Michael Boncoeur

Last updated

Michael Boncoeur was the stage name of Michael Vadeboncoeur, a Canadian sketch comedian, most noted as one half of the comedy duo La Troupe Grotesque with Paul K. Willis in the 1970s and 1980s. [1]

Contents

Career

Originally from Vancouver, British Columbia, he had local stage acting roles as a child, most notably as the young Ptolemy in a 1962 production of Caesar and Cleopatra . [2] He and Willis formed La Troupe Grotesque in 1968, [3] moving to Toronto that year but struggling to get established until Riff Markowitz hired them as writers for his television series Party Game [4] and The Hilarious House of Frightenstein . [5]

They performed as a sketch comedy duo on stage, both in Toronto and regular touring throughout both Canada and the United States. [6] Willis was the primary writer of most of their material, while Boncoeur took on the staging and costuming. [7]

They were also invited to join the cast of The Hart and Lorne Terrific Hour , but declined to audition out of fear that the show would steal their material; [4] as well, they filmed a CBC Television pilot, although there is no historical evidence that it was ever actually broadcast, [4] and had plans to record a comedy album for GRT Records which never materialized. [4]

The duo's comedy was strongly influenced by British sketch comedy. [4] They disdained the influence of American comedy, including the rise of improv comedy at The Second City, although they were both major fans of the more scripted and formatted SCTV despite disliking Second City's improvisational stage shows; [4] one of their regular pieces in that era parodied improv comedy by asking the audience to provide male and female character suggestions, which Willis and Boncoeur would perform "improvisationally" for exactly two or three lines of dialogue before Boncoeur's character would say "I wish I was in Paris", with the sketch then transitioning into its true purpose, an elaborately-staged song and dance number. [4] They were also noted for the edginess of some of their comedy; after the news of the Jonestown massacre broke in November 1978, their show that evening opened with the duo distributing Kool-Aid to the audience. [8]

In addition, Boncoeur was noted for being open and unapologetic about being gay, which was a relative novelty in comedy in their era; [4] many of the troupe's local shows in Toronto were performed at the Manatee, a gay club. [4] Boncoeur was also noted for a drag impersonation of Queen Elizabeth II, performed with a frame around his head to suggest a postage stamp. [4]

In 1976, they created the CBC Radio comedy series Pulp and Paper with Gay Claitman. [9] The following year, they toured the stage revue Plain Brown Wrapper. [10]

They ceased touring in 1980, [11] but reunited in 1984 to create two CBC Radio comedy specials, a spoof of CBC programming called This Hour Has 17 Programs in June [12] and the year-end review The Year of Living Obnoxiously in December. [13] They received ACTRA Award nominations for Best Writing, Radio Variety for This Hour Has 17 Programs at the 14th ACTRA Awards in 1985, [14] and for The Year of Living Obnoxiously at the 15th ACTRA Awards in 1986. [15] In 1985, Willis also created the radio comedy special If You Love This Government, a political satire in which Boncoeur did not appear on air but served as a producer. [16]

He also served as a wardrobe master in theatre, most notably for a national touring production of the musical Cats in 1988. [17]

Murder

On March 24, 1991, Boncoeur's body was found in his Forest Hill apartment; [11] he had been stabbed to death and robbed of numerous possessions including his motorcycle. [18]

Although the Toronto Star reported having received a strange unidentified phone call asking "Has a gay man been murdered in the Toronto area in the last 10 hours?" the day before his body was found, it was unclear whether the motive for his killing was homophobia or simple robbery. [19] His motorcycle was later found in the Cabbagetown area of the city, following early reports that it had been seen on Highway 400 near King City. [19]

The earliest police reports also inaccurately claimed that Boncoeur was an "AIDS patient", which Willis responded was not the case. [19]

Two youths were later arrested and charged with the murder. [20] One was an established acquaintance of Boncoeur's, while the other, Adam Blake Harris, was a classmate of the first youth at a reformatory school. [4] They had shown up at Boncoeur's home earlier on the day of his death with the intention of robbing him; however, as Boncoeur had to leave for a show, he gave them $20 to buy food, with which they instead bought a knife. They returned to his home again later in the evening; Boncoeur, who intended to go to bed early as he had another show the next day, allowed them to sleep on his couch for the night, following which Harris stabbed him in the carotid artery soon after he fell asleep. [4] However, some of the media coverage falsely appeared to imply that Boncoeur might have predatorily lured the boys home for sex. [21]

Harris was tried as an adult as he had reached age 18 by the time of the trial; he was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment in 1994. [22] There is no media record of whether the other youth ever went to trial.

