In 2005 my life changed when I attended the 2005 CBC Comedy Festival Gala, “Welcome to Turtle Island.” It was a night of standup comedy featuring Indian Country’s finest comedians. It was hosted by Grahame Greene and it featured Don Burnstick, Howie Miller, Art Napolean, Don Kelly, Gerry Barrett, David McLeod and the legendary Charlie Hill. It was taped for television and if you google it you’ll be sure to be able to youtube most of the clips from that night.

I was in the audience that night and I can honestly say it changed my life. Seeing/hearing comedy from “our own perspective” is something that I’d only heard of. I was working with Tonto’s Nephews (All Aboriginal Improv/Sketch comedy troupe) and we didn’t really delve into our “Native-ness” onstage other than us BEING Native and …

As a comedian – we perform our “acts” as our bread and butter.  When I’m being paid good money for a gig – I go to my “act” because it’s tried, tested and true – the jokes, generally, work.  My act has a story arc, alot of characters, re-occurring themes, etc. and it’s built to tell my story.  A good comic though won’t rely on that “act” for years and years and years and years and years and years, all the while, still charging TONS of money for that same act.  I’m not a comic that does that.  Though relatively young in the “standup game”, and having only done standup for the last three and a half years, the one thing that I understand about comedy is that you HAVE TO BE RELEVANT in order to matter.

There are many comics …

THIS IS A LATE POST – ORIGINALLY WRITTEN OCTOBER 9, 2009.  THE BLOG POST WAS MY REACTION TO THE EVENT, THE VIDEO WAS TAKEN THE NIGHT BEFORE NASA BOMBED THE MOON.  OBVIOUSLY, WE NOW KNOW NASA FUCKED THIS WHOLE THING UP BY NOT GETTING THE PICTURES THEY NEEDED FURTHERING THE DISCUSSION THAT SPACE PROGRAM IS A JOKE, A LIE, AND A MTYH. THIS BLOG POST IS A BIT LATE – BUT STILL WORTH POSTING.

VIDEO: QUICKTIME VIDEO HERE. YOUTUBE VIDEO HERE.

Where to start, where to start?  First of all – I’m NOT a scientist.  That might come as a shock to some reading this blog because I do look good in a sweater and I am a bit of a nerd – but – I’ve got a fight to pick today.  A fight.  Fists.  Kicks.  Groin shots.  Hair pulling.  Fuck …

One of the oldest cliche’s in the book – laughter is good medicine.  We as Indian People pride ourselves on not taking ourselves too seriously, about being able to laugh when we’re down, and about how laughter has gotten us through some pretty lean times.  I’d agree with all of those things – but it led me to thinking: WHERE ARE OUR INDIAN COMEDY FESTIVALS?

Week after week in the summer time I see ad’s, facebook invites, tweets about all of the amazing music festivals/gatherings that are taking place across Indian Country.  No doubt, the music scene is “older” and more established than an Indian Comedy scene, but i think that a comedy festival would be a good first step to raising the profile of “our comedy” in Indian Country (not to mention getting it out into the mainstream).

There have been …

a couple of weeks ago i was honoured to be a part of the cbc radio series – NDN ACTION.  i was asked by a kick ass producer, ruth shead (@ruthlesstravels on twitter), at the cbc to be a part of the series as they were profiling a handful of indian people around manitoba that are taking action to make change/create change/be the change in their communities.  it was a fantastic interview and we talked for nearly an hour about a whole bunch of different things.  i generally hate talking about myself but ruth had a sensibility and an understanding that i hadn’t experienced with the media before – a breathe of fresh air really.

[Audio clip: view full post to listen]

there are a few details in the interview that i could have given better context to, but, i was so …

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.