Celebrating Canadian talent

KATHARINE HAMER EDITOR

According to a new documentary about his life, Michael Cohl is "the most famous man you've never heard of."

The Toronto-based music promoter is put under the microscope in filmmaker Barry Avrich's Satisfaction: The Life and Times of Michael Cohl, which airs next week on CBC.

From humble beginnings as the son of a clothier, Cohl grew from an ambitious strip club operator to become the most successful concert promoter in the world, with clients including the Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd and U2. He convinced the Stones to headline SARS Fest in Toronto when the city was under siege from the mysterious respiratory illness. Nearly 500,000 fans showed up to hear the band play at Downsview Park. Cohl has also staged tours for Michael Jackson, sporting events and numerous Broadway productions.

"We tend to celebrate mediocrity in Canada," said Avrich in a recent interview with the Independent. "For Michael Cohl to be able to control the industry is absolutely staggering and unprecedented – to be Canadian and affect change internationally. It's not about [Canadian director] Atom Egoyan making a movie and doing well with it."

"I learned in Hebrew school, whatever I did, I had to win," notes Cohl in the film. After deciding he wanted to become a concert promoter, he leapfrogged competitors by making strategic alliances (including with Maple Leaf Gardens owner Harold Ballard) and shoring up funds.

For years, "I was the family member, the friend, that you didn't want to see," he explains, "because I'd ask to borrow $300,000."

When Cohl took over promotion of the Rolling Stones in 1989, it was the biggest news ever to hit the industry. Now, bands come to him looking for deals – and yet, Avrich told the Independent, "he's not enamored by the business. He doesn't spend Christmas on Mustique with Mick Jagger. He's not interested in sharing the spotlight."

Avrich, who said he likes to make films about "unusual" and generally unknown subjects, became fascinated by Cohl when his advertising agency was working with the promoter. "I watched from the sidelines," he said, "at the sheer speed with which [Cohl] built his company into a dominant force."

Advertising has been Avrich's bread-and-butter job for more than 20 years – he currently runs his own agency, Endeavour Marketing, as well as turning out films. "I don't sleep long nights," he admitted. "I write on every available surface."

For the past 11 years, he has created the trailers for the annual Toronto International Film Festival. He has also made documentaries about Vanity Fair writer Dominick Dunne, film mogul Lew Wasserman and Toronto lawyer Edward Greenspan.

"Through the osmosis of film, I've met some great people," Avrich mused.

Not all of those filmmaking experiences were easy, however. Wasserman's family refused to participate in the documentary about him – despite Avrich taking out reassuring ads in the Hollywood press. With Cohl, "there weren't intentional brick walls but there were very apparent hurdles, scheduling crews, [trying to] nail him down, 'OK, it's not going to be Aspen at 4 p.m. but six months later in Miami.'"

Although several of his subjects – Cohl and Wasserman among them – have been Jewish, Avrich said, "I didn't feel some kind of Jewish connection. I didn't feel with anybody I interviewed it was a raison d'etre because it was one Jew to another Jew. But I definitely think, as a Jewish person, you are born to tell stories, because no one tells stories like Jews."

Satisfaction airs on CBC's main network Monday, July 24, at 8 p.m.

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