), but Gross is the only one who has really only played Canadians – he’s always a Canadian. Sure he must have been in things where he’s assumed the mantle of another nationality or creed, but I choose to ignore it. Gross seems to embody an ideal of Canadianess in his major roles: excessive politeness and the rule of law, gentle artistic eccentricity, and REVENGE UPON THE EVIL AMERICANS!!!!
Constable Benton Frasier remains the preeminent Paul Gross experience. For anyone who was not into somewhat-cult 90s era Canadian-U.S. coproduction magical realist cop dramedies, the premise of Due South: a Mountie is assigned to the Chicago P.D. after an investigation into the untimely death of his father (also a Mountie, and noted Canadian thespian/legend Gordon Pinsent) makes him politically toxic up north.
Figure 2: Acting Legend and jodhpur aficionado Gordon Pinsent
Fraser is partnered with Ray (David Marciano), basically your standard issue 80s-90s gruff-cop-with-a-heart-of-gold, and they run around misunderstanding each other and solving crimes. DELIGHTFULLY. The whole show revolves around a clash of benign stereotypes and the Fraser-Ray relationship is U.S. (brash, cynical, prone to violence) and Canada (polite, passive-aggressive, slightly magical) in a nutshell. Due South largely works because Gross and Marciano work together. When Marciano left at the end of season two, it diminished the show, something basically acknowledged when they brought him back for the excellent series finale.
Fraser has quasi-magical powers, his ghost dad shows up to dispense sage advice, he can crack cases by tasting and smelling things, he can communicate by semaphore, his dog can read lips, it goes on! What Gross really brings to the part is a sense of sadness and weight, without which Fraser might be too perfect to like. Fraser would much rather be doing Mountie things way up in the territories, his time in Chicago is definitely a punishment he only gradually comes to enjoy. It’s notable that (SPOILERS) in the series finale he heads off to find the Franklin Expedition instead of staying in Chicago, his dream achieved. (/SPOILERS)
Gross also wrote several episodes and even contributed his songwriting/singing talents on occasion. In what would get my vote for best single episode (“All the Queen’s Horses,” from season two), a train full of Mounties sings a song about riding forever, written by Paul Gross. What. A. Guy. Said episode features a bomb on said train, Leslie Neilsen as a Mountie, Fraser getting kissed, and a mounted cavalry charge. TOO DAMN GOOD.
Figure 3: Police Squad has never looked better
Due South was actually filmed in Toronto, which blows my mind a bit, since it means we have a show about a Canadian in the U.S. city which is actually filmed in a Canadian city. Some real ouroboros stuff there! As the Gordon Pinsent and Leslie Neilsen cameos foreshadow, Due South boasted cameos from about every Canadian actor who was anyone in the mid-late 90s, which makes for a great drinking game/form of bingo for Canada obsessives!
The next major role I associate with Paul Gross also features a ghost. Slings & Arrows is also a cult show, being beloved by Shakespeare and theater geeks for its many in-jokes and perceptive realism vis a vis backstage shenanigans. Gross plays Geoffrey Tennant, an actor who was committed to an asylum during a run of Hamlet some years ago. He’s been scraping by on the fringes of the theater world, when his mentor, Oliver Welles, the director of the New Burbage Festival (it’s totally this y’all) is run over by a truck filled with hams (theater humour y’all!) The upshot is that Tennant is put in charge of the New Burbage festival and his former mentor appears to him as a ghost, which no one else can see, which makes everyone else sure he’s still one socket short of a set. Tennant and Welles have history, which makes having to hang out together is fraught.
This is a show I find hard to talk about because it has so many wise and insightful things to say about being alive, being a good person, and life in general which are beyond my ability to express well. Happily this is a Paul Gross article so I can just focus on what he brings to the table (but seriously, watch this). Quite honestly it’s another straight man role; one of the grand ironies of the narrative is that he’s the sanest person in a world of bizarre and eccentric people. THEATER PEOPLE. He’s got to put on Hamlet, or the whole festival is toast.
