The release of the new Bob Dylan biopic, A Complete Unknown, and the recent death of Gene Hackman has stirred memories of my early time in Vancouver when I was a young man with dreams of being an entertainer.
Landing there in June of 1988 I found a burgeoning centre of festivals and film making. Eager to participate in whatever way I could I enrolled in acting classes and volunteered for Vancouver’s Folk Festival, the Comedy Festival and the Fringe Festival. I enjoyed these experiences and the people involved. I had open access to Festival backstage areas where I rubbed shoulders with other volunteers as well as some famous performers.
Pete Seeger
Pete Seeger and his grandson Tao were at the Vancouver Folk Festival in 1989 the same year as Billy Bragg, Eric Bogle, Loreena McKennitt, Roy Bailey, Spirit of the West, Weddings-Parties-Anything and Attila the Stockbroker. Pete Seeger made a memorable morning appearance at a rain-soaked workshop stage where I was on shift. It was a deluge that day. The audience were soaked and makeshift raincoats were made from black plastic bin bags with head and armholes cut out. Every stage had big puddles and I seriously wondered how safe this could be with all the trailing electric cables.
Getting Pete Seeger to the festival had been a coup for the organisers. The festival’s mascot was a banjo-playing cartoon bird called Pete Seagull named in honour of this great folk icon. In true form Pete showed his solidarity with the damp audience by sitting down in a puddle on the stage. Then he stood up and waggled his soaking wet behind at the audience before picking up his banjo and beginning his set.
I was told that Pete was having trouble with his memory and this was why he would be performing alongside his 17-year-old grandson, Tao Rodriguez-Seeger. Having Tao there gave Pete musical support but also made sure that when Pete forgot the lyrics Tao kept things going. Looking back, I am now struck by how young Tao was to be in this role.
Mid-afternoon the rain stopped and the sun came out. I found myself chatting with Tao on the festival grounds. Being with a “Seeger” was mind-blowingly exciting for me. I had taught myself banjo from Pete’s famous red book How to Play the Five-String Banjo. Another major music resource for me had been my dad’s record collection, bursting with music by Pete and Peggy Seeger as well as Leadbelly, Burl Ives, Josh White and Woody Guthrie.
I admit I was somewhat star-struck and hung out with Tao for as long as I could. Some girls came up and asked Tao if he and Pete would sing Little Boxes later. To be truthful I’m not altogether sure why he was hanging out with me. He seemed slightly bored. When I asked if he knew Arlo Guthrie he said, with a weary sigh, “Yes I know Arlo.”
As the years have gone by, I suspect his interest in me might have been that my bushy hair and hippy shirt signalled knowledge of where some unadvertised “real fun” might be had at the festival. I had no such knowledge. The Vancouver Folk Festival was always known for being only about the music. There was no secret party tent.
Finally, he said, “It’s 3 o’clock, I have to go meet my grandpa.”
This was Pete Seeger no less! I tagged along with him to where, in the big food tent amongst all the empty tables, sat Pete Seeger and his wife Toshi having a late lunch. They greeted Tao and nodded politely at me but did not seem overly enthused by my presence there. Here I was with one of my heroes but I felt lost for words. I said the only thing that came to mind in that moment, “Are your trousers still wet?”
Pete Seeger replied that he’d since returned to his hotel and changed his jeans.
Unable to justify my presence there any longer I said goodbye and left. I felt disappointed in myself that I hadn’t been able to leverage the situation towards more of a conversation other than to enquire after the state of his trousers. I was also slightly disappointed to discover that Pete’s earlier show of solidarity was not completely real. The audience remained cold and wet for the day while he had warm dry jeans waiting in his hotel room. But really, what did I expect?
That evening, as Pete and Tao closed the festival in front of a couple of thousand people, I went and stood right behind them on the main stage and sang along to Guantanamera. Don’t worry, I hadn’t crashed their performance. I was with a few dozen other volunteers who had been called on to fill the stage with people. Pete had a giant maraca that he played with a slow and steady beat. He said, “It’s a funny thing. Inside this maraca are hundreds of beans. But only one of them is on the beat! Half of the beans are ahead of the beat and the other half are behind the beat. But all those offbeat beans make it possible for that one bean in the middle to be right on the beat.”
I enjoyed this metaphor and think about it often. It has changed my perspective on the meaning of success. We are not individuals. Every successful person, no matter how talented and hard-working, reached their position by virtue of those around them who either paved their way, or who, by their very presence, support and hold them in place.
Gene Hackman
In the late 1980’s Vancouver was getting called ‘Hollywood North’. Thanks to tax breaks from British Columbia, U.S. film companies found it cheaper to make movies in Canada. Vancouver was regularly being dressed up (or down) to look like L.A., New York and various other U.S. cities. American actors were often spotted in the street or in theatres and night clubs. Johnny Depp was doing TV in 21 Jump Street and the X Files were still an idea waiting to be shot. I took acting classes at The Breck Academy, owned and run by Peter Breck, star of the 1965-‘69 American Western series The Big Valley. On hearing that his old friend Gene Hackman was in town, filming Canadian scenes for Narrow Margin, Peter invited Gene to come and have a chat with the aspiring actors in his academy.
It’s quite something to be up close to a Hollywood star. Whereas Pete Seeger had been only familiar to me through music, Gene Hackman was a face I’d seen in movies on TV. He arrived with a bodyguard and sat in our acting studio chatting to about 40 of us. Someone had welcomed Gene by giving him a ‘Welcome!’ balloon on a stick which the bodyguard now had to sit and hold, while remaining attentive and alert. It looked funny.
Gene told the story of when he was 10 years old and came out from an Errol Flynn swashbuckler movie. He strutted down the street carrying himself like a badass pirate ready to take on foes in fencing fights. When he suddenly caught sight of his own reflection, in a shop window, he was shocked to see a 10-year-old-boy looking back at him. This boy looked nothing like the swashbuckler he felt he was. This produced a career long fascination with wanting to make his inner and outer selves match up and thus his way into acting began.
Gene was interesting and kind and even gave notes to a terrified student who was picked to stand up and do a monologue. She performed remarkably well considering she was in front of the whole school PLUS GENE HACKMAN! Towards the end of the talk a student asked Mr Hackman if there was one thing he’d learned that he could pass on to us. It was a very open-ended question and I watched Gene pause and become thoughtful. He said, “Don’t make fun of a script. Even if it’s a bad one”
He seemed to struggle for words and added, “It’s not helpful. It has a diminishing effect on the work.”
Gene Hackman was an intelligent and unassuming speaker and I cherish the opportunity that I had to be in a room with him. Now, because of his words, I always take my raw material seriously. Whether it’s a script or a song that I’m working with I don’t mock the material. My aim is to always use my abilities to bring the material to life in the best way I can. Ridicule is easy and cheap. Rise above it.
Keep Strumming and Smiling,
Ralph