Martin Short, Eugene Levy, Avril Chown, Jayne Eastwood and many young people who lived in Ontario had acting dreams. Composer and lyricist Stephen Schwartz announced a casting call for a Toronto cast of his musical Godspell. Those three actors and seven more beat thousands to be in a big production that ran for 488 performances. After the performances, the young cast would hang out, not knowing what the next step would be. One cast member would have a short career but the rest would become Canada and America’s comedy greats.

One can watch these comedy greats’ stories in You Had to Be There: How the Toronto Godspell.… I’m sorry that I couldn’t finish the title but it’s otherwise a film about a lot of things. And a good one too, which uses most of the cast as subjects, reminiscing on old times. The Greater Toronto and Hamilton area was and still is a great place to be young and talented. The interview segments, simple as they are, capture the Golden Horseshoe as a place with loads of potential. 

Films about people before they became famous are a dime a dozen, most of them serving as nostalgia bait. Sure, a lot of this film has that, but it makes its interviewees relatable, transporting viewers back to 1972. Outside of interviews, You Had to Be There has recordings of the cast hanging out after some of their shows. Accompanying Martin Short’s audio recordings of those sessions are authentically groovy animation segments. Animation also brings that theatrical production to life, since it took place before official, legal recordings existed.

You Had to Be There is probably one of the few films about Toronto that shows that versions of the old city still exist. Artistic young people can still hang out in cities, and as those people grow up, most of them can still have reunions. One big difference though, or maybe it was only true for this Godspell production, was that shows ran for months. Eventually, the show has to end, and these working young actors have to get jobs, but most of them land on their feet. As Paul Shaffer, the show’s musical director, said, the Toronto cast is just as talented as their southern counterparts.

You Had to Be There also highlights how unique Godspell was, a perfect fit for the talented young Torontonians. I can go on about how the show follows Judeo-Christian traditions of storytelling, etc, but it also was gender equal. All of the five female cast members dealt with sexism before and after the show ended, specifically Chown. One of her interview scenes is particularly heartbreaking and will hit harder especially because of recent events. The film tells her story respectfully, knowing how to balance that with the stories of the cast’s great comedians.

Canadian cinephiles can watch You Had to Be There in select theatres. There will Q&A with Jayne Eastwood and producer Tom Powers this Friday Oct 2nd at TIFF Lightbox. And after that,  another Q&A with Eugene Levy and Jayne Eastwood on Friday Oct 10th.