Amy Wallis at the Stratford Festival on May 23, 2012.Moe Doiron/The Globe and Mail
Amy Wallis, a young musical theatre talent who starred at the Stratford Festival after shining as Anne of Green Gables at the Charlottetown Festival, has died.
The Talent House, Wallis's agency, announced on Facebook that the Vancouver-born actor had passed away on Sunday surrounded by loved ones in her hometown "after a lengthy battle with leukaemia." She was 32.
In 2012, The Globe and Mail profiled Wallis as one of five young actors to watch at the Stratford Festival. She made a strong impression in her debut that season in the vocally (and comically) demanding role of Mabel in Gilbert and Sullivan's The Pirates of Penzance and playing Sally in You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown.
But the soprano had already made her name in musical-theatre performances in Vancouver and Charlottetown.
In British Columbia, Wallis is best known for the four seasons (2006-2009) she spent starring in the Arts Club's holiday production of Beauty and the Beast; her performance as Belle led to her being nominated for a Jessie Richardson Award. (She also received a Jessie nomination for playing multiple characters in Alice: A Wonderland for Carousel Theatre.)
Meanwhile, on Prince Edward Island, Wallis starred as the lead character in the Charlottetown Festival's long-running production of Anne of Green Gables from 2006 to 2009 as well. She was in the touring cast when Anne visited the Elgin Theatre in Toronto in 2009.
After Wallis was diagnosed with leukemia in February 2014, friends launched an Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign to raise $5,000 to cover her living costs in Toronto while she underwent treatment at Princess Margaret Hospital. More than $12,000 was donated by 162 funders. According to Talent House, plans for a memorial will be announced soon.
J. Kelly Nestruck