April 25, 2014 – OTTAWA (Canada) –The National Arts Centre is delighted to announce that Canadian film, television and stage actor Colm Feore will host the Governor General’s Performing Arts Awards (GGPAA) Gala presented by Enbridge, on Saturday, May 10 in Ottawa. Mr. Feore is having an extraordinary performance year, as he will be taking on the role of King Lear in the Stratford Theatre Festival production that opens in early May. Also in a few weeks, Mr. Feore will be featured in the film The Amazing Spiderman 2, as the character of Donald Menken. The film, a summer blockbuster, will receive wide distribution in movie theatres across North America in the coming weeks.

One of Canada’s most versatile actors of the stage and screen, Mr. Feore has served as master of ceremonies for the GG Performing Arts Awards Gala for the past four years. In December 2013, Mr. Feore was appointed to the Order of Canada by Governor General David Johnston. Mr. Feore has a distinguished body of work spanning more than 30 years. He appeared recently in the CBS series The Good Wife and season three of Neil Jordan's The Borgias, and completed his third season of Museum Secrets, which he narrates for the History Channel. Among dozens of other film roles, Mr. Feore received a Genie nomination for his starring role in the wildly successful Bon Cop, Bad Cop and also starred in the Genie Award-winning film The Trotsky.

A fine stage actor, his Stratford Shakespeare Festival roles include Macbeth in Macbeth and Cyrano in Cyrano de Bergerac, Coriolanus, Fagin in Oliver, Hamlet, Romeo, Richard III, Iago, Petruchio, and Henry Higgins (My Fair Lady). He also played Cassius opposite Denzel Washington in Julius Caesar on Broadway, for which he received the St. Clair Bayfield Award.

Created in 1992, the Governor General’s Performing Arts Awards are Canada’s highest honour for the performing arts. This year’s laureates for Lifetime Artistic Achievement are Blue Rodeo, Tom Jackson, Brent Carver, Louise Lecavalier, Anik Bissonette, and Janine Sutto.

Two other distinguished national awards are also conferred each year as complements to the GGPAA for lifetime artistic achievement. This year Jean Giguère will receive the Ramon John Hnatyshyn Award for Voluntarism in the Performing Arts, while Albert Schultz is the recipient of the National Arts Centre Award, which recognizes exceptional achievement over the past performance year. This year’s Mentorship Program, which serves as an investment in future artistic achievement, pairs opera singer and past laureate Joseph Rouleau with protégé Jean-Philippe Fortier-Lazure. 

The National Arts Centre is proud to produce the 2014 Governor General’s Performing Arts Awards Gala in partnership with the Governor General’s Performing Arts Awards Foundation and the National Film Board of Canada. The Awards are presented with the support of the Department of Canadian Heritage and the Canada Council for the Arts.

 

Media are invited to attend the gala red carpet event on May 10, 2014 at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa. Media can arrive at 6:30 for VIP arrivals between 7:00-7:30 p.m. Tickets for the Governor General’s Performing Arts Awards Gala on Saturday, May 10, 2014 are available at the NAC Box Office and through Ticketmaster, 1-888-991-2787 or at http://www.ticketmaster.ca.

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