Cast of Characters: Five Cape Breton Dramas

David Wayne McKay

Out of Print

In A Cast of Characters, four Cape Breton history-makers tell their own stories, and the dramatic life of a fifth is recreated on the stage. Individually and together, these dramas illustrate the power of a single person to overcome hardship and, with work, love and determination, effect change in large numbers of people.

In the four short monologues Guglielmo Marconi speaking about his experiences up until the time he sends his famous trans-Atlantic wireless message from Glace Bay. Lillian Crewe Walsh tells how, inspired by her poem, “The Lady of The Loom” she designed the Cape Breton tartan. Dawn Fraser, an eccentric poet of Cape Breton’s labour movement in the 1920s tells stories and recites his cutting and critical poetry to visitors in his store.Hugh MacLennan, the well-known Canadian novelist explores his childhood in Cape Breton while trying to write “Each Man’s Son.”

“With A Strong Hand: The Jack Munroe Story,” a full-length play, takes its audience on an emotional journey through the life of Jack Munroe. It dramatizes his childhood in Cape Breton, his mining days in Butte, Montana, his challenge for the Heavyweight Boxing Championship, his horrible and enlightening years in World War I with the famous Princess Pat’s, and his final days in the Canadian north as a prosperous prospector.