A friend in New York asked me why I "like things from Nova Scotia." I was puzzled until I realized the source of the question was the Trailer Park Boys. I started trying to describe Canadian east-coast humour, which led me to Codco (of Salter Street Films)...and then I promptly gave up, cause there's no explaining those guys. (For the record - yes I know they were from Newfoundland) So in lieu of a description, here's some holiday transcription (scene 4 from "Would You Like to Smell My Pocket Crumbs?", 1975, as published in The Plays of Codco):
Tommy Common Christmas Special
The Characters:
Tommy Common
Friends
Singers
Kid 1
Kid 2
Announcer
The Queen
Mother
Father
Children
The Setting
Stage setting for a CBC Christmas special. Feeling of "old fashioned Christmas," fake snow on singers' shoulders, etc. Singers stroll back and forth across stage singing Christmas carols, providing a bridge between sketches.
Tommy Common: (Singing)
Sleigh bells ring, are ya listening?
In the lane, snow is glistening...
(He speaks to the audience)
Oh, hi! Well, it's Christmas time again. And well everyone seems to be getting into the spirit. Especially my good friend Dean Martin. Ha ha ha! What could be nicer than to have your best friends come and visit you on Christmas Eve. Sit around the yule fire and sing Christmas carols. Oh, here are my best friends now.
(Friends enter in a tight bunch, making exaggerated happy gestures, but emitting no sound.)
(He calls to them.) Hi friends! Come on in! Come on in! Through the door. Come on in! Yes, Christmas is holly and ivy and all good things. Welcome. (Friends begin to laugh and shout as if volume has suddenly been turned on. They attack Tommy, beat him senseless, and exit, still laughing and shouting.)
(Enter strolling singers, linked arm in arm).
Singers: In the meadow we can build a snowman
And pretend that he is Parsons Brown.
He'll say are you married, we'll say...
Two Male Singers: (Arms linked and appearing effeminate. They speak.) Not exactly, man.
(Introduction on piano to "God Save the Queen." Two singers detach themselves and become Announcer and Queen.)
Announcer: Ladies and gentlemen, Her Majesty the Queen!
Queen: Hello (She stops, realizing that her accent has rendered the word unrecognizable. She tries again.) Helle-ah. (She tries again.) Hell-ya; hell-uh; hillya; hilloo. (A whole bunch of "hellos" emerge at once.) Hilleehillyoohillaaaahillye (Piano repeats first line of "God Save the Queen" which covers her confusion. She pulls herself together and starts again.) On this festive and happy (Her accent has now destroyed the word "happy." She tries again.) hi-yappy; hi-yippie; h'yappy (Her voice trails off.)
(Singers resume stroll.)
Jingle bell, jingle bell, jingle bell rock,
Jingle bell chime in jingle bell time,
Dancing and prancing in jingle bell square,
In the salty air.
(Two singers detach themselves and become kids.)
Kid 1: Shur I saw Santy Claus. It was last Christmas Eve. Me and Dad and Jack Costello were up real late drinking. Yeah, drinkin'! And Santy Claus came down over the stairs, and I picked up me hockey puck, boy and I said, "Get up over them God-damn stairs and don't come down again, or I'll pick you off wit' dat, luh." And he didn't either.
Kid 2: What ya get for Christmas?
Kid 1: Nudding!
Queen: (She resumes character and is finishing off her message now.) And a happy new year (Oops, there goes the word "year." It sounded more like "yir." She tries to correct it.) ye-ir; yeah; yuh; yeh; ya; yi; yoo (She trails off in confusion as "God Save teh Queen" comes up again.)
Single Singer: I saw daddy kissing Santa Claus
(Singers become a family. It is late Christmas Eve. Nerves are frayed. Children are panicking as parents begin to unravel.)
Mother: No, you can't have anything more to eat. You'll have it all tomorrow. Christ sake, I spent more than we had for the past two months. Well, this is it, this is the last year I'm getting into it. I bought all the presents you know. I had to get all the treats and yank all the decorations up from the basement. I suppose you want me to fill the bloody stockings?
