HOW COOL IS MICHAEL RILEY?

Published in the TORONTO STAR
February 3rd, 1999

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Riley plays arrogant, Armani-clad, hockey super agent Brett Parker in the CTV series Power Play. And he has the audacity to admit he didn't play hockey as a kid.

A Canadian kid who didn't play hockey? That's an extraditable offence. (Hey, he and Garth Drabinsky could be on the same plane.)

"Theatre took over my life, it became my raison d'etre," he explains, "but I developed a love of the game."

And he did his homework.

Riley met with hockey agent Don Meehan and Leafs' lawyer Gordon Kirk and he went to "hockey aficionado" buddy Ted Dykstra's (Two Pianos, Four Hands) house to watch the playoffs.

Ted supplied the pizza and the pointers, Riley the beer.

Riley also did his research for the film Pale Saints, for which he is nominated for Best Supporting Actor Genie tomorrow, up against Kurush Deboo (Such A Long Journey), Callum Keith Rennie (Last Night), his Pale Saints co-star Saul Rubinek and George Wendt (Rupert's Land).

And Riley's a presenter as well, or rather a co-presenter, with Sheila McCarthy. The list of presenters has been augmented by Roy Dupuis, Mia Kirshner, Don McKellar, Natasha Henstridge, Roberta Maxwell (Supporting Actress nominee) and Jill Hennessey (Law & Order).

In Pale Saints, Riley plays Dody, a gangster with a severe brain injury.

"It's an actor's part from heaven," he recalls, "I salivated, I am a research addict. Dody was the head of a criminal crew, like De Niro's character in Heat. He got a severe gunshot wound to the head and was never the same. I had 10 days to prepare and I phoned a number of hospitals but not a lot of hospitals would let me in. They said every soap opera designer wanted to see what a hospital looked like."

Finally, Daniel Freeman Hospital in California came through when he had three days left.

"They have a trauma unit. I sat in on group therapy, I did physical therapy. I simulated a victim of a gunshot to the temporal lobe to the left side with a doctor and he'd correct me.

"The hook I hung onto was repudiation of the severity of the injury. Understand that for a criminal with guns blazing who masterminded the crimes and who now is sitting in the getaway car. . . it's frustrating and demoralizing."

Recently Riley co-starred with Gordon Pinsent, who plays the Hamilton Steelhead team's owner in Power Play, in the CBC TV-movie Win, Again!

He's also done Chasing Rainbows, Due South, The Helsinki Roccamatios (for which he won the 1996 Best Actor Gemini); 14 MOWS (movies of the week); Diplomatic Immunity, another Genie Supporting Actor nom and nine other films, including Amistad, French Kiss, and Perfectly Normal, his movie debut.

In the beloved Perfectly Normal, he played Renzo, an opera buff.

"I got a lot of scripts about morticians who sang opera," he allows. "Brett is a political shark, a Machiavellian character, he couldn't be further away from Renzo. I get tickled by that. I did two MOWs back to back. In one, I was a serial rapist with extensions in my hair. The grip says, 'You're scaring the hell out of my dog.' The director says, 'do you ever do comedy?'

"I did the Disney film Dogmatic, where I did a man who played a dog. I played the Jim Carrey thing, falling all over. The director said, 'Man, do you ever do drama?' "

After the Genies, he's off to Vancouver to help Henry Czerny, an old pal from National Theatre School Days, celebrate his birthday on Monday.

If Riley wins a Genie, it could be a knockout birthday present for himself. He turns 37 tomorrow.