Getting by with a little help from your friends...

Getting by with a little help from our friends…

“What would you think if I sang out of tune
Would you stand up and walk out on me?
Lend me your ears and I'll sing you a song
And I'll try not to sing out of key
Oh I get by with a little help from my friends
Mm I get high with a little help from my friends
Mm going to try with a little help from my friends”

Billy Shears

Recently I read a tweet from a person criticising the amount of Twitter retweets Russell Crowe did. I thought about this for a while and I had to disagree. There are a couple of things I really like about these musicians and artists whose fandoms I am interested in and their use of social media. Firstly, I am always learning something about the places and communities where they are all from, the story of the products they create and the inclusion of fans in their stories through retweets and replies. Yes, it is a nice thing to valid and share fan’s thoughts, creating a sense of belonging and a community by sharing their tweet. Fandoms and social media are a place which bring people together and they become life long friends.

However, one of the really interesting things the fans have noticed on Twitter over the years is the friendships and support between Russell Crowe, Alan Doyle, Scott Grimes, Kevin Durand and Allan Hawco have on a personal level and professional level. As many of the fans know Russell Crowe, Scott Grimes and Kevin Durand met on the set of Mystery Alaska, and became friends. Then Russell Crowe met Alan Doyle and they made Robin Hood and then did Winter’s Tale and a heap of Indoor Garden Parties in Canada, America and Australia. Russell and Alan made the album Crowe and Doyle Songbook 3. Then Russell, Scott, Kevin, Alan and Allan all came together for an episode of Republic of Doyle. Scott Grimes and Alan Doyle had a regular episode on the show. 

I have read some interesting stories about how they all became friends. Kevin Durand explains how he met Russell and Scott then Alan during an interview for Robin Hood just after they made Robin Hood together.  “Russell, Scotty and I met on a movie called Mystery, Alaska which started back in 1998. That was my first movie. It was my first audition for a movie actually. I was a theatre grad up to that point. Then Russell and I also did 3:10 to Yuma together. Scotty and I did a movie together. It was called Throwing Stars at the time and then they changed the title to Who's Your Monkey?, a small independent. So, we were all very familiar with each other.

And the connection with Alan was that I had been a huge, huge Great Big Sea [Alan Doyle's folk band] fan way back before Mystery, Alaska happened and I gave Russell and Scotty copies of his CD. And they all became big fans. Through the course of a decade of different things happening, we all ended up becoming good friends and becoming the Merry Men, so to speak. I'm grateful for the journey’. (From interviews in Sherwood. Kevin Durand Actor in 2010 film. Robin Hood Conducted and transcribed by Allen W. Wright)

In an interview with CBC in Newfoundland 2011Russell Crowe explained how they all became friends‘  in the interview (below) Russell explains that he met Great Big Sea frontman Alan Doyle at the NHL Awards. Hawco was ‘on the bones of his ass – a struggling actor doing Shakespeare in the park or something like that at the time” (Hawco and Doyle are both from St. John’s and Great Big Sea’s “Oh Yeah” is the theme song of Republic of Doyle).

But then there’s more to this story than that…here’s what a few hours of watching Youtube clips and studying Twitter feeds produced on the interesting relationship between this group of very talented an creative friends. (Russell Crowe – The Republic of Doyle connection by Jamie Ordolis 23 August 2011 CBC live). I also love this article as it is the beginning of news agencies using Twitter and social media as a source of news and searching timelines to find information out.

In an interview for American Songwriter Alan Doyle describes he came to meet and work with Russell Crowe in 2002. “I met Russell when we were both presenters at the NHL Hockey Awards almost a decade ago in Toronto. I had heard that he was a GBS (Great Big Sea) fan and had even performed one of the songs I had written. I made sure I was standing in the hall when he was passing through and casually introduced myself. He had first heard of GBS and my writing when he was filming a movie called Mystery Alaska in Canada in the late 90’s. After a few chats he asked if I ever passed through Toronto where he was living while filming Cinderella Man and if I would like to write a song or two. I totally jumped at the chance, of course, and the rest is history. (From ‘Meet Alan Doyle, Russell Crowe’s Musical Partner in Crime’, by Britta Dragicevic published on the 16 May 2012 for the American Songwriter)

In a recent interview with the National Post Sessions Alan Doyle talks about when his friendship with Russell Crowe and how his recent trip to Gander made headlines when he tweeted him from the Gander airport. He explains “I’ve known Russell for 12 years now. He was introduced to Great Big Sea while shooting Mystery, Alaska in Alberta and he was a big fan so he introduced himself to me at the NHL awards in Toronto in ’02 or ’03. We ended up writing a bunch of stuff together, I produced his album…it’s a great friendship. Anyways, he called me late one night just before Christmas and said, ‘I’m flying into Newfoundland tomorrow so our plane can refuel.’ I think he was flying from London to Atlanta. I said, ‘You’re flying into St. John’s?’ and he said, ‘Yeah, I guess.’ So I was like, ‘Awesome, I’ll come up and see ya.’ About three in the morning I get a text saying, ‘We’re not flying into St. John’s we’re flying into Gander, where’s that?’ And I said, ‘it’s about four hours away.’ And so when he got there he started tweeting about how he expected us to be there, joking around, and the local media made a big deal about it and I was like, ‘Guys, he was on the other side of customs! I couldn’t have even seen him even if we had gone. It’s a gag.’ But you know what’s cool about it? it’s that, and maybe this is little brother complex but I still think it’s cool that there’s a guy that’s as worldly and as famous as him that takes a moment to acknowledge when he’s in Newfoundland he loves the place, that he’s got friends there and that it’s significant to him. I probably should be above that but I’m not. It feels like a bit of a pat on the back to be honest”. (Great Big Sea’s Alan Doyle is looking for something true to sing on ‘So Let’s Go’” by Jon Dekel published on 21 January 2015).

Russell, Alan, Scott, Kevin and Allan have made movies and television episodes together, written songs and created albums together, and of course done concerts together.  When each person has created something new they seem to be always there with help and encourage each other and give their work a bit of a plug. Their friendships I am sure have it's ups and downs and creative differences over time, but is something we can all learn from and aspire to as a fandom. Fandoms are places where many people meet and become life-long friends through the activities and sharing stories about the things they love. This post is a tribute to the friendships between Russell Crowe, Alan Doyle, Scott Grimes, Kevin Durand and Allan Hawco and all the fans in these fandoms who have met and become real life friends.

from the dailytelgraph.com (no copyright infringement intended)