Father: Then don't fill 'em, for God's sake.
Children: (Frightened, trying to please.) We don't want nothing in our stockings.
Father: Well, you're not gonna get anything in your stockings and where do you think all the God-damned money is coming from? Santa Claus?
Mother: (To father.) Now, my son, you can keep your money and go down to the Newfoundland Hotel for Christmas. There's gonna be no Christmas here!
Children: (Weeping.) This is not a house, it's a hell hole!
Father: What's wrong with ye two? Be quiet! (He prounounces it "quite.") It's gonna be a wonderful Christmas. (Pause.) Just like last year!
(Children weep more loudly.)
(Singers form strolling singers.)
Tiny tots with their arms all on fire,
Will find it hard to sleep tonight.
They know that Santa's on his way ...
(Songs and lights fade.)
I think there could be a market (or at least an audience) for CODCO and the Boys in the States, if it didn't hurt Canadian national pride too much. (Kind of like the US being represented only by Appalachia?)
My first intimation that Canadians felt differently about their own east coast was an SCTV parody of a "typical" 70s Canadian Film Board film. It was cruel but funny, at least to us foreigners. (Although a US show, SCTV was filmed in Ontario, and Levy and Thomas are Canadian.) In the film, a group of "maritimers" are driving to Toronto to find jobs. As they drive they pick up hitchhikers, who ask things like "Are there doctorin' jobs in Toronto?" To which the drivers reply "Yeah, there's doctorin' jobs, lawyerin' jobs--get in the car!" When the little impromptu group arrives in Toronto, they sit in their motel room, doing nothing, till one of them says "Where do you want to go?" and another says "Yonge Street!" Cut to an arty slow-mo scene of the travelers walking down the crowded sidewalks of Yonge Street at night, looking for a party. (The motel/Yonge Street back and forth is repeated a couple of times.) The most memorable thing was the music, which is still stuck in my head after 20 years. I just learned from the internet that the sprightly folk ballad is called "To It and At It," by Stompin' Tom Connors:
"There's a rainbow in Toronto where the maritimers are bold
They always get a potful--but they never get a pot of gold
But they're to it and at it, at it and to it--
Ya gotta tune your attitude in
If ya don't get at it when ya get to it -
Ya won't get to it to get at it again...
Ya won't get to it to get at it again."
When the maritimers go to Yonge Street, a slower "heavy metal" version of the song plays.
That's a classic SCTV episode! It was a spoof of an early 70s Canadian movie, made in all earnestness, called "Goin' Down the Road." The best thing about SCTV was their deadpan recreations. They didn't alter the original much at all. SCTV was originally a Canadian TV show for years and years. I grew up on it. It came out of a comedy stage show in Toronto.
I can't stop thinking about Codco. they were so freakin' great. Their "House of Budgell" stuff was just impossible: all the smart, ironic, political pride of the downtrodden stuff (like Trailer Park Boys), only mixed with Python-esque surreal mania and big slapstick potty humour jokes. I dunno how to see those shows again. Maybe they're on video but I doubt it.
Tom! You thought mac people could be indignant, try telling Canadians that SCTV was an American show. Good idea.
There's plenty more Stompin' Tom out there, you'd like him I think.
I remember Codco fondly too. Thursday night used to be CODCO and Kids in the Hall. The Kids were laugh out loud funny - CODCO was laugh out loud funny only 5 hours later when you wake up remembering that they were giving the queen martini enemas.
Somehow it all seemed to make sense in the context of the show. The Friendly giant killing spree was my favorite episode.
Check out the CBC online shop (remember that it is only days before Christmas)
http://www.cbcshop.ca/
Blithering fucking idiots.
