Salah Bachir

Salah Bachir died on October 8, 2026, at the age of 71, five days after his birthday. Film critic Barry Hertz wrote that day that after years of medical complications Bachir had undergone medical assistance in dying (MAID), a legal end of life option in Canada, and called him a titan of Canadian cultural philanthropy, an advocate for HIV research and the former president of Cineplex Media. His former colleague John R. Kennedy wrote that he was at peace after years of pain and sent condolences to his husband Jacob. The trade publication Media in Canada reported his death on October 9, 2026. Funeral or memorial arrangements had not been announced in the sources reviewed.

Salah Bachir was born in Lebanon on October 3, 1955. His family immigrated to Canada in 1965 and settled in Rexdale, a district in the north west of Toronto. (Wikipedia gives the year of immigration as 1955, but Bachir himself described arriving in 1965 and learning English from an ESL teacher, Mr. Mackenzie.) He worked hard at fitting in and played hockey, football and lacrosse, and he remained a devoted NFL fan all his life. At 15 he picketed alone outside the Dominion store in Rexdale Plaza in support of Cesar Chavez and the Delano grape boycott, raising about $150, $50 of it from his father, and gave it to Chavez when he visited Toronto. In his teens he returned to the same store to protest over Indigenous rights, the killing of Steve Biko and cruise missile testing over Canada.

Bachir studied history and political science at the University of Waterloo, where he was active at the student newspaper. He later received five honorary doctorates: York University (2015), Toronto Metropolitan University, then Ryerson (2015), the University of Alberta (2016), OCAD University (2017) and Wilfrid Laurier University (2022).

Bachir worked at his brother's home video store, one of Canada's first, before launching Videomania, the country's first consumer video magazine, in 1980. In 1984 he started Premiere, a trade publication for the video distribution and retail business, and he co-produced the annual Focus on Video trade show for 15 years. In that period he helped launch the Canadian home video operations of Disney, Universal, Vestron and Thorn EMI and set up two creative agencies, Imaginus Graphics and New Image Complete Print Services. Through his memoir, many of his best stories date from this era, when he interviewed stars such as Marlon Brando, Elizabeth Taylor and Patricia Neal for his video magazine.

In 1999 Bachir became founding president and chair of Famous Players Media, an in-cinema advertising and marketing partnership with Famous Players Theatres and Viacom, and launched the magazines Famous, Famous Quebec and Famous Kids. When Cineplex acquired Famous Players in 2005, including his 49 percent share of Famous Players Media, his company Phamous Characters was engaged to build the new Cineplex Media division and he became its president. Cineplex Magazine became the most read magazine in Canada, with more than 4.3 million readers per issue at its peak, and Cineplex Media grew into the country's largest cinema and digital place-based media network and one of Cineplex's most profitable divisions. He brought Scotiabank into a multi-year partnership covering theatre naming rights and the Scene loyalty program, which he co-founded with Scotiabank's Rick White and which later became Scene+. He also inserted social justice public service announcements into the pre-show, including a 2005 ad backing same-sex marriage that drew death threats. He left Cineplex at the end of 2021 and in the same period served as publisher of the relaunched Star Cineplex magazine for Torstar.

Bachir assembled a collection of more than 3,000 works, mainly Canadian, including Betty Goodwin, Stephen Andrews and Attila Richard Lukacs, alongside Warhol Polaroids and prints, Herb Ritts, Yousuf Karsh, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Mapplethorpe and Man Ray. The Globe and Mail compared him to Cosimo de' Medici for his support of artists. Sixty Warhol pieces from his collection were shown at Oakville Galleries in 2006, the same gallery showed his Betty Goodwin collection in 2010, and the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art mounted Over the Rainbow from his collection in 2014. He donated art and money to the National Gallery of Canada, the Art Gallery of Ontario, The Image Centre, Hart House, the Art Gallery of Hamilton, Rideau Hall and others. On June 1, 2017 he became the fourth Chancellor of OCAD University, succeeding Rosalie Sharp.

The Globe and Mail dubbed him Gala Salah in 2013 for the more than 100 galas and luncheons he hosted, among them The 519 Gala, the Governor General's Performing Arts Awards Gala, the Salah Bachir Show for St. Joseph's Health Centre Foundation, the Wild Bird Ball with Margaret Atwood for the Pelee Island Bird Observatory, Camp Ooch's Imagine the Magic gala and the Art Gallery of Ontario's Chagall and Picasso galas. As Honorary Patron of The 519 he spearheaded its 2004 capital campaign, recognised by the Salah J. Bachir Wing, and led its annual gala for nearly two decades. He and his husband supported the Bachir Yerex Family Dialysis Clinic at St. Joseph's Health Centre, and he was an advocate for HIV research and care. He was Grand Marshal of the Toronto Pride Parade in 2005, the festival's 25th anniversary, and again in 2016.

Bachir was a Member of the Order of Canada and of the Order of Ontario, recognised for his leadership as an entrepreneur and his commitment to the arts and social justice, notably through The 519. His other awards included the Pride Toronto Lifetime Achievement Award (2009), the Canadian Centre for Diversity Human Relations Award (2012), the MOCCA Award in Contemporary Art (2015), the Association of Fundraising Professionals International Outstanding Volunteer Fundraiser award (2017), induction into the Playback Hall of Fame (2017), and the June Callwood Outstanding Volunteer Award and the Legacy Award from Canada's LGBT+ Chamber of Commerce (both 2021).

After a kidney transplant, Bachir developed sepsis and needed an ileostomy. Stuck in hospital during the pandemic, he began posting stories on social media about the famous people he had known, and readers urged him to turn them into a book. First to Leave the Party: My Life with Ordinary People... Who Happen to Be Famous was published by Penguin Random House Canada on October 17, 2023, with each chapter devoted to a different person, from Marlon Brando and Elizabeth Taylor to Ella Fitzgerald, Andy Warhol and Norman Jewison. It was one of the first books to print the author's pronouns on the cover, and part of the proceeds went to the LGBT Rights Program at Human Rights Watch. He toured North America promoting it in 2024.

Bachir was openly gay, though he came out to some of his family later in life. He married the artist Jacob Yerex on October 17, 2015, at The 519, in a lavish ceremony that doubled as a fundraiser and featured a performance by k.d. lang. They lived in Toronto with their dog Max. He named Joni Mitchell, Nina Simone, Fairuz and k.d. lang among his favourite musicians and said Joni Mitchell's Clouds was the album he played in hospital while his bandages were changed.

The 519 announced his passing and established the Salah Bachir Fund, honouring his wishes, to provide emergency financial aid, groceries and livelihood support to LGBTQ+ refugees who are clients of the centre. Its executive director Maura Lawless said his extraordinary impact would be felt for generations, and board chair Tom Spence said his dedication to 2SLGBTQ+ communities left a legacy that cannot be measured. Public spaces carry his name, including the Salah J. Bachir Wing at The 519, the New Media Wall at The Image Centre at Toronto Metropolitan University, rooms at the Art Gallery of Ontario and Oakville Galleries, and the Bachir Yerex Family Dialysis Clinic at St. Joseph's Health Centre. The Scene+ loyalty program he helped create remains one of Canada's largest rewards networks.