Accused sues after charges dropped in cash-for-gold case

2:42 pm

Charges against the local cash-for-gold employee alleged to have hired a hitman to kill a competitor were recently dropped. Now, Maria Konstan is suing those she says wrongly accused her of plotting to commit murder.

Konstan is asking for about $3.5 million in damages from jewellery store owner Jack Berkovits, Saeed Hossieni, Toronto Police Service, police chief Bill Blair and the original officer involved in the case.

“It has been a horrible year,” said Konstan. “I’m humiliated. I lost my pride and dignity.”

According to Konstan’s statement of claim, Hossieni and Berkovits alleged that she had asked Hossieni to murder Berkovits, who owns Omni Jewelcrafters. Omni was located across the street from Harold the Jewellery Buyer, a store at which both Konstan and Hossieni once worked.

Konstan was arrested in July of 2010 and was charged with threatening to destroy property, threatening bodily harm, threatening death and two counts of counselling to commit an indictable offence.

The charges against Konstan were dropped in June of this year.

Senior Crown prosecutors re-evaluated the case in June, said spokesperson Brendan Crawley, via e-mail. He said the Crown concluded they were not in a position to prove the charges.

Crawley declined to comment further.

“If they couldn’t prove them [the charges] now, then they couldn’t prove them then, and if they couldn’t prove them then, why did they charge her in the first place?” asked Konstan’s lawyer, Barry Swadron.

“Obviously we were thrilled,” said Harold Gerstel, owner of Harold the Jewellery Buyer. “We had no doubt they [the charges] would be dropped. We knew this was a waste of the public dollar.”

Berkovits would not comment on the matter other than to repeat the Crown’s statement. Hossieni could not be reached.

This time, it’s personal

1:36 pm

There is one gossip columnist, who will remain anonymous, in this city that has a dirty little secret. He pretends to have a personal assistant during the Toronto film festival to help garner the best invites.

During the film festival, it’s important to come across as if you are important, he would argue. As far as I can tell, people are picking up on the idea. I know I have. And I’m not the only one.

Recently, I was shocked to get an e-mail response from a stranger on behalf of a good friend of mine. “She’s in Paris right now,” the e-mail read. “I’ll make sure I pass on the message.”

Apparently, my friend had jumped on the latest trend floating around Forest Hill and Rosedale these days. If pink is the new black, personal assistants are the new iPhones. The latest in luxury accessories goes beyond technological gizmos and designer labels into the land of labour relations.

Thankfully — and I mean really, really thankfully — I hadn’t said anything politically incorrect or made some stupid-ass joke in my e-mail. How embarrassing would that be? I mean, give a girl a bit of notice, would you?

The cost of a personal assistant per month is about the equivalent of one semi-nice designer handbag — cheaper if you hire one part-time.

As of now, I have five friends who have enlisted their own assistants to help them with everything from interior design projects and public relations work to picking up the laundry and running errands. These are people with whom I go grocery shopping or meet for coffee. Not a Kardashian in the bunch.

One of my friends, a freelance fashion photographer, hired a personal assistant to make phone calls for him and respond to his e-mails. He dictates to her what he wants to say in his e-mails as she types away. “It’s fun and it makes me feel important, so why not?” he says when I ask him if he really needs someone to do that for him.

Another friend, who owns her own small public relations business, hired a personal assistant because one of her friends had one.

“My friend had one and I thought, Why not? I didn’t exactly need one, but then I thought, I have so much bullshit I don’t want to do on my own, why not?”

All it takes, it seems, to find a twenty-something personal assistant is to ask another twenty-something personal assistant for a friend.

I have had a personal assistant now for almost a year, sharing her with another writer.

I don’t really need a personal assistant. But, then again, I really didn’t need that Max Mara dress I just bought last week either. (And I get more out of my personal assistant than I will the dress.)

However, my personal assistant has made my life so much more organized. She bought me a Daytimer, unasked, because she saw how disorganized I was. She calls my makeup artist for me when I need to go to an event. She invoices all my employers, which is something I was always awful at. And, she will come up with excuses on my behalf when I have to bail, or she will tell me, point blank, “You need to go to this.” She’s like a tough-love mother.

