Jane Campion wins directing Oscar for ‘Power of the Dog’

Michael Douglas comes to terms with fears, fame, father

NEW YORK — Michael Douglas, the award-winning actor and producer, recently turned 82. He is a cancer survivor, a recovered addict, a married man, the father and son of actors.

He is also an author, who begins his memoir with a message of thanks to his family — past and present and future — for the “sense of immortality.”

“Many times my father was asked, ‘Kirk, are you jealous of your son?’” he said during a recent interview at a Manhattan hotel, referring to his late father, fellow actor and sometime combatant Kirk Douglas.

“And he said, ‘Jealous?’ This is a sense of immortality, a continuity of generations.’”

Fantastical, moving graphic memoir explores addictions, organ procurement and more

At the heart of Mary Shelley’s 1818 classic Frankenstein and its many pop culture adaptations is the scene in the mad scientist’s lab where Victor Frankenstein, helped by a bolt of lightning, animates the grotesque figure made out of human and animal parts lying on his anatomy table.

As much as Shelley’s novel is a philosophical investigation into the desire of modern science to create new life, it is also a gruesome window into the clandestine European trade in graveyard and battlefield body snatching that fuelled early 19th-century anatomy research, medical training and public dissection theatres.

Whose bodies ended up on the slab to advance medical knowledge? As Montreal-based artist Arizona O’Neill explains in her captivating first graphic narrative, it was inevitably poor, racialized and criminalized bodies that were deemed appropriate for the indignities of public display and dissection in earlier periods.

But what about today? This is the central question driving the story of Opioids & Organs, O’Neill’s beautifully drawn story of coming to terms with her father’s untimely death due to a fentanyl overdose as well as the awful truth that Canada’s post-2015 opioid crisis has greatly increased the number of organs available for donation, mostly from otherwise healthy young men like her father.

Beausejour biz has a bit of everything and a lot of buzz

BEAUSEJOUR — Andrea Swain, co-owner of Pennyweight Market, a combination bulk food outlet, ice cream parlour and good, old-fashioned general store situated in Beausejour, laughingly opines that one of the challenges of launching a new venture in a small community such as theirs is that “everybody in town knows your business.”

Among the benefits? That’s easy, she says: everybody in town knows your business.

Not long after they acquired the space four summers ago, rumours abounded as to what it was going to be when it reopened, Swain continues, seated next to her associates Kimberley Friesen and Laurie McLean, inside their cute-as-a-button shop at 802 Park Ave. The previous owner had been around for more than 20 years, and ice cream and milk shakes were two of her main drawing cards, so there was some concern — OK, a lot — on the part of the high school students down the street that the three of them were going to turn it into a (here she lowers her voice to a whisper) health-food store.

Friesen, who, like Swain, grew up in Beausejour, located 45 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg, was at a neighbourhood pool party in July 2017, a few weeks before Pennyweight’s grand opening. She recalls being peppered with questions, including one from a 10-year-old girl splashing about in the shallow end who was under the impression the former locale’s beloved “candy island” was about to become a thing of the past. The second Friesen told the youngster not to worry, that the colourful array of gummies, licorice and chocolates wasn’t going anywhere, she came bounding out of the pool to give her a big, albeit wet, hug.

School divisions to argue against paying property taxes on buildings

A fall court date has been set for Winnipeg school divisions to argue why they should not have to pay municipal property taxes on any of their buildings — not just elementary, junior high and high schools.

Under Manitoba’s Municipal Assessment Act, properties that are “used for a public school” should be exempt from taxation to a maximum exemption of 4.047 hectares.

Divisions claim that all of their non-school facilities, ranging from bus depots to education resource centres, contribute to schooling. The City of Winnipeg, however, only wants to provide exceptions to active schools.

“Schools are very different today. There’s a lot happening in the schools, in terms of all aspects of the mental, emotional, physical well-being of children,” said Mark Newman, the lawyer representing all six metro-area divisions: Winnipeg, Seven Oaks, River East Transcona, Pembina Trails, St. James-Assiniboia, and Louis Riel.

Kelly Taylor

Kelly Taylor is a Winnipeg Free Press copy editor and award-winning automotive journalist. He's been a member of the Automobile Journalists' Association of Canada since 2001.