Guylaine St-Onge, actress
deb...@comcast.net
JIM BAWDEN
TELEVISION COLUMNIST
When Guylaine St-Onge, the talented TV co-star of such Canadian series
as Earth: Final Conflict and Lonesome Dove, decided to switch to
theatre producing, she took on more than she bargained for.
In 2001 St-Onge agreed to produce a staging of Brad Fraser's
Unidentified Human Remains and the True Nature of Love but had to take
over the leading role of Candy just four days before the opening.
Propelled into the role, opposite John Carson, she was lovely and
affecting, demonstrating a shading to her talent which few people knew
existed.
"Maybe this will be my way into theatre. I totally loved it," she told
The Star's Rita Zekas in 2001. "To have the discipline of an actor to
perform every night with the audience right there.
"You get fed by the audience. On a movie set, you're lucky if you feel
something at the end of the day."
St-Onge died Thursday of cervical cancer after a courageous 2 1/2-year
fight. She was just 39. Few people outside her closest friends knew she
was sick. She tried to continue working as best she could while
undergoing alternative treatments.
Born in Montreal, she grew up in the small town of Ste-Hyacinthe where
she began studying ballet at 4. By 14 she was taking the bus weekly to
Montreal to perform in a dance troupe.
She also appeared on a Montreal TV show titled Lautrec '83, described
by St-Onge as "Solid Gold without a budget. It was the '80s: high heels
with gold lamé and a big smile. I did ballroom, cha-cha, Latin
dancing."
She then jumped to the big-budget CTV drama series Mount Royal (1989)
as Stephanie Valeur. "I had no acting experience other than
commercials," she told Zekas.
Looking like Monaco's Princess Stephanie, she played a model in Paris,
who falls for one of her father's oldest friends. "It set the status
for most of my subsequent roles: the wealthy bitch," she told Zekas.
She then played a tycoon's amoral wife in the Keith Carradine series
Fast Track, which was shot in Toronto in 1997. In Lonesome Dove she
played the recurring character of Florie (1995-96) and in three Ken
Finkleman series including More Tears (1997) she played "the wife of
the rich guy who ran away with his secretary."
"Ken had me watch Fellini's 8 1/2," St-Onge joked. "I had short hair
and I was sexy with glasses and very mysterious."
There was more sex but less mystery in the Toronto-made series Earth:
Final Conflict (1997), where she played the malicious Juda, an alien
with an insatiable appetite for human life. "I'm a vampire seductress,"
she explained at the time. "I wore a leather outfit with a triple-D bra
size and I sucked the life out of everybody."
Recent movies included Angel Eyes (2001) with Jennifer Lopez and One
Way Out (2002) with Jim Belushi.
She leaves her ex-husband David, companion Zéca and nine-year-old son
Aiden.
