Trudeau Stories

By Brooke Johnson

"When we got to the rooftop and sat down, he ordered a half bottle of white wine, dug into the plastic bag and pulled out a tiny book of Shakespeare’s sonnets. Inside was written Pierre Elliott, 1968. 'Somebody gave it to me on my first Christmas as Prime Minister. I wrote an inscription in it, so no one would think you’d stolen it…' 'For Brooke, for her birthday—And the best of memories, Pierre E.T. 1987'"

In 1985, while a student at the National Theatre School of Canada, Brooke Johnson became friends with Pierre Elliott Trudeau. In her solo play, Brooke brings to life the story of this surprising friendship. At once vital and charming, poignant and very funny, Trudeau Stories is about friendship and loss and about who the heck we think we are.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Scirocco Drama
• Release date: Jul 21, 2022
• ISBN: 9781990737947

Brooke Johnson

Brooke Johnson is a stay-at-home mom and tea-loving writer. As the jack-of-all-trades bard of the family, she journeys through life with her husband, daughter, and dog. She currently resides in Northwest Arkansas but hopes to one day live somewhere more mountainous. Follow her on Twitter.

Book preview

Cover: Trudeau Stories by Brooke Johnson, published under Scirocco Drama, shows Pierre Elliott Trudeau dancing with a woman.

TRUDEAU

STORIES

BROOKE JOHNSON

Trudeau Stories

first published 2014 by

Scirocco Drama

An imprint of J. Gordon Shillingford Publishing Inc.

© 2014 Brooke Johnson

Scirocco Drama Editor: Glenda MacFarlane

Cover design by Terry Gallagher/Doowah Design Inc.

Cover photo is of Brooke Johnson and Pierre Elliott Trudeau, 1985. Used courtesy of the National Theatre School of Canada. Thanks to Gerry Porter in pre-press treatment.

Author photo by Adrian Truss

Production photos by R. Kelly Clipperton Printed and bound in Canada on 100% post-consumer recycled paper.

An earlier version of Trudeau Stories was originally published in a limited edition chapbook format in 2012.

We acknowledge the financial support of the Manitoba Arts Council and The Canada Council for the Arts for our publishing program.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, for any reason, by any means, without the permission of the publisher. This play is fully protected under the copyright laws of Canada and all other countries of the Copyright Union and is subject to royalty. Changes to the text are expressly forbidden without written consent of the author. Rights to produce, film, record in whole or in part, in any medium or in any language, by any group amateur or professional, are retained by the author.

Production inquiries should be addressed to:

Brooke Johnson

c/o Long Black Car Productions

193A Roncesvalles Ave.

Toronto, ON M6R 2L5

[e-mail]

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Johnson, Brooke, 1962-, author

Trudeau stories / Brooke Johnson.

A play.

ISBN 978-1-927922-04-0 (pbk.)

ISBN 978-1-990737-94-7 (EPUB)

1. Trudeau, Pierre Elliott, 1919-2000--Drama. 2. Johnson,

Brooke, 1962- –Drama. I. Title.

J. Gordon Shillingford Publishing

P.O. Box 86, RPO Corydon Avenue, Winnipeg, MB Canada R3M 3S3

Production History

Trudeau Stories was first performed as part of the Summerworks Theatre Festival in Toronto, August, 2007 at the Tarragon Theatre Mainspace, with the following cast and crew:

Brooke Johnson as herself & others

Directed by Allyson McMackon

Stage Manager: Fiona Jones

Technical Team: Shanna Miller, Verne Good, Gavin Fearon

Floor by Lindsay Anne Black, inspired by Ernest Cormier

Produced by Adrian Truss /Black Dog Group

Trudeau Stories was remounted by Theatre Passe Muraille, presented in the TPM Mainspace, Toronto, November, 2008 with the following cast and crew:

Brooke Johnson as herself & others

Directed by Allyson McMackon

Stage Manager: Fiona Jones

Lighting Design: Sarah Yaffe

Production Manager: Ryan McDougall

House Technician: Peter Eaton

Floor by Lindsay Anne Black, inspired by Ernest Cormier

Since July 2009, the play has been produced by Long Black Car Productions, with a lighting design by Glenn Davidson.

The playwright acknowledges the Ontario Arts Council and the Toronto Arts Council for workshop funding.

A black and white photograph of the author Brooke Johnson. The author is sitting on a boat posing with water in the background.

Brooke Johnson

Brooke is a 1987 graduate of the Acting Program of the National Theatre School of Canada, and has performed in theatres from Signal Hill to the Yukon River, from the National Arts Centre to the Georgia Strait. Amongst other acting honours, she has two Gemini Awards, and four Dora Mavor Moore nominations, and has enjoyed roles in the premieres of many new Canadian plays.

Trudeau Stories is her first written work for the stage. She also wrote and illustrated a children’s book, Uh Poo Fem Bon Furtz, and with her partner, Adrian Truss, made a documentary entitled, Massanoga, about her grandfather’s lumber mills in eastern Ontario.

She lives in Toronto, although during the summer months she is somewhere on the water in the Grand Banks trawler, Mary Mary, which she and Adrian sailed up the Intracoastal Waterway from the Gulf of Mexico.

The Origins of Trudeau Stories

Pierre Elliott Trudeau died in the late September of 2000. The grief I felt was in part shared publicly by millions of people, and in part it was desolately private. When I started to write what was subsequently filed in a folder and hastily labeled Trudeau Stories, it was out of the necessity of mourning. I wasn’t writing a play or a book or even an article, but for myself, for remembrance. I needed to revisit a magical time in Montreal—sort it, see it in black and white, and so move