Oh, Canada!

For those lucky enough to live in the center of the universe (aka Toronto), you already know that this weekend marks the first time the Canadian Comedy Awards will slide through town in several years. As it turns out, there are other cities that exist in Canada. Who knew?

The awards themselves aren’t until Monday, but festivities in full swing as all the performance nominees are performing around town at Second City, Comedy Bar, and Bad Dog Theatre. For Torontonians, it might seem there isn’t an urgency to see shows as there would be in other cities, since most nominees are based here. However, a few out of town sketch groups have locals clamoring for tickets, and the one-person show nominees are remounting productions that some of us failed to catch at past Fringe Festivals.

The show with the most hype (and mystery) around it is a special edition of Sunday Night Live, hosted by Kevin McDonald from Kids in the Hall. I won’t be there to gaze at the promised celebrity drop-ins, because I’ll be downtown enjoying the sold-out Paul F. Tompkins show (he isn’t Canadian, but I think we can give him honorary citizenship for the weekend, no?). But I’m already looking forward to hearing about it.

A few panels during the day Saturday may be worth a few words here. I’ll also be covering the awards ceremony itself on Monday night, and will post the details as soon as I sleep off the afterparty.

http://www.canadiancomedy.ca/

About the Author

Sharilyn Johnson is the author of the book Bears & Balls: The Colbert Report A-Z. Called "one of the city’s most discriminating comedy critics” by NOW Magazine, Sharilyn has been covering comedy for longer than she cares to admit. She served as the comedy reporter for Winnipeg's Uptown Magazine for five years, and was the host of the radio show Laugh Tracks for three seasons. Her work has also appeared in the Toronto Star, the Winnipeg Free Press, The Apiary, and on CBC Radio's national comedy programs LOL and Definitely Not the Opera.