Production still from Sweet Talk courtesy of manifestation.tv.

Valentine’s Day is for lovers, right? Candy, flowers, candlelit dinners, and all that? For some people, maybe. But for those whose idea of romance consists of sitting at home and getting off while some stranger they’ve never met moans over a phone line, the documentary Sweet Talk may be a more fitting Valentine.
Canadian filmmaker Steven James May’s Sweet Talk, a documentary about phone sex workers, has been airing on the SexTV cable channel for a while. Sweet Talk trails three women—Maria, Ginger, and Dolores—as they demystify exactly what it looks like on the other end of all those 1-900 numbers listed in the back pages of NOW.

Anyone who remembers Jennifer Jason Leigh’s scenes in Robert Altman’s Short Cuts, where she lazily teases strangers over the phone while Chris Penn broods around their apartment, may not be shocked to find out how routine a professional phone sex gig is. But what makes Sweet Talk more than just a backdoor glance into a halfway shady profession is the charisma of its subjects.
Though all sort-of foxy in their own way, none of the three women featured in Sweet Talk are the kind of bottle-blonde sorority girls you’ll find on late night Quest infomercials. Maria is a mother of two, whose home office is about as romantic as an H&R Block, and whose real ambition is to be a writer (as of filming, she’s written 250 pages of a mystery novel tentatively titled Sane Insanity). Ginger’s turn to the world of aural sex came out of financial necessity, since she needed to supplement her job as a waitress. And Dolores seems the least removed of the bunch, dressing up in frilly negligees, and eagerly describing sissification fantasies. She also succeeds in effectively turning the camera around on the director, a rare feat for any but the most nimble documentary subjects.

All in all, it’s a pretty solid documentary, one which allows these women to speak for themselves, and turns a non-judgmental eye on their line of work. Valentine’s Day sees the release of Sweet Talk on DVD, via the movie’s website. Sunday will also see a special DVD launch in Toronto. May is pretty mum on the details, but anyone who’s so inclined can email manifestationtv@yahoo.com for more information.
It’s not exactly a fancy dinner and moonlit stroll, but the Sweet Talk DVD premiere may be the perfect place to take more adventurous sweethearts, or to shake the blistered hands of local phone sex enthusiasts.

Source: The Globe and Mail, February 12, 1960.

Valentine’s Day is less than a week away—have you selected a special card, a heart-shaped trinket, or a generic box of chocolates yet? Stereotypical gifts to suit every degree of thoughtfulness, or lack of that, were much the same in 1960 as they are now, whether you shopped at tonier shops in Yorkville or the neighbourhood five-and-dime.
This ad for Yorkville businesses included in ultra-fine print a list of merchants where shoppers could discover the BEST gift. Among the businesses still in the neighbourhood, even if their Yorkville locations have changed or have shifted south along Yonge Street, are Bay Bloor Radio, Birks, Curry’s Art Supplies, Grand & Toy, Roberts Gallery, and Stollery’s.

If a gift didn’t work, the way to a valentine’s heart might have been through his or her stomach. The Star’s Margaret Carr suggested a traditional full-course meal. “Maybe I’m old-fashioned,” Carr wrote, “but I’m all in favour of the hearts-and-flowers type of day…So, what better valentine than a dream of a dinner for two, with soft lights and soft music? Even without any flowery verses, he should get the idea!” On the menu: veal scallopini, buttered asparagus, hot rolls, celery curls, cherry gelatine salad on lettuce, ice cream in maraschino cherry pastry shells, and coffee. If this meal didn’t produce the desired results, the chef could use Carr’s ready-made reply: “Roses are red, the salad is too, if this food doesn’t send you, nuts to you!”

Source: The Toronto Star, February 10, 1960.

