Geordie Johnson

Geordie Johnson (born February 25, 1953 in Claresholm , Alberta ) is a Canadian actor .

Life

Geordie is the second of three children born to George and Pam Johnson from Cowley, a small village in Alberta. He grew up in Cowley and went there to the Livingstone School in Lundbreck up to 12th grade.

As a child he was often ill and spent a lot of time in sanatoriums for treatment for asthma and tuberculosis. He said that this time helped him worry about people and watch them interact with each other. In a 1999 interview, he said, "It gave me the opportunity to become an excellent observer and I was surprised at how people could come up with different views on situations that I had just been through." Johnson also said that he was "pathologically shy" when he was young and that he "could hardly speak and had violent, violent reactions to new acquaintances".

His mother told the Pincher Creek Echo that when Geordie was young, "he and his friend Marcel Desjardin would come up with dramatic scenes that they would perform at Christmas concerts and other occasions." However, the school did not have a theater class.

As a teenager he worked in the family sawmill. He graduated from high school in 1970 and enrolled at the University of Calgary , where he graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Drama. He had decided to make more of his life than just work in a sawmill. His parents supported him in his goal of becoming an actor and took great pride in his skills. His mother Pam said that she and her husband George "never tried to dissuade their son from pursuing an acting career." "We both noticed that he can," she said.

He received his first review for the drama Waiting for Godot , which was shown at the University of Calgary in 1972. The critics mentioned the "insane passion that Geordie Johnson puts in his role as Lucky", the slave of the character Pozzo . His text in the piece was limited to the sentence "soliloquy of intellectual gibberish" ("self-talk from intellectual ramblings"). This passion for acting seems to have kept him afloat all these years. His mother said that all these years had not been easy and that he had often worked in construction to get by.

After graduating in 1974, Geordie played a few roles, but most of them were small or short appearances. Among other things, he played the ugly stepsister Baloney in the Cinderella production of the Theater London's (Ontario) in 1976. The London Free Press designed the drama with comments from children. Johnson received the amusing praise of a child: "Baloney Needs a Psychiatrist!" He also had roles in Bent and a half-dozen small roles at the Stratford Festival in 1979 and 1980. He got one of his first major roles in 1981 when he played Ray in John McLure's Lone Star played. He received a Dora Mavor Moore Award nomination for outstanding performance as a leading actor.

His television career began in the mid-1980s. He played a sick actor in an episode of the very successful Street Legal series , a Russian ballet dancer in Adderley and a copycat killer in Alfred Hitchcock Presents . But he never completely forgot about the theater.

In 1987 he was cast as the Montreal drag queen Hosanna , in a new English-adapted version of the play by Michel Tremblay. The director was Richard Monette, whom Johnson had met between 1979 and 1980 and who himself played Hosanna in the 1974 premiere. The production received critical acclaim, as did Geordie himself. The Globe & Mail wrote: "Geordie Johnson as the obsessed, conceited, witty and pathetic Hosanna is all he should be - wonderfully funny, sadly adorable and very irritating". The Toronto Star wrote: "He is in absolute majestic reign of the role and gives a wonderfully sustained and lovely performance." In 1988 Johnson worked again for Richard Monett , in the "Ted Tiller's Dracula" production at the Young People's Theater . Like Cinderella , it was intentionally cheesy and even the Toronto Sun wrote in its headline, “Dracula as Comedy? With Monette on top, count on it. "Johnson played the role of Transylvanian very well, and one reviewer wrote," He pops into view, like a perfectly placed appearance and his Carpathian accent rolls just enough to remind us who he is His portrayal of Dracula was fondly remembered, so that in 1989 he got the title role in a new television series about Dracula, in Dracula: The Series (in Germany under the title Dracula is back ). This version of Dracula was that of a blond ruthless businessman residing in a castle in Luxembourg .

In the early 90s, Johnson starred in a few plays, but then became more concerned with his television career. In 1996 he returned to the Stratford Festival . In a 1999 interview, he said he had to go back to the theater after "eating so much light fare that he ended up needing a proper feast" and that he was "a pretty bad television actor." he "Chance Wayne" in Tennessee Williams' Sweet Bird of Youth and "Edmund" in King Lear . The Toronto Star wrote of his role, "Johnson brings the right mix of good looks, idealism and wasted opportunities to the role of Chance Wayne, a former rich boy who became a gigolo and returns to the place of his birth." Years Johnson continued to star. 1999 earned him one of his most acclaimed roles, Richard II . The National Post wrote a flattering review: "Johnson's voice is exceptionally fluent, and his ability to pack an indefinite number of sentences in a single breath - very helpful for the baroque talkative Richard - gets the game going at full blast." Another reviewer wrote, "It is Johnson's execution that makes the continued accuracy to the rhythm and tempo of the poetry, he does not seem to constrict himself as he enters the confines of an emotional realm."

In 1999 he left the Stratford Festival to return to television. Among other things, he played a leading role in the series Largo Winch (in German under Largo Winch - Dangerous Legacy ), which was based on the French comic of the same name. There he played the ex-KGB agent and computer expert Georgy Kerensky .

He then returned to the Stratford Festival . He currently plays at Yale Repertory Theater in the play A Woman of No Importance as Lord Illingworth .

