SCTV
Second City TV, alternatively SCTV was a comedic television series, started in Toronto, Canada, in 1976, by writers and actors at the Toronto branch of The Second City Improv theatre.[1]
The show was originally broadcast on Global TV, Canada's nascent third nationwide television network. Original stars of the series included Jayne Eastwood, John Candy, Eugene Levy, Catherine O'Hara, Andrea Martin, Joe Flaherty, Dave Thomas, Harold Ramis, Rick Moranis and Martin Short.[1]
Production of the series moved from Toronto, to Edmonton, Alberta, for two seasons, in 1980.[2]
Strange Brew
[edit | edit source]When the series first started to be broadcast in the United States broadcast regulations in the United States allowed them pack in two additional minutes of commercials every half hour. So producers decided they would film two minutes of content not intended for the USA. Dave Thomas and Rick Moranis created two stereotypically Canadian characters, Doug and Bob Mackenzie, for those two minutes. They wore toques and lumberjack shirts, over Hockey jerseys. They liked to drink beer, and referred to a case of beer as a "two-four". The characters were popular, and they decided to make a spin-off film, entitled Strange Brew, which borrowed the plot to William Shakespears's Hamlet.
References
[edit | edit source]- ↑ 1.0 1.1
Marty Younge (2019-12-09). "What it takes to be first at The Second City". CBC News. Retrieved 2026-01-14.
The original Second City was opened in Chicago in 1959 as a place to study and perform Paul Sills' method of improvisational acting that had been developed by his mother and the mother of all improv, Viola Spolin.
- ↑
"Second City's second city: Edmonton gets kudos for helping SCTV really take off, comedian says". CBC News. 2018-04-17. Retrieved 2026-01-14.
Not that he's complaining. If anything, those true northern realities contributed to some great television during the year-and-a-bit that Thomas and the cast of the Canadian sketch comedy SCTV were based in Alberta's capital city.