3 December 2008
Tracey's Been Working on the Railroad - Let's Hope
We See It
First CPR passenger train to arrive in Port Moody, British
Columbia - 4 Jul 1886 Canadian Pacific Railway.
The last time most of us saw Ian Tracey was on CBC's
Intelligence, playing central character Jimmy Reardon.
"I took a breather, about 10 months off," he says.
Tracey has recently got back into the acting groove. He had roles in two pilots.
But what I really want to talk to him about is the miniseries Iron Road, a big-budget China/Canada
co-production for CBC-TV, which will air in late summer, 2009. An epic story about the building of the North
American transcontinental railway, it was filmed in China and British Columbia, and stars Sun Li (sometimes credited as Betty Sun),
Peter O'Toole, and Sam Neill. Tracey played the corrupt Irish-born boss of a crew of Chinese railway workers. Iron Road
has already been screened as a feature film at several film festivals and won awards.
"It's an important story, but very entertaining, very dramatic," Tracey says. "We take for granted that we know about
the building of the railways, but we don't. We certainly don't know the story from a Chinese perspective. Working in China had a
certain amount of culture shock for me, but I think the story will be a culture shock for Canadians.
"It looks beautiful too, and there's a very unlikely love story at the heart of it. I really hope it gets the attention and
recognition it deserves."
That remains to be seen - an August, 2009, airdate on CBC doesn't sound like the broadcaster is giving the miniseries a
top-flight time slot.
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