Oh, boy, another argument, I mean, debate. The "Second City" is Chicago, and the Second City improv/comedy stage act spawned Saturday Night Live, SCTV, and other stuff. True, according to the troupe's official history, "In Toronto, The Second City made the difficult jump from live theater to television." But Joe Flaherty, Andrea Martin, and Harold Ramis are American, and the bulk of SCTV's satirical targets were non-Canadian. It was syndicated on US television from the get-go. So I don't think it's as clear as you say. But whatever.
omigod. this is what I get for checking dmtree from work! Tom that is so wrong. There is a live Second City stage in Toronto too, and that's where the show originated. some of the actors are from USA, but they started acting in SCTV in Canada. My book about it is at home. will provide source material later. yay debate.
I understand there was a Second City stage act in Toronto, and as my quote states: "In Toronto, The Second City made the difficult jump from live theater to television." The question is where did Second City originate? Is Madame Tussauds a New York wax museum because we have one in New York? Aren't the content of the show and the nationalities of the cast relevant in determining where something belongs? I'd say SCTV was at least a hybrid.
from the sctvguide.ca
At 7:30 PM on 21 September 1976 (a Tuesday), with little fanfare, no budget, and on a network that, at the time, was strictly second-rate compared to Canada's two 'national' networks (CTV and CBC), 'Second City Television' started broadcasting. For the next year, once a month on Thursdays at, you got it, nine and to the tune of Spike Jones' "Dance Of The Hours" (the first season theme song), SCTV bit the hand that fed it.
I don't see the part about it being American here. Maybe I'm not digging deep enough? Maybe it got more "American" after season 3 when it moved to Edmonton?
Amending my previous statement: I'd say SCTV was at least a hybrid (American comedy franchise with mixed American and Canadian actors), that "began its broadcast history on Global television in Canada and in syndication in the States but moved on to NBC and finally to the Cinemax Cable Network."
actually tussauds is from paris by way of london.
Oh, okay. sort of like that joint Canadian/American show Family Ties? It was syndicated on Canadian TV and had a Canadian actor in it.
My link http://sctvguide.ca/ (note the "ca") is a much better source for all your SCTV needs.
No, Family Ties was an American show. As long as we're being sarcastic, maybe you can tell me about those early SCTVs that had mostly Canadian content, as opposed to the ones we saw where Bob and Doug and "Rainbow in Toronto" were just occasional bits sprinkled in with all the satires of American movies and TV shows.
But Canadian content _is_ basically American movies and TV shows with sprinkled bit of Canadiana.
Trailer Park Boys was a whole different order of experience for me. True, there were references to American rappers and so forth, but there's a point of view I don't get here. It's truly abject.
When TPark Boys gets air time in USA, it'll get co-opted too. Once it's been on HBO awhile, that abject stance won't seem so foreign after all. We're used to the co-optation. We'd like to think of it as a subtle form of infiltration, but once our comedians have done their stint on SNL they lose their edge and we have to start all over training new ones.
The reason I knew Joe Flaherty was American was his improvisation "Bloodsucking Monkeys from West Mifflin, Pennsylvania." He was Count Floyd and they had no movie that night so he had to make up something "scary" for the kids. In the course of describing where the bloodsucking monkeys went on their rampage of death and gore, he mentioned every small town within a 25 mile radius of Pittsburgh (where he was born). F-ing hilarious. "You know how in Alien the monster burst out?" (Desperate look offstage to see how much more time he's got to kill.) "Well, the monkeys sort of...burst in!"
Okay... I admit to maybe some bad form earlier (in my defense I was never actually on a debating team). I perhaps should not have said that certain other people were "wrong." Here's a quote from Dave Thomas, " To the best of my recollection, the people present at the meeting when SCTV was created were Joe Flaherty, Harold Ramis, Eugene Levy, Andrew Alexander, Bernie Sahlins, Sheldon Patinkin, Del Close, and me. I think ...that Andrea [Martin] and Catherine [O'Hara] were excluded from that meeting because they were not originally hired as writers." The meeting occurred at the 'Old Firehall" which was the location for the Toronto version of Second City. There were, indeed people from Chicago in attendance. Dave Thomas says, "I remember Joe Flaherty was excited about Harold [Ramis's] involvement because they had worked together on the Second City Stage in Chicago. "
All of these people put together and wrote the acts in Toronto that became the TV show. Yes it got US syndication eventually. yes they were thrilled with that. Yes there's a bunch of American culture spoofs, of course, we do get us all the channels up here. Also British spoofs. More from Dave Thomas, " I played a Scottish verterinarian who visited sick animals and told their owners that they all had to be put to sleep." This sketch was called " All the Long-Leggedy Beasties" and was a parody of "All Creatures Great and Small."