It is easy to adapt to having a personal assistant.

When another friend with a personal assistant e-mailed me, we had this awkward e-mail exchange through our assistants. I was like, “But you stop by my house for coffee every morning! We’re friends! Can’t you get back to me?”

Apparently, having a personal assistant is similar to having an accessory, like Paris Hilton and her mini dogs. You have a cute doggie; you carry it around in its wee designer purse. You have a personal assistant; you get them to respond.

When my friend came back from Paris, I called her and said, “WTF?” She answered she had to hire a personal assistant to make her kids’ doctors’ appointments, remind her about getting things fixed around the house and even make a meal plan for her. So, really, she hired one because I had one. Another friend, a part-time interior designer, says her personal assistant took the job with her instead of doing an unpaid internship somewhere.

“First, I pay her. I pay her more than minimum wage, and also she gets to see what I do on a daily basis,” she explains. “She gets contacts, too, and can see if she likes what I do, everything that goes into it. And if she were interning some place, she wouldn’t even get paid!”

With the film festival this month it should be interesting. As one of my friends who works for a movie company says, “If you get your personal assistant to call to get you an invite, or on the guest list, it will work better than just calling yourself.”

And why not all the time? Try writing me. Claudia will get back to you right after RSVPing to my favourite film festival parties.

Post City Magazines’ columnist Rebecca Eckler is the author of Knocked Up, Wiped!, and her latest books: How to Raise a Boyfriend and The Lucky Sperm Club.

Changing lanes & lives

1:34 pm

Most arguments against bike lanes are absurd. We have wide roads to accommodate cars. On either side we have pedestrian sidewalks. In most large urban areas, we also have bus lanes and transit systems. When cyclists ride on roads, drivers often get annoyed. If they ride on sidewalks, pedestrians rightly get angry.

Human-powered transportation will only get more popular as gas prices rise and the negative consequences of our car-centric culture increase. We should be doing everything we can to discourage single-occupant automobile use while encouraging public transit and pedestrian and pedal-powered movement.

The reality is that drivers are slowed more by increases in car traffic than by bike lanes.

According to a study by Stantec Consulting Ltd., traffic delays because of bike lanes were mostly imagined. Drivers who were surveyed thought it took them five minutes longer to travel along a street with a new bike lane. But the study showed that it actually took from five seconds less to just a minute and 37 seconds more.

There’s also the argument that slowing car traffic down is a good thing. In some European cities, planners are finding that making life more difficult for drivers while providing incentives for people to take transit, walk or cycle creates numerous benefits, from reducing pollution and smog-related health problems to making cities safer.

In Zurich, Switzerland, planners have added traffic lights, slowed speed limits, reduced parking and banned cars from many streets. “Our goal is to reconquer public space for pedestrians,” chief traffic planner Andy Fellmann told the New York Times.

Where streets were closed to cars in Zurich, store owners worried about losing business, but the opposite happened: pedestrian traffic increased 30 to 40 per cent, bringing more people into stores and businesses. In the long run, most cities that have improved cycling and pedestrian infrastructure have seen benefits for area businesses.

Building bike lanes also creates jobs and other economic spin-offs, according to the Political Economy Research Institute. Researchers found “bicycling infrastructure creates the most jobs for a given level of spending.”

It’s important to note that European cities have matched disincentives to drive with improved public transit. After all, not everyone can get to their destination by walking or cycling. But with fewer cars and reduced gridlock, those who must use automobiles have an easier time getting around.

Fortunately, the backlash against cycling appears to be subsiding. As oil becomes scarce and pollution and climate change increase, people are finally realizing that transporting a 180-pound person in two tonnes of metal just isn’t sustainable.

Post City Magazines’ environmental columnist, David Suzuki, is the host of the CBC’s The Nature of Things. David is also the author of more than 30 books on ecology.