Perhaps the single best part of Slings & Arrows is the relationship between Tennant and Ellen Fanshaw, the resident theater diva. The nuclear end to Tennant and Fanshaw’s relationship pretty much caused his mind to break and of course they’ve got to work together to make the production a success. Ellen Fanshaw is also the BEST character on Slings & Arrows, she’s massively conceited, but hugely talented, and terrified for her future as she reaches an age where she can only play Lady Macbeth, nurses, and witches on the Shakespeare circuit. Now you might say, up what does this character have to do with Paul Gross? A: Martha Burns, who plays Fanshaw, is Gross’s real life spouse! Game, set, match, topical relevance! Seriously though, it’s a great show, very Canadian (co-created by a member of Kids in the Hall! How Canadian is that?), and Paul Gross is totally credible as a former great Shakespearian actor and present day guy-just-barely-holding-it-together. The later two seasons (featuring productions of Macbeth and King Lear) are honestly even better while being the dictionary definition of ‘bittersweet.’
The final uber-Canadian role I associate with Gross is his turn as the immoral conniver Thomas McLaughlin in the CBC miniseries H2O and The Trojan Horse. These shows are Canadian House of Cards, i.e. devious political machinations played for high office. McLaughlin kills his father (a canoeing accident, the most Canadian form of assassination behind ‘the moose did it’) and sells all of Canada’s water to the U.S. to consolidate his power, causing mass protests and domestic insurrection within Canada. At the end of H2O, it’s revealed the whole plot was a pretext to allow the annexation of Canada by the U.S. (dun dun dunnnnn). In The Trojan Horse, McLaughlin runs for U.S. President, planning to win and wreck the country from the inside, FOR REVENGE.
There are numinous Scandal-like complications, backstabs, turnabouts, betrayals, and the return of Martha Burns as the Governor of Texas! The whole mess can’t quite decide if it’s trying to be sort of serious or is a delicious gooey mass of cheesy wonderfulness (the latter is obvious more entertaining). Annnnddd of course: Paul Gross, he’s really good at being a slimeball (sorry Paul! I love you!). McLaughlin is a character who is either being weak, gloating over outsmarting someone, or looking po-faced as he is outsmarted, but Gross has the raw charisma to make the viewer believe that the electorate would choose to make this utter bastard Prime Minister/President.
Figure 4: EVIL Paul Gross
Paul Gross: thespian, musician, Canadian, legend. Looks amazing in red. Let us appreciate him for the national and international treasure he is.
POSTSCRIPT: Extra Paul Gross credit, he also starred in Men with Brooms, an intermittently amusing sitcom about curling. Recommended for curling die-hards and PG completists. Gunless is an intermittently amusing meta-western about an American gunslinger crossing into Canada and his resulting confusion at the orderliness and lack of guns. Major problem: Paul Gross plays an American. Please, there is suspension of disbelief but that’s just too far!
Tags: canada, canadians, forrest barnum, heroes, movies, paul gross, something something canada, television
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Slings & Arrows is magnificent: see Rachel McAdams in the first season as the positively edible ingenue Kate. It’s a buffet of Canadian stage and screen talent and makes me very happy indeed. Binge-able and entirely marvelous.
A buffet, yes. A buffet that included me being shocked out of my socks when my beloved GILBERT BLYTHE showed up as a creepy, plagiarizing playwright!
That story arc was the dark night of my soul. Jonathan Crombie did *not* age well and I had to squint to see my beautiful, dimple-eyed Gilbert in that guy.
Quick find-and-replace: it’s Slings & Arrows.
‘SLINGS AND ARROWS’! *screams with joy*
*Screams just as loudly*
I often try to convince people how good (and how funny) Slings & Arrows is, but most of my pleas fall on deaf ears. It’s really not at all inaccessible, despite its concept sounding really highbrow. Even if you aren’t completely familiar with the play they are putting on it’s still really enjoyable (although the parallels they work in between the play and the main plot are enhanced if you do). It’s very well written (and acted), etc.
Truly, you all are my people!