Saturday Night Live was both the Holy Grail and the foil for SCTV. More from DT: " I told Danny Ackroyd about [a skit I wrote]. He responded, 'David that 's hilarious. I'll do it on Saturday Night Live. You'll be the first person ever to get a piece on SNL who's not a staff writer.' A few weeks later, Bernie [Sahlins, the executive producer of SCTV] saw it on SNL. He came in to the SCTV office and complained, " I just saw one of our pieces on 'Saturday Night Live.'" This was pre-US syndication for the SCTV show. So yes of course there's US content, why? Cause the show was media saavy and did sketch comedy. Also ambitious people who wanted a shot at more than the measely Canadian market. But that doesn't make it American writing or American comedy.
quotes above from SCTV: Behind the Scenes, by Dave Thomas, published 1996 by McClelland and Stewart.
Count Floyd was great. Where is Joe Flaherty now? I always liked Harold Ramis too. Dave Thomas talks a lot in the book about how he Ramis was a great writer, but couldn't act, and knew it, so he always ended up playing the straight guy on the show.
He wrote a moviecalled "È già ieri" that's shooting in the Canary Island, Sapin.
Don't sweat it Tom, next they'll be claiming that Niel Young is Canadian.
Just saw FUBAR yesterday, more quintissential hoser-based Candiana like TPark boys, also fiction in documentary style. Less transparent, set in Calagary. FUBAR is extremely funny, well paced and well acted, but the genre is wearing a little thin for me nonetheless. It reminded me of American Movie, which is a genuine documentary, but has that abject thing going on. Our New Year's day movie lineup:
Badlands
Don't Look Now
FUBAR
To Live and Die in LA
The Thing
Interspersed with banned and censored cartoons and episodes of The Awful Truth.
From the SCTV Guide Joe recommended:
Garth and Gord and Fiona and Alice
Garth and Gord (surgeon and lawyer) drive to Toronto from the Maritimes in search of lawyering and doctoring jobs. They pick up Fiona, a nuclear physicist, in Quebec, and run over a woodchuck being filmed for Hinterland Who's Who. They arrive in Toronto full of hope, but Garth's pal says things are slow and there are no jobs after all. They go to Yonge Street, where they meet Alice. Fiona finds a job setting up pins in a bowling alley. Gord gets Alice pregnant. They go to Yonge Street to think. Alice leaves Gord. They decide head out to Alberta.
Music by Stompin' Tom Conners ('To It and At It'), Gordon Lightfoot ('Alberta Bound') and Paul Flaherty does a hard-rockin' cover version of 'To It and At It' (apparently as a parody of David Clayton Thomas).
Garth - Candy; Gord - Flaherty; Fiona Cournoyer - Martin; Alice - Jayne Eastwood; Hinterland director - Levy; irate hospital patient, staff - extra; CBC crew - extras; citizens of Toronto - themselves, eh?
Tommy Sexton RIP
(Check out my site at http://www.newfoundland-art-camp-art.andmuchmore.com)
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A friend in New York asked me why I "like things from Nova Scotia." I was puzzled until I realized the source of the question was the Trailer Park Boys. I started trying to describe Canadian east-coast humour, which led me to Codco (of Salter Street Films)...and then I promptly gave up, cause there's no explaining those guys. (For the record - yes I know they were from Newfoundland) So in lieu of a description, here's some holiday transcription (scene 4 from "Would You Like to Smell My Pocket Crumbs?", 1975, as published in The Plays of Codco):
Tommy Common Christmas Special
The Characters:
Tommy Common
Friends
Singers
Kid 1
Kid 2
Announcer
The Queen
Mother
Father
Children
The Setting
Stage setting for a CBC Christmas special. Feeling of "old fashioned Christmas," fake snow on singers' shoulders, etc. Singers stroll back and forth across stage singing Christmas carols, providing a bridge between sketches.
