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Winnipeg Free Press
03-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Winnipeg Free Press
Funny story
Opinion Welcome to Jen Tries, a semi-regular series in which Free Press columnist Jen Zoratti tries something new and reports back. In this instalment, Jen Tries… standup comedy. No surprise here, but I love telling stories. Especially funny stories. MATT DUBOFF PHOTO Columnist Jen Zoratti performed standup for the first time this week at the Winnipeg Comedy Festival. I was at a party last year telling, as it happens, a Jen Tries story and my pal Shannon Guile, who works at the Winnipeg Comedy Festival, told me I should try Laughing With the Stars, the festival's pro-am show wherein local celebrities take the stage alongside local professional comedians and try standup comedy for the first time. I said yes, and then immediately got the stress sweats. Why did I agree to this? Don't get me wrong: I think I am funny, and I think other people do, too, because 'you're so funny' is feedback I have received. But being funny and being a comedian are not the same thing. I'm not professionally funny. I occasionally use humour in my writing, but I would never call myself a 'humour columnist' because that's way too much pressure to be funny all the time. I'd rather the fact that I'm an occasional newspaper clown be a delightful discovery about me, like how I lose all sense of direction inside a mall. I got out of doing Laughing With the Stars last year because of scheduling. But when Winnipeg Comedy Festival artistic director Dean Jenkinson asked me again this year, I had no excuse not to. It's always easier to not do things than to do things. So I decided to do the thing. Every little girl in the 1990s wanted to be a marine biologist for some reason. I did too, but I also wanted to be a writer, a TV meteorologist, a flight attendant and, yes, a standup comedian. Your guess as to how I even knew what a standup comedian was is as good as mine, since I do not believe it was one of Barbie's careers at the time. But I did grow up in a comedy house. I was sentient for Seinfeld's heyday and was raised on NBC Must-See TV sitcoms. And I did know what it felt like to be able to make people laugh. Discovering that you can make people laugh is like 'figuring out I could make a rainbow appear on the wall just by staring at it,' to borrow a quote from musician Kathleen Hanna on finding her singing voice. It's a superpower. I'm painting a picture of an outgoing, class-clown kid, but I was actually quite shy — or 'reserved' as the report cards used to like to call it. When I pictured a career as a comedian as a kid, I wasn't wishing I could be someone else. I was wishing I could be myself, out loud, in front of everyone. All this to say, performing my own comedy set in a pair of light-wash jeans has been a dream of mine since the '90s. It's bucket-list stuff for me. It just took turning 40 to get there. I took the assignment very seriously. By January or February, I had my set down. A couple of jokes were pulled from my column, but the rest was all new. I didn't want to share anecdotes; I wanted to challenge myself to craft a standup routine. My bits kept evolving. I'd think of new ideas as I was falling asleep, sometimes even while I was asleep. I ran my set all the time — on walks, in the shower. I figured out pacing and delivery. I figured out better pacing, better delivery. I cut stuff that wasn't working. In the end, I had written — and memorized — eight minutes of comedy that I was proud of. There was nothing left to do but do it. I kept telling people I wasn't nervous despite the fact this show has been saved in my calendar for months as 'COMEDY FEST OH NO.' By the time I was in the green room backstage at the Gas Station Arts Centre with my fellow stars — CBC's Marcy Markusa, CJOB's Richard Cloutier, University of Winnipeg professor Marc Kuly and entomologist Taz Stuart — I tried to focus on the excitement, not the nerves. It was reassuring to see that the professionals were pacing in the wings just like us amateurs. Veteran Winnipeg comedian Big Daddy Tazz was our host and guide; he gave us good advice such as 'don't walk on your laugh,' which basically means allow your laugh room before moving on to the next bit. When it was finally my turn — sixth, excruciating — I took a breath and did my set. And people laughed. I get why people get addicted to doing standup. When your humour is mostly written, you never get to hear the laugh in the room. Hearing the laugh in the room is the warmest embrace. At the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, Japanese skip Fujisawa Satsuki wrote a mantra on her hand. 'I'm a good curler. I have confidence. Let's have fun.' Now, I am not saying that doing eight minutes of something that isn't even my actual job is as stressful as competing at the literal Olympics, but listen: pressure is pressure. I adopted a modified version of Satsuki's words in the lead-up to the Comedy Fest. Wednesdays A weekly look towards a post-pandemic future. 