Not everyone at the Wintergarden Theatre in Toronto was blown away by Cory Monteith’s job as host of the Gemini Awards Saturday night. One eye witness compared it to when an NFL quarterback hosts Saturday Night Live.
Still, there was Monteith, loving the moment, getting his picture taken with Elvis Costello immediately after the show and posting it on Twitter (where he can be followed as “Frankenteen”). How cool is that.
What you have to give Monteith credit for is just getting to this point in his career in such a short time and keeping his head on his shoulders throughout. I was quite amazed when the 28-year-old Glee star told me just how low things were for him not that many years ago, when he was a struggling young actor at risk of homelessness on the streets of Vancouver. The full story is in Sunday’s Toronto Star, you can read it here.
It is amazing how many successful stars really went through a starving artist period before catching their big break. Michael J. Fox talks about living out of his car and using a pay phone as his office before Family Ties changed his life. Jewel and Hillary Swank have similar stories. Thing is, for every Monteith or Swank, there are probably thousands of other young wannabes who never make it in Hollywood. Living out of a car or off the street becomes a sad way of life.
Monteith is a spokesman for Virgin Unite’s Re*Generation Canada movement, which seeks to have Nov. 17 declared National Youth Homelessness Awareness Day in Canada. Read about how there are an estimated 65,000-plus homeless youths on the streets of Canada and find out what you can do about it here.