Tommy Common: (Singing)
Sleigh bells ring, are ya listening?
In the lane, snow is glistening...
(He speaks to the audience)
Oh, hi! Well, it's Christmas time again. And well everyone seems to be getting into the spirit. Especially my good friend Dean Martin. Ha ha ha! What could be nicer than to have your best friends come and visit you on Christmas Eve. Sit around the yule fire and sing Christmas carols. Oh, here are my best friends now.
(Friends enter in a tight bunch, making exaggerated happy gestures, but emitting no sound.) (He calls to them.) Hi friends! Come on in! Come on in! Through the door. Come on in! Yes, Christmas is holly and ivy and all good things. Welcome. (Friends begin to laugh and shout as if volume has suddenly been turned on. They attack Tommy, beat him senseless, and exit, still laughing and shouting.)
(Enter strolling singers, linked arm in arm).
Singers: In the meadow we can build a snowman
And pretend that he is Parsons Brown.
He'll say are you married, we'll say...
Two Male Singers: (Arms linked and appearing effeminate. They speak.) Not exactly, man.
(Introduction on piano to "God Save the Queen." Two singers detach themselves and become Announcer and Queen.)
Announcer: Ladies and gentlemen, Her Majesty the Queen!
Queen: Hello (She stops, realizing that her accent has rendered the word unrecognizable. She tries again.) Helle-ah. (She tries again.) Hell-ya; hell-uh; hillya; hilloo. (A whole bunch of "hellos" emerge at once.) Hilleehillyoohillaaaahillye (Piano repeats first line of "God Save the Queen" which covers her confusion. She pulls herself together and starts again.) On this festive and happy (Her accent has now destroyed the word "happy." She tries again.) hi-yappy; hi-yippie; h'yappy (Her voice trails off.)
(Singers resume stroll.)
Jingle bell, jingle bell, jingle bell rock,
Jingle bell chime in jingle bell time,
Dancing and prancing in jingle bell square,
In the salty air.
(Two singers detach themselves and become kids.)
Kid 1: Shur I saw Santy Claus. It was last Christmas Eve. Me and Dad and Jack Costello were up real late drinking. Yeah, drinkin'! And Santy Claus came down over the stairs, and I picked up me hockey puck, boy and I said, "Get up over them God-damn stairs and don't come down again, or I'll pick you off wit' dat, luh." And he didn't either.
Kid 2: What ya get for Christmas?
Kid 1: Nudding!
Queen: (She resumes character and is finishing off her message now.) And a happy new year (Oops, there goes the word "year." It sounded more like "yir." She tries to correct it.) ye-ir; yeah; yuh; yeh; ya; yi; yoo (She trails off in confusion as "God Save teh Queen" comes up again.)
Single Singer: I saw daddy kissing Santa Claus
(Singers become a family. It is late Christmas Eve. Nerves are frayed. Children are panicking as parents begin to unravel.)
Mother: No, you can't have anything more to eat. You'll have it all tomorrow. Christ sake, I spent more than we had for the past two months. Well, this is it, this is the last year I'm getting into it. I bought all the presents you know. I had to get all the treats and yank all the decorations up from the basement. I suppose you want me to fill the bloody stockings?
Father: Then don't fill 'em, for God's sake.
Children: (Frightened, trying to please.) We don't want nothing in our stockings.
Father: Well, you're not gonna get anything in your stockings and where do you think all the God-damned money is coming from? Santa Claus?
Mother: (To father.) Now, my son, you can keep your money and go down to the Newfoundland Hotel for Christmas. There's gonna be no Christmas here!
Children: (Weeping.) This is not a house, it's a hell hole!
Father: What's wrong with ye two? Be quiet! (He prounounces it "quite.") It's gonna be a wonderful Christmas. (Pause.) Just like last year!
