Montreal

Luba’s Accordion

It’s been almost two weeks since I’ve been back from the Ottawa/Montreal leg of our Comedy Before the Frost tour and I still haven’t had the time to post any of the photos or videos.  But I’m working on it.  I promise.

… I’ve been busy!

2012 Cream of Comedy

I had my first Level D class at the Second City Training Centre this past Monday (Rob Baker‘s my teacher – So excited! Uh… the comedian, not the dude from The Tragically Hip – although that would also be cool.) Afterwards, I huddled and dodged the hurricane over to the Main Stage to check out the last little bit of the 2012 Cream of Comedy show, where those 5 performers who were selected from Fresh Meat got to battle it out one last time in hopes of winning the Tim Sims Engouragement Fund  Finally, Christi Olson was declared victor and was awarded  $5k & a scholarship to the Training Centre.  Good on her.  She’s hilarious and totally deserves it.  Also, I hear she needs money to buy meds, so… good.  Comedy’s literally keeping this girl alive.

Kudos to the producer Deanna Palazzo for putting for the hard work she put into Fresh Meat and CoC this year.  They were both really fantastic performances, which ran smoothly, professionally and hilariously, just as planned.

I don’t know why, but because I didn’t know Tim Sims, I derived great pleasure out of recognizing him from the old Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups commercials where he played Rory Tate, the scientist tracking mysterious peanut butter and chocolaty crop circles.  I REMEMBER those! I guess it makes me feel better because I can acknowledge that though I never got to see Tim perform live, some element of his performance has been ingrained in my memory – so I feel better about being nominated to be in a competition for award in his name.  Does that make sense? I don’t care.  It does to me.

You remember this too, right?

IT DOES TO ME!

Anyway, C0C was hosted by Kristeen von Hagen, who is hilarious.  And,  having heard she was in town, the wonderful Jess Beaulieu snagged her up to headline her and Laura Bailey‘s popular CHICKA-BOOM show, on which I got to perform with some other fun sketch and improv comedians and none other than Royal Canadian Air Farce veteran, Luba Goy.

The Canadian Ukrainian Princess

“What? Brie, that’s amazing!”

I know.  You don’t have to tell me that.  I feel it too.

She performed a great little bit of stand-up and included some of the fan favorites, including Kim Campbell & Donald Duck.  After the show, Luba kept us out too late for a Sunday, telling the hosts they need to hurry up, get married and have babies (not with each other…) before their parts dry up.  She then picked up what is probably the Free Times Café owner’s family heirloom, a sweet old accordion, without permission and went to town on it – telling us tales of her own one-of-a-kind childhood accordion, which her friend traded in sans permission.  Tragedy, right?

Who could say anything though? She’s Ukrainian Canada’s sweetheart!

Also, Luba tells me I’m no longer allowed to drink sweet white wine, so… I have to settle for Pinot Grigio these days.

YOU HAVE TO DO WHAT LUBA SAYS!!!!  BAD THINGS WILL HAPPEN OTHERWISE.

Luba Goy – more terrifying than Halloween.

I Did Stratford

The Stratford edition of Comedy Before the Frost is now history and marks the first out-of-town comedy show I’ve produced (well, co-produced.)

I think I would qualify it as a success in that people we do not know were in attendance and paid money to listen to us tell jokes.  Not thousands of people, but people.  One of whom had reserved in advance for a group – as a birthday celebration.  We were part of someone’s major life event!  (If you consider a birthday a major life event, which I do.)

I was especially touched when I noticed my good pals from Sarnia in the crowd; friends I’ve known since high school (actually, I think I knew Josée before high school, she can correct me if I’m wrong,) who’d made the trek down specifically to see me perform.  That’s dedication, folks. That’s friendship.  They traveled further than I did to get to that venue.  These two are the best kind of people there is.  Afterwards, they treated us comics to drinks and billiards, which is like…gold for comics.  Sweet liquid, billiard-y gold.

Jerry Shaefer, our host, performed some really funny, interesting and unique stuff – which I was really excited to see because it didn’t fit in with the regular run-of-the-mill host.  He took some time to look into work we’d all done in the past, which was really nice and considerate – and he told stories, played characters and was just damn delightful to watch perform.  The birthday-boy was especially excited when he found out Jerry used to be on the Red Green show.  Apparently he was a huge fan.

We also made connections that will hopefully lead to more shows in Stratford, a lovely town in which to perform.  A town you KNOW values live entertainment.

If thy beist thou boyfriend

But first, time to get our sights set on Ottawa and Montreal.   I’m hoping for a bigger crowd for both these shows, and to recognize a few friendly familiar faces.

Also, more liquid billiard-y gold would be nice.

Toronto’s Indie Comedy Fun Time Hour

I’d been meaning to go for a long time, but I finally got around to attending Toronto’s Indie Comedy Hour, a fun monthly half-booked, half-lottery open mic on College Street hosted by two awesome babes; Catherine McCormick and Arleigh Curran.  Annnnnd it pretty much restored my faith in humanity.

I had a great set, the crowd was amazing, the other comics were fantastic – a lot of whom I’d never seen before, which was also refreshing.  If you’re a comic in TO and you haven’t tried this room out, you’re just wrong.   And if you’re not a comic, and you need something to do on a Wednesday night once a month, you should definitely check this show out because I guarantee you will laugh.

I was asked to come back next month and perform on the booked portion of the show, which was amazing and I’m honoured.  Yeehaw!  Bring on Spring and Summer nights of comedy around TO.  It’s gonna a good Summer.

I’m being temporarily optimistic!

But speaking of the summer – I would like to organize a small road trip to Montreal to finally attend the Just For Laughs festival.  I’ve never been before and though I don’t have the money to afford it at this point, hopefully by July I’ll have made enough to sustain me in Montreal for at least 2 or 3 days of the festival.

Also, preliminary plans are in the works for a Fall tour with some fellow comics.  Stay tuned because that might be really awesome!

In the meantime, you can catch me tomorrow night, I’ll be performing at the Theatre Elusive with my pals The Young Geologists.  For more information, check out the Performances section of this blog!  Doooooooo it!