Love, sea lure actor to the coast - Rebecca Jenkins leaving Toronto for 'a magical place'
April 13, 2003
DAVID SPANER, The Province
There's something about the West Coast that's magical to Rebecca Jenkins.
The co-star of the award-winning Marion Bridge, which opens in Vancouver next Friday, spent much of her youth in Toronto but there was a time in Halifax, too, that has stayed with her.
"It think Toronto's amazing for anybody in their 20s," Jenkins says. "There's a lot of culture. But I never stopped wanting to get back to the ocean. It's a magical place. I would much rather live in a place that's more beautiful and has more nature. I crave that. And Vancouver certainly has that."
Now, Jenkins is relocating to Vancouver from Toronto and the West Coast will be the richer for it. She's one of Canada's most-gifted actors, first catching the attention of moviegoers with her 1989 Genie Award-winning performance as a Prairie woman who becomes a wartime band singer in Anne Wheeler's classic Bye Bye Blues.
While she's excited about working in Vancouver film scene and has a hankering for the ocean, truth be told there is another motivation for the move: Jenkins has fallen in love with a Vancouver man. So when the school year winds up, she and her seven-year-old Sadie will pack up and head for the West Coast.
- - -
For film people, there are places to go to and places to leave.
Before the 1990s, Vancouver was a place to leave and aspiring film actors, from Michael J. Fox to Carrie Anne Moss, headed south with little work to come back to.
That, however, has changed in the past few years, with the growth of Vancouver's U.S. service movie industry and Canadian independent scene. And some have returned to work here after sojourns in the U.S., including Nicholas Campbell, Helen Shaver, Alan Scarfe, Martin Cummins and Carly Pope.
It's not just the traditional north-south flow that's been altered. The film scenes in Vancouver and Toronto have thawed relations between the cities, with actors (Vancouver's Babz Chula and Ben Ratner, for instance) and directors (Scott Smith) working in both places. It's sea change that enables an actor such as Jenkins to make the move west without missing a career beat.
The past year has been a particularly creative time for Jenkins, co-starring in the feature Past Perfect, the W network's adaptation of Margaret Atwood's The Sunrise, and the forthcoming Deepha Mehta movie The Republic of Love. And before moving to Vancouver she'll shoot the film Wilby Wonderful on the East Coast.
Marion Bridge won director Wiebke von Carolsfeld the award for best Canadian first feature at the 2002 Toronto International Film Festival. It co-stars Molly Parker and Stacy Smith in a story of sisterhood in a dysfunctional family in Cape Breton.
"I have five sisters and to have two sisters to play with (in Marion Bridge) appealed to me. I like the idea of family secrets, too," she says. "I love doing indie films. You have a lot of passion involved from everybody. Everybody's in it because they have something creative to express. The only reason to be in this business is the authentic creative voices and those are in the indie scene."
Jenkins has been here before. After attending the University of Waterloo, she was in the city for six months in the mid-'80s studying at the Playhouse Acting School.
It was a time of few decent roles for young women ("It was the time of Porky's. I was kind of disillusioned."), so upon her return to Toronto, she turned to her first love: singing. She sang with Parachute Club and toured as a backup to Jane Siberry for three years.
So, Bye Bye Blues was a natural for Jenkins, combining her acting and singing and interest in the Second World War period. It was followed by other films (Bob Roberts, South of Wawa) and TV (Gemini nominations for her roles in the CBC series Black Harbour and the movie Harvest for the Heart).
Jenkins lived in New York for a year but never really considered a permanent move south.
"I really, really have to say I love being Canadian. It's a simpler life."
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April 13, 2003
DAVID SPANER, The Province
There's something about the West Coast that's magical to Rebecca Jenkins.
The co-star of the award-winning Marion Bridge, which opens in Vancouver next Friday, spent much of her youth in Toronto but there was a time in Halifax, too, that has stayed with her.
"It think Toronto's amazing for anybody in their 20s," Jenkins says. "There's a lot of culture. But I never stopped wanting to get back to the ocean. It's a magical place. I would much rather live in a place that's more beautiful and has more nature. I crave that. And Vancouver certainly has that."
Now, Jenkins is relocating to Vancouver from Toronto and the West Coast will be the richer for it. She's one of Canada's most-gifted actors, first catching the attention of moviegoers with her 1989 Genie Award-winning performance as a Prairie woman who becomes a wartime band singer in Anne Wheeler's classic Bye Bye Blues.
While she's excited about working in Vancouver film scene and has a hankering for the ocean, truth be told there is another motivation for the move: Jenkins has fallen in love with a Vancouver man. So when the school year winds up, she and her seven-year-old Sadie will pack up and head for the West Coast.
- - -
For film people, there are places to go to and places to leave.
Before the 1990s, Vancouver was a place to leave and aspiring film actors, from Michael J. Fox to Carrie Anne Moss, headed south with little work to come back to.
That, however, has changed in the past few years, with the growth of Vancouver's U.S. service movie industry and Canadian independent scene. And some have returned to work here after sojourns in the U.S., including Nicholas Campbell, Helen Shaver, Alan Scarfe, Martin Cummins and Carly Pope.
It's not just the traditional north-south flow that's been altered. The film scenes in Vancouver and Toronto have thawed relations between the cities, with actors (Vancouver's Babz Chula and Ben Ratner, for instance) and directors (Scott Smith) working in both places. It's sea change that enables an actor such as Jenkins to make the move west without missing a career beat.
The past year has been a particularly creative time for Jenkins, co-starring in the feature Past Perfect, the W network's adaptation of Margaret Atwood's The Sunrise, and the forthcoming Deepha Mehta movie The Republic of Love. And before moving to Vancouver she'll shoot the film Wilby Wonderful on the East Coast.
Marion Bridge won director Wiebke von Carolsfeld the award for best Canadian first feature at the 2002 Toronto International Film Festival. It co-stars Molly Parker and Stacy Smith in a story of sisterhood in a dysfunctional family in Cape Breton.
"I have five sisters and to have two sisters to play with (in Marion Bridge) appealed to me. I like the idea of family secrets, too," she says. "I love doing indie films. You have a lot of passion involved from everybody. Everybody's in it because they have something creative to express. The only reason to be in this business is the authentic creative voices and those are in the indie scene."
Jenkins has been here before. After attending the University of Waterloo, she was in the city for six months in the mid-'80s studying at the Playhouse Acting School.
It was a time of few decent roles for young women ("It was the time of Porky's. I was kind of disillusioned."), so upon her return to Toronto, she turned to her first love: singing. She sang with Parachute Club and toured as a backup to Jane Siberry for three years.
So, Bye Bye Blues was a natural for Jenkins, combining her acting and singing and interest in the Second World War period. It was followed by other films (Bob Roberts, South of Wawa) and TV (Gemini nominations for her roles in the CBC series Black Harbour and the movie Harvest for the Heart).
Jenkins lived in New York for a year but never really considered a permanent move south.
"I really, really have to say I love being Canadian. It's a simpler life."
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