Now Playing: North York's Hottest Star

1:20 pm

IT’S BEEN FOUR years since Laura Vandervoort broke out as Clark Kent’s super-powered cousin Kara on Smallville, a role that made her familiar to millions of fans of the 21st century spin on the Superman franchise. But it’s only been a month since the 27-year-old actress decided, like so many Canadian stars before her, to go west — and south — to Los Angeles. Over the telephone, Vandervoort admits she’d like her old North York neighbourhood airlifted into the city of angels. “That’s my childhood. That’s where I used to walk my dog. Los Angeles is fast paced and a little bit overwhelming — I miss the quiet a little bit.”

It doesn’t sound as if Vandervoort has had much quiet time in the past year. In addition to shooting the second season of ABC’s V — where she memorably plays twin Visitor sisters — she’s wrapped three feature films that should be released over the fall. In addition to a cameo in music video director- producer McG’s sure-to-be-flashy This Means War, Vandervoort has a choice role in Family Guy mastermind Seth McFarlane’s Ted, which she says gave her a rare chance to flex her comedic muscles. “It’s got a lot of potty humour, a lot of guy humour, which nobody has really seen me do.” She says that she was also excited to co-star with Mark Wahlberg, whom she admits having had a crush on since his bad-boy days in the mid-’90s’ killer-boyfriend thriller Fear. “I also worked with Reese Witherspoon this year,” she says, laughing, “and I was thinking I should have gotten both of them to sign my Fear DVD.” Vandervoort says the move from television into feature film is part of her career path, so long as it’s done on her own terms. That’s why she’s balancing Hollywood productions, like This Means War and Ted, with homegrown projects like Aaron Woodley’s upcoming The Entitled, which was shot in Parry Sound.

“It’s about these three degenerates without any friends who decide to kidnap the popular kids at their school,” says Vandervoort, who adds that she was actually hoping to play one of the bad guys. She’s more interested in stretching her talent than getting pigeonholed, whether it’s as a blonde-sweetheart type or a sci-fi girl. Her biggest imperative, though, is to keep connected to home. “I always want to work with Canadian directors,” she says. “If I had to choose between two great scripts, I think that I’d try to support the Canadian industry.”

Now Playing: TIFF's Hottest Director

1:20 pm

THERE MIGHT NOT be a hotter ticket at this year’s film fest than A Dangerous Method, which stars Viggo Mortensen as Sigmund Freud and Michael Fassbender as Carl Jung. The actors are red-carpet mainstays, but the real attraction for T.O. movie-goers is the guy behind the camera: David Cronenberg, now entering his fifth decade as the only Canadian director whose last name also doubles as an adjective. (To call a film “Cronenbergian” implies something violent, visceral, visionary.)

The simple way to describe the Forest Hill resident’s career would be to say that he’s moved from gross-outs to galas. In the 1970s, icky, low-budget horror films like Shivers and Rabid wowed midnight movie crowds and outraged cultural gatekeepers like Robert Fulford, who penned an angry anti-Cronenberg screed in the pages of Saturday Night. Less than a decade later, however, the director had proved that he had more stamina than his critics, channelling his obsessions with fractured psyches and damaged bodies into box-office hits (The Fly) critical smashes (Dead Ringers) and censor-baiting provocations (Crash). The disconnect between the elegantly grotesque images on screen and the seemingly mild-mannered artist behind them prompted dozens of articles.

“People sometimes talk as though you have a checklist of stuff,” he told me in 2005 before the TIFF premiere of A History of Violence, a smoothly disturbing thriller with gooey, gory elements. “Like, you know, ‘Wait a minute, there aren’t enough body portals here,’ or whatever.” The director’s insistence that he’s trying not to repeat certain themes is fair enough, although it’s hard not to think about the similarities between Videodrome and eXistenZ — both about virtual reality run amok — or note that A Dangerous Method is the third film he’s made with Mortensen, whose close-to-the-vest acting complements Cronenberg’s cerebral style perfectly.

“I’ve often said that you make a movie to discover why you want to make a movie,” said Cronenberg during an interview at FanExpo 2010, as if anticipating concerns that the period-piece premise of a A Dangerous Method seems a little genteel for a director once dubbed “the baron of blood.”