'I am funny. I have confidence. Let's have fun.' There's something particularly instructive about that last part, 'Let's have fun.' It can be so easy to let stress or anxiety jump into the driver's seat in moments like this. But I didn't want my comedy set to be something I 'got through.' I wanted it to be a thing I enjoyed. Even if I never do comedy again, I'm so proud of myself for challenging myself in this way — even though it was scary, even though the possibility of failure was high. People have been asking me how it went. And I can honestly say: 'I had so much fun.' Jen ZorattiColumnist Jen Zoratti is a columnist and feature writer working in the Arts & Life department, as well as the author of the weekly newsletter NEXT. A National Newspaper Award finalist for arts and entertainment writing, Jen is a graduate of the Creative Communications program at RRC Polytech and was a music writer before joining the Free Press in 2013. Read more about Jen. Every piece of reporting Jen produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print – part of the Free Press's tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates. Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber. Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
Winnipeg Free Press
29-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Winnipeg Free Press
Crowdwork makes the show work for comedy improv duo
No rehearsal, no Notes app and no prepared remarks: Alex Forman and Nash Park follow the crowd's lead when taking the stage as a comedy duo. For the last three years, the British Columbia comics have used audience members — their relationships, their careers, their morbid, strange realities — as an evergreen reservoir of one-night-only material, building improvised sets completely off a crowdwork foundation. Typically, that type of audience interaction is meant to support road-tested material, but for Park, originally from Terrace, B.C., and Forman, who was born and raised in Virden, the improvised jostling is at the root of everything. Nash Park (left) and Alex Forman 'Standups use their own stories to tell a joke. We use other people's stories to tell a joke together,' says Forman, who with Park, Jon Dore and a lineup of other comedians, will bring the Crowd Work Show to the Gas Station Arts Centre on Thursday as part of the Winnipeg Comedy Festival. One of the most difficult parts of being a working comedy producer and performer is to consistently develop fresh sets while also promoting your work online, says Park, who's done comedy for seven years. Comedians are weary of repeating themselves, especially in small comedy circuits, he adds. Crowdwork presents an opportunity for comedians to develop rapport, keep audiences engaged and push beyond the expected boundaries of the form. Crowdwork can also go viral without comedians having to blow any punchlines. 'It's like scraps of fun for the internet,' comedian Jordan Jensen, who headlined at Rumor's Comedy Club last weekend, said on a recent episode of Bein' Ian with Jordan, the podcast she co-hosts with Ian Fidance. Some industry veterans — including that episode's guest, Todd Barry — worry that the increased emphasis on crowdwork as a driver for online engagement has reduced the perceived value of well-honed material. But the response by audiences, both in person and on social media, has led crowdwork to become more than throwaway fodder or a dead-air filler. 'A lot of traditional comedians really don't like crowdwork because to them it goes against the artform because it's the only thing that really goes viral,' says Park, who thinks there's room for both preparation and randomness. 'But I feel the way we're doing it is kind of different. We kick up dust and once there's enough in the air we start playing around. We start out really broad, as opposed to pointing at a table and saying, 'You.'' Inviting the audience into a setting that feels like the midway point between an improv show and a light roast of non-celebrities, Forman and Park give the crowd a certain sense of control over the outcome. Before the show, one audience member is given a confetti cannon, which they're responsible for setting off as soon as they think the performance should end. And as soon as the comics take the stage, they begin to gently interrogate and tease out humour from attendees, building bits from those scraps. 'Coming from Virden, teasing is my love language,' says Forman, who says the southwestern Manitoba town 'trained me to be a comedian.' 'Virden really equipped me to be who I am. I was the shyest kid in the world and that town beat that out of me.' During Elections Get campaign news, insight, analysis and commentary delivered to your inbox during Canada's 2025 election. The formula has been working well for three years for Forman and Park, who co-own a comedy events company and podcast called OK Dope. They run monthly shows in Victoria, with recent showcases on Vancouver Island, Regina and Saskatoon. After their stop in Winnipeg, the duo will head to Calgary and Edmonton. Last month, Forman and Park recorded a special at Victoria's Hecklers comedy club, set to be released on their YouTube channel in the coming months. 'The audience teases us and we tease them,' says Forman, who describes the vibe as a low-intensity roast conducted by two soft comics who know what it feels like to be bullied. 'We're both incredibly broken people,' Park says with a laugh. Ben WaldmanReporter Ben Waldman is a National Newspaper Award-nominated reporter on the Arts & Life desk at the Free Press. Born and raised in Winnipeg, Ben completed three internships with the Free Press while earning his degree at Ryerson University's (now Toronto Metropolitan University's) School of Journalism before joining the newsroom full-time in 2019. Read more about Ben. Every piece of reporting Ben produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press's tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates. Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber. Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
Winnipeg Free Press
25-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Winnipeg Free Press
Local jokester rides comedic convergence from pizza purveyor to artistic director of the Winnipeg Comedy Festival
Did you hear the one about the pizza cook who went on to become the artistic director of the most watched comedy festival on Canadian television? In the spring of 1990, a then-19-year-old Dean Jenkinson was working part-time at Sbarro, an Italian-flavoured spot in the CF Polo Park food court. Jenkinson, a dry wit blessed with a deadpan delivery, was cracking his co-workers up so much over the course of their shifts together that they ultimately convinced him to enter an open-mic competition at an Osborne Village comedy club. RUTH BONNEVILLE / FREE PRESS Comedian Dean Jenkinson is celebrating his fifth anniversary as artistic director of the Winnipeg Comedy Festival, which kicks off next week. He enjoyed the experience immensely — more about that in a sec — and 35 years and thousands of punchlines later, Jenkinson is presently toasting his fifth anniversary at the helm of the Winnipeg Comedy Festival, which runs in venues across the city from April 29 to May 4. (The joke was on him; during his inaugural year as artistic director in 2020, the annual weeklong event was forced to shift from its usual springtime slot to late summer as a result of COVID-19. Ditto in 2021.) Although Jenkinson isn't scheduled to perform at the 2025 festival — highlights will air on CBC Television later in the year — he refers to his director's role as being the best of both worlds. 'With all the sacrifices you have to make as a standup in this country — around travel and being away from home and kids and family — I'm really grateful to have something stable in the industry that's comedy-related, and that I get so much satisfaction out of,' he says, seated in an Academy Road coffee shop where he is sporting a This Hour Has 22 Minutes windbreaker, a memento of the decade-and-a-half he spent writing for the award-winning TV program. 'That said, every time I do get the chance to step on stage, I'm reminded of why I fell in love with comedy in the first place… how much fun it can be when you and the audience are locked in, when they believe in you and you believe in yourself and every word coming out of your mouth is gold. Now, whether that's actually the case or not is another story altogether.' Jenkinson, 54, was born in Edmonton, the second of three brothers. His family moved to St. Norbert when he was four, after his father accepted a teaching position at the University of Manitoba. Describing himself as a pretty decent student who regularly pulled straight As, he quotes one of his favourite actors when asked if, as one might expect, he ever fit the bill of class clown. 'Billy Crystal once said there's a difference between being the class clown and being the class comedian. The class clown is the guy who runs naked across the football field, while the class comedian is the guy who convinces him to do it. I was probably more the second guy.' Jenkinson wasn't sure what direction he wanted to go in after graduating from Silver Heights Collegiate in 1989. He was gifted on the electronic organ, which led to a gig playing at Winnipeg Jets home games at the old Winnipeg Arena, but he doubted there was much of a future in that. 'Billy Crystal once said there's a difference between being the class clown and being the class comedian. The class clown is the guy who runs naked across the football field, while the class comedian is the guy who convinces him to do it. I was probably more the second guy.' It was assumed he would attend university because of his grades and he eventually chose architecture as his field of interest, believing it would be a good blend of creative and analytical thinking. 'What I quickly learned, however, is that I didn't have any particular talent or passion for it, and I started getting the first Cs of my life,' he states. He stuck with the three-year program nonetheless, and it was shortly after his first year of studies when he landed the aforementioned job at the food court. That led directly to the open-mic experiment, an overwhelming success thanks to a set of circumstances Jenkinson vows he wouldn't repeat in a 'million years.' To boost his confidence, he invited practically everyone he knew to come cheer him on. 'There were tables of people from work, tables of people from school, tables of friends and family. They laughed at everything I said and if that hadn't been the case, who knows if I'd have tried again,' he says, mentioning if he remembers correctly, his monologue that evening revolved mainly around recent movies. 