I've always loved spoken radio shows – variety, documentaries and, especially, dramas. I think I'd prefer it to television if the selection of programming was there. Thankfully, there are still some public broadcasters like the BBC that keep up great radio drama programming.
Community radio is more about music and short interviews but I noticed, belatedly, that CKUW has entered the radio drama genre !
"At the Monarchs Convenience", set in the West End, has been on the air since April 2008. Rick is the prickly proprietor of an old-style neighbourhood convenience store and the quirky selection of residents and business owners that come through his doors make up the rest of the show’s characters.
The show is quite good. and an interesting combination of two old-time institutions: radio drama and the corner store.
- At the Monarchs Convenience airs Mondays at 5:30 on CKUW or see the above link for webcasts.
- For a bit of Winnipeg corner store nostalgia check out the NFB’s Ted Baryluk's Grocery available on-line !
2 comments:
Thanks for posting the link to Paskievich's wonderful short film, and also for your in-depth look into city neighborhood's most important institution, the corner grocery store. While economies of scale did away with the majority of them over the past seven or eight decades, it is interesting to note Winnipeg remaining corner store's survival today depends largely on people in the surrounding neighborhood who do not have a car, and usually are renters. I think that this would be true not only in the North End or around Spence Street, but also in Wolseley. While it's increasingly becoming middle class, there is still a significant student/renter population that would be the main customers of, say, Sunrise on Canora and Westminster and Laura Secord on Wolseley and Ruby(?). Across the river, meanwhile, to my knowledge, there are no traditional corner stores left. When my Grandmother was growing up there in the '40s, they lined Academy Road.
Anyway, I enjoyed this post.
Thanks r and p !
I'd love if more of the stores became more 'depanneur-like' with meat, fruit, veg and decent bread. So many are just repositories for chips coke and really bad bread !
Post a Comment