Cronenberg’s film Cosmopolis has just wrapped, and he’ll soon be directing a cinematic version of Jonathan Lethem’s novel As She Climbed Across the Table, about a man in love with a black hole. It sounds strange, perverse and provocative — in other words, perfectly Cronenbergian.

Now Playing: Festival Femme Fatale

1:20 pm

FOR SOMEONE WHO describes herself as a private person, it’s not surprising that local actress Mia Kirshner was a little unnerved about her latest role in the film 388 Arletta Ave. Set to premiere at TIFF this month, the film directed by Randall Cole (19 Months), follows a married couple tracked by a stalker — who watches them via hidden cameras at their home and work.

Kirshner plays a wife with a comfortable life whose husband, played by Nick Stahl (Carnivale), has to outwit the stalker to save their lives. She says the screenplay stood out for her for its fresh and horrific take on the potential dangers of being so connected through technology.
“The script was original and frightening,” she says. “I was drawn to the idea of not even knowing your whole life is being videotaped and then the idea of your life falling apart.”

Kirshner, 36, says the movie, which was shot in Toronto, hits upon certain modern anxieties.
“It’s hard to get privacy and to not be traceable,” Kirshner explains. “Everywhere we go, we’re hooked up to electronics, and there’s something really disturbing about that.”

Kirshner’s breakout performance in filmmaker Atom Egoyan’s Canadian classic Exotica (1994) as an exotic dancer has led to roles in high-profile projects, such as the title character in Brian de Palma’s crime thriller The Black Dahlia (2006) and as a troubled writer in Showtime’s popular drama series The L Word (2004 to 2009).

Less visible to most are Kirshner’s humanitarian efforts, which started with the book I Live Here, a collection of stories about displaced persons in disadvantaged countries.

“I wanted a book to show how crises are viewed from the people living in the situation,” says Kirshner. The book led to the I Live Here Foundation, created in 2005, of which Kirshner is the director. The foundation also enabled Kirshner to “return to high school” — to Lawrence Park Collegiate — where she rallied the students and teachers behind her cause.

The actress’s next project is a slight departure from her role in 388 Arletta Ave. Kirshner will play a wedding planner in the romantic comedy I Think I Do, set to shoot in Winnipeg this fall.

“It’s definitely where I’m at emotionally,” Kirshner says. “The older I get, the sillier life becomes, and you realize life isn’t too bad after all.”

Now Playing: 905 Femme Fatale

1:20 pm

WHEN WE FEATURED Ksenia Solo on the cover of the Richmond Hill Post in 2005, she was a budding actress with big ambitions. Today, with an ever-expanding resumé, her story’s a little different. She’s no longer on the cusp of “making it” — she’s already there.

Living in Richmond Hill, Thornhill and North York growing up, Solo’s career got a jump-start when she starred on the hit TV series Renegadepress.com. Through her character, Zoey Jones, Solo “moonlighted” as an intrepid e-zine reporter, taking the same brazen approach as her Degrassi peers in tackling teen issues. That’s to say, Zoey Jones never shied away from a challenge.

The same, perhaps, can be said of Solo herself. After completing high school in the GTA, the actress packed her bags for New York City, studying acting, dancing and photography. Moving, again, to Los Angeles, Solo began auditioning for — and booking — a slew of powerhouse parts. Most memorable, for Solo, was the actress’s audition for a role in director Darren Aronofsky’s TIFF-premiering (and Oscar- nominated) film Black Swan.

“When I heard [Aronofsky] was doing a ballet film, I freaked out,” says Solo, now back in the GTA, where she’s filming yet another season of acclaimed TV drama Lost Girl. “I said to myself,‘I have to be in this movie.’”

After aceing a first and then a second audition, Solo says: “The rest is history.” Translation: she got the part. That is, she was cast by Aronofsky as Veronica, one of Natalie Portman’s character’s antagonists.

