Comedy
Interviews & Features
Interview: Match Game's Darrin Rose crossing Canada with a cast of comics for Just for Laughs
Posted by: Paul Little • November 9, 2013 @ 6:21pm
Just for Laughs is a comedy institution -- an iconic name not just in Canada but around the world.
Amplified Idiots: The Inexplicable Rise of the Winnipeg Comedy Scene
Posted by: J.D. Renaud • June 24, 2013 @ 10:53pm
Winnipeg has one of the most diverse and pound-for-pound funniest comedy scenes in Canada. The problem is, it's in Winnipeg.
Over the past decade, and even more-so in the past five years, the comics in my desolate stomping ground have been growing into impressive and formidable comedy beasts. Winnipeg is no stranger to fostering rich and healthy arts communities.
Interview: Irish stand-up comic Tommy Tiernan talks about the role of the "fool" and why he relishes it
Posted by: Paul Little • April 12, 2013 @ 3:16am
Irish comedian Tommy Tiernan has been performing stand-up since the early 90s. Around his home country, he's achieved monster success, to the point of being considered comedy's answer to Bono (who, according to Tiernan, should be Ireland's answer to the papacy). But around the rest of the world, even places where he has achieved success, his reputation is as a controversial comic.
Winnipeg Comedy Fest Interviews: The "Rank & Vile" Darren Frost and Kenny Robinson
Posted by: J.D. Renaud • April 10, 2013 @ 6:52pm
Get ready to show your psychiatrists on the dolly where the bad men touched you, because Darren Frost and Kenny Robinson are bringing their X-Rated Rank & Vile show to the 2013 Winnipeg Comedy Festival.
Few comics are willing to see how far "too far" can go more than Darren Frost.
Winnipeg Comedy Fest Interview: Rising Canadian comedian K. Trevor Wilson
Posted by: J.D. Renaud • April 9, 2013 @ 11:22am
I've had the good fortune of seeing K. Trevor Wilson perform a number of times, and every time I do, his jokes only get better, his delivery only gets smoother, and his beard only gets more luxurious.
Winnipeg Comedy Fest Interview: Veteran stand-up comic and writer John Wing
Posted by: J.D. Renaud • April 9, 2013 @ 11:13am
Returning by popular demand to the Winnipeg Comedy Festival once again, John Wing has more than secured his reputation as a stellar performer and true renaissance man in the world of comedy. A seasoned vet of the stand-up world, both nationally and abroad, Wing has long been one of Canada's most original and consistently irreverent comedic voices.
The Winnipeg Comedy Festival has long been considered a comics' festival. The comedians who come to the prairie city to perform over a week in April absolutely love their time here. The festival treats the performers incredibly well, and the crowds are friendly, responsive, and plentiful.
Interview: Jeremy Hotz, the most miserable comic in the world of stand-up
Posted by: Paul Little • March 9, 2013 @ 1:23am
At this stage of his career, Jeremy Hotz could be considered an icon of Canadian comedy. Having achieved some success south of the 49th (where Hotz has been living for over a decade) -- including appearances on The Tonight Show and a Comedy Central Presents special -- the stand-up comic has pretty much done it all in Canada.
Amplified Idiots: "Hecklers" - Tortured Artists Torturing Artists
Posted by: J.D. Renaud • January 22, 2013 @ 12:45pm
Heckling is an art form.
It's not a very appreciated art form, but it is still a creative vocation deserving of our attention and respect. Unfortunately, it's also one of those amorphous, pretentious art forms. You know, like jazz fusion or interpretive dance.
I have written a lot of material about things I've hated. The reaction has been hit or miss.
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