Willo Perron: From Westmount High rebel to king of stage design

   Montrealer Willo Perron has become one of the world's most sought-after stage-designers, hooking up the on-stage gimmicks for stars as Lady Gaga, Kanye West and Jay Z.
   As a kid Perron enrolled at Westmount High because that's where his friends went.
   But he felt he was being cruelly picked on by a French teacher.
   Willo, who has a French mom and an English dad, wasn't sure what to do. So his dad told Willo to tell the teacher to fuck off. He did and got expelled.
   So his father Billy Georgette took him on a theatre tour of the UK where he admired and absorbed much impressive stagecraft. When he returned, Willo switched to the arts-oriented FACE school downtown.
   Willo's new course led him into a career of design. First he redid a big Montreal bicycle store, then he overhauled a series of American Apparel shops, soon after he got hired to do something similar at Apple stores but leaped off that train to design Kanye West concerts.
   When Kanye needed an opening act,Willo suggested a then-unknown Lady Gaga, who has gone on to some sort of fame partially with his help.
   His company organizes every element of the concert except the sound, for example a light-suit worn by Kanye West was one of his signature pieces.
   Perron, who now lives in Los Angeles, has become an increasingly powerful name in the stage design business, with an exploding set of big-named clients.
   To think that none of that might have happened if he had not been picked on at Westmount High.