“It was a surreal experience,” she says. “I got to work with a killer cast. And I loved working with Natalie Portman. I’ve looked up to her since I was ten years old.”

Even on days when Solo wasn’t scheduled to work, the eager actor — betraying her directorial ambitions — would wind up on set.“It’s always been my dream to be behind the camera. So I’d visit the shoots on my days off and just watch how Darren [Aronofsky] could make his magic happen.”

After Black Swan made its Canadian debut at TIFF (“the red carpet was crazy!”), Solo landed a role in a Steven Spielberg–produced TV series (Locke & Key) and yet another part in a star-studded film — The Factory, with John Cusak playing the lead. For now, though, Solo’s happy to be back in the GTA, reprising her Gemini-nominated role in Lost Girl and periodically visiting her homes-away-from-home for auditions in New York and L.A.

Now Playing: Thornhill's Hottest Export

1:20 pm

HAYDEN CHRISTENSEN IS one of those rare actors who got into the “biz” for the love of the craft, rather than the pursuit of fame and fortune. He’s drawn to projects with visionary directors, and at just 30 years old, Thornhill’s most famous export has already worked with some of Hollywood’s greatest filmmakers including George Hickenlooper (Factory Girl) and Sofia Coppola (The Virgin Suicides).

Christensen shot to superstardom earlier this decade as Anakin Skywalker in the Star Wars prequels when he had a chance to work with legendary director George Lucas. Before that, he made his mark in Hollywood as Kevin Kline’s angst- ridden son in Irwin Winkler’s Life as a House.

With his penchant for working with top directors, it’s not surprising that Christensen is a perennial film festival favourite. Last year, he walked the red carpet on his home turf at TIFF to debut Vanishing on 7th Street, a chilling post- apocalyptic thriller directed by Brad Anderson.

Christensen says he jumped at the chance to work with Anderson. “He’s extremely articulate in his vision, and his past films have all been very creative endeavours,” he explains. “Tonally, he’s able to capture something that is really unique and an extension of his creativity.”

Vanishing also gave Christensen an opportunity to flex his own creative muscles and collaborate with the tiny cast that included Thandie Newton and John Leguizamo. “What I liked about the script was the containment of it and how that would allow for real character exploration,” says Christensen. “I thought we could approach it like a play, and that was really appealing to me.”

Christensen has appeared in an eclectic range of films since his Star Wars years. In addition to the intense Vanishing on 7th Street, he also starred in Takers last year, an ensemble crime film co-starring fellow Canuck Paul Walker and Idris Elba. Before that, he appeared in New York I Love You alongside his long-time love Rachel Bilson.

Christensen has been busy behind the scenes, too. He and his brother Tove run a production company called Forest Park Pictures. Christensen starred in the company’s first feature film, Shattered Glass. The multi-talented siblings signed a three-picture deal for Forest Park with Hollywood heavyweight Screen Gems in 2008. The Brothers Christensen have clearly done their hometown proud.

Now Playing: Bayview's Hottest Star

1:20 pm

ASK AARON ABRAMS how he landed a leading role in Take This Waltz, and he’ll tell you it’s because of his resemblance to Seth Rogan and Sarah Silverman, who play his brother and sister in the film. “I’m like the missing link between the two that makes it believable for them to play siblings,” the Bayview native jokes.

Take This Waltz is one of two films starring Abrams that will have its world premiere at TIFF. The other, 388 Arletta Avenue, is a thriller co-starring Nick Stahl and Mia Kirshner. But it’s Take This Waltz, with its high-wattage cast, that’s generating the most buzz leading into the festival. Abrams describes the film as a bittersweet dramedy about a woman (Michelle Williams) who has an affair while on a business trip only to discover that the man (Luke Kirby) lives right across the street from her and her husband (Rogan). It’s the second film by writer-director Sarah Polley, who was nominated for an Academy Award for best adapted screenplay for her first film, Away from Her.

“Sarah is a brilliant person, one of my favourite people on earth, and she wrote an amazing script that is funny and sweet and sad and heart wrenching,” says Abrams. Abrams has known Polley since they were classmates at Earl Haig Secondary School, and they later co-starred on the hit series Slings and Arrows.

