I will make up for my lack of posting with a very long, newsy post. I have been to Toronto quite a few times in August and September, some times for shows, and for TIFF, one day I went just to be a foodie
On my foodie day, I went to the Chickery, which is run by Celebrity chef, David Adjey. It was okay, the
chicken tenders were moist, but I prefere my dad's beer can chicken and my
mama's coleslaw. I really liked his ranch dipping sauces though. I don't think
the value was there. Here's a pic of the food:
Afterwards I went to go a Magum pop up shop. The Magnum brand is
pretty new to North America, but it is a British ice cream bar. This pop up
shop let you customize your bar, with choices of what kind of ice cream,
chocolate coating (dark, white or milk), and toppings, some of the flavours are
crazy for example grape nerds! Seriously! There was a line to get into the
store to be served by a "pleasure maker" which is what the employees are
called. I hada vanilla ice cream bar, with white chocolate coating, macadamia
nuts, strawberries and toffee bits for toppings and milk chocolate drizzle. It
was $6 and worth every penny, glad I got to try it, as the store was only
around until the end of August. Here's a pic of the goodie:
Another thing was was only around in August was the touring production
of Anything Goes. This was one show that I knew I wanted to see when Mirvish
announced it was coming. It didn't disapoint, it was everything I love about
musicals, the costumes, the sets, the dancing, great music. Cole Porter really
knew his stuff. I would love to play the part of Reno Sweeney, it seems like a
fun role. The one negative, I kept on wishing it was Sutton Foster playing
Reno, not Rachel York, even though she did a fine job. I love the title
number... "god knows Anything Goes"
The show was being performed at the Princess of Wales Theatre which
will eventually be demolished to make way for ugly condo buildings. In case you
can't tell, just a little bitter about this. I have known about this for a
while but it makes it sort of bitter sweet when I go to the PoW because of
that, everytime, I wonder, will this be the last time. This time I noticed
something I never noticed before: a letter to Ed Mirvish signed by Princess
Diana! I took a pic:
I also found myself in Toronto for the Toronto
International Film Festival. My friend
Siob had offered my tickets to a South African made kids movie called Khumba,
it was really cute. It was about an zebra (Khumba) born with out stripes on his
backside, (so he had a white bum) the other zebra's thought he was cursed
because of this, and blamed him for the drought, so he sets out to earn his
stripes. On the first Saturday I dragged my friend Alex along and we were on the road at
7 am to make it on time for the early morning screening. The Q&A with the
director was fun, I got a kick out of watching the kids ask questions. We were
the first North American audience to see the film.
After the movie we were walking down King St plotting our next move,
what celebs we wanted to try and meet etc. I saw people waiting at the red
carpet at Roy Thomson hall in the rain no less. We found out Mike Myers was
coming in an hour or so for his directorial debut "Supermensch: The Legend
of Shep Gordon" so we stuck around. I was talking to this guy from etalk
who was covering the red carpet, and we found out Alice Cooper was going to be
there too.Apparently my eyes lit up, and the guy from etalk tried to talk to me
but I was interview me, but I was speechless, this girl next too me, called me
cute. While we were waiting this guy came right over to me, and asked me if I
wanted tickets to the movie, um let me think.... Yes! I would have been happy
enough just to meet those two, sadly because of timing, they couldn't spend
alot of time with the fans so I didn't get to, because they had to go do the
interviews. Here's the pick I snapped of Mike Myers and Tom Arnold.
As we entered the hall, I was greeted by Yvan Pedenault who was the
lead in We Will Rock You back in 2007, he didn't recognize me from the multiple
stage doors (I was over sixty pounds heavier back then) We also noticed that
out tickets were Red Carpet Lounge ones, when we asked, even though there was
only 5 minutes before the movie, we got to go into a lounge were that they gave
us free drinks and snacks. I tried Chablis for the first time, it was nice. I
don't know why we didn't take pics of the room though. Alex and previously
quipped that the only thing that could have made this day better was free
alcohol, I didn't think that would happen, little did I know! We even had
reserved seats. I don't know how I got so lucky, my theory is the guy thought I
was cute, or was attracted by my hot pink Betsy Johnson tights and scarf. (The
tights dyed my feet pink by the way, because my Michael Kors boots got wet in
the rain)
The movie itself was interesting, it is doctumentry about the life of
this manager Shep Gordon. It had some really funny moments and poignant ones.
After Mike and Shep were interviewed on stage. It would have been better if the
audience could have answered questions. I did learn neat factoids though like
why Alice Cooper performed his new stuff during the movie Wayne's World.
Basically Shep his manager said if you don't let him, then you can't have him.
(I love Wayne's World) Alice Cooper didn't come on stage even though he was
interviewed in the movie, he just sat in the audience (He got mobbed
afterwards)
Day 2 was just about the red carpet, and I dragged my friend Verena
along for the ride. I wanted to meet Sandra Bullock, so I found myself outside
the Princess of Wales theatre where the premiere for Gravity was happening, I
got to be right up front of the barricades. It was kind of crazy seeing King St
closed off to traffic other than street cars. The poor security guard, who had
to lift the pile ons everytime time one need to get by. My impression of Sandra
is she is a real lady, who seems to really care about her fans, she came early
and spent a decent amount of time on the red carpet. I was lucky enough to get
my copy of Miss Congeniality signed. I was a little more prepared this time and
had brought stuff to get signed. I thought George Clooney was going to be
there, but he wasn't. Here's a pic of Sandra signing and of my DVD:
After that I wandered over to the Elgin for the main event. I was a
hugh Colin Firth fan, so my mission was to met him when I heard he was going to
be in town. I got to the red carpet for Devil's Knot nice and early, and was
right up front. I had brought my copy of Bridget Jone's Diary to have him sign,
I wasn't sure if his Devil's Knot co-star Reese Witherspoon was going to be
there, so I didn't grab one of my many movies with her in it, so I ended up running
into to the Eaton Centre and buying Pleasantville for $8.
When the stars arrived, they literally stopped traffic on Yonge St, so
that the starts could go see the fans, who had been lined up across the street
from the theatre. Pretty crazy! Here's what the set up looked like:
Colin Firth apparently didn't like me, because he missed me on his
first run by, and when he came by the second time, he completely ignored me
when I was holding out my DVD, and said please Mr Firth. I know he saw me
because he looked right at me. I don't know maybe he thought I was too eager or
something, and thought you get nothing. What a jerk. So needless to say I am
not a fan anymore. I might give him a chance to redeem himself in the future,
but right now I am still bitter. Here's a pic:
Back to the positive, it was a really pleasant surprise to see True
Blood's Stephen Moyer (he plays Bill) he didn't come near my part of the line.Here's my blurry pic of him:
Reese was prefectly polite, she almost crossed the back across the
street, but stayed when fans called to her. She didn't sign the blank paper the
lady next to me was holding out. I almost got a poised pic with her but Verena
couldn't get the camera to work. I did however get Pleasantville signed so it
was worth the money. So that was TIFF for this year, I will leave you with a
pic of Reese and my autograph:
