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Michael James Aleck Snow, CC, RCA, artist, filmmaker, musician (born 10 December 1929 in Toronto, ON; died 5 January 2023). Michael Snow was one of Canada’s most acclaimed visual artists and avant garde filmmakers. His work was concerned with redefining the relationships between various media, the acts and interpretations of perception, and the complex interplay of sound, language and meaning. A Companion of the Order of Canada and a Chevalier of France’s Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, he was the first recipient of the Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts. He also won a Molson Prize, a Guggenheim Fellowship and the Gershon Iskowitz Prize, among many other honours.

Gordon Edward Pinsent, CC, FRSC, actor, writer, director (born 12 July 1930 in Grand Falls, NL; died 25 February 2023). A cultural icon in his native Newfoundland, Gordon Pinsent was a fixture in Canadian film, theatre and television for more than 60 years. Often described as a Renaissance man, the former soldier and noted painter rose to prominence as the lead in CBC-TV’s Quentin Durgens, M.P. (1966–69). He adapted two of his novels, The Rowdyman and John and the Missus, to the big screen, starring in both and directing the latter. His more than 150 credits as an actor include the movies The Shipping News (2001), Away from Her (2006) and The Grand Seduction (2013), as well as the TV series Street Legal, Due South, The Red Green Show and Republic of Doyle. A Companion of the Order of Canada and an inductee to Canada’s Walk of Fame, Pinsent won a Governor General’s Performing Arts Award in 2004 and numerous lifetime achievement awards.

Sarah Polley, OC, actor, director, writer, producer (born 8 January 1979 in Toronto, ON). Sarah Polley is an acclaimed director and screenwriter and one of Canada's most talented and well-known actors. Her work as a child actor in such TV series as CBC’s Road to Avonlea (1990–96) and in such films as Atom Egoyan's Exotica (1994) and The Sweet Hereafter (1997) established her as a rising star. She later embarked on a highly successful career as a writer-director with such award-winning films as Away from Her (2006), Take This Waltz (2011), Stories We Tell (2012), and Women Talking (2022), for which she won an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. She has won multiple Genie and Gemini Awards and was the first woman to receive a Genie Award for best director. She is also an Officer of the Order of Canada and a member of Canada’s Walk of Fame.

Brendan James Fraser, actor (born at Indianapolis, Indiana 3 Dec 1968). Brendan Fraser rose to fame in the 1990s as a handsome leading man in comedies, dramas, and action/adventure movies, such as Encino Man (1992), School Ties (1992), Airheads (1994), George of the Jungle (1997), Gods and Monsters (1998), and The Mummy (1999) and its sequels. He was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame in 2006 and won an Academy Award for his lead performance in Darren Aronofsky’s The Whale (2022) in 2023.

Andrée Lachapelle, actor (born 13 novembre 1931 in Montreal, QC; died 21 novembre 2019 in Montreal). In a career that spanned more than 50 years, Andrée Lachapelle put her stamp on well over 200 characters in Quebec theatre, television and film. While she excelled in conventional distinguished roles, as lovers or neurotics, she also portrayed powerful professional women with depth and a broad emotional range.

Sandra Miju Oh, OC, actor, producer (born 20 July 1971 in Nepean, ON). Sandra Oh is a versatile actor whose performances in film and television have won popular and critical acclaim. She won Genie Awards for her performances in Double Happiness (1994) and Last Night(1998) before gaining international recognition for her role in the successful ABC medical drama Grey’s Anatomy (2005–14). Her work has been groundbreaking for the visibility it has brought to roles for Asian actors in North America. With her lead role in the BBC America drama Killing Eve (2018–), Oh became the first actor of Asian heritage to be nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for best actress and the first to win a Golden Globe in that category since 1981. She was inducted into Canada’s Walk of Fame in 2011 and won a Governor General's Performing Arts Award in 2019. She was made an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2022.

Ryan Rodney Reynolds, actor (born 23 October 1976 in Vancouver, BC). Charming, affable and boyishly handsome, Ryan Reynolds is one of the most recognized Canadian actors in Hollywood. He established his persona as a charismatic, quirky and quick-witted smart aleck in a wide range of Canadian and Hollywood films. They include the college comedy National Lampoon's Van Wilder (2002); the heist movie Foolproof (2003); the romantic comedies Definitely, Maybe (2008) and The Proposal (2009); and the action movies X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009), Green Lantern (2011), Deadpool (2016) and Deadpool 2 (2018). He has a star on Canada’s Walk of Fame and the Hollywood Walk of Fame and has also pursued a variety of successful business ventures. He received a Governor General’s Performing Arts Award in 2021.

