PETER ELKAS + ALIREZA KHATAMI

On the Saturday October 17 edition of The Richard Crouse Show we meet filmmaker David Greaves. His father William produced more than 200 documentaries and wrote and directed more than half of these. He garnered many accolades for his work, including four Emmy nominations. In 1972 he assembled gathering of artists, writers, musicians, and organizers at Duke Ellington’s Harlem townhouse to film their to recollections on the cultural, artistic, and intellectual movement of the 1920s and 30s known as the Harlem Renaissance. Shot verité-style, the footage isn’t just a record of an extraordinary event, it’s also a tribute to the legacy of change ushered in by the people who assembled that afternoon. That footage sat, unreleased for fifty years until William’s son David, who was one of the camera operators on that August afternoon in 1972, restored some 60,000 feet of 16mm film and completed Once Upon a Time in Harlem. Then, Zoë Roberts, one of the co-creators of the hit musical "Operation Mincemeat" stops by to talk about the show and how a dead body, a fake love letter, and — of all people — Ian Fleming turn the tide of WWII? Then, we’ll meet Brad Schiff and Jacob Tremblay of the new film “Wildwood.” The dark fantasy based on Colin Meloy and Carson Ellis’s book comes from the stop motion animation wizards at a company called LAIKA, whose other films Coraline, ParaNorman, The Boxtrolls, Kubo and the Two Strings, and Missing Link are all classics.

On the Saturday October 10, 2026 edition of The Richard Cropuse Show we’ll meet Kristen Joiner. She is a writer, activist, and producer. After two decades in nonprofit and human-rights work, she was asked to co-author the memoir of disability rights leader Judy Heumann—a collaboration that became “Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist,” and later the YA book “Rolling Warrior.” Judy was blunt from the first meeting: Kristen had spent a career in social change and still had not understood disability as a civil rights issue. That tension—between a nondisabled writer and one of the movement’s central figures—shaped both the book and what followed. Kristen is now an executive producer on the feature film “Being Heumann,” directed by Oscar winner Siân Heder and starring Ruth Madeley as Judy and now playing on theatres. Then we meet Teagan Johnston. She is a Toronto-based multidisciplinary artist whose work moves fluidly between music, film, and writing. Born in the Yukon and raised across South Africa, Spain, Switzerland, and Canada’s West Coast, she first emerged under the name Little Coyote before stepping forward under her own name with the critically acclaimed 2022 album Sentimental Ballad—a raw, piano-driven portrait of heartbreak. Her new album, Big Time was written during a period when she had stepped back from music and was questioning her future in the industry after spending her twenties trying to “hit the big time.” Her relationship with music was also reignited through teaching piano to children; watching her students develop their own relationships with music reminded her why she fell in love with it in the first place and gave her a renewed perspective that nothing is set in stone and not everything needs to be taken so seriously. Then, Sean Menard and Darrel Fox of the film Run Terry Run stop by. Terry Fox’s 1980 run across Canada to raise money for cancer research is a well-documented story, familiar to many Canadians. Despite our familiarity with the tragic story, ehe new documentary “Run Terry Run” offers up new footage that packs an emotional wallop. The story of a plainspoken but philosophical twenty-two-year-old everyman whose mission, driven by compassion and courage, was cut short by cancer, is tragic. But it’s refreshing and necessary to have a movie like “Run Terry Run” provide an up close and personal look at what Canadian unity and heroism look like.

On the Saturday October 3, 2026 edition of The Richard Crouse Show we’ll meet First let’s meet Robert Mark Kamen, screenwriter of 23 movies, including The Karate Kid, Taken and many others. Yup, he’s the mind behind lines like Wax On Wax Off and Liam Neeson’s famous, “a very particular set of skills” speech. His latest project is The Karate Kid: The Musical, which will be playing on Toronto at the Princess of Wales Theatre until November 1. See Mirvish.com for more details. Then, Canadian blues-rock legend Colin James, eight-time Juno winner, multi-platinum artist, and one of the most electrifying guitarists this country has ever produced, joins the show. From the prairies of Saskatchewan to stages around the world, he’s earned a devoted following and collaborations with some of music’s greatest names. Now he shares a whole new side of the story with Playing the Changes: A Musician’s Memoir—a funny, open-hearted, and deeply moving account of his early years, the road that led him to open for Stevie Ray Vaughan at eighteen, and the making of a lifelong musician, all the way up to the release of his debut album. Finally, Duncan Fremlin, musician, banjo player, singer, and frontman of the country-folk group Whiskey Jack stops by. Today we talk about his new book “Stories Not Fit for the Stage - An Anthology,” a collection of tall tales, confrontations, anecdotes and encounters—some accidental, some not—with music and entertainment figures.

On the Saturday September 12 edition of The Richard Crouse Show we’ll meet best-selling author Anita Rau Badami. an acclaimed Indian-Canadian novelist whose work explores family bonds, cultural identity, and the immigrant experience spanning India and Canada. She moved to Canada in 1991 and is best known for novels including the bestselling Tamarind Mem, the award-winning The Hero’s Walk, Can You Hear the Nightbird Call?, and Tell It to the Trees. A recipient of the Marian Engel Award, she lives in Montreal, which is the backdrop for her latest novel Asha In Her Garden. It’s the story of Asha Mohan, an Indian immigrant in Montreal whose backyard garden (shaded by a beloved old maple tree) has long been her personal sanctuary amid family struggles and daily life. As the aging tree must finally be cut down, Asha reflects on a violent incident from twenty years earlier, an earlier tragedy in India that prompted her family’s move to Canada, and the complexities of her relationships, finding new clarity about her life. Then we’ll meet meet award-winning composer, sound designer, and classical music provocateur Matthew Reid. Best known for a decade as music director and composer for The Second City, he has created scores for film, television, theatre, games, and live performance. His ambitious piano cycle Moods of Limited Transposition explores emotion through innovative harmonic language across a planned 36 short works. Finally, we spend some time with Mundy McLaughlin, a Canadian author, former labour and human rights lawyer, and artist. Her debut novel, Blue Life, is a coming-of-age story set against the vibrant, gritty art, punk, and club scenes of late-1970s New York City and New Jersey.

On the Saturday September 5, 2026 edition of The Richard Crouse Show we’ll meet New York Times and internationally bestselling thriller author Linwood Barclay. With more than 25 novels to his credit, including breakout hit “No Time for Goodbye,” which sold over a million copies in the UK alone, his gripping, twist-filled domestic suspense novels explore ordinary people plunged into extraordinary danger, family secrets, and moral dilemmas. His books have been translated into more than two dozen languages, sold millions of copies worldwide, earned praise from Stephen King, and have been adapted for television. His latest white-knuckle thriller, “Not a Word” follows a man who discovers his parents dead in an apparent murder-suicide — only to uncover a web of dangerous secrets tied to Big Pharma and his own family’s past. Master of the “what would you do?” thriller, Linwood Barclay remains one of crime fiction’s most reliable and compelling voices. Then, David Kittredge, an Emmy-nominated director, editor, producer, and screenwriter known for his work across independent film, documentary, and queer cinema stops by. His credits include writing and directing the cult LGBT thriller “Pornography: A Thriller,” editing the acclaimed director’s cut of “54,” and serving as lead editor and co-executive producer on Shudder’s award-winning series “Queer for Fear: The History of Queer Horror.” Today we’ll talk about his feature documentary “Boorman and the Devil,” about John Boorman and the making of “Exorcist II: The Heretic,” premiered at the Venice Film Festival.