These days, Abrams is working on — he’s writing, producing and starring in — a comedy series tentatively titled Highland Gardens. The show’s inspired by the L.A. hotel where many broke Canadian actors live while trying to land their big break in Hollywood. Abrams himself splits his time between Toronto and L.A., but he’s racked up more than 40 acting credits on his resumé, including roles in Cinderella Man with Russell Crowe, and Amelia with Hilary Swank and Richard Gere. Not bad for “an annoying look-at-me kid” (those are his words) who grew up in the Bayview area.

Abrams says Highland Gardens is expected to premiere on CTV early next year, and he’s already finished work on another new film, co-starring Toni Collette and Michael Sheen and produced by Julia Roberts.

“It’s amazing to me that I get to act opposite some amazing people, people I’ve idolized since I was eight years old,” he says. “One minute I’m doing a scene with Alan Alda, and the next we’re chatting about the weather.”

Now Playing: TIFF's Patron Saint

1:20 pm

Ivan Reitman is coming home this September to see how his baby is doing. The director and producer of such hits as Ghostbusters, Kindergarten Cop and the recent rom-com No Strings Attached, will be in Toronto for TIFF — which moved into shiny new digs in the Bell Lightbox just one year ago. The TIFF HQ at the corner of King and John sits on a plot of land (valued at $22 mil) that was donated by the Reitman family and dubbed Reitman Square, in honour of Ivan Reitman’s parents, Clara and Leslie.

“It’s going to be a bit like a first birthday celebration,” he says, adding that the centre is well beyond taking baby steps. “It’s spectacular how the Lightbox has become not just a focal point for film and film lovers during the festival, but year-round. It’s attracting huge crowds … and has become an important cultural centre.”

And there’s another reason why Reitman will be in town to soak up the best that cinema has to offer at the 36th festival of festivals. “I love movies and I love going to movies, and there’s really no better movie-going experience than to be in a packed theatre at a festival watching some new film no one’s ever heard of just capture your imagination. It’s like when I was eight-years-old and I saw Ben Hur at the old University theatre at Bloor and Yonge, and I was just blown away.”

Reitman, who was born in Slovakia and grew up in North Toronto, has been a driving force in the film industry, both at home in Canada, where he produced everything from the early films of David Cronenberg to the Trailer Park Boys: The Movie, and in Hollywood, where he shepherded Animal House, Old School and Up in the Air (directed by his son Jason Reitman) into cinemas. But he is best known, of course, for directing the first two Ghostbusters films. “We’ve talked about making a third one for a long time, and I am now working really seriously on making it happen,” he says, tight-lipped about plot details.

In the meantime, Reitman is excited by what this year’s TIFF has to offer. “It’s the pre-eminent festival. It’s a jumping off point for independent films and international films looking for a North American audience. It’s the jumping off point to films that will be up for awards at the end of the year. And like the Cannes Film Festival, it offers a great marketplace for films looking for distribution,” he says. “It’s a film lover’s paradise and something I look forward to being a part of.”

Five obvious (and not-so-obvious) things to do in Toronto before summer ends

1:00 pm

The countdown is on. We’re staring the end of summer in the face, with our remaining dog days numbered in the single digits. Such little time, and yet, so much left to do in our city before the big end. Here’s our to-do list of what to take in before summer turns into a pumpkin at 11 p.m. on Labour Day (because, as everyone in Toronto knows, when The Ex closes its gates, it means school’s on and summer is gone).

