Tournament for Carl

Monday night, October 17th, a bunch of actors, bankers, directors and theatre people in Charlotte are going to get together to help out one of our own.

Carl McIntyre has been an actor in Charlotte for the past couple of decades. He's been in shows all over town, as well as working in film & television and teaching acting classes. On September 15th, Carl had a serious stroke.

I get chills every time I think about it. A stroke is the worst thing that can possibly happen to an actor, outside of dying. Our instrument is our body and our voices, and a stroke takes that away willy-nilly. Carl has made amazing recovery, and is home from the hospital now after treatment and a surgery to repair a heart condition that was previously undiagnosed and led to the stroke.

But he still can't talk. He is an actor that can't speak, and those of you who work in front of the footlights or camera can imagine what that must be like.

Carl was a avid poker player, so we're getting together as many people as possible to raise money for his recovery, because like most theatre folk, Carl was underinsured, so this will be a double strain on his family - loss of revenue from being unable to work and the medical bills.

I'm not expecting any of you folks to come to Charlotte to play, but if any of you folks have done things that are cool (like write a book) that you could autograph and donate, or if you have any other type of neat-o stuff that could work as prizes, please let me know. All the buy-ins go to Carl and his family, so I'm trying to come up with stuff for the final table and top few finishers.

Thanks,

J