Gil Garratt is the artistic director of the Blyth Festival, which has been dedicated exclusively to creating and staging original Canadian theatre since 1975.
In 1951, governor-general Vincent Massey went on a fact-finding mission, undertaking 114 public meetings all over Canada to check on the condition of the country’s culture. There were flaws in his methods, to be sure, but the report he delivered was a clarion warning: Canada faced “the very present danger of permanent dependence” on American culture.
The Massey Report raised the alarm that Canada was importing American culture, unchecked, full-bore across its stages, pages, airwaves and screens. Even nearly 75 years ago, Massey could see that Canadians were at risk of coming to see our world all through an American lens.
“It is in the national interest,” Massey declared, “to give encouragement to institutions which express national feeling, promote common understanding and add to the variety and richness of Canadian life, rural as well as urban.”
How prescient. Here we are, today, caught in U.S. President Donald Trump’s crosshairs (figuratively, at least for now), asking ourselves: “what gives?”
Canadians are booing the American anthem at rinks; bars and restaurants are changing their taps and wine menus; stores are ripping American products from shelves; politicians are plotting the pinch points of import and export. “Buy Canadian!” we holler. And in our stores, we see neat labels – “Made in Canada,” “Product of Canada,” “Canadian Made” – to make it easier to stand in the aisle and make a sober choice.
But what about in our culture? I mean, you wanna talk about trade deficits?
In 2022, Hill Strategies pegged the U.S.-Canada cultural trade deficit at around $7.3-billion in favour of the United States, a gap that has existed for decades. As a culture worker for the past 30 years, I have watched a relentless flood of American culture spill into Canada. And make no mistake. Culture is one of America’s most lucrative exports.
Every day of the week, Canadian cinemas run almost nothing but American movies. (Quebec fights harder for its artists and lifts them up more, but English Canada barely seems to register that its cinemas are constantly showcasing the Stars and Stripes.) Canada’s radio air waves – yes, we still have those – are dominated by American music. Cable television, or what’s left of it, is no different. Almost every channel airs nothing but American shows.
Things are even more extreme in the digital world. We walk around with massive catalogues of American music in our pockets. We stream American shows. American influencers dominate our social media, podcast and YouTube feeds. Our politicians address us from American platforms. Even our bookstores are crammed with American books printed by American publishers; the CanLit sections of bookstores can usually be found on a single shelf, tucked away under a humble little red-leaf sticker.
And closest to my own heart: across this country, on most of our main stages , we see a constant stream of American plays. The box-office royalties from those works flow steadily south to American playwrights, and their American agents.
It doesn’t have to be this way. Brilliant, hilarious, insightful Canadian artists have been standing politely in the wings all over this country, waiting for their chance. And now, we are at a moment of reckoning.
Canada is not the United States. We have a different history and a different Constitution – a difference between our Charter and the U.S. Bill of Rights. We have a different judicial system, a different political system, a different education system. We have a different belief in reconciliation, and a different approach to our ports of entry. We have a different standing in the world, and a different commitment to peace, order and good government. We have different heroes. Our trails have been blazed by different feet.
Above all, we have a different story – and we have our own storytellers.
Imagine a year where every play on every Canadian stage was written and performed by Canadian artists. Where every concert by a Canadian orchestra was the work of a Canadian composer. Where every major exhibit at a Canadian art gallery presented a Canadian artist, and where Canadian films played in every cinema across the country. Here, in Canada, that seems like an impossible logistical hurdle. In America, for American art, they just call that status quo.
The Massey Report was supposed to be warning, not a prophecy. And if stories are what make a culture, isn’t it time we made the choice, as Canadians, to listen to ours?