Filmography

• 1983: Chautauqua Girl
• 1983: Skullduggery
• 1986: The Boy in Blue
• 1986: The Campbells (9 episodes)
• 1986: Adderly (1 episode "The Dancing Lesson")
• 1988: Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1 episode "User Deadly")
• 1989: The Comedy of Errors (TV movie)
• 1989: Bridge to Silence (TV movie)
• 1990–1991: Dracula is back (TV series, 21 episodes, "Dracula: The Series")
• 1991: "ENG" (TV series)
• 1991: The Hidden Room (1 episode "Let Death Do Us Part")
• 1988–1992: Street Legal (5 episodes)
• 1992: Beyond Reality (1 episode "The Color Of Mad")
• 1992: The Ray Bradbury Theater (1 episode)
• 1993: The Diviners
• 1990–1993: Counterstrike (2 episodes)
• 1993: A Stranger in the Mirror (TV movie)
• 1994: The Circle Game
• 1994: The secret of your tenderness ("A Change Of Place")
• 1993–1994: Kung Fu: The Legend Continues (2 episodes)
• 1994: Bionic Ever After? (TV movie)
• 1994: Spenser: The Judas Goat (TV movie)
• 1994: Bionic Ever After? (TV movie)
• 1995: Forever Knight ( Nick Knight - Der Vampircop ) (2 episodes)
• 1996: Liszt's Rhapsody
• 1996: Tek War - Warriors of the Future ( TekWar , 1 episode)
• 1996: Taking the Falls (1 episode)
• 1996: The English patient
• 1996: Spoken Art (1 episode)
• 1997: PSI Factor - It Happens Every Day (1 episode)
• 1998: Once a Thief (1 episode)
• 1999: Highlander: The Raven (1 episode "The Devil You Know")
• 1999: Too Rich: The Secret Life of Doris Duke (TV movie)
• 1999: Poltergeist - The uncanny power
• 1999: Dangerous Evidence: The Lori Jackson Story (TV movie)
• 2000: Canada: A People's History (TV movie)
• 2000: Traders (8 episodes)
• 2000: The City (1 episode)
• 2001-2003: Largo Winch - Dangerous Legacy (38 episodes)
• 2002: Charms for the Easy Life (TV movie)
• 2001–2003: Andromeda (1 episode)
• 2003: The Absence of Emily
• 2003-2004: Starhunter (2 episodes)
• 2007: The Dark Room (TV movie)

theatre

• 19 ??: Cinderella ....?
• 19 ??: Rome and Juliet .... Benvolio
• 1974: The Greek Vision; Sons of Earth and Sky; Prometheus .... Prometheus / Oedipus
• 1975: Day One .... Judas and Others
• 1975: Fortune and Men's Eyes .... Smitty
• 1976: The Gracious Lady / Close Friends .... Permanent Transient, Cocaloony / Jon
• 1976: No Sex, Please - We're British .... Peter Hunter
• 1977: Alice Through the Looking Glass .... Gremlin, Violet, Guard, Fawn, Pudding
• 1977: Sweet Bird of Youth ....?
• 1978: The Sea ... Willy
• 1978: Scapin ... Arlequino
• 1979: Richard II .... Westminster, Herald
• 1979: The Second Part of Henry IV .... 2nd Drawer
• 1979: The Woman ....?
• 1979: King Lear .... French messenger
• 1980: Henry V ... Bates
• 1980: Titus Andronicus ....?
• 1980: Much Ado About Nothing .... 1st overseer
• 1980: Henry VI .... Somerset / rebel / soldier
• 1980: King Lear .... French messenger
• 1981: The Taming of the Shrew .... Player / Lucentio / Joseph
• 1981: Lone Star ... Ray
• 1983: Geometry ... Wayne Gibson
• 1984: Of Mice and Men ... Whit
• 1984: Rumors .... Michael
• 1984: Cloud 9 .... Harry / Martin
• 1985: Raptures ... Blake Whittier
• 1986: Farther West .... Thomas Shepard
• 1986: Holiday .... Nick Potter
• 1986: Passion, Poison and Petrifaction ... Heavenly Choir
• 1986: Tonight We Improvise .... Mangini
• 1987: The Grace of Mary Traverse .... Hardlong / Jack
• 1987: Hosanna ... Hosanna
• 1987: I Am Yours .... Toilane Creese
• 1988: Observe the Sons of Ulster Marching Towards the Somme .... David Craig
• 1988: Count Dracula ... Dracula
• 1989: Titus Andronicus / The Comedy of Errors .... Bassianus / Antipholus of Syracuse, Ephesus
• 1989: The Relapse .... Worthy
• 1989: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof .... Brick
• 1990: A Walk in the Woods .... John Honeyman
• 1991: Woman in Mind .... Andy
• 1993: Death of a Salesman .... Biff
• 1993: The Taming of the Shrew .... Petruchio
• 1994: Dancing at Lughnasa .... Garry
• 1995: Transit of Venus .... Le Gentil
• 1996: Rough Justice .... James Highwood
• 1996: King Lear ... Edmund
• 1996: Sweet Bird of Youth .... Chance Wayne
• 1997: Romeo and Juliet .... Mercutio
• 1997: Death of a Salesman .... Biff
• 1997: Oedipus Rex .... Chorus
• 1998: The Winter's Tale .... Autolycos
• 1998: The Cherry Orchard .... Yasha
• 1998: The Night of the Iguana .... T. Lawrence Shannon
• 1999: Pride and Prejudice .... Mr Darcy
• 1999: Richard II .... Richard
• 2002: Syncopation .... Henry Ribolow
• 2003: Troilus and Cressida .... Hector
• 2004: Guys and Dolls .... Nathan Detroit
• 2006: Democracy .... Walt Whitman
• 2006: Travesties .... Henry Carr
• 2007: Amadeus .... Saleri
• 2007: The Rainmaker .... Starbuck
• 2008: A Woman of No Importance .... Lord Illingworth

Awards

• 1988: Dora Mavor Moore Award for "Best Lead Actor" for his appearance in the drama "I Am Yours"
• 1997: Stage Door Award as "Best Supporting Actor"
• 1999: Gemini Award for "Best Actor in a Guest Role in a Drama Series" for "The City"

Web links

• Geordie Johnson in the Internet Movie Database (English)