There isn’t anything funny about cancer, but the gang at Monday hear that laughter is good medicine so we’ve decided to host an evening of comedy, music and musical comedy to raise money for pediatric cancer research.
Black Press is lucky enough to have Saanich News reporter Kyle Slavin on the Cops for Cancer Tour de Rock team this year, and as our contribution to the cause, we rallied the most hilariously talented army of troops our fair city could provide to battle for laughs and applause at Club 9ONE9, Tues., July 31 for Comedy For Cancer.
Leading the pack is emcee Jason Lamb. This early-rising radio (The Zone 91.3) and comedy club (Heckler’s) host has opened for some of Canada’s comedy elite, including Russell Peters and Norm MacDonald, and Americans Bob Saget and most recently, Jon Lovitz.
“This is such a great cause,” says Lamb, whose co-host, Dylan Willows, did the Tour de Rock in 2008. “I don’t think I have any cancer jokes, but it’s not really a ripe vein of comedy.”
Local funnyman Mike Delamont, who you may know as Carlo Rossi, Lando Rock, or simply — God, disagrees. “Maybe cancer is one of those things that you need to laugh really hard at,” he says. “It all depends on how you hit it.”
Delamont, who recently returned from the Montreal Fringe with his show God is a Scottish Drag Queen, was inspired to donate his talents to the lineup because of a friend he recently lost to cancer.
“It’s never the old fat guy who kills people that gets cancer,” he says, shaking his head in disbelief.
Adding the female perspective is soap opera star Kirsten Van Ritzen. But don’t worry, Van Ritzen isn’t only dramatic damsel, she’s one of the stars of the amusing Sin City Carnies, the improvised soap opera, which recently wrapped an almost 30-episode season at the Victoria Event Centre (nominated for a 2011 M Award for Best New Production).
And to get the music flowing, 2011 M Award winning Best Comedy Performer Wes Borg with his hilarious hits “I’m Just a Little Dumb (whenever you come around),” “Every OS Sucks,” “Get Me The Fuck Out Of Edmonton,” and the children’s classic, “Worse Than Hitler”, as well as old classics like “Toronto Sucks” and “The War of 1812.”
Watch for a collaboration between Borg and Delamont (with Morgan Cranny) at this year’s Victoria Fringe Festival (Aug. 23 – Sept. 2).
Also keen to make an impact is singer-songwriter Mike Edel. The recent Peak Performance Project Top 20 pick is bringing his guitar and smooth voice to the show. He recently had a nephew that was sick and staying at the Ronald McDonald house in Edmonton.
Edel and his band stopped in to play a show for the kids and their families. “I'll remember playing for those kids for a long time,” he says. “The music just did something different for those families facing a medical crisis than it did for people in the bar that night, and we played the same songs.”
Violinist-extremist Kytami will be shredding the strings with her brand of electronic fiddle fusion. And cabaret folk duo Auto Jansz and Andrea June will serenade the crowd.
All proceeds will go to support Slavin’s fundraising efforts for the Cops for Cancer Tour de Rock.
Slavin has covered the event for the Saanich News for two years and was impassioned to ride after watching the students at a local high school take ownership of their school’s contribution to the fundraising effort.
“I never saw that in my experience of high school,” says Slavin. “I never saw kids get behind something like Tour de Rock, and it’s so inspiring.”
Slavin needs to raise a minimum of $5,000 to do the 1,000-km ride from the north tip of Vancouver Island to Victoria, and he’s only $1,000 shy of that mark. But his personal goal is to raise $15,000 for the Canadian Cancer Society.
“I figured $5,000 is easily shatterable, and I thought $15,000 sounded like a good number. If I can beat it, even better.” M