French Comedy Bastards gives three French-Canadians an opportunity to showcase a form of comedy that may not be familiar to anglo audiences
BASEM BOSHRA , The Montreal Gazette
Published: Thursday, July 10, 2008
After exhaustive research - okay, one Google search - there appears to be no historical evidence to suggest that Pierre Elliott Trudeau was a big fan of stand-up comedy.
But it's a safe bet to assume the late prime minister and staunch champion of a bilingual Canada would get a kick out of the mere presence of French Comedy Bastards at this year's Just for Laughs festival.
The Bastards in question, you see, are three French-Canadian comics - Mike Ward, Maxim Martin and Derek Seguin - who will be performing entirely in English during their three-night stint at the Cabaret du Musée Juste pour Rire, which kicks off tonight.
French Comedy Bastards' Derek Seguin (left), Maxim Martin and Mike Ward: The show's name was Ward's idea, they say.
Yet while we referenced one of the more polarizing political figures in recent Quebec history a couple of paragraphs back, it would be a mistake to head to the French Comedy Bastards show hoping for material that dwells on the social or linguistic tensions in the province.
"We do to talk about it a bit because we almost have to," Martin says, "but I'd say it's barely two per cent of the show.
"It would be too obvious for us to come out and do that, and it's already been overdone, anyway. We barely talk about it in French - why would we do it in English?"
Instead, the Bastards have taken a "comedy is comedy" approach that's likely to give the show much broader appeal than if it had, say, ''15 minutes of poutine jokes," says Martin, who was raised in Western Canada by francophone parents.
"Whether you speak French, English or Spanish, the same things bother you about society, the same things piss you off," adds Martin who, like Ward, is one of the biggest stars on the French comedy circuit in Quebec, while being virtually unknown in English Quebec - unlike Seguin, who's a familar face on the English comedy-club circuit.
And, as Seguin notes, the lack of cultural or political specificity could help the show's long-term touring potential.
"Our idea from the get-go was to be able to take this show on the road, and what's funny politically here in Quebec isn't funny in the rest of Canada or the world," says Seguin, who's half Irish and half French-Canadian.
The French Comedy Bastards show is also an opportunity for the comics to showcase a form of live comedy that may not be familiar to anglo audiences in the province.
"In English comedy, there's either stand-up shows or sketch comedy shows - you never really see the combination of both," Ward says. "But in French, that's almost all it is. So we started talking about how it would be fun to build a show that, on paper, looked like a French show, but was in English.
"French shows are more theatrical, they have a beginning and an end, while English shows are tighter and the writing is punchier," explains Ward, who went to English elementary and secondary schools in Quebec City, and even studied briefly at McGill. "So this is the best of both worlds"
Mixing it up in terms of the show's form also suited the eclectic nature of the comics' material, Seguin adds.
"Over the past few months of working on it, it's become this sort of collective stream-of-consciousness show, where one of us says, 'Oh, man, we should talk about this,' or 'Let's make a sketch out of this.'
French Comedy Bastards gives three French-Canadians an opportunity to showcase a form of comedy that may not be familiar to anglo audiences
"Some of the stuff lasts only 60 seconds, just so we can throw an idea out there."
The show's intriguing premise has elicited surprise with a dash of envy from the comics' French colleagues.
"When Mike and I came up with the idea and decided to broaden the horizon and share the stage with someone else, I think every friend of ours who speaks three words of English asked us to be on the show," Martin says. "Because I think deep down most comics want to broaden their art as much as possible."
Finally, we'd be remiss if we didn't delve into the roots of the show's attention-grabbing name. It was Ward's idea, so we'll let him explain:
"It isn't like this anymore, but about 10 or 12 years ago, when French comics started to make a lot of money, whenever I'd do shows on the English side, I felt like (the English comics) hated me, because I had a nice car and I had some money, so I was the 'French comedy bastard.'
"So when Max and I started talking about the show last summer, that name just popped into my head."
But what started out as a bit of a joke actually turned out to be quite a good fit, Martin adds.
"Mike and I are pretty edgy, and so's Derek, so we definitely have the material to back up the name."
French Comedy Bastards runs tonight through Saturday at 9 at the Cabaret du Musée Juste Pour Rire. Tickets are $23.40 and are available at boxoffice.hahaha.com or or .
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