You can’t keep a star like Cynthia Dale down

People keep asking me, what's happened to Cynthia Dale.

A much-loved star she disappeared from theatre stages.

And, here's the reason why.

They told me I was too old. I should just give up. At 49 it was time to let someone younger have a chance."

What Cynthia Dale was talking about was ageism. She understands it. It's something she's fought for 15 years. And she will freely tell you she's 62.

Really? So, what.

She looks like a million bucks, sings with power and passion and can hold down a stage with utter confidence. She's the closest thing to a Canadian musical theatre star we've ever had.

There are so many roles Cynthia Dale can still play. And she should be doing them at Stratford. That's the place she burned a patch off the stage in shows like South Pacific," Anything Goes" My One and Only," My Fair Lady" and more. That's the place where she grew up theatrically.

Fortunately, Dale didn't listen to the naysayers. After a brief moment or two she went out and got a job.

In Grand Bend, in 2006 she did the best damn Sweet Charity I ever saw. And yes, I am counting Gwen Verdon, Chita Rivera and Juliet Prowse.

Later Dale did a concert version of Stephen Sondheim's Passion" in the little Studio Space at Stratford. It played only a few nights. People fought to get in. It should have been programmed for a whole season right on the Festival, or Avon stage, where it belonged.

I went to see it the night before I had quadruple bypass surgery. People said I was nuts. No, it buoyed my spirit. I wouldn't have missed it. Something to restore faith in the way theatre can lift the heart and massage the soul.

If Cynthia Dale could keep on, keeping on, no matter the slings and arrows, so could I.

Beyond her luminous talent, the thing Dale has is the tenacity to never give in to the naysayers, to fight for her rightful place centerstage.

Last year Dale did a brilliant solo show in Toronto called Take the Moment." Singing the songs of Stephen Sondheim, she raised the roof of The Winter Garden Theatre. Well, she looked fantastic in red leather and she sang with a maturity that connected thrillingly with grown-up words and music, everything from Assassins" to Gypsy." And when she laid into Sondheim's I'm Still Here," that outrageous anthem to showbiz survival she rocked the roof off that staid old theatre.

I first met La Dale" as her friend Brian McKay used to call her, when they were appearing together in South Pacific" in 2006 at Stratford. Mesmerized, like some giddy teenager, I saw the show several times and waited dutifully for my friend McKay and the magnificent Dale to come out the stage door.

Why don't we meet for coffee tomorrow?" McKay said.

We did and I met with Dale several times after that. An articulate, generous person, she shared many interesting thoughts about life and the theatre with me.

I remember at 23, I had a secret nightmare," she said. I feared I'd wake-up one day at 40 and be round-faced and boring."

That never happened.

But Cynthia Dale did wake-up to face a brick wall. She realized she was a woman in a theatre world that feared age.

Standing on the stage at the Winter Garden Theatre last May, Dale said, I was told I was too old. I should make way for someone else, someone younger. I guess I sort of believed that, because for a year or so, I went home and tended my garden. But damn it, I wasn't finished. I knew I had more inside me."

That meant Dale's one woman show Take the Moment" superbly directed by former Toronto Star theatre critic and stage director Richard Ouzounian.

It also means the upcoming production of A Little Night Music" with La Dale playing Desiree Armfeldt, again directed by Ouzounian in a staged concert that also stars Dan Chameroy, Fiona Reid and Eric McCormack.

In 2016, back at Stratford for a short time, Dale played the Countess in this Sondheim show. She was excellent, but she was playing the wrong part. She's a shoe-in for the Desiree role, all romance, smart talk and smiles.

I thought back to 2006 when Dale was playing Nellie in South Pacific," before the age thing came up.

I don't know how much longer I can do this," she said. I've done all the big musicals there are. And you know I'm getting older. Sometimes I think, Oh God, when you can't do this, what will you do? What will my life be?' And you know, it will be fine."

But no, it wasn't fine. Being pushed out is never fine. When ageism became the issue Cynthia Dale's spirit, drive and ambition kicked in.

I know, people think that I'm tough. Well maybe I am, but mostly I'm very hard on myself. Some things are painful. But you just get on."

Cynthia Dale is on stage in A Little Night Music" at Koerner Hall, 273 Bloor St. in Toronto. May 26-27-28. Call 1-416-408-0208 or go to tickets@rcmusic.com.

Gary Smith has written about theatre and dance for 40 years. gsmith1@cogeco.ca