The night before I dropped my younger son at the airport for his flight back to university, he suggested we watch a movie he had seen at the theatre in Montreal. We do this a lot—sharing films, music, and television we each think the other will enjoy.
Indeed, one of the first things we did when Sacha arrived home was watch an HBO show I am passionate about, Somebody Somewhere. I have evangelized about this half-hour comedy to my friends for months, devastated to have only discovered it myself just as it was cancelled after three seasons. Anyway, trust me, you should watch it. You will laugh, you will cry, and you will feel better about being human.
One evening when we couldn’t settle on anything because we were both too stressed out and squirelly, he suggested we try a reality show. “I hear it’s the most wholesome thing,” he said in response to my look of unalloyed skepticism. Well, let me tell you, three seasons in and halfway through Season 2 of the Australian version, I admit that Love on the Spectrum is absolutely the show I needed this summer to restore my faith in people.
Once we had forced the zipper closed on his suitcase, his older brother came over, and the three of us sat down to watch Sacha’s movie of choice. Sing Sing is a film based on a real program at the infamous prison that uses theatre as a way to crack open the hearts and minds of long-dehumanized inmates. Apart from actor and playwright Colman Domingo in the lead, most of the roles are played by the inmates themselves. And what can I tell you? We watched as these men’s interaction with art opened a door to trust, compassion, and redemption.
Looking through the stories in this issue, I see some of the same process at work: the search for understanding and connectivity with others, and the complicated path to healing.
Sophy Romvari is a talented Canadian who grew up on Vancouver Island. Her family has suffered unimaginable heartache—a pain that has been ever-present in this young filmmaker’s life and art. Her debut feature film had its world premiere at the prestigious Locarno Film Festival in August, where it took the Swatch First Feature Award. As she was readying to bring Blue Heron to TIFF and then VIFF, I spoke to Romvari about family, grief, and how this work has created a degree of closure.
Model-turned-photographer Lee Miller first worked behind the lens shooting fashion for Vogue. With the advent of the Second World War, she pulled on a uniform to become the magazine’s photographer on the ground, fearlessly pointing her lens at horrors and indignities. We talk to her son and granddaughter at Miller’s home (now archive) in England where, after her death, journals revealing terrible truths about her childhood were uncovered. Miller’s work—to be seen in a major exhibition at The Polygon Gallery this fall—was her way of providing the dignity to others she herself was denied.
At 75, Tantoo Cardinal is a Canadian cultural icon. Lauded internationally as one of this country’s most significant actors, Cardinal has used her gift and passion for telling stories to counter the racist histories written about Indigenous peoples. Much of the work she has chosen to support has been groundbreaking, changing forever the approach to representation in popular culture.
She talks to us about moving back to Canada, the school she has set up to train future generations of Indigenous actors and storytellers, and her expectations for the next chapter of her onscreen career. We are honoured to celebrate her on the cover of this issue.
Read more from our Autumn 2025 issue.
