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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.

Daniel Joseph Levy, actor, writer, producer, director, TV host (born 9 August 1983 in Toronto, ON). Dan Levy is best known for his role as David Rose on the CBC sitcom Schitt’s Creek, a series he created and co-starred in with his father, comedy icon Eugene Levy. Schitt’s Creek is one of the most acclaimed Canadian TV series of all time. It was named Best Comedy Series at the Canadian Screen Awards in 2016, 2019, 2020, and 2021. It also became the first comedy series ever to win all seven of the top awards at the Primetime Emmy Awards; Levy won four — the most by a single person in one year. He has also been honoured for promoting acceptance of the LGBTQ2S+ community.

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.

Simu Liu, actor, writer, director, producer, stuntman, model (born 19 April 1989 in Harbin, China). Simu Liu is best known for his role as Shang-Chi, Marvel’s first Asian superhero, and for his role as Jung Kim on the hit CBC sitcom Kim’s Convenience. A former stuntman and model who also produces his own projects, the Chinese Canadian Liu has also become an advocate for equal race representation in the entertainment industry. He was named one of the top 500 entertainment business leaders of 2021 by Variety and one of the 100 most influential people of 2022 by Time magazine.

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.