(Children weep more loudly.)
(Singers form strolling singers.)
Tiny tots with their arms all on fire,
Will find it hard to sleep tonight.
They know that Santa's on his way ...
(Songs and lights fade.)
- sally mckay 12-16-2003 5:17 am
I think there could be a market (or at least an audience) for CODCO and the Boys in the States, if it didn't hurt Canadian national pride too much. (Kind of like the US being represented only by Appalachia?)
My first intimation that Canadians felt differently about their own east coast was an SCTV parody of a "typical" 70s Canadian Film Board film. It was cruel but funny, at least to us foreigners. (Although a US show, SCTV was filmed in Ontario, and Levy and Thomas are Canadian.) In the film, a group of "maritimers" are driving to Toronto to find jobs. As they drive they pick up hitchhikers, who ask things like "Are there doctorin' jobs in Toronto?" To which the drivers reply "Yeah, there's doctorin' jobs, lawyerin' jobs--get in the car!" When the little impromptu group arrives in Toronto, they sit in their motel room, doing nothing, till one of them says "Where do you want to go?" and another says "Yonge Street!" Cut to an arty slow-mo scene of the travelers walking down the crowded sidewalks of Yonge Street at night, looking for a party. (The motel/Yonge Street back and forth is repeated a couple of times.) The most memorable thing was the music, which is still stuck in my head after 20 years. I just learned from the internet that the sprightly folk ballad is called "To It and At It," by Stompin' Tom Connors:
"There's a rainbow in Toronto where the maritimers are bold
They always get a potful--but they never get a pot of gold
But they're to it and at it, at it and to it--
Ya gotta tune your attitude in
If ya don't get at it when ya get to it -
Ya won't get to it to get at it again...
Ya won't get to it to get at it again."
When the maritimers go to Yonge Street, a slower "heavy metal" version of the song plays.
- tom moody 12-16-2003 9:08 pm
That's a classic SCTV episode! It was a spoof of an early 70s Canadian movie, made in all earnestness, called "Goin' Down the Road." The best thing about SCTV was their deadpan recreations. They didn't alter the original much at all. SCTV was originally a Canadian TV show for years and years. I grew up on it. It came out of a comedy stage show in Toronto.
- sally mckay 12-17-2003 2:43 am
I can't stop thinking about Codco. they were so freakin' great. Their "House of Budgell" stuff was just impossible: all the smart, ironic, political pride of the downtrodden stuff (like Trailer Park Boys), only mixed with Python-esque surreal mania and big slapstick potty humour jokes. I dunno how to see those shows again. Maybe they're on video but I doubt it.
- sally mckay 12-17-2003 2:53 am
Tom! You thought mac people could be indignant, try telling Canadians that SCTV was an American show. Good idea.
There's plenty more Stompin' Tom out there, you'd like him I think.
I remember Codco fondly too. Thursday night used to be CODCO and Kids in the Hall. The Kids were laugh out loud funny - CODCO was laugh out loud funny only 5 hours later when you wake up remembering that they were giving the queen martini enemas.
Somehow it all seemed to make sense in the context of the show. The Friendly giant killing spree was my favorite episode.
- joester (guest) 12-17-2003 9:41 pm
Check out the CBC online shop (remember that it is only days before Christmas)
http://www.cbcshop.ca/
Blithering fucking idiots.
- joester (guest) 12-17-2003 9:51 pm
Oh, boy, another argument, I mean, debate. The "Second City" is Chicago, and the Second City improv/comedy stage act spawned Saturday Night Live, SCTV, and other stuff. True, according to the troupe's official history, "In Toronto, The Second City made the difficult jump from live theater to television." But Joe Flaherty, Andrea Martin, and Harold Ramis are American, and the bulk of SCTV's satirical targets were non-Canadian. It was syndicated on US television from the get-go. So I don't think it's as clear as you say. But whatever.
- tom moody 12-17-2003 10:02 pm
omigod. this is what I get for checking dmtree from work! Tom that is so wrong. There is a live Second City stage in Toronto too, and that's where the show originated. some of the actors are from USA, but they started acting in SCTV in Canada. My book about it is at home. will provide source material later. yay debate.
