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nearing 60 and needed someone to learn the ropes while he could still swing from them. When she was a kid, Gail earned quarters shining her dad's shoes once a week. That image lingered in 1989. "You're essentially going back to working for your dad, shining his shoes again, and getting an allowance/salary. I was concerned. If it didn't work out, how do you separate the business fallout from the family?" she says. But her col- leagues in Halifax encouraged her to try it out, promising her a job if she ever came back. With safety net secured, she and Paterson returned to Manitoba. Paterson, a limnologist, got the perfect job, at Winnipeg's Freshwater Institute, as lead scientist for the Experimental Lakes Area. Asper's first day on the job was similarly auspicious. After a protracted legal battle between Izzy Asper, who then owned half of Global, and Seyton Ltd., comprised of Paul Morton and Seymour Epstein, which owned the other half, a judge dissolved the partnership and offered Global up in an auction between the two parties. The Aspers won that auction in December 1989, becoming sole owner of Global Ventures Western Ltd. and subsidiary Global Ventures Holdings Ltd. The pace of life accelerated thereafter: Canwest went pub- lic and then international. Asper accepted the added role of corporate secretary, recording board minutes and capturing the "flavour" of meetings. Her father insisted she be meticu- lous and thorough in case they got subpoenaed in court. The advice was prescient. Her minutes from the 1990s were re- cently examined in court in connection with some remain- ing Morton/Epstein litigation. Alongside managing the le- gal team, she handled investor relations and liaised with the board of directors. How corporations are governed, and the relationship between board members, managers, share- holders, and other stakeholders, came under greater scrutiny in the 1990s, and Canwest was not immune. "We were always be- ing looked at with concern because we didn't have enough independent directors, we didn't have a separate CEO and chairman, and there were these reports coming out attacking the right of the majority shareholder to have a say on the board," she says. "I was constantly writing submissions to defend the role of the entrepreneur." I'm walking through the cubicle-sec- inner thespian. She did, though, precisely because she was a lawyer. Every year, in conjunction with the Manitoba Bar Associa- tion, MTC puts on a community play fundraiser with the en- tire cast composed of lawyers, Crown prosecutors, and even judges. The play is performed over several nights in April, at the Warehouse Theatre, and in the past two decades has raised more than $500,000. Her first audition landed her a part in Twelve Angry Jurors, a gender-neutral adaptation of Twelve Angry Men. "The thing I remember about her audi- tion and her work — and, by the way, I never flatter; I only compliment — was that she could easily pursue a profes- sional career in theatre," says Schipper. "She gets what it means to be in the moment. She has a lot of talent, and the same charisma that works for her offstage is lit up onstage." Since that first show, Asper has played many roles, including Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Allan Fineblit remembers seeing her as Nathan Detroit's legal system, and human rights are very much tied into the laws of the land." have a special understanding of the tioned administration offices of the Manitoba Theatre Centre, eyeballing the tapestry of theatre post- ers, cast photos, media clippings, and stranded stage props on my way to the boardroom with artistic director Steven Schipper. Gail and Izzy Asper had more in common than law and the Order of Manitoba. They were both musicians and performers. At age 19, she attended the then-Banff School of Fine Arts to sing and act and dream of Broadway. But acting would be a struggle, she concluded, and it might never pay off. When she returned to Winnipeg in 1989, with five years of legal training under her belt, she had no plan to revive her "Lawyers girlfriend, Miss Adelaide, in Guys and Dolls, about 10 years ago. "Gail was born to play that part. She was absolutely fab- ulous. It suited her to a T," says Fineblit, CEO of the Law So- ciety of Manitoba, who once worked at Izzy's law firm. She's not the only actor among city advocates, he says. "They're all hams. That's why they do it; they love to perform." And not just on stage. Freedman says it was near Christmas two years ago when Gail Asper presented her annual report to the Friends of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights. "Gail gave her report by singing it to the tune of some Christmas carol — Rudolph or something like that. Were people taken aback? No. That's Gail. They almost expect it of her." Asper still marvels at the opportunities afforded her by the law. "My legal training was absolutely kismet, fate," she says. "Because I was a lawyer, I could audition for MTC, so I auditioned and the next year they asked me to join the board." That lead to her MTC board presidency from 1996 to 1998, during which she learned about fundraising, capital campaigns, and managing volunteers — the very skills she re- quires today for the museum proj- ect. "So it was the law which helped me get involved again in arts and cul- ture," she says. "It opens doors." It also opens your mind to periodic in- dignation. A longtime member of the Women's Legal Education and Action Fund and keenly interested in the feminist aspects of family law, Asper despairs how some women are shortchanged during a divorce. Take, for ex- ample, a woman who chooses raising children over becom- ing partner with a law firm. She takes 10 years off or works part time and finally becomes partner at age 45, instead of 32. Then hubby wants a divorce. Her savings are fewer, her RRSP contributions are lower, and she's lost 13 years of part- nership wages. That lost capacity should be capitalized and form part of her settlement, says Asper. "But there was a case www. C ANADIAN mag.com M AY 2008 37