'Honestly, it probably wasn't until my fourth or fifth time on stage when I ate it pretty hard and was like, 'oh, I guess you don't kill every night.'' Around the same time as his comedic debut, Jenkinson landed a second part-time job, one that involved delivering singing telegrams for a party and event-planning business called Scheme a Dream. Among the office staff was Jon Ljungberg, an experienced comedian and the future host of Citytv's Breakfast Television. After Jenkinson informed Ljungberg that he, too, was interested in standup, Ljungberg let him know that Rumor's Comedy Club on Corydon Avenue was in the market for local hosts to warm up audiences for headliners. Scot McTaggart, who managed Rumor's for six years before opening the Academy Road restaurant Fusion Grill in 1996, picks up the story from there. McTaggart had been in his position for three months in June 1990 when, within the space of a few hours, he lost both of his regular emcees. He adopted a next-person up mentality by handling the host duties himself, but it soon became abundantly clear that live comedy wasn't his forte. MIKE DEAL / FREE PRESS FILES Comedian Dean Jenkinson in 2006. A few minutes into his second night as host, a person seated near the front of the Rumor's stage made the sound effect of a bomb whistle — loud enough for everyone in the room to hear — along with the ensuing explosion, as McTaggart's attempts at humour failed over and over again. 'I had already seen Dean's act, I think at the Comedy Oasis, when he contacted me through Jon and I hired him immediately, owing to the fact that my short experience running a comedy club obviously meant I was a great judge of talent,' McTaggart says, breaking into a grin. 'Or maybe it had something to do with me having zero interest of ever getting on a stage again, and Dean being more than willing to do just that.' McTaggart says one of the challenges of hosting as many as seven shows a week was that there were a fair number of Rumor's regulars who frowned upon hearing the same routine twice in a short period. That never bothered headliners who simply moved on to the next city, but it presented a problem for locals such as Jenkinson to constantly come up with fresh material. 'Dean, or 'Clean Dean' as we called him, because his stuff was always clever, bright and for the most part, G-rated, was always up to the task,' McTaggart recalls. 'I don't want to say he was a normal guy because there's nothing normal about wanting to get up in front of a group of people with your pants by your ankles, but honestly he was. He loved comedy and he loved the science of putting a joke together. I never heard a bad word about Dean, which is almost impossible to say in that biz.' By the late 1990s, Jenkinson's shtick had caught the attention of the producers of CBC Winnipeg's suppertime news hour. They were looking for somebody to deliver weekly satirical rants about whatever was in the headlines and they invited Jenkinson to their Portage Avenue studio to audition. 'I guess they liked what I had to offer because I ended up doing that for a few years,' says Jenkinson, who would often accompany himself on guitar, Adam Sandler-like, as he cracked wise about crime statistics or goings-on in the mayor's office. His work there opened the door to take on writing opportunities for The Royal Canadian Air Farce, The Debaters and, in 2011, for Kunal Nayyar and Simon Helberg — more commonly known as Raj and Howard from the hugely popular CBS sit-com The Big Bang Theory — when the pair hosted a Just for Laughs skit called Tribute to Nerds, at a showcase event in Montreal. JOE BRYKSA / FREE PRESS FILES Dean Jenkinson as Mr. Chuckles on stage at the Winnipeg Comedy Festical in February, 2007. 'It was definitely a challenge writing jokes and skits for other people,' Jenkinson. 'Initially there was a lot of self-doubt and asking myself, 'is this good enough? Do I dare show it to them?' I gradually got over that hump until it became a case of 'Oh, you didn't like that joke? Well here's another, and another…'' Comedian Lara Rae co-founded the Winnipeg Comedy Festival in 2002, and served as artistic director until Jenkinson succeeded her five years ago. Rae can't think of a person better suited to the role than Jenkinson, with whom she's worked on numerous occasions. 'We first met in 2001 when I helped him get a job for a sit-com on Global called Big Sound, then shortly after that we did a fringe play together, a musical called How Do You Know When You're Done?' Rae says, when reached at home. 'We have a very good and strong friendship and he was one of a handful of male friends who was there for me when I transitioned in 2015, which could have been a tricky thing.' Rae says Jenkinson has the perfect mix of business acumen and comedic know-how that's required of an artistic director. 'Standups are a unique breed. We're outliers, we're iconoclasts, we're trouble-makers… and within the confines of television, which involves a lot of money and decision making, we don't always flourish,' says Rae, who chose Jenkinson to be her best man. 'One of the things I'm especially proud of with Dean is his ability to grow and develop in the 'business' part of show business. That's where he's really matured these last two decades because when it came to the 'show' part, he was always pretty solid.' Jenkinson, the father of a 14-year-old daughter, 12-year-old son and 15-year-old stepdaughter, says it's funny, but he can't remember ever entering into a conversation with his parents along the lines of what his backup plan was if 'this comedy thing' failed to pan out. 'I look back and think God bless them,' he says polishing off the last of his coffee. RUTH BONNEVILLE / FREE PRESS It's been 35 years since Dean Jenkinson entered an open-mic competition at a local comedy club