While newspaper ads for Kresge’s and other retailers highlighted their selection of traditional boxed valentines, they didn’t mention whether they carried trendy “sick” cards. Seen as “contemporary” valentines for “sophisticated” people (or at least an excuse for the reporter to use air quotes), these cards ditched the traditional for quick insults. One example: a card with a lovely peacock on the front with the text “There’s something about you that reminds me of a bird…” The punchline inside? “…Your brain!” According to Toronto psychologist Dr. David A. Stewart, the cards were a cynical reaction by the “cool set” against use of traditional emotions like love in advertising campaigns. “It reveals a desire to get away from the traditional emotional expressions. It’s an affectation of coolness,” he told the Star. “Friendship is trite and corny, but we all appreciate it. We are living in a consumers’ goods society and we’re constantly exploited. It’s a little thing to sit down and write a note to a friend that would be more appreciated. But we’re in a hurry and use the printed cards.” Stewart predicted that the cards, which were popular in urban areas but not among the rural set, would soon die out in favour of traditional expressions of love.
Perhaps the popularity of “sick” cards inspired this piece of verse sent to the Star by Wilma M. Coutts of Durham, Ontario:

We’ve seen some classy valentines
Around here in our day,
Festooned with satin hearts and lace
And perfumed with sachet.
The valentines that we get now
Would make an artist wince,
Lop-sided hearts and wobbly darts—
Bedaubed with crayon prints.
These funny, funny valentines
Designed by someone small,
These are the ones we put away
And treasure most of all.

Additional material from the February 10, February 12, and February 13, 1960, editions of the Toronto Star.

Candy-heart pins on sale at a previous year’s Erotic Arts and Crafts Fair. Photo courtesy of Come As You Are.

CRAFTS: As we mentioned in our Valentine’s Day preview post last week, there is lots to see and do today. For a relatively inexpensive but unique shopping experience, there’s the Gladstone’s annual Erotic Arts & Crafts Fair. The event showcases romantic and erotic art in the form of handmade lingerie, jewelry, cards, silk-screened prints, posters, and other memorabilia. Check out their website for a sampling of sale items from last year. Gladstone Hotel (1214 Queen Street West), 12–8 p.m., FREE.
BURLESQUE: For something only slightly less innocent, the Scandelles present their final Valentine’s Day Burlesque show at Lee’s Palace. This is their tenth annual gay-positive cabaret, as they will be changing venues thanks to a development grant from the Ontario Arts Council. Tonight’s show sees Scandelles past and present unite to perform pieces from their repertoire. Lee’s Palace (529 Bloor Street West), 10 p.m., $12 through Ticketmaster, $15 at the door.
DANCE: If you didn’t get a chance to see Enwave Theatre’s inspired new work, It’s About Time: 60 Dances in 60 Minutes—well, it’s about time. Today is the last day to watch Dancemakers’ production, which explores the small moments in our daily lives and events that can take place in less than a minute. The music accompanying the dance uses actual field recordings; sixty people were asked to record the sounds of different places for a minute each. Enwave Theatre (231 Queens Quay West), 3 p.m. and 8 p.m., $15-$38.
WORDS: Whistler’s Grille offers a night of comedy, music, and live theatre with the show No Sweetheart Required. The event features a series of short comedies about love, or the lack thereof, from directors such as Nancy Bradshaw and Blake Thorne. There will also be a one-woman presentation by comedienne June Morrow, a dance piece by Event Horizon Dance, and music by David Hein. Whistler’s Grille and Café (955 Broadview Avenue), 8 p.m., $18.
COMEDY: Each Saturday for the rest of this month, Bad Dog Theatre’s newest improvised parody, Man Men, spoofs the 1960s as “the golden age of advertizing and womanizing.” Improvisers promise to weave narratives of love, lust, power, unfaithfulness, and sexual harassment, all set in an ad agency bureau. Bad Dog Theatre (138 Danforth Avenue), 10 p.m., $10.
MUSIC: The Danforth’s Winterfolk Festival presents an alternative to Wavelength as more than one hundred musicians descend on the area this weekend to play roots, blues, folk, and more. This is Winterfolk’s sixth annual outing for Toronto, and it takes place in at least five different venues, including the Black Swan Tavern, Dora Keogh, The Willow Restaurant, and Mambo Restaurant. Various venues, all day starting at 2 p.m., many events are FREE.

