Great shows, great price – great loss
It would appear that Doug Ford is doubling down on his efforts to make it clear that he has no intentions whatsoever of reevaluating the decision to open up sections of the protected Greenbelt to development. On Monday, he promised all the communities that have been given housing targets to meet by 2031 that they would rewarded by receiving a portion of a $1.2 billion fund created especially for applauding municipalities that got on board.
Lest your eyes glaze over at the mention, yet again, of this Greenbelt/housing fiasco – for that’s what it is – think for a moment about what is going on just to the south of Uxbridge, and how it will affect us as a town, perhaps even you personally. I ask this because it’s affecting me in an extremely personal way. Ford’s decision to sell off out the Greenbelt and okay the building of hundreds of homes in North Pickering is going to substantially change my life.
About 16 years ago, I took a small part in a farce called Pardon Me, Prime Minister at Herongate Barn Dinner Theatre (Herongate for short). For those who have not been fortunate enough to have ever visited this gem, located just south of Whitevale on Altona Rd., Herongate is literally a theatre inside a century-old barn. Guests eat where the cows used to reside and get milked, and the theatre, above the barn/dining room, was formerly the mow where hay was stored. Also on the property, which is surrounded by luscious rolling hills, crops, and greenery as far as the eye can see, is a large, rambling farmhouse that is as old as, if not older than, the barn itself.
I love being at Herongate. I love the people I have performed with. I was quickly taken in by the Herongate family, and have lost count of how many plays I’ve done since that first show. I’ve celebrated milestone birthdays there, led the conga line at many a New Year’s Eve party there, and worn enough wigs to know that I definitely don’t look good as a redhead, and not bad at all with grey hair! Herongate is my home away from home. The people who own it – Ann Ward and Steve Graham – have become incredibly dear friends, as have so many of the actors with whom I have worked.
After 50 years of serving millions of home-cooked meals and staging hundreds of plays and musicals, Herongate’s curtain will close for the last time on Sunday, Sept. 10. Not because it’s changing hands, and not because the owners want to retire – in fact, the entire 2023 season was billed and ready to go. We were already planning New Year’s Eve. No, Herongate is closing because TACC, a huge development company, didn’t like that the nine acres on which Herongate stands was a tiny little holdout in the middle of all the land they had already purchased and, once ol’ Dougie removed development restrictions on this land, were ready to build houses on. Well, they (TACC) finally got their way, and Herongate was sold. To a developer.
Writing those words makes me sick, especially after the auditor general’s recently released report on the Greenbelt revealed that the lands on which Herongate sits weren’t even required for the 1.5 million homes the Conservatives are bent on getting built.
The rolling hills I described earlier will likely disappear. Untold amounts of wildlife will lose its habitat. And the crops that are currently growing there – all that beautiful farmland that ensures we eat – will be gone. The house and barn – I can’t speculate on what will happen to them, but even if they were moved, brick by brick and board by board to another location, it just wouldn’t be the same.
I’m in this final Herongate show, and after every performance, I cry while driving home. I cry for myself. I cry for live theatre. I cry for the thousands of people who love Herongate and have been regulars over the years. I cry for Ann and Steve, who have essentially been forced to move on from a business that Ann’s parents started 50 years ago. I cry over a government that clearly doesn’t listen to the people that elected it. I cry over people so bent on greed for money, development, and paving over our planet, they will stop at nothing until they get their way.
I wonder if we should invite Doug Ford and his buddies to the Sept. 10 performance. Perhaps the crying they’ll see then will make them realize that some things don’t have a price. But the show must go on.