Legacy

The undertones of homophobia in response to his death, both the false claim about his HIV status and the sexual predation allegations, motivated his lifelong friend Lynn Johnston to bring a gay character into her comic strip For Better or For Worse to help combat anti-gay stereotypes and discrimination. [21] Michael Patterson's classmate and friend Lawrence Poirier, who had previously been seen in the strip as a minor supporting character, came out as gay in 1993. [21]

Stand and Deliver: Inside Canadian Comedy, a 1997 book about the history of Canadian comedy by Eye Weekly entertainment writer Andrew Clark, faced some criticism for misidentifying Boncoeur as "Michael Rapaport". [23]

Related Research Articles

CODCO is a Canadian comedy troupe from Newfoundland, best known for a sketch comedy series which aired on CBC Television from 1988 to 1993.

Roger Abbott was an English-born Canadian sketch comedian who was a founding member of the long-lived Canadian comedy troupe Royal Canadian Air Farce, and remained one of its stars and writers until his death.

John Morgan was a Welsh-born Canadian comedian.

Barbara Budd is a Canadian actress, narrator and radio announcer. Between 1993 and April 30, 2010, she was the co-host of CBC Radio One's As It Happens.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maury Chaykin</span> American-Canadian actor (1949-2010)

Maury Alan Chaykin was an American-Canadian actor. Described as "one of the most recognizable faces in Canadian cinema," he was best known for his portrayal of Rex Stout's detective Nero Wolfe on the television series A Nero Wolfe Mystery (2001-02), as well as for his work as a character actor in many films and television programs.

Nancy Adele White is a Canadian singer-songwriter, whose humorous and satirical songs on political and social topics were a regular feature on CBC Radio from 1976 to 1994 on the public affairs show Sunday Morning.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Canadian Comedy Awards</span> National awards for performed comedy

The Canadian Comedy Awards (CCA) is an annual ceremony that awards the Beaver for achievements in Canadian comedy in live performance, radio, film, television, and Internet media. The awards were founded and produced by Tim Progosh in 2000.

Peter James Edward Oldring is a Canadian actor and comedian.

Variety Tonight was a CBC Radio show which aired from 1980 until 1985 in the 8–10 p.m. timeslot. It was a nightly series featuring jazz and pop music as well as trivia games, book and movie reviews, comedy segments and interviews.

Mosquito Lake was a Canadian television sitcom, which aired on CBC Television in the 1989–90 television season. The show, a family sitcom, starred comedian Mike MacDonald as Bob Harrison, the father of a family spending the summer in a dilapidated cottage on Mosquito Lake.

The Royal Canadian Air Farce was a comedy troupe that was active from 1973 to 2019. It is best known for their various Canadian Broadcasting Corporation series, first on CBC Radio and later on CBC Television. Although their weekly radio series ended in 1997 and their television series ended in 2008, the troupe produced annual New Year's Eve specials on CBC Television until 2019. CBC announced that, due to budgetary constraints, the special scheduled to air on December 30, 2019, would be the final in the series.

Sylvia Bela Lennick was a Canadian comedic actress. A supporting cast member of Wayne & Shuster's television comedy troupe, she was most famous for her role as Calpurnia, with the famous catch phrase "I told him, Julie! Don't go!", in the Shakespearean parody "Rinse the Blood Off My Toga".

The Vestibules, formerly known as Radio Free Vestibule, is a Canadian comedy troupe composed of Terence Bowman, Paul Paré, and Bernard Deniger.

The 2nd Canadian Comedy Awards, presented by the Canadian Comedy Foundation for Excellence (CCFE), honoured the best live, television, and film comedy of 2000 and was held in April 2001 at The Guvernment in Toronto, Ontario. The ceremony was hosted by Sheila McCarthy and Patrick McKenna and was televised by The Comedy Network.

The 12th Canadian Comedy Awards, presented by the Canadian Comedy Foundation for Excellence (CCFE), honoured the best live, television, film, and Internet comedy of 2010. The ceremony was hosted by Steve Patterson and held at the Isabel Bader Theatre in Toronto, Ontario, on 17 October 2011.

"A Shakespearean Baseball Game", subtitled "A Comedy of Errors, Hits and Runs", is a sketch by the Canadian comedy duo Wayne and Shuster. First performed on television in 1958 and slightly revised in 1971 and 1977, the sketch depicts a fictional baseball game with the manager, players, and umpires all speaking in Shakespearean verse. The dialogue parodies lines from the plays Hamlet, Macbeth, Julius Caesar, and Richard III while referencing modern baseball culture. It became Wayne and Shuster's signature sketch, and both its television and radio recordings have been preserved as significant works.

