CBC logic has often challenged the mind.
Case in point: there was a time in the ‘80s when the Corp. had two of Canada’s most talented comedy teams in its stable. There was the Air Farce, for decades Canada’s consummate radio troupe.
And there was The Frantics, an utterly visual act, one that could spoof Star Trek with two baseball bats and a sombrero, co-starring a talking sweater as the alien.
So guess which troupe was given their own radio show so the other could get a try-out on TV?
“We were supposed to replace the Air Farce on radio, and we happened to walk in not knowing this was the plan,” says Rick Green, who, with pals Dan Redican, Peter Wildman and Paul Chato, will be playing a combined 30th anniversary show and CD release Monday at the Royal Theatre.
”We weren’t very political, so it was tough for us to do. We really had to reinvent ourselves,” Redican says. “Although,” he adds, looking at Green, “you had the best Yuri Andropov joke. It was Reagan, ‘Get me the Russian Premier on the phone!’ - ‘Andropov?’ - ‘No, I’ll try to stay awake.’”
All four laugh hysterically at the groaner. There’s an impromptu suggestion of a funeral sketch for topical jokes past their “best before” date.
Happily for almost all concerned, that Air Farce TV special didn’t spawn a series (that would come a few years later).
“And with them back on the radio making Joe Clark jokes, they told us ‘You can go back to silly stuff.’ And we were, like, okay,” Redican says.
Not long after that, The Frantics finally got let loose on TV, with the sketch series Four On The Floor, which introduced Canadians to their pre-Kids In The Hall absurdist sense, and trademark characters like the Canadian superhero Mr. Canoehead (Chato) - although CBC nixed Canoehead’s slogan, “a story so incredible, only Mormons would believe it.”
But the early misadventures did spawn Frantic Noises, the troupe’s new CD of songs, most of them from the radio series.
“We had to have a song every week on the radio show,” Redican says.
“Which was Peter’s area, he’s the music guy,” says Chato.
“A lot of the songs were strictly for radio,” Green adds, “you wouldn’t have heard them on stage, partly because there was production to them, and partly because two of us don’t sing all that well.”
Adds Wildman, “we had a lot of music stored up, and everybody liked the song. I was working with (Emmy-winning) producer Tim Burns, and we finally reached a defining moment with the anniversary, and I pitched it to the other three, and they said ‘Yeah.’”
Old faves include the Maritime chanty Vagina Bound, Big Bad Al - The Einstein Song, the Randy Newman-esque Kiss My Ass (I’m A Monarch), and an unexplainable favourite called Brown Car.
As for the 30-year celebration, it’s a slightly-belated commemoration of the troupe’s first show, Oct. 31, 1979 at U of T’s Innes Hall (I first saw them a few weeks later when they played the Ryerson Pub).
“It’s 30 years with a 15-year intermission. We decided to get remarried,” Wildman says of the period between the late ‘80s and early ‘00s when they’d split up.
Green went on to create high-minded comedy like History Bites and Prisoners Of Gravity, Redican starred in Puppets Who Kill, Wildman had the show Buck Staghorn and now works in the creative department for Q-107, Talk 640 and The Edge radio, and Chato has his own little web designing empire (www.yourwebdepartment.com).
So who gets remarried after 15 years anyway, we ask.
“Robert Wagner and what-her-name did, Natalie Wood. They remarried,” Green says. “And look how that turned out,” Redican adds.
jim.slotek@sunmedia.ca
