And then there was the pride of nationalism, of rising consciousness in the Caribbean, of having support, of being proud of who you were and what belonged to you. Of being able to soar in flights of language without fear. Your audience was your critic, if they understood, reacted, if they said it was good, then it was. I was writing for them first, the world after.
What was your involvement with the arts?
Though born in Trinidad I grew up in Grenada. I was always interested in the arts and in Grenada was active in a group called BeeWee Ballet as a dancer and actor. This gave me my first groundings in theatre. On my return from studying in Montreal, Canada, I went to UWI Jamaica. While there I was very involved in University Drama, touring with the drama group to Belize, taking part in the Tallawah Festival, and eventually playing a leading role in the Jamaican Pantomime“ Hail Columbus” opposite Ranny Williams. On my return to Trinidad I founded the Creola Theatre Group putting on shows at the Little Carib Theatre. Then in 1975 came the Tim Tim storytelling shows, where I highlighted the stories from my books and featured many well known performers, including Louise Bennett, Mary Carter-Smith, Alice McGill, Andrea Gollop and many others. In 1983 I saw the need to create a platform for talk artistes and started the Talk Tent with the Motto‘ Where Talk Is Art”. Both shows are still going strong with the Talk Tent now a popular post-carnival event at Queen’ s Hall and the“ Tim Tim” show now on in October at NAPA the National Association for the Performing Arts.
From the beginning I have always considered myself a regional artist, as I have always had tremendous support up and down the islands. As such I have performed in almost every island of the English Speaking Caribbean, from Guyana right up to the US Virgin Islands, Tortola, St. Martin, Cayman and the Bahamas. International performances took me to Miami, Toronto, New York. Washington, London to name a few. On the writing side I became a self-publisher publishing books, CD’ s, Videos and DVD’ s and was also President of the Writers Union. Today I am using my art form as a motivational speaker, presenter and facilitator in communication skills.
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