"Rinse the Blood Off My Toga" is a comedy sketch by the Canadian comedy duo Wayne and Shuster. First broadcast on The Wayne and Shuster Hour on CBC Radio in 1954, it was reenacted for their British television debut in 1957 and their first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1958. The sketch recasts the Shakespearean historical tragedy as a detective story with gangster overtones. Set in the Roman Senate right after the assassination of Julius Caesar, the script has Brutus (Shuster) engaging the services of private eye Flavius Maximus (Wayne) to identify Caesar's assassin. Several lines from the sketch became popular catchphrases, including Flavius's order of a "martinus" in a Roman bar, and the repeated lament of Caesar's widow Calpurnia in a thick Bronx accent, "I told him, 'Julie, don't go!'" It is considered Wayne and Shuster's most famous sketch.

The Toronto Sketch Comedy Festival, also known as the TOSketchfest, is an annual comedy festival in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, devoted to sketch comedy. Held over 12 days in March, the festival presents performances by both established and emerging sketch comedy troupes from Canada and the United States.

Paul Kenneth Willis was a Canadian sketch comedian, most noted as one half of the comedy duo La Troupe Grotesque with Michael Boncoeur in the 1970s and 1980s.

Gay Claitman is a Canadian sketch comedian and writer, who won two ACTRA Awards for Radio Variety Performance and Radio Variety Writing at the 8th ACTRA Awards in 1979 for her work with Nancy White and Robert Cameron on the radio play Lies My Mother Told Me.

References

  1. ↑ Jack Batten "Two-man La Troupe Grotesque produces superb satire". The Globe and Mail , March 1, 1973.
  2. ↑ "Young Actor Provides for Future". The Globe and Mail , August 4, 1962.
  3. ↑ Herbert Whittaker, "Open-coffin satirists: from high schoolish to brilliant". The Globe and Mail , July 10, 1969.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Robert Dayton, "La Troupe Grotesque". ByNWR.
  5. ↑ Bob Allen, "Grotesque pair have improved". The Province , September 16, 1974.
  6. ↑ Jack Batten, "Outrage is business for La Troupe Grotesque". The Globe and Mail , January 13, 1973.
  7. ↑ Peter Rehak, "Performer, writer took comedy to the edge in 1960s: Show business pioneer: Helped establish Canada as centre for comedic talent". National Post , December 7, 1999.
  8. ↑ Mark Breslin, "Paul K. Willis". The Globe and Mail , April 11, 2000.
  9. ↑ Blaik Kirby, "Can CBC radio build a bridge between glitter rock and Beethoven?". The Globe and Mail , November 2, 1976.
  10. ↑ John Fraser, "Waste, no taste in Brown Wrapper". The Globe and Mail , January 27, 1977.
  11. 1 2 "Police hunt former CBC comic's killer". Vancouver Sun , March 27, 1991.
  12. ↑ Elina MacNiven, "Air Farce, Frantics return this summer: Tuning in for radio chuckles". The Globe and Mail , June 30, 1984.
  13. ↑ Elina MacNiven, "CBC spoof of the year that was". The Globe and Mail , January 5, 1985.
  14. ↑ Charles Hanley, "Chautauqua Girl has three chances for a Nellie: ACTRA names award nominees". The Globe and Mail , March 19, 1985.
  15. ↑ "ACTRA nominations for 15th annual Nellie Awards on April 2". Montreal Gazette , March 18, 1986.
  16. ↑ Paul McGrath, "This is way the world ends: first wimps. then a bang". The Globe and Mail , September 14, 1985.
  17. ↑ Barbara Crook, "Cats backstage: More than meets the eye". Ottawa Citizen , September 28, 1988.
  18. ↑ "Ex-radio comic stabbed to death". Waterloo Region Record , March 26, 1991.
  19. 1 2 3 John Duncanson and Bill Taylor, "Ex-comic murdered by robber police say". Toronto Star , March 26, 1991.
  20. ↑ Patricia Orwen, "Why juvenile violence is on the rise". Toronto Star , August 3, 1991.
  21. 1 2 3 Pam Becker, "Drawing from life". Chicago Tribune , December 17, 2004.
  22. ↑ Gary Oakes, "Teenage murderer to serve time in two jails: First two years to be spent in reformatory". Toronto Star , February 24, 1994.
  23. ↑ Libby Stephens, "Laughing 'til we stop: Stand And Deliver: Inside Canadian Comedy By Andrew Clark". Toronto Star , May 17, 1997.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.