David Suzuki and Tara Cullis facing each other on stage, a colorful projected backdrop and blue stage lighting

An Epic Love Story and its Environmental Legacy Converge on Stage

by Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts
August 5, 2026

Canadians and environmentalists around the world are familiar with David Suzuki, the Japanese-Canadian scientist and leader in sustainable ecology who has devoted his life to environmental activism and education.

Now, many more can experience Suzuki’s personal story as What You Won’t Do For Love—a play inspired by two of the great loves of his life—comes to UC Davis on Nov. 13, on the heels of his 90th birthday and latest book.

What You Won’t Do For Love features Suzuzki and his wife, Tara Cullis, 74 — a former Harvard professor, award-winning writer, climate activist and co-founder of the David Suzuki Foundation — reflecting on their extraordinary 50-year partnership and a life shaped by deep love, commitment and the courage to act. They are joined onstage by actors Michelle Mohammed and Sturla Alvsvaag in an intergenerational dialogue developed to explore how love can inspire people to take action for the planet.

The intimate 90-minute theater experience, produced by Toronto’s critically acclaimed Why Not Theatre, debuted in 2020, and has toured throughout Canada in 2024 and spring 2026.

A deeply personal, totally enchanting love story. David and Tara take us on a magical journey into the heart of commitment—to one another, to family, to community, to justice and to the planet. A testament to hope.
Maude Barlow, Author and activist, founding member of the Council of Canadians, co-founder of the Blue Planet Project.

Book cover: Black-and-white portrait photograph of David Suzuki smiling against blurred green background.

Similarly, Suzuki’s book Lessons From a Lifetime: Ninety Years of Inspiration and Activism, shares wisdom and hard-earned lessons for activists alongside personal stories and heartfelt contributions from his friends, family and admirers, including Margaret Atwood, Neil Young, Jane Fonda and Justin Trudeau.

The book also shares Suzuki’s journey from surviving internment camps as a Japanese-Canadian child to becoming North America's most trusted voice in science communication.

“Although my parents and I were born and raised in Canada, when World War II occurred, all of our rights of citizenship were erased as we were sent to ‘camps’ in the Rockies and expelled from British Columbia at war’s end,” he told Streets of Toronto in 2022. He remembers being bullied by other children because he didn’t speak Japanese — an early lesson in racism.

The family resettled in Ontario, and Suzuki went on to earn his Bachelor of Arts degree in biology at Amherst College, Massachusetts, and his Ph.D. in zoology from the University of Chicago in 1961. He worked for a year at a national research laboratory in Tennessee before returning home to Canada.

From 1969 to 2001, Suzuki was a faculty member at the University of British Columbia, and is currently professor emeritus. He’s best known for hosting The Nature of Things, the world’s longest-running science television program, from 1979 to 2023, and is widely recognized as a world leader in sustainable ecology and has received numerous awards for his work, including a UNESCO prize for science and a United Nations Environment Program medal.

In May, a 90th birthday benefit concert for Suzuki was live-streamed throughout Canada. Multi-hyphenate artists and speakers from the worlds of social justice and climate activism, athletics and entertainment—including Bruce Cockburn, Tara Cullis, Sarah McLachlan, Al Gore, Rick Hansen, Chantal Kreviazuk and Janelle Lapointe— helped celebrate the milestone.

Cullis and Suzuki’s legacy is carried on through their children. Their youngest, marine biologist Sarika Cullis-Suzuki, is the co-host of The Nature of Things, and their eldest daughter, environmental activist Severn Cullis-Suzuki, is now executive director of the David Suzuki Foundation.