Paul Gross as Geoffrey Tennant looked (and in many ways acted) exactly like the director of my MFA theater program, which was slightly frightening. Still LOVE that show.
I can never truly love Paul Gross because he wrote, produced, directed, and starred in Passchendaele, which was so egregious I can’t.
Yeahhh, I thought about mentioning Passchendaele but it’s the kind of thing that aspires to be handsomely mounted and fails. Sorry Paul Gross!
I aspire to be handsomely mounted by Paul Gross #sorrynotsorry
Would you kindly explain why you think Passchendaele fails. I
found it difficult to watch but from what I read it was accurate. So your insights would be helpful to know.Thanks
I just discovered Slings & Arrows recently, and as great as Geoffrey is, my true love and new patronus is Darren Nichols. DEAL WITH THAT.
But back to Paul Gross, I submit (and will loudly argue so if drunk) that Fraser is the character that pre-conditioned people of my age and background to adore Giles so much on Buffy. Foreign, but in a super-friendly, strong-jawed, non-threatening fashion. Delightful, arcanely knowledgeable, and good at singing and stuff.
Interesting theory! I do indeed love both Fraser and Giles…
for reasons that don’t need exploring at this juncture I LOVE BENTON FRASER.
okay, I’m going to read the article now.
And having read the article I am going to immediately start watching H20 and The Trojan Horse. And maybe rewatch Slings & Arrows.
It’s not Canadian (although I am!), but my favorite Paul Gross film is Aspen Extreme.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0106315/ It’s tag line was “TOP GUN ON THE SKI SLOPES” and it is not officially ski season in my home until we have watched this and eaten a fondue.
Whoa — no mention of sexy 70s stud Paul Gross from the 1993 adaptation of TALES IN THE CITY? He plays an American, sure, but it’s still a great performance.
Mmm, Brian…
IMPORTANT ADDITIONAL PAUL GROSS VIEWING: the video for his song Voodoo. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4x1pwogXuNg
The first two seasons of Due South were certainly better in some ways but Callum Keith Rennie was amazing as Ray Kowalski and I have a lot of love for the later episodes.
The one where he has to teach (CKR) Ray to pretend to be Canadian so Chicago can’t arrest him is my absolute favourite. So, so Canadian.
o/
RayK was a DELIGHTFUL ADDITION to due South, but it basically changed genres between season 3/4.
That show about the water sounds completely nuts, and also I like that the paranoid Canadian fantasy is all about US annexation.
It’s not _that_ paranoid. I’m not sure if militaries still do it, back when military strategists used to fill up their time with creating lots of hypothetical “what if we annexed this country?” scenarios, the U.S. did have plans for “how to annex Canada” on the books. And it was a subject that American newspapers openly mused about in the second half of the 19th c. as well.
Okay, that was the pre-1940 historian in me talking. Yeah, it’s totally paranoid… _for now_. ///ominous music\
Can we talk about how Martha Burns played the ghost of Fraser’s MOTHER in the Due South finale? That show is 100% nuts, and I couldn’t possibly love it more.
I wanted Slings and Arrows to go on FOREVER. I would have happily watched all those characters through the entire Shakespearean pantheon.
It is just pure delight, isn’t it?
Imagine if they had gotten to Twelfth Night! OH THE SHENANIGANS THAT WOULD HAVE ENSUED.
HOW DOES MEN WITH BROOMS JUST SQUEAK IN AT THE POSTSCRIPT??? I had no idea it was adapted into a TV series, but the movie is MAJESTIC.
I mean, what is more Paul Gross-y than Paul Gross in a curling movie which involves him usually wearing a Cowichan-ish sweater?
Exactly! I can – and DO – quote that movie for days!
When I refreshed the page to see this article at the top, I yelled out “PAUL GROSS!” while making the triumphant gesture of all champion athletes.
o/ PAUL GROSS!