- sally at work 12-18-2003 12:01 am
I understand there was a Second City stage act in Toronto, and as my quote states: "In Toronto, The Second City made the difficult jump from live theater to television." The question is where did Second City originate? Is Madame Tussauds a New York wax museum because we have one in New York? Aren't the content of the show and the nationalities of the cast relevant in determining where something belongs? I'd say SCTV was at least a hybrid.
- tom moody 12-18-2003 1:35 am
from the sctvguide.ca
At 7:30 PM on 21 September 1976 (a Tuesday), with little fanfare, no budget, and on a network that, at the time, was strictly second-rate compared to Canada's two 'national' networks (CTV and CBC), 'Second City Television' started broadcasting. For the next year, once a month on Thursdays at, you got it, nine and to the tune of Spike Jones' "Dance Of The Hours" (the first season theme song), SCTV bit the hand that fed it.
I don't see the part about it being American here. Maybe I'm not digging deep enough? Maybe it got more "American" after season 3 when it moved to Edmonton?
- joester (guest) 12-18-2003 1:37 am
Amending my previous statement: I'd say SCTV was at least a hybrid (American comedy franchise with mixed American and Canadian actors), that "began its broadcast history on Global television in Canada and in syndication in the States but moved on to NBC and finally to the Cinemax Cable Network."
- tom moody 12-18-2003 1:47 am
actually tussauds is from paris by way of london.
- bill 12-18-2003 2:06 am
Oh, okay. sort of like that joint Canadian/American show Family Ties? It was syndicated on Canadian TV and had a Canadian actor in it.
My link http://sctvguide.ca/ (note the "ca") is a much better source for all your SCTV needs.
- joester (guest) 12-18-2003 4:01 am
No, Family Ties was an American show. As long as we're being sarcastic, maybe you can tell me about those early SCTVs that had mostly Canadian content, as opposed to the ones we saw where Bob and Doug and "Rainbow in Toronto" were just occasional bits sprinkled in with all the satires of American movies and TV shows.
- tom moody 12-18-2003 4:22 am
But Canadian content _is_ basically American movies and TV shows with sprinkled bit of Canadiana.
- joester (guest) 12-18-2003 6:44 am
Trailer Park Boys was a whole different order of experience for me. True, there were references to American rappers and so forth, but there's a point of view I don't get here. It's truly abject.
- tom moody 12-18-2003 7:16 am
When TPark Boys gets air time in USA, it'll get co-opted too. Once it's been on HBO awhile, that abject stance won't seem so foreign after all. We're used to the co-optation. We'd like to think of it as a subtle form of infiltration, but once our comedians have done their stint on SNL they lose their edge and we have to start all over training new ones.
- sally mckay 12-18-2003 8:21 am
The reason I knew Joe Flaherty was American was his improvisation "Bloodsucking Monkeys from West Mifflin, Pennsylvania." He was Count Floyd and they had no movie that night so he had to make up something "scary" for the kids. In the course of describing where the bloodsucking monkeys went on their rampage of death and gore, he mentioned every small town within a 25 mile radius of Pittsburgh (where he was born). F-ing hilarious. "You know how in Alien the monster burst out?" (Desperate look offstage to see how much more time he's got to kill.) "Well, the monkeys sort of...burst in!"
