In her decades-long theatre career, Catherine Wreford has auditioned for dozens of shows. But none had higher stakes than the audition she did in November 2013.
Five months earlier, as part of her treatment for brain cancer, she hemorrhaged during an operation. She was left with aphasia, unable to speak or write.
A couple of months into her recovery, which included daily speech therapy, Wreford — a Stratford Festival and Broadway veteran — was determined to audition for the role of Ulla in the Mel Brooks musical “The Producers,” which was being produced by Winnipeg’s Rainbow Stage, where she had worked before.
Wreford had no expectation of being hired, though; she merely wanted to give a decent audition.
“I wanted to prove to myself that I could still do this,” she said. “I worked on my speech and on my singing by learning this role. I bought a wig because I was bald from chemotherapy. I showed up and sort of spoke a bit softer and slower than usual, and so I asked them to change the tempo slightly. But without looking at the script, I said all of my lines and sang the song. And I felt great. I told them, ‘I’m still in treatment. You can’t hire me. But thank you for letting me do this.’”
Initially, she was given a life expectancy of two to six years. It’s now been nearly 12 years and she’s as busy as ever. In 2022, she and her best friend Craig Ramsay, whom she met while both were teens in the Royal Winnipeg Ballet School, teamed up and won the eighth season of “The Amazing Race Canada.” (Their nickname was “Team Broadway.”)
Wreford spoke to me in between the matinee and evening performances of Nick Green’s “Casey and Diana”at Winnipeg’s Royal Manitoba Theatre, in which she played Princess Diana, following a run at Theatre Aquarius in Hamilton.
She has MRIs every three months and so “I sort of live three months to three months.”
Dealing with cancer is hard enough for anyone. But for those in the performing arts, with its short-term contracts and precarity, it can be especially challenging.
“You have to live day by day, but I’m a big planner — I like knowing what’s coming up and with cancer you often have no idea what’s happening,” said Andrea Scott, a playwright and screenwriter whose credits include the much-produced play “Controlled Damage,” the TV show “Murdoch Mysteries” and the new Disney/ABC hit “High Potential.”
After the final performance of her recent Stratford Festival premiere, “Get That Hope,” she was in so much pain she had to leave the closing day celebration to rest. A couple of days later, after a scheduled cystoscopy, she discovered that she had an aggressive form of bladder cancer.
One of the first people she told was her best friend Akiva Romer-Segal, one half of the talented musical theatre duo Colleen & Akiva (with Colleen Dauncey), whose shows include “Grow” and “The Louder We Get.”
On the day of Scott’s first surgery to remove a tumour, Romer-Segal began feeling pain in his own abdomen. That turned into a diagnosis of colorectal cancer, metastasized to the liver.
“I obviously would never wish for this to happen to anyone, but in a way I’m glad we’re both dealing with this at the same time,” said Romer-Segal.
“Andrea is the only person who has the most innate understanding of what I’m going through right now, especially the frustrations with the medical system. We have conversations that I can’t have with anyone else, in a tone that I can’t take with anyone else.”
These days, the friends share a gallows humour. When Scott discussed the pain she felt last fall, comparing it to someone dying in another century, Romer-Segal, not missing a beat, began singing Rodolfo’s high notes from the opera “La Bohème.” Then the two broke out into giggles.
“This kind of humour is unavoidable,” said Romer-Segal. “The other day I was at a mall and two songs came on that made me laugh. One was called ‘There’s a Good Reason These Tables Are Numbered,’ with the line, ‘I’m the new cancer,’ and the other was ‘Side Effects.’”
Scott recently posted something on social media about Linda Creed, a songwriter and lyricist who in the 1970s wrote a song for a Muhammad Ali biopic called “The Greatest.”
“She wrote the theme song, called ‘The Greatest Love of All,’ and it was actually about her battle with breast cancer,” said Scott. “Now I hear that Whitney Houston song differently because cancer causes you to have all these issues with your body and how you walk through the world.”
Between them, Scott and Romer-Segal have encountered so many awkward moments and instances of bureaucratic inefficiency that they have begun brainstorming a TV project about younger people living with cancer.
They keep a shared doc, filled with unintentionally funny things that have happened to them. Like the time Scott received a text from someone asking her how she was doing and she replied that every day she was reminded that she was dying.
“He texted back, ‘Same, girl,’” said Scott. “I remember thinking, ‘Are you f—king kidding me?’ And then I realized it was hilarious.”
Lucy Simic, who was diagnosed in 2018 with stage four ROS1 lung cancer, which had metastasized into her brain, recently used her experiences in the bluemouth inc. performance piece “Game of Life.”
The collectively created show, which played the Theatre Centre in March, includes two parts. A live component called “Elephant” recreates a dinner party at which Simic’s diagnosis is the proverbial elephant in the room that no one wants to discuss. A second part, called “Lucy AI,” is an interactive installation in which audience members can ask an abstract-looking Lucy avatar questions and engage in conversation. The answers are extrapolated from reams of material Simic had provided about herself, accompanied by archival video and film from her life.
Because of Simic’s chemo cycles — every fourth Thursday, followed by two days of steroids, followed by a period of low energy before she feels like herself — she knows when to plan for performance weeks or special occasions.
There’s also the psychological impact of performing a story about her condition. Her husband, bluemouth inc. member Stephen O’Connell, admits in one moving monologue that he doesn’t want her to die.
“Even when we’re rehearsing that scene, it’s quite poignant,” said Simic. “But this is our life. We’ve been living with this for six years now, so it brings it all back and makes it real.”
Dora Award-winning actor Sandy Duarte, now based in Los Angeles, was diagnosed with stage four lymphoma in December 2023. Her cancer is now eight months in remission.
She chronicled her treatment in her just published memoir, “Cancer Ramblings.” She doesn’t consider herself a writer but found it creatively fulfilling to jot down thoughts about what was going on with her.
“Writing gave me the permission to not give an eff and write for myself, and write towards the light,” she said. “It became the outlet I needed to express myself and gave me the faith to carry on.”
A yoga teacher, she has since begun cancer retreats for people who are living with the illness. And she sees a connection between the arts and healing.
“You can watch a movie or see a play and be reminded that you should phone home and tell your mom how much you love her,” she said. “We need the arts to let us remember how to live truly and deeply. These days I like to say I’m in the creative and wellness arts.”
One especially difficult aspect of being in the arts and living with cancer is the financial hit.
Romer-Segal has kept his job working for a marketing firm, which comes with a health plan that helps subsidize things like iron infusions and side effect medication. But then there are the Ubers he needs to take because he can’t use public transit while he’s attached to a pump infusing medicine in his arm.
“And it’s hard to take on work,” said Scott. “Doctors are constantly scheduling you for appointments. You can’t be a reliable employee. And you still have to pay for things like rent and food.”
On the other hand, stage artists can often find other ways to do what they do best: communicate. Romer-Segal began parodying influencers in his Instagram stories.
“I showed what I ate for breakfast, how I showered with a PICC line in me and the whole process of getting chemotherapy,” he said. “It was intended to be a parody. But people found it interesting. Since my friends and family are spread across the world, it was also a way of communicating with them and letting them know that I was OK. I think these videos demystify things for people and make things a little less scary and confusing.”
