Comedian Rick Mercer filming TV stand-up special on Saint John stage

By Andrew Bates, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Telegraph-Journal

As his Stand-Up for Canada tour draws to a close, Rick Mercer’s show in Saint John Friday will be taped as a television special.

The tour has visited 16 cities since kicking off in Saskatoon Sept. 11, with shows this week in Moncton, Charlottetown, Saint John and Halifax before winding up in Mercer’s hometown of St. John’s on Sunday. The sold-out Friday show at the Imperial Theatre will be recorded as a one-hour comedy special for CBC and CBC Gem, producers Bruce Hills Entertainment, Counterfeit Pictures and Hemmings Films announced Wednesday.

“I don’t have to tell you how beautiful that theatre is,” Mercer said Wednesday in a phone interview. “The first time I walked on stage in this theatre, I said if I ever film a stand-up special, that’s where I’m doing it, so that’s come around full circle.”

The tour features Mercer, known for his work on This Hour Has 22 Minutes, Made In Canada and Rick Mercer Report, along with comedians Sophie Buddle, Mayce Galoni and Julie Kim, offering a “funny, insightful and heartfelt celebration of Canada,” according to the release.

“It’s been pretty incredible, we’ve hit the entire country in many ways,” he said.

Mercer said there was a “huge appetite for this tour,” saying they sold 40,000 tickets “out of the gate” across the country.

“Obviously the title resonated with people, the notion resonated with people,” Mercer said. “There’s always been fans that have have always enjoyed the celebratory aspect of my act, and they’re up for that right now.”

The show’s punny title comes at a time of anxiety amidst the fraying of the country’s trade relationship with its closest neighbour, the United States, and a punchy “elbows up” approach to supporting Canadian goods and institutions.

Mercer said it’s not a “dunk on the U.S.A. tour,” saying his act is about Canada, not the U.S., adding that he doesn’t “have to worry about dunking on the U.S.A., ’cause they’re doing that themselves.”

“But obviously these are interesting times for Canada, because we’re at odds in any ways with our largest trading partner and a country that was traditionally our best friend,” he said. “That causes a lot of anxiety and a lot of unsettled feelings … but during difficult times, people turn to comedy, they always have.”

The moment is in some ways inherently surreal, and Mercer said “it’s not like you couldn’t write it, you could, it’s just that nobody would believe it.”

“If someone wrote the last five years as a movie, no one would produce it because they’d say that’s just absurd,” he said. “At this point we’d believe anything, and I think that’s the world writ large, it’s not just politics. I feel like if I walk outside the front door and there’s a UFO hovering over my head, I’d go, hey, it’s the tourists, no surprise.”

In terms of how he’s seen Canadians deal with it as an audience, he noted that “everyone’s different,” saying noting that many people have “very close relatives” or work ties to the U.S., and others “not so much.”

“There’s no common denominator, other than the fact that Canadians are very much a sovereign nation, and we don’t take kindly to our neighbours acting in a way that is not neighbourly, and that’s upsetting to everyone,” he said.

He said the tour, as well as the “tremendous” response from fans “provides a bit of respite from the storm,” he said.

“We’re just a night out, celebrating what Canadians hold dear, and Canadians are obviously responding to that in large numbers,” Mercer said.

Mercer said he’s “very proud of the show,” as well as the comedians who have accompanied him, saying they’re well-known in the stand-up realm but it’s been “great” to introduce them to his audience.

“I just know the special is going to look great because that theatre looks fantastic and New Brunswick has always been a great audience for comedy,” he said.

A premiere date for the special “will be confirmed at a later date,” according to the release.