joey lucius, kayla lorette, a.j. vaage, alana johnston,
james hartnett, hannah hogan, alex spencer
When I was in elementary school, there was one program that I watched on television that my mother tried subtlety to dissuade me from watching (which, of course, only heightened the show’s allure for me). It was called You Can’t Do That On Television, a Canadian sketch comedy show for children which ran from 1979-1990 and featured a cast of mostly teenaged performers. The show was written to appeal to a child’s comic sensibilities and, therefore, all the sketches were tailored to finding the absurdity within the daily lives and experiences of children and teenagers. The show became most well known for its traditional “sliming” of any actor who uttered the phrase “I don’t know,” and You Can’t Do That On Television’s green slime has since been appropriated by the Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards. I was strongly reminded of You Can’t Do That On Television last week while watching a new Canadian sketch comedy show for children called That’s So Weird, which is broadcast on Wednesdays at 7:30pm (EST) on YTV.
That’s So Weird features a cast of seven performers, all of whom are strikingly older than the cast of You Can’t Do That On Television, which gives their performances a stronger and more professional edge, while the characters that they play and the sketches that they perform are all just as strongly rooted in finding the absurd amid the world of children between the ages of eight to fifteen (approximately). For this reason, although I found myself engaging with That’s So Weird, I also wished that I could see the show through the eyes of a ten year old, because I think the kids for whom this show was created have a far richer appreciation of its humour than I do, just like I understood You Can’t Do That On Television far more ardently than my mother.
The premise of That’s So Weird is a clever one, So Weird TV is a fictional television station owned by a fictional company named Jamco, whose executives have hired seven children to create a sketch comedy program whose sole purpose is to promote Jamco products, both through stringent product placement in the sketches and infomercials scattered throughout. The products are all ridiculous to the extreme, but in their weirdness and absurdity, they also provide a wry commentary on their real-life counterparts. Companies do, in fact, laden children’s programming with advertising and often for products that are less than ideal for children to be consuming. At So Weird TV these products include Drool-Aid, a Kool-Aid knock off which uses spit instead of water, Beef-Whiz, a genetically modified spread fraught with chemicals, and Shantz, what would happen if the makers of the Snuggie made clothing for use outside the home. These products each lend themselves well to large amounts of disgusting-looking items being both eaten or poured and spread continually over the actors and large amounts of physical and visual humour as well.
Like in sketch shows for adults, such as Saturday Night Live and MADtv, That’s So Weird also creates spoofs of the most recent trends in popular culture. Recurring features include episodes of the Canadian soap opera for teenagers Depressi High which is a clear spoof of the popular television series Degrassi: The Next Generation and Count Eduardo III, one high school’s resident vampire, a clear reference to the popular Twilight series of novels by Stephenie Meyer. Many of these sketches are quite poignant in their ability to capture the absurdity of the culture we are continually inundated with, while still providing superficial sight gags to keep them light hearted and fun for kids to watch. There are several sketches that spoof reality television; one in which seven teenagers attempt to live together and their ridiculous and immature behaviour perfectly mirrors that of adult contestants on Big Brother and one entitled Are You Taller Than A Fifth Grader?, for which, I think, the title is self explanatory. In subverting the conventions of the children’s popular culture, these sketches can be escapist and funny for them, but they also encourage them, to some degree, to think critically about the conventions which have been subverted and give children a new perspective on the media which is being fed to them both at school and at home. There is also a hilarious segment in each episode called So Weird TV Reports in which one of the performers goes on location as a field reporter and participates in some sort of event or experience within the community and also conducts interviews with the participants of this event or experience. Alana Johnston has a particularly crazy experience at an Outdoor Show, while Kayla Lorette bonds with Toronto Maple Leaf forward Jason Blake over their mutual love of ABBA.
What makes That’s So Weird especially refreshing is its legitimacy. Despite the fact that the show is targeted at children, the creators have decided to cast seven of Canada’s most talented, experienced and versatile young comics in their cast (Johnston and Lorette are joined by James Hartnett, Alex Spencer, A.J. Vaage, Hannah Hogan and Joey Lucius). Children’s programming is an important foundation that I believe holds great influence over the entertainment choices a child will grow to make in the future. It is encouraging to see Halifax Film and YTV refusing to patronize Canada’s youth and instead offering them the opportunity to see performances that are professional and well-crafted, while still being tailored especially for younger audiences. The best examples of this are the commitment and comic sensibility of A.J. Vaage as Daniel Book (a nineteen year old going on seven and a half year old who reminds me of Andrew Keenan-Bolger’s Leaf Coneybear from the musical The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee) and the incredibly hilarious performances of Logan and Wilf by Alana Johnston and Kayla Lorette, in which they transform themselves with absurd precision into ten year old boys.
According to its Wikipedia entry, You Can’t Do That on Television was created to be a “fun” show for children, one that made no attempt to be educational, and yet I feel like, to a certain degree, it was educational, and that That’s So Weird is fulfilling that same demographic for a new generation of children. These shows are introducing Canadian children to sketch comedy, an introduction which I think is an important one because sketch and Improv have such a rich and proud history in this country and our comics are some of the best in the world. It is important for us to foster those who will grow to follow in the footsteps of Alana, Alex, Kayla, James, Joey, Hannah and A.J. in the future and those who will continue to support this sort of entertainment from the audience. It’s also important for our kids to be encouraged to laugh and to see the humour in the world and this is a show that I think is sure to produce a fair amount of giggles and shrieks of disgust and delight, mirth and merriment and glee in the fact that for this one half an hour, the weirder things are the better.
That’s So Weird (Halifax Film, YTV) can be seen on Wednesday nights at 7:30 (EST) on YTV. Check out this awesome website for all sorts of information on this show and for special features and interactive fun.
