Frank's Way

Frank's Way is our next film project that will feature disability activist Frank Hull as he redefines his relationship to the piano, once his lifeline through generational trauma and conversion therapy, now as a medium to publicly share his journey of survival and self-reclamation. 

*Content Warning for 'Frank's Way Demo Reel' below: mention of suicide pact, physical and emotional abuse and conversion therapy. 

Frank Hull is an artist and activist ​​who proudly lives with cerebral palsy and madness, embraces his Mi'kmaq heritage, and celebrates his gay identity. In Frank's Way he revisits his relationship to the piano, his “first love” that saved his life while he experienced physical and emotional abuse as a child.

Frank talks about the effects of generational trauma passed down from his grandmother’s experience in the Canadian Residential School system and then later as a teenager with the use of conversion therapy by the LDS Mormon Church. It was his relationship with the piano at school and church that allowed him to access his inner strength to survive these experiences.

Frank prepares to share his music with an audience in the form of a concert for the first time at the age 52. He has not had regular access to a piano for over 30 years. Frank begins playing on public pianos in the city until he is gifted one from an anonymous donor and begins to play every day. He remembers his compositions like he played them yesterday and creates new pieces effortlessly. His approach to playing is what he calls ‘faking it’. Other artists that he works with are moved by his ‘musical genius’.

Frank recalls meeting singer songwriter Paul Anka when he was 16 through the Montreal program World of Dreams. Anka later rewrote his own lyrics to his song 'My Way', and gave the sheet music to Frank when they met again in Montreal.

Frank plays in a concert featuring other musicians who share similar experiences to him through their shared identities. He has never performed as a musician in this way before. During the concert he shares some of the journey that brought him to this moment. The audience is witness to his natural gift at storytelling and creating beautiful music through his reunion to the piano, his first love.

The film’s visual language will keep the audience eye-to-eye with Frank. The camera will meet him at his seated height, never looking down, and at the piano, we will see him as he experiences himself - from a seated or upward gaze. His hands, captured in intimate close-up, will become their own characters along with the piano, not just an instrument but a central character in his story.

This visual intimacy will be interwoven with archival material including his meeting with Paul Anka, stark images of Canada’s residential schools and conversion therapy, and photographs of his childhood in Halifax, NS to reveal the cultural and historical weight behind each note he plays.

Conversations with friends, artists, and former teachers will help fill out a portrait of a man whose musical genius has long been unknown. Rehearsals will offer a window into both the craft and the vulnerability of preparing for performance, a shift from music as a private refuge to a gift to be shared.

Frank will play at public pianos across Toronto, where his playing emerges in bursts, a living reminder that his music never left him. These scenes will bridge the past and present, showing that talent, like memory, can lie dormant yet remain intact.