This book is inspiring, spirited, and totally absorbing.” -Diane von Furstenberg "We never expected any of the reaction that we got and so we were proud of what we'd done," said Baker.“ I’ll Build a Stairway to Paradise is like an exquisite string of pearls: the perfect balance of elegance, style, design, and beauty. "When we'd watched it, we laughed, we cried, we'd come out elated out of the theatre," Rosalyn Fawcett (Miss November) said of the first time they saw the stage show, which first debuted in London. The all-Canadian cast includes Fiona Highet, Fiona Reid, Kathryn Akin, Terri Cherniack, Barbara Gordon, Kyra Harper, Kimberley Rampersad, Brigitte Robinson and Jane Spence. Tim Firth, who co-wrote the "Calendar Girls" film, also penned the play that's running in Toronto through May 28. "We were all completely in awe of meeting her. "She'd been 'round the shops in Skipton to buy sunflowers to bring us and she just stood there and she just said: 'I'm so excited about meeting you girls,"' said Baker. When Helen Mirren (who was nominated for a Golden Globe for playing Christine Clancy, Miss September) visited, she was armed with sunflowers in honour of John Baker, who had grown them when he was first diagnosed. When the "Calendar Girls" film was in production, Baker often had cast and crew members over to her place for afternoon tea. "We didn't realize this when we did it, but I think they thought: 'Well, there's still life in us yet, you know. "I think the older women, especially, just thought: 'Well done,"' said Baker. A portion of money from ticket sales to the stage show also goes to the cause. They've since done a new calendar every year and created their own merchandise, donating all the money from sales to leukemia and lymphoma research. Released in April 1999 for the year 2000, the first calendar was a hit and saw the ladies receiving a flood of kudos from fans around the world. From then on he's taken all my friends' photographs in the nude."
#Stacks n cracks calendar girls crack#
"But all the time I was doing that, Terry was looking through a crack and telling me what to tell the model to do, and so in the end we just said: 'Come on in here, Terry,' and he did.
My husband, Terry, was going to set the shots up, and I would go into the girls' (room) and click the shutter," said Lynda Logan, a.k.a. She agreed and they set up a top-secret, late-night shoot in one of their homes. "But he was only ill for five months, he only had five good days, really, at home, so we never did it."Īfter he died, the WI ladies suggested the calendar idea to Baker again in the hopes it would keep her busy. "We thought it would be fun for John to come along and watch us have our photographs taken," said Baker, a.k.a. To raise funds and awareness of the disease, she and five other members of the local chapter of a social organization called the Women's Institute decided to pose nude for a calendar while covering up with knitting needles, a teapot, easel, pastries and various household items. Their story started in '98 in North Yorkshire, U.K., when Baker's late husband, John, was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma at age 53. And also because we had done it for a charity." We took all the clothes off and just kept the pearls on. "Also, we were members of the Women's Institute, which is thought to be a very fuddy duddy organization where people wore tweed skirts and twin sets and pearls and hats.
"I think it was because we were all friends, we were older women and we had taken our clothes off," she said during a recent interview with three of her fellow Calendar Girls at the Mirvish Productions office. And now they're the focus of a stage show that hits Toronto's Royal Alexandra Theatre this week, after a stint in Winnipeg.Īngela Baker, whose late husband's battle with cancer inspired their journey, says she thinks there are several reasons why their story has struck a chord with audiences.
#Stacks n cracks calendar girls series#
They've released a series of semi-nude calendars and inspired a hit 2003 film. To date, they've raised over three million pounds (nearly C$4.7 million) and counting for lymphoma and leukemia research. TORONTO - Twelve years after they first doffed their duds for charity in England, the original Calendar Girls are still wearing well.
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