Obvious: take in a concert at the CNE. Maybe the adrenaline-pumping Midway is not your cup of tea. Maybe other Ex events like the UFC fighters meet-and-greet and the Guns N’ Roses tribute bands just don’t turn your crank. But how about a concert at the historic Toronto Star Bandshell, which marks its 75-year anniversary this summer? Check out Canadian rap n’ roller k-os with online hip hop teen sensation Reema Major on Sept. 2. Or, for something completely different, there’s Tommy James and the Shondells with Andy Kim on Sept. 3. Go for it, it’s a Toronto tradition.
CNE, Aug. 19-Sept. 5

Not-so-obvious: Sound Travels Festival of Sound Art. If you haven’t, ahem, heard, there’s been a celebration of sound art in Toronto this whole entire summer. What’s left to do? Check out the outdoor sound sculpture on Centre Island, the Synthecycletron, that’s there until Oct. 5. And there’s also a free concert at Yonge-Dundas Square: a day-long new music marathon on Sept. 3. Sounds good. Plus, you can’t go wrong with something that’s free.
INTERsection: Toronto’s New Music Marathon, Yonge-Dundas Square, Sept. 3

Not-so-obvious: Open Roof Festival. Take in the outdoors, see some live music, catch a movie and support a good cause all at once. Not bad for ticking some summer to-do items off your list. The Open Roof Festival ends tonight, and all proceeds from the festival go to support Toronto’s independent film community. Tonight, Brampton’s indie rock band The Junction play, and following them, there’s a screening of acclaimed documentary Eco-pirate: The story of Paul Watson.
Open Roof Festival, Amsterdam Brewery, Sept. 1

Totally obvious (but often overlooked): The Labour Day Parade. This one really is obvious. Why not pay tribute to the reason why you have the day off? (Provided, of course, that you’re lucky enough to have the day off.)
Labour Day Parade, leaves from Queen and University, Sept. 5, 9:30 a.m.

Not-so-obvious: Hispanic Fiesta. Here’s an opportunity for downtowners to venture to a land called North York. Mel Lastman Square is subway accessible and easy to get to, plus, it’s less smoggy and crowded than downtown. It’s win-win for everyone. The Hispanic Fiesta runs throughout Labour Day weekend at Mel Lastman Square and promises over 300 performances, from local to international artists, including children’s programming and Latin bands. The fiesta starts Friday night at 7:30 p.m.
Hispanic Fiesta, Mel Lastman Square, Sept. 2–5

Cluckin’ on: the venerable Chick ‘n’ Deli returns, revitalized and renamed

11:03 am

With a freshly-painted rooster perched atop of what once was the Chick ‘n’ Deli, locals can stop wondering what happened to their long-standing chicken institution. The newly-named People’s Chicken is now open for business. After 30 years under its previous moniker, restaurant and rooster alike received a well-earned refresher prior to re-opening to the public last Thursday.

Operator of the popular nightspot, Steve Amuno, says that the response so far has been positive for the restaurant, now complete with a new interior, patio and extended dance floor.

“Last Thursday (the opening) was really busy. Friday was good, Saturday steady and Sunday extremely busy,” he says. “We think it can only get better from here on.”

The initial plan was for the renovations to take two months, but it ended up taking nearly four, casting doubt as to whether it would open its doors again.

“[People] got angry when the renovations started taking longer,” Amuno says. “There was a delay in what we wanted to do, so for the first two months, the place sat with papers on the windows.”

But why the name change?

“I can’t even tell you how many [phone calls] I’ve gotten with people asking why we changed our name,” Amuno says. “It encourages curiosity.”

“We wanted to open the door to everybody, so changing the name around, we feel will attract a lot of people.”

Located half a block south of Eglinton along Mount Pleasant Road, the restaurant hasn’t altered it’s focus from its two main staples that kept it in business for three decades: chicken and music.

“Most people know us for the chicken wings and the live music. We’re one of the only restaurants in the city that has live music seven days a week,” Amuno says. “This place can be packed.”

The wait seems to have been worthwhile, as interest continues to grow with passers-by regularly stopping to see the main board out the front of the property, which displays the weekly bands, including veterans of the live music circuit, Robbie Lane and The Disciples.

With summer quickly dwindling away and patios soon to be dismantled across the city, anyone who wants to check the new place out may want to do it while the sun still shines on the patio (and the rooster).

People’s Chicken, 744 Mount Pleasant Rd, 416-489-7931

1...849850851...1,014 Page 850 of 1,014