Seriously, people, if you haven’t seen “Slings & Arrows,” you are in for a goddamned treat. I own the entire collection on DVD, and I watch and rewatch it with undiminished delight. It’s hilarious and touching and tense and sweet and – well, it’s just one of my favorite shows ever.
p.s., and maybe SPOILER ALERT for S&A but I don’t reeeeally think so: so artful is the writing of S&A that each series approximately enacts the arc of the play the troupe is tackling that season. [edited to add: and I mean really approximately; you won’t know exactly how the conflicts will arise or resolve because it’s not a direct plot life, just a playful reimagining.] It’s subtle enough to feel completely natural and not stagey, but it adds a layer of resonance and structure to each season. Such a marvelously executed show.
Me too! Well, actually first I thought, “Oh, no, Paul Gross isn’t dead, is he?” And then when I checked and made sure that this was a perfectly ordinary celebration of Paul Gross, not an unexpected obituary, I was thrilled. But just a word to everyone who is considering watching S&A : do not give up if you don’t like Episode 1. Whatever you may think of the pilot, make sure you watch the first three episodes of the first season. At that point I am fairly sure you will be hooked for life.
And yes to your p.s. Without getting too deep into SPOILERS, I think one of the really amazing things about the last season is the way it plays with your expectations about how this parallel will happen. You think Geoffrey is Lear, but he’s not – he’s Kent. And the moment when you realize that is tremendously powerful and makes you reconsider everything that’s happened in the season. I cannot possibly convey my sense of how good that show is.
As for Due South – are there any other Due South Season 1 purists out there? As far as I’m concerned the show ends with Victoria’s Secret Part 2.
RAY KOWALSKI FOR LYFE. *waves flag* Callum Keith Rennie is my longstanding Canadian actor imaginary boyfriend though, so I am biased! Exclamation points!
RE: Paul Gross, I agree with all the good things said about him above. Benton Frasier could sing the hell out of a sea chanty or Stan Rogers song.
I was coming down here to say this!
Ray V. is great too, and you can certainly argue that the show got a little goofier in the last two season, but I LOVE Ray Kowalski and the different dynamic he brings to the show. And not for nothing but CKR is absurdly attractive.
Agreed. I am not anti Ray V, but Ray K was such an intensely bizarre character (who I wanted to bang like a screen door, yes).
Oh god, my earliest exposure to fandom insanity was the violent and vicious Ray K vs Ray V debates on like, Livejournal.
I know! I was like, “I want to go express my love for RayK in the comments, but am I ready for the possibility of another Ray War? I still have traumatic flashbacks to the first one! I SWEAR I SWING BOTH RAYS.”
ORIGINAL RAY 4EVER
HA! I had the same thought. I was like, is it cool to talk about this here? Am I going to get a bunch of mean emails about Due South, like it’s 1997???
Man, people were…really invested in that shit. This was also around the time I discovered fan fiction was a thing – because people would write fan fiction where they had their least favorite Ray turn out to be evil and die horribly. Or just die horribly.
Yes, I managed to start a Ray V. v Ray K. war in the comments. ALL MY DREAMS ARE ACHIEVED
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5FfJ89rGPc
I don’t see how saying that you think certain Due South episodes, or seasons, are better quality than other episodes and seasons leads to a Ray War. The author said nothing negative about RayK or Callum Keith Rennie. He was just praising David Marciano’s contribution, and DM deserves the praise. Some of us agree with what the author said, and some don’t. It’s nothing against RayK or CKR.
I once randomly saw CKR AND Jonathan Crombie (aka Gilbert Blythe) in Denver in the same week. I thought my little half-Canadian heart was going to explode from all the excitement.
WHY HAVE I NEVER HEARD OF THESE CRAZY CANADIAN POLITICAL THINGS
they sound so great and I want to watch them TWICE.
Also, how have I never seen Due South? This sounds like exactly the sort of thing I like.
I’m delighted that the author flagged the part where the text began to reveal H20’s underlying whatever (“it’s revealed that” NOPE DON’T READ THAT, SILLY ME) because obviously I’m going to track down this miniseries and watch it avidly.
Drop what you are doing and go watch Due South RIGHT NOW. It’s amazing.
OMG Slings & Arrows is SO THEATRE PEOPLE, I can’t even really make it through the seasons, it hurts me so.