Seth Aaron Rogen, actor, comedian, writer, producer, director (born 15 April 1982 in Vancouver, BC). Seth Rogen is one of Hollywood’s leading comedic stars. He is famous for playing characters that are at once sweetly naïve, slyly intelligent and utterly profane. Initially known for his collaborations with writer-producer Judd Apatow on such films as The 40-Year-Old Virgin (2005), Knocked Up (2007) and Superbad (2007), he eventually began producing and co-directing his own comedies, such as This Is the End (2013) and The Interview (2014). Known as “the stoner king of comedy,” Rogen was named Comedy Star of the Year in 2008 by the US National Association of Theater Owners. He has twice been named Canadian Comedy Person of the Year at the Canadian Comedy Awards.

Michel Dumont, OQ, actor, artistic director, translator and narrator (born 29 January 1941 in Kénogami [now Saguenay], QC; died 13 August 2020 in Saint-Lambert, QC). As artistic director of the Théâtre Jean-Duceppe for more than 30 years, Michel Dumont was regarded as a leading figure in Quebec theatre. He acted in more than 70 plays, some 15 TV series and a number of films. He won the Prix Gémeaux for Best Actor in a Supporting Role in a Drama Series three times (1998, 2003, 2013) and was made an Officer of the Ordre national du Québec in 2013.

Lisa LaFlamme, OC, OOnt, journalist, broadcaster (born 1964 in Kitchener, ON). Lisa LaFlamme is known for her long and distinguished career as a high-profile television journalist. She was the first woman to host CTV National News, a role she held — as chief news anchor and senior editor — for over a decade. She was named Best National News Anchor at the Canadian Screen Awards five times. Her abrupt termination from CTV, announced in August 2022, was met with broad public outrage. She has been appointed to the Order of Canada and the Order of Ontario.

Ken Scott, writer, director, actor (born 1970). Ken Scott worked as a comedian and actor before writing several of the most accessible and appealing French Canadian films of the early 21st century. His intricately written commercial comedies La grande séduction (Seducing Doctor Lewis, 2003) and Starbuck (2011), which he directed, topped the Canadian box office in their respective years and have been remade in different languages around the world — a testament to their universal appeal.

Ryan Thomas Gosling, actor, musician, producer, director (born 12 November 1980 in London, ON). Ryan Gosling started out as a child actor before giving a breakthrough performance in the Sundance-winning indie drama The Believer in 2001. He has since created, in the words of the New York Times’ Dennis Lim, “a whole gallery of sensitive, intelligent, anguished young men, often with hipster tendencies or dark sides.” An A-list Hollywood star, he has proven equally adept at comedy ( Lars and the Real Girl, Crazy, Stupid, Love., The Nice Guys, The Big Short), drama ­(The Notebook, Half Nelson, Blue Valentine, The Ides of March, First Man) and science fiction (Blade Runner 2049). He has received two Oscar nominations and won a Golden Globe in 2017 for his lead role in the musical La La Land.

David C. Onley, 28th lieutenant-governor of Ontario (2007–14), broadcaster, writer (born 12 June 1950 in Midland, ON; died 14 January 2023). Before his appointment as Ontario's lieutenant-governor, Onley was a successful media personality and advocate for the disabled. Having contracted polio at age three, Onley was partially paralyzed from the neck down. David C. Onley was appointed Ontario's 28th lieutenant-governor on 5 September 2007, succeeding James Bartleman. On 23 September 2014, he was succeeded as lieutenant-governor by Elizabeth Dowdeswell.

Buffalo Child Long Lance, writer, actor, impostor (born Sylvester Long at Winston-Salem, North Carolina on 1 December 1890; died in Arcadia, California on 20 March 1932). Of mixed Indigenous and white (and possibly black) ancestry, he was able to escape the segregated southern US because he looked "Indian."

Pierre Perrault, OQ, film director, poet, writer (born 29 June 1927 in Montréal, QC; died 23 June 1999 in Montréal). Pierre Perrault was one of Quebec’s most significant and celebrated artists. His collective work in radio, film, television and print explores the genesis and nature of French Canadian culture and identity. A pioneer of direct cinema, his elegiac 1963 documentary Pour la suite du monde, co-directed with Michel Brault, is a landmark in Canadian cinema. His writing received three Governor General’s Literary Awards: for poetry, theatre and non-fiction. An Officer of the Ordre national du Québec, Perrault received the Prix Ludger-Duvernay, Prix Albert-Tessier, Prix Victor-Barbeau, the Médaille des Arts et des Lettres from the Government of France, and the Médaille d’argent du Mouvement national des Québécois et Québécoises.