Sunshine Sketches: Sunday February 12th, 8PM on CBC

Deb: Many projects come and go. Some are fun, some are successful, some are a nightmare, and some are special.

Sunshine Sketches Of A Little Town is special.

If you are Canadian, this is a must-see as it is a proud part of our heritage. If you are not, please consider watching as it is great family viewing.  Colin and I have seen a copy and it is delightful, funny, and surprising.

Colin and Deb on set.

Sunshine Sketches was written by Stephen Leacock in 1912. Mr. Leacock  was a humourist and writer of fiction who was born in Hampshire, England in 1869. He came to Canada with his family at the age of six and was educated among other schools at the prestigious Upper Canada College in Toronto and the University of Chicago where he received a doctorate in political science and political economy. He soon became disillusioned with politics (smart lad) and turned to writing, with fiction and humour a specialty. He started out his literary career writing short stories that were published in magazines in Canada and the U.S. and became very popular all over the world. Around 1911 it was said that more people had heard of Stephen Leacock than had heard of Canada. Still true today!!!  :-)

Between 1915 and 1925, he was the most popular humourist in the world.

Groucho Marx and Jack Benny were among his biggest fans. He was a huge influence on them when they were young vaudevillians and fifty years after first reading him they still considered him one of their favourite comic writers.

Sunshine Sketches was shot in the thinly-disguised town of Mariposa, a small town in Ontario that Leacock was all too familiar with. The story is based on fact and fiction or, I should say, fact and embellishment.

This production is a virtual who’s who of Canadian talent, with the great Gordon Pinsent at the helm. We are proud of it and wanted to share. Please consider spending some time with us in this charming little town. 

Barbara: I saw the trailer for this just the other night and it looks fabulous! Beautifully shot and with some great stars (including our dear Deb and Colin). I’m so glad you remembered to remind us, Deb—because TV shows, especially Canadian ones, tend to fall through the cracks. I really want to catch this one!

We couldn’t get the trailer to embed here, but if you go to this link, you can see a really cute (and not too long) making-of doc.

Making Magic And Believing In It

Barbara: So, yes, we shot our demo pilot on Wednesday and it was wonderful! Cannot even begin to describe the wondrousness of it. We promised you photos and here they are. But I also wanted to expound a bit (a very tiny bit) on the whole “making your dream come true” thing. Man, it takes a lot of work and prep and tenacity and commitment and optimism and courage to do it, but most of all, MOST of all, it takes a village to raise a dream. Without our army of likeminded, dedicated, hard-working, imaginative, and creative dreamers, Deb and I would never ever have had our dream come true. All day, I couldn’t help marveling at this barefaced fact. Deb was marveling too. We would routinely, throughout the day, look at each other in wonder and amazement. We are eternally grateful to all who came aboard our project and helped to realize it.

But there’s also the other side of the whole process: the questioning, the insecurity, the second-guessing, the fatigue. And the next day you wake up and you kinda feel like you’ve been through a tornado: exhilarated and invigorated, but also unable to stop wondering, “What the hell actually happened out there?!” The thing about dreams is that very often they feel like … well, like dreams. Did it really happen? Was it as good as I thought? Is life in any way … different because a miracle just happened?

In my experience, I have never been able to have the glory of the one hand without the anxiety of the other. Have you? Is it possible? Or are we just hardwired to be faithful skeptics?!

Deb: Well, I can only second what Barb said. It was a tiny little miracle this day. Yes, it’s true that when we did the postmortem the next day we were brimming with things we might have done or could have done or might have changed or had regrets about. But the truth, the real truth, is that THIS is the creative process. The fact that we were given this opportunity was the gift. The rest is not even worth the paper to wrap it in. We are proud. Beyond that, we will see. 

My Little Mosque

Deb: After six seasons, we wrapped Little Mosque on the Prairie in Toronto last night.

Deb on set with most of the Little Mosque cast

This last month has been full to the brim with emotion. We have been through a lot together, this cast. We have over the six years shared joy and mourning. We have welcomed babies into the world, and eulogized dear friends and family. We have celebrated weddings and lamented departures of cast friends who moved on to other things. The six years have not been without incident though and we have over time griped and gossiped and complained. That’s part of the gig.

But in these last months of the final season, all of that has just fallen away and all we are left with is friendship and adoration for each other, and a deep sense of pride for having been involved with this show.

Little Mosque on the Prairie will always be a highlight of my career because of its message of tolerance, inclusion and illumination. It is seen in almost 100 countries around the globe and hopefully the message they intended is getting out. Simply put, that people are people. I have learned so much about the Muslim faith on this show and have embraced the differences and the similarities to mine.

But what I will miss the most is the laughs. The only thing, and I mean ONLY thing, that can put a spring in my step at 5 am is the knowledge that I am about to start laughing and not stop for the next twelve hours. Honestly, it is the closest I get to feeling like a kid again. And anytime I want to complain I think, “Really? You come in and get paid to work with talented lovely people, you get free food and time between shots to check Facebook, and every time your feet are tired someone is there with slippers.”

My darling cast member and dear friend Sheila and I have been making a point this last season to catch ourselves when even the tiniest complaint threatens to permeate the laughter. We look at each other surrounded by fun and say, “What the hell are we complaining about?”

We have been brimming with emotion with each day that sees another cast member wrap. Last night there was just three of us left. Sheila, girl of my heart; Neil, the nicest man on earth whom I have known since he was a kid; and myself. We cried. Man, did we. For everything. For the show that we have shared and the life we have shared during that show. And then we dried our tears and laughed. And then we had drinks and laughed some more.

The show-biz family is a movable feast. When you are in the show, they become such a huge part of your life. When the show ends, some will remain and some will depart leaving just a lovely memory of a time of your life. And like most actors, I have no idea where my next job will come from. Right now, I don’t care. Mosque is going to stay with me just a tad longer.

Barbara: Oh, Deb, I so feel for you right now. It’s a close, maybe even uniquely close work-environment being on a set (if you share a similar experience in another job, please let us know!). You are thrown together by happenstance (okay, and talent), you must pretend to be other people with different relationships, you must bond with those around you whether you want to or not, you must put up with crap and be an unsuspecting shoulder, you often discover souls you would never otherwise have crossed paths with or chosen as friends, and you bond before you even know it. The gamut of this relationship can run its course over a day, a week, a month, or it can evolve over a few months a year for several years, as in your case, Deb.

It’s strange. And intense. And beautiful.

Kinda like a family.