The castle on Mount Pleasant Road is formidable. After extensive negotiations to secure an audience with Chatelaine’s queen, editor-in-chief Sara Angel — including one cancellation, attributed to an unexpected out-of-town trip — I’ve been given 30 minutes of her time. But it isn’t quite that simple. After checking in with security, I head up to the… Continue reading Nightmare on Mt. Pleasant
Category: Spring 2007
Morning Glory
Andy Barrie pulls up in a taxi to the Front Street entrance of CBC’s downtown Toronto fortress at approximately 5:30 a.m. After settling the fare with his long-term driver, who jokes that Barrie has paid for at least 10 per cent of his mortgage, the king of morning radio grabs his copies of The Globe… Continue reading Morning Glory
Heart Attack
On a late fall morning, Kirk Makin walks out of room No. 13 in Ottawa’s Elgin Street courthouse. His tall, imposing figure stands above a clutch of lawyers and court officials. The hearing he’s covering — Her Majesty the Queen vs. Ontario Power Generation, John Tammadge and Robert Bednarek — has just finished, and Makin’s… Continue reading Heart Attack
The Case for George
Eight thirty p.m.: the crunching sound of a key working a lock. George Stroumboulopoulos opens the door to his Queen West home in Toronto and throws his keys on the coffee table. He sits down with a plate of pasta to watch the Canadiens game. He’s reading The Guardian online when Jennifer Dettman, executive producer… Continue reading The Case for George
In From the Cold
Late one morning last October, Carol Off, the new host of CBC Radio One’s evening flagship As It Happens, prepares to interview Zemedkun Teckle, spokesperson for the Ethiopia Ministry of Information. Ensconced in a recording studio in the Canadian Broadcasting Centre in downtown Toronto, she dons her headset. The wall behind her features a groovy… Continue reading In From the Cold