- tom moody 12-18-2003 9:04 am
Okay... I admit to maybe some bad form earlier (in my defense I was never actually on a debating team). I perhaps should not have said that certain other people were "wrong." Here's a quote from Dave Thomas, " To the best of my recollection, the people present at the meeting when SCTV was created were Joe Flaherty, Harold Ramis, Eugene Levy, Andrew Alexander, Bernie Sahlins, Sheldon Patinkin, Del Close, and me. I think ...that Andrea [Martin] and Catherine [O'Hara] were excluded from that meeting because they were not originally hired as writers." The meeting occurred at the 'Old Firehall" which was the location for the Toronto version of Second City. There were, indeed people from Chicago in attendance. Dave Thomas says, "I remember Joe Flaherty was excited about Harold [Ramis's] involvement because they had worked together on the Second City Stage in Chicago. "
All of these people put together and wrote the acts in Toronto that became the TV show. Yes it got US syndication eventually. yes they were thrilled with that. Yes there's a bunch of American culture spoofs, of course, we do get us all the channels up here. Also British spoofs. More from Dave Thomas, " I played a Scottish verterinarian who visited sick animals and told their owners that they all had to be put to sleep." This sketch was called " All the Long-Leggedy Beasties" and was a parody of "All Creatures Great and Small."
Saturday Night Live was both the Holy Grail and the foil for SCTV. More from DT: " I told Danny Ackroyd about [a skit I wrote]. He responded, 'David that 's hilarious. I'll do it on Saturday Night Live. You'll be the first person ever to get a piece on SNL who's not a staff writer.' A few weeks later, Bernie [Sahlins, the executive producer of SCTV] saw it on SNL. He came in to the SCTV office and complained, " I just saw one of our pieces on 'Saturday Night Live.'" This was pre-US syndication for the SCTV show. So yes of course there's US content, why? Cause the show was media saavy and did sketch comedy. Also ambitious people who wanted a shot at more than the measely Canadian market. But that doesn't make it American writing or American comedy.
quotes above from SCTV: Behind the Scenes, by Dave Thomas, published 1996 by McClelland and Stewart.
- sally mckay 12-18-2003 9:28 am
Count Floyd was great. Where is Joe Flaherty now? I always liked Harold Ramis too. Dave Thomas talks a lot in the book about how he Ramis was a great writer, but couldn't act, and knew it, so he always ended up playing the straight guy on the show.
- sally mckay 12-18-2003 9:32 am
He wrote a moviecalled "È già ieri" that's shooting in the Canary Island, Sapin.
- joester (guest) 12-18-2003 4:58 pm
Don't sweat it Tom, next they'll be claiming that Niel Young is Canadian.
- steve 12-18-2003 7:00 pm
Just saw FUBAR yesterday, more quintissential hoser-based Candiana like TPark boys, also fiction in documentary style. Less transparent, set in Calagary. FUBAR is extremely funny, well paced and well acted, but the genre is wearing a little thin for me nonetheless. It reminded me of American Movie, which is a genuine documentary, but has that abject thing going on. Our New Year's day movie lineup:
Badlands
Don't Look Now
FUBAR
To Live and Die in LA
The Thing
Interspersed with banned and censored cartoons and episodes of The Awful Truth.
- sally mckay 1-02-2004 9:12 pm
From the SCTV Guide Joe recommended:
Garth and Gord and Fiona and Alice
Garth and Gord (surgeon and lawyer) drive to Toronto from the Maritimes in search of lawyering and doctoring jobs. They pick up Fiona, a nuclear physicist, in Quebec, and run over a woodchuck being filmed for Hinterland Who's Who. They arrive in Toronto full of hope, but Garth's pal says things are slow and there are no jobs after all. They go to Yonge Street, where they meet Alice. Fiona finds a job setting up pins in a bowling alley. Gord gets Alice pregnant. They go to Yonge Street to think. Alice leaves Gord. They decide head out to Alberta.
Music by Stompin' Tom Conners ('To It and At It'), Gordon Lightfoot ('Alberta Bound') and Paul Flaherty does a hard-rockin' cover version of 'To It and At It' (apparently as a parody of David Clayton Thomas).
Garth - Candy; Gord - Flaherty; Fiona Cournoyer - Martin; Alice - Jayne Eastwood; Hinterland director - Levy; irate hospital patient, staff - extra; CBC crew - extras; citizens of Toronto - themselves, eh?
- tom moody 5-01-2004 4:30 am
Tommy Sexton RIP
(Check out my site at http://www.newfoundland-art-camp-art.andmuchmore.com)
- anonymous (guest) 7-25-2005 10:07 pm