Much as I want to join in the Paul Gross appreciation – because o/ Paul Gross! – there are too many things that just rub me the wrong way about this ‘celebration’.
First, the blatantly deliberate slight against another equally fantastic Canadian actor, Callum Keith Rennie, who played Ray Kowalski on Due South (Marciano’s ‘replacement’) I mean, I don’t mind if you prefer Rav V. to Ray K. and the first 2 season to the latter (I personally love them both) but to not even acknowledge CKR, another completely ubiquitous Canadian actor (and good friend of PG!) just smacks of pettiness. You’re willing to sing the (totally deserved) praises of David M… but not even mention CKR’s name? You even include the fact that Fraser essentially ‘rides off into the sunset’ to find the Hand of Franklin at the series end – and neglect to add that he does so with Ray K!
Then to give so little appreciation to ‘Men with Brooms’ (referring solely to the later sitcom, which Paul only produced/guested on, vs. the brilliant movie that Paul wrote/directed/starred in) – as another commenter pointed out “what is more Paul Gross-y than Paul Gross in a curling movie”? What could be more Canadian?
And Wilby Wonderful doesn’t even get mentioned in the postscript?
At least you adequately covered Slings & Arrows – because it IS brilliant. (although, to comment that ‘Paul Gross is totally credible as a former great Shakespearian actor’… um, yeah, maybe take a look at his theater credits – not to mention that he was nominated for a Dora Award for his performance in Romeo & Juliet, so it’s not a real big stretch).
Paul is national treasure, though, so at least you got that right.
I know, right? It’s a curling movie with an angsty relationship with Leslie Neilsen, curling sweaters, a ubiquitous bagpiper, and a soundtrack prominently featuring Sarah Harmer. It’s more Canadian than Canada.
If there had been dancing at our wedding, we would have danced to “Silver Road.” A song by Sarah Harmer and The Hip, from a movie about Canadian curlers. My husband has no choice but to be Canadian by association.
Ohhhh, I want to watch Slings & Arrows again, right now. Most brilliant show ever (at least up there with Farscape).
Somehow, I never watched/got into Due South. I think I own it, because it’s Paul Gross and was $10, and I’ve seen bits from friends who also adore Paul Gross, but I need to try that again.
Also, I never saw the Men in Brooms TV show, but the movie is hilarious and awesome.
Read more at http://the-toast.net/2014/04/29/paul-gross-celebr…
I was just clicking away from the page when I saw your comment about loving both Slings & Arrows AND Farscape and I had to frantically back-click just so I could thumbs-up EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS, including never getting into Due South despite being surrounded by Due South fangirls. Are you me?
A fandom twin, yay! I do not see enough Farscape love, ever, which is so sad. Even science fiction tv people seem to forget it ever existed, but it was glorious, wasn’t it?
(hey hey, got a log in! Time to start chatting with my people and not just reading. 😉 )
Wilby Wonderful is another Paul Gross movie and it is really, really good. Sweet but serious, and starring many other famous Canadians including Callum Keith Rennie, Sandra Oh, and Ellen Page.
I love Paul Gross so much. I also pumped my fists in the air when I saw this headline.
A couple more things that I love about Paul Gross (in addition to this entire list):
1.) when he took over running Due South, and added Callum Keith Rennie as New Ray/Stanley Kowalski, Gross deliberately amped up the homoeroticism, because Rennie exudes so much sexual chemistry and you just have to run with that. Benton Fraser and Kowalski ride off into the sunset together (on the same snowmobile or something), you guys.
2.) I’m working my way through Republic of Doyle on Canadian Netflix, and Paul Gross is one of the big bad guys (and Gordon Pinsent!), and everything is beautiful and nothing hurts. They’ve also had Martha Burns, and so many Codco people!
In conclusion: Canadian TV is the best, especially when it’s campy, and Paul Gross is a national treasure.
There is no proof that PG “deliberately amped up the homoeroticism” because he has never publicly admitted doing this, and I will always believe this. The interview with PG that F/K shippers often quote is always being interpreted to mean that PG inserted slash, but he didn’t even know what it was until the interviewer mentioned it, and by that time, much of Season 3 had already been filmed.
If you wear “slash goggles,” then you’re going to find homoeroticism in any show. But I personally don’t find it in any seasons of Due South between Fraser and either Ray. Fraser was friends with both Rays, but that was it, and he was much better friends with RayV than with RayK.
Oh yeah, Republic of Doyle, Paul Gross and Gordon Pinset clearly having the time of their lives swaggering about with guns while the gorgeous Allan Hawco tears around in a sports car when he’s not being kissed by beautiful women. Good fun!
My mother watched Due South Obsessively. She’s also a woman who watched Firefly on TV, when it was on Fox. I recall watching it quite vividly, even though I was 9 when it ended. I have linked her to this article, I will let you know if any mama_money hilarity ensues.
My entire family watched Due South obsessively!
I saw Paul Gross at a restaurant and fully stared at him all the way through lunch. He definitely noticed.
“When Marciano left at the end of season two, it diminished the show, something basically acknowledged when they brought him back for the excellent series finale.”
First of all, no. Ray K is a beautiful unicorn snowflake and Ray V is a smarmy sleaze-bucket.
Second of all, thanks a lot for restarting the Ray Wars and ensuring that I will have to sit on this page, constantly refreshing, in order to refute any and all enemy combatants.
Ray V has the saddest, most expressive eyes in the entire world. I will defend him to the very death.
“I learned two things from my father. One, timing. Mostly when to duck. And two, you never hit a kid. Because it doesn’t teach him anything.”
So you can’t express your own opinion about the quality of a particular season of Due South and compare it to other seasons without starting a “Ray War.” Ridiculous! Some fans prefer the seasons with Callum Keith Rennie, and some prefer the seasons with David Marciano. It’s just personal taste. And if you call any Ray names or refer to him negatively, then that is more starting a “Ray War” than an opinion about the quality of certain seasons of Due South! The author said nothing negative about Ray K, and it’s his opinion that the last two seasons of Due South weren’t as great as the first (an opinion I share – and I’m not saying it was CKR’s fault that the quality was less in the last two seasons. I think the writing had a lot to do with the show diminishing, and I don’t the think the series finale was “excellent,” even with DM in it).
McLaughlin kills his father (a canoeing accident, the most Canadian form of assassination behind ‘the moose did it’)
I just snorted coffee out my nose at this!
And I have renewed my determination to watch both Slings & Arrows and Due South. (I have read more fanfic for both than I have watched. So it goes… at least, in my life that’s how it’s gone.)
What! No mention of Getting Married in Buffalo Jump, which is the best (and only) late -1980s Canadian movie about a marriage of convenience between a female ranch owner and her super-hot ranch hand in rural southwestern Alberta? Paul Gross swims buck naked in a creek! He does a lot of manly ranch-related things! And don’t get me started on his Alberta drawl! I blame that movie for not finding a boyfriend when I was living in rural Alberta. Nobody could compare (and all the young guys were in Fort McMurray).
I have actually heard of this but not seen it! It seems to have had a seminal impact on the sexuality of many (mostly Canadian) young people who get misty-eyed and speak of a damp, nude Paul Gross.
It was on television A LOT in the late nineties. You must track it down because it is so gloriously terrible!
Added and bumped to my #1 spot on Netflix. Who doesn’t want to get misty-eyed and speak of a damp, nude Paul Gross? I am in.
The introduction of Ellen in the pilot episode of Slings & Arrows is also possibly the most perfect “instantly defining character moment” you will encounter: http://youtu.be/owfeSoW-DmY?t=4m50s
“Sorry everyone, Sorry for caring”
“WEEKS ago you promised!”
I love Paul Gross but Season 1 of Slings and Arrows is SO MUCH about Luke Kirby. MMMM
Sloan. It is all about Sloan.
I hope I get to be the one to introduce you to Buried on Sunday, a movie in which Paul Gross commandeers acquires a Soviet nuclear sub, and declares a small fishing island off the coast of Nova Scotia a sovereign country because something-somthing fishing quotas something something Ottawa fat-cats. THAT’S A REAL MOVIE. Legend has it, a real Russian sub surfaced during filming and asked if they could be of service: I like to believe this is because of the irresistible cross-cultural appeal of Paul Gross.
That sounds… like all of my dreams come true (starts googling assiduously).
OMG WHAT.
I thought I was the only person who remembers that movie! Paul Gross programming the sub’s nuclear missiles to strike Mount Rushmore and Canada’s Wonderland, good times.
Slings and Arrows is all on Acorn! (As is Miss Fisher Season 2 and a million other amazing things!) I just rewatched all of it, and it was even better than I remembered. I wish so badly there were more of it.
Paul Gross should be a handsome Canadian on Miss Fisher. I WOULD DIE.
WHAT HAPPENED TO MORE SLINGS AND ARROWS BECAUSE I WAS PROMISED MORE.
Also the new handsome Canadian in a suit who solves crimes is Yannick Bisson, from Murdoch Mysteries. DISCUSS.
Also, can I please write one of these about Peter Outerbridge? (Who was ALSO in Men with Brooms with Paul Gross, but sadly I don’t think they kissed.)
*joins in the dancing, flailing, cheering chorus of glee over Slings & Arrows* I love that show SO MUCH, you guys. It’s all the more delightful when you’ve been to the Shakespeare festival that Slings & Arrows oh-so-thinly fictionalizes (and borrows the occasional actor from).
What about “Getting Married in Buffalo Jump”?!? The whole thing is so cheesy, and he’s so beefcake-y! It is required viewing for any true Paul Gross fan, and I cannot believe this article neglected to mention this gem.
I had never heard of any of these things until now (sorry) but that video of a train full of Mounties having a sing-a-long, interspersed with clips of train-top makeouts, was the best thing ever.
Slings & Arrows is a nigh-perfect show, and extra hilarious to me because I’m a regular visitor to the Stratford Festival. Plus, fun fact: I have a friend who works at one of their gift stories, and the word is that- at least, as of a few years ago- they were not permitted to acknowledge that S&A existed. Not just that they didn’t sell it: if anyone asked, they had to go “NOPE NEVER HEARD OF THAT SHOW NUH-UH.” Fortunately, the icy hand of Des Macanuff has finally loosened, so hopefully they’re unclench about it soon.
That said, I do find the final season of S&A to verge more on the bitter than the sweet. It was just too dark, and far too snotty towards the musical theatre performers. (Which is, admittedly, a problem the show always had- you knew Richard was a dumbass because HE LIKED MAMMA MIA, THAT IGNORAMUS.) Also it kiboshed my secret otp of Richard/Anna, and that I cannot forgive.
This whole website is a conspiracy. Ray K is a beautiful angel and not mentioning CKR in an article about Paul Gross is UNFORGIVABLE and also restarting something in me that I thought died on LiveJournal in 2006. A formal apology would not be out of line.
*Obvious disclaimer that this comment is a joke since there seems to be at least one overly serious participant in the Ray Wars here. Due South is a delight no matter which seasons you prefer… but not liking Ray K does imply a deficiency of character.
I hope you’re still joking. Not liking Ray K is simply personal preference. No one should be accused on being a bad person because he or she does not like a certain character.
Met Paul Gross for the first time in Slings & Arrows—-loved him, loved the series. Checked out his other films—fell MADLY for him in Passchendaele, drooled over him in Buffalo Jump, laughed with him in Men with Brooms and Gunless (oh, that first scene!). Caught up with him in Aspen Extreme and Trojan Horse, but have yet to enjoy Due South. He’s an extraordinary actor, writer, director, and apparently, a very fine human being, not to mention GORGEOUS!!
PAUL GROSS! / *flails with mad adoration*
I <3 Paul Gross in every one of his endeavors…and I am travelling to Canada this December to see him and Martha in the stage play “Domesticated” — first time in decades that they are doing a live stage play together.