Source: The Toronto Star, February 12, 1954

Valentine’s Day is nearly upon us, a day of happy lovers and happier chocolate purveyors. Back in 1954, two of the city’s larger candy chains filled the newspapers with ads showing off their sweet suggestions. Beyond wolfing down bonbons, what else could sweethearts do that year?
There was the option of more food. Culinary columnists provided their ideas for suitable meals and treats for lovebirds to make at home, which would have helpful in 1954 as Valentine’s Day fell on a Sunday, a day when entertainment options outside the home were limited. The Telegram proposed a full buffet consisting of baked Virginia ham, sweet potato casserole, tossed salad, French bread, cranberry/celery salad, iced relishes, and Cherries Jubilee with ice cream. This spread may have been a plot to fill up diners so much that they wouldn’t be in the mood for any monkey business later on. Margaret Carr of The Toronto Star offered up a strawberry-almond mould loaded with gelatin, ladyfingers, and “frills of whipped cream” that may have stimulated a few lovers. The Globe and Mail determined that a one-bowl orange cake was appropriate, as long as one mixed the batter with six hundred spoon strokes—three hundred before the eggs were added, three hundred after. One stroke too many and both the cake and the romance would be ruined.

Source: The Telegram, February 11, 1954

If you were unable to come up with a poem to deliver to your Valentine, editorial pages came to the rescue, especially if you were as negligent in delivering your wishes as the protagonist of The Star’s offering, Len G. Selle’s Valentine:

Oh, lovely girl who reads this verse
Think not I am unwise;
I know the softness of your hair
The languer in your eyes.
The laughter of your “rosebud mouth”
And “teeth like pearls”—I guess;
It just remains, my love, for you
To send me your address.

Ah, what a novel scheme this is
To win a Valentine,
To advertise my heart’s desire
At nothing flat a line?
But breathing on my shoulder
Is my last important date…
Alas, this little Valentine
Is twenty years too late!

At the University of Toronto, University College co-eds celebrated by re-enacting Valentine rituals from 1754. These included pinning bay leaves on pillows to ensure any sweethearts dreamed of would be yours within a year, a performance of a play that used creepy masks, and writing names of suitors on slips of paper, rolling them in clay, and dropping them in a jar of water, with the first to float indicating the lucky man.
Modern rituals were the focus of The Telegram’s “Teen Talk” column, where Cynthia Williams offered advice:

Are you trying to woo and win the lady of your choice? Are you trying to get rid of a dope who has been stalking your steps for the past six months? Now’s your chance! Ready-made! But here’s a pointer, boys, if you do want to be popular. The girl, or girls, in your life might not be expecting a card, but believe me, you’ll be number one boy if you remember to send one! And girls, I did get a few of the boys to admit that they were kind of flattered if they got cards, even unsigned ones, that piqued their curiosity!

No mention was made of what a small gift of chocolates could do.
Additional material from the February 11, 1954 and February 12, 1954 editions of The Globe and Mail, the February 13, 1954 edition of The Telegram, and the February 9, 1954 and February 13, 1954 editions of The Toronto Star.

Four stills from a Norman McLaren short film that aired on NBC on Valentine’s Day, 1940. Courtesy of the National Film Board.

Most holidays are commercial, but Valentine’s Day, shamelessly so. It’s not statutory. It’s not political. It’s not religious, unless love is your religion, in which case you probably live in a commune in middle Saskatchewan, and you refuse to go on the internet because it makes you nervous, and oh, my god, how are you reading this? Ahem. Where were we? Right. Valentine’s. It’s not even really a holiday. All the more reason to celebrate, we say: if ever the economic clime called for a Buy Sweet Nothings Day, it’s now. (“Stimulus package” has an erotic frisson to it, no?)
After the break, we’ve got Valentine’s plans for every budget. Estimate the length of your love and the depth of your overdraft limit, then spend your V-Day and money accordingly. S/he’s worth it.

Under $25

Put on your gussiest polyester and take a ride on Toronto’s very own love boat: the Santa Cruz. Haven’t heard? You’re probably under 21. Thrown by aged hipsteress Tyler Clark Burke, the alt-singles party series goes down regularly on Captain John’s Seafood Ship (1 Queens Quay West) and attracts a rowdy crowd of old faithfuls in flannel. This very special VD edition (think kissing booths and cupcakes) is actually the night before Valentine’s, giving you one last chance to find—if you don’t already have—someone to be yours. Pre-ordered tickets are $10 each until Monday at midnight and will be real-mailed to you Tuesday morning. (Double dating? With a purchase of four or more tickets, get $5 off.) Sweeter still: the first three readers to email santacruzforever@gmail.com with the subject line “Torontoist” will win a pair of tickets, because we heart you.
Okay, pop quiz! What’s the greatest Hollywood love story of all time? Ew, no. Not Heidi and Spencer. Casablanca. See the 1943 definition of a classic film in all its black-and-white glory at Bloor Cinema, where tickets are $9 each. Bogart and Bergman take the screen at 6:45 p.m. on V-Day; since the film is about sixteen hours long, we suggest you sneak in Dee’s takeout.
But really, if you’ve been very good lovers this year, you won’t even leave the house on Valentine’s Day. Order in your reward: with forty-eight hours notice, Babycake will deliver sweet, scrumptious, individually frosted Valentines to your door. A gift box of six cupcakes (perfect for sharing, and then some) is $24 plus tax, and can be ordered online or by calling 416-406-5910 during regular business hours.

Under $50

If you like a date with class, sweep your s.o. off to the opera. (You know, that thing everyone went to on Gossip Girl two weeks ago.) With the Canadian Opera Company’s Opera for a New Age program, students and twenty-somethings can nab decent seats for just $20 each. (To compare, an AMC ticket to New in Town, a city-girl-meets-country-boy rom-com starring Renee Zellweger and Harry Connick Jr, is around $13. Just saying.) That’s $40 and tax for the pair of you to see a 4:30 p.m. Valentine’s Day performance of Antonín Dvořák’s Rusalka, a love story along the lines of the pre-Disney Little Mermaid, but sung entirely in Czech.
To paraphrase the Duke, it don’t mean a thing if you ain’t got that bling… and if you ain’t got it, you can at least ogle it. Opening February 14, the ROM’s Nature of Diamonds exhibit has all the covetable sparkle of forever without the commission-hungry sales peeps. They’re even flaunting the Incomparable: an aptly named 407-karat stunner, straight outta the motherfucking Congo. Tickets to this ice festival are $22 each ($19 if you’re still in schoo, or pretending) which makes $44, pas de tax, for two.
Lunch at the lovely Gladstone Cafe shouldn’t cost a couple more than $30 with tax and tip, which leaves you a crisp green to spend at the annual Erotic Arts and Crafts Fair afterward (’til 8 p.m., on the second floor.) Admission is free and the goods are very, very bad indeed—wood-carved dildos by artist Bud Fujikawa, for example, or a “Coinilingus” change purse.

Under $100

Forget wrangling Winterlicious reservations or lining up two-by-two for corner booths on this most competitive of dining nights. Instead, call Hidden Lounge (416-546-4556) to reserve a night of home-away-from-home cooking. This supper club of sorts is run by a young couple from the confines of their way-west-end loft, with prix fixe menus changing month to month. For Valentine’s, Hidden Lounge offers three courses for $30 each. Bring your own bottle, leave a nice tip, and you’re still spending less than $100 for the eve. You could do it all yourself, but you couldn’t do it better. (Book now; space is limited.)

Over $200

Nothing says “I love you” like a T-shirt that says “I love you.” Right? At Popfuel, couples who sign up for a Valentine’s Day screenprinting workshop will save $50 off the combined price, trimming it from $300 to $250 for two. This doesn’t include tax, but does include six shirts with two different designs. Can’t commit to wearing your lover’s head over your heart? Try Obama’s instead. We hear those are going to be real popular.
And finally, there’s the ultimate smug-couple indulgence: a Valentine’s vacation. You don’t even have to leave the city! Lovers of tradition need only stay a night or two at Toronto’s grand dame of hotels, the Fairmont Royal York, to feel like tourists in the old world.
The Fairmont’s “Love in the City” package, starting at $195 a night, includes breakfast for two at the acclaimed EPIC Restaurant, the York Kitchen, or (best of all) bedside. Most recommended add-on? The “Bear Affair” treatment: two half-hour, full-body massages for $110. And if you’re feeling really flush, upgrade to the “Royal Romance” package, which comes with sparkling wine, chocolates, and a copy of Pablo Neruda’s Twenty Love Poems—perfect for partners who have better things to do for each other than shop. (Speaking of which, there’s a late checkout included, no questions asked.)
Happy day of love, Toronto, however you make it.