Rick Hansen and friends celebrate Man in Motion tour’s 30th anniversary

MOTION MAINTAINED: Thirty years after his Man in Motion wheelchair journey around the world, Rick Hansen took the elevator to a Rick Hansen Foundation fundraiser in the Hotel Georgia ballroom. Other than still using a chair, the decades appear to have been good for Hansen. Ditto for wife Amanda, who was called in when Rick needed a physiotherapist for 1984 Olympic trials hurts. “Make her a pretty one,” he cracked prophetically. Called again three days into his world tour, Amanda stayed on. Today, she recalls a two-week break in New Zealand “when Rick’s system began to break down and he had to start moving again.”

Along his multi-nation way, Rick was heartened when many folk likened him to Terry Fox and to “what he did for the country and disabled persons. He epitomized the spirit of most Canadians.” Another Canadian exemplar was represented at the Hansen reception in the form of Wayne Gretzky Estate Winery products, although none from the ’99 vintage.

PRESTISSIMO: That was the cue last December when the Tom Lee Music company began demolishing premises for its relocation two blocks north on Granville Street. When VP-director Graham Blank hosted an opening reception there recently, Kenneth Lee, 28, re-enacted father and then-company president Henry’s 2006 photograph as a Granville Street busker. But instead of papa’s $50,000 Fender “Harley Davidson” guitar, he chose an acoustic $9,999.99 National Reso-Phonic dobro. Career-wise, they’re on the same page, though. In July, Kenneth will join the global Tom Lee Group in Hong Kong where Henry is chief financial officer.

STEINWAY OR THE HIGHWAY: It will be both for city pianist Jane Coop this fall when she begins a Victoria-to-Halifax tour of 13 cities, with New York and London to follow. She’ll rehearse the Beethoven-Rachmaninoff repertoire at home, relishing her personal Steinway 7B instrument’s “warm and expansive sound.” For the tour’s Vancouver recital, though, she may play the $600,000, nine-foot Steinway Model D named Kuniisii for the supernatural figure that Haida artist Jay Simeon applied with its ground-argillite acrylic finish.

NEVER LOST IT: When a 1961 Vancouver park board byelection prompted her political debut, Canadian Florist of The Year Grace McCarthy reflected: “I guess I felt a little obligated to give something back. It sounds a bit mundane, I know, to say I thought I owed it to the community, but I still have that strong sense of responsibility.”

THAT’S AMORE: Attending National Day celebrations at the Italian Cultural Centre, Consul General Massimiliano Iacchini conferred his government’s Commendatore status on CMC Engineering Group president-CEO Lucio Sacchetti. In Rome, meanwhile, President Sergio Mattarella had honoured Aquilini Group founder Luigi Aquilini and 24 other industrialists as Cavalieri del Lavoro, meaning Workers Knights. Formalities over, celebrants looked forward to Sunday, June 11, when they’ll join artists, merchants, restaurateurs and others packing 14 blocks of traffic-closed Commercial Drive for the Amore-themed Italian Day on The Drive festival.

ON TOP: Leo Awards Founder Walter Daroshin was thrilled when the 19th annual running named winners from 1,295 entries by B.C. films, TV productions and performers during three Hotel Vancouver events. Hello Destroyer was named best motion picture, and its Jared Abrahamson was named best male actor. The Hollow Child’s Jessica McLeod was best female actor. Oddly, veteran actor Ben Ratner was overlooked when his remarkable depiction of a punch-drunk boxer in Ganjy was, like the short film itself, not nominated. Any transformative-appearance award would likely have gone to 2015 Eadweard star Michael Eklund whose bleachedblond mohawk, shaved dark sides and two-tone beard may make auditions challenging. Then again, wacky dos haven’t harmed certain living or dead dictators or today’s U.S. president.

DIFFERING VISIONS: It was 1992 when the then-colony of Hong Kong’s final governor, Chris Patten, cheered Vancouver listeners by mentioning a “bridge fabricated across the ocean from this great and civilized land to a rock in the South China Sea.” That rock became China’s Hong Kong Special Administrative Region in 1997, and the bridge still stands. Contemporary filmmakers crossed it recently with the eight-production Creative Visions program screening at the Cinematheque to June 23. It opened with writer-director Alex Law and producer Mabel Cheung’s Echoes of the Rainbow, wherein a boy dies of leukemia amid 1960s Hong Kong’s inequalities and corruption.

WITH HONOUR: Former citybased U.S. consul general Lewis Lukens was minding the fan in London recently when President Donald Trump flung something that way. Following a multi-death terrorist attack in the British capital, Trump, a.k.a. Tweeter the Great, called Muslim mayor Sadiq Khan’s appeal for calm “a pathetic excuse.” With Washington’s London embassy having no ambassador since Jan. 18, chargé d’affaires Lukens took the dignified and daring step of praising Khan’s leadership while expressing U.S. sympathy and solidarity. Current Vancouver consul general Lynne Platt likely will be equally gracious at her approaching Fourth of July reception.

DOWN PARRYSCOPE: Anyone recall a third-party review for Glen Clark’s fast ferries fiasco?

PHOTOS: MALCOLM PARRY Wife Amanda feted Rick Hansen at a 30th-anniversary celebration of his wheelchair-around-the-world Man In Motion journey which she accompanied throughout as his physiotherapist.

At relocated Tom Lee Music, Jane Coop saw a $600,000 Steinway she may play to launch her cross-Canada, New York and London recital tour.

At the Leo Awards, Michael Eklund, here with Eadweard co-star Sara Canning, won no prize but raised the bar on topknot-and-beard styling.

Italian Consul General Massimiliano Iacchini congratulated Luigi Aquilini and Lucio Sacchetti on his country conferring different knightly honours on them.

Wayne Gretzky wines were served when CTV anchor Mike Killeen attended and Global rival Sophie Lui was MC at the Rick Hansen event.

Director Alex Law and producer Mabel Cheung screened Echoes of the Rainbow to launch the Cinematheque’s post-1997 Hong Kong series.

Former U.S. consul general Lewis Lukens, here with wife Lucy, countered Donald Trump’s post-terror rudeness to London Mayor Sadiq Khan.

Kenneth’s father Henry Lee played a $50,000 Fender guitar at the old Tom Lee Music locale in 2006 before leaving for Hong Kong head office. Kenneth will join him there in July.

During a reception at Tom Lee Music’s Granville Street store, Kenneth Lee did a little busking for the crowd while strumming a $10,000 National Reso-Phonic dobro.