FilmPOP Special Screening: PAPER PROMISES
Special Screening:
PAPER PROMISES
Shane Harvey | Canada 2008/2010 | 82min.
With Larry Harvey and Shane Harvey in person!
Paper Promises is a son’s gift to his dad. The now-82 year-old Larry Harvey was once a rising young country singer and songwriter, a contemporary of Johnny Cash and Hank Snow and other nascent stars of Nashville’s golden age. It was a career cut short by booze and bad decisions...until, more than 50 years later, his son Shane helped him realize his dream of performing on the fabled stage of the Grand Ole Opry. Paper Promises, the younger Harvey’s intimate personal chronicle of how that happened, is full of heart and humour, emotion, inspiration, nostalgia, and yes, lots of vintage country music. The documentary version of a classic hurtin’ song. But with a happy ending. (Rob Salem, Toronto Star)
Guest Bio: Larry Harvey
Raised in Carmanville, N.L., Larry Harvey moved to Toronto by the early 1950s and began singing in nightclubs, on radio and on the new medium called television. He caught the attention of King Records, a Cincinnati-based label that also signed a singer named James Brown. The young Canadian agreed to an eight-song deal and was soon down in Nashville, recording, performing and hanging out with Cash and Elvis Presley. Harvey’s first four singles did well, reaching the Top 10 in Canada and enjoying moderate U.S. success. A look at the inaugural list of members of the Country Music Association shows his name with the likes of Cash, Tex Ritter, Marty Robbins, Roy Rogers, the Everly Brothers and Porter Wagoner. But as his career seemed to be taking off, he voided the deal with King Records after a dispute over distribution. With a wife and three children at home, Harvey decided to call his music career a day. He accepted a job in a bread plant, then moved on from factory to factory before settling down at a one-man glass business he would run for 25 years. While he continued to play around Ontario a little, the place where Harvey’s music had the most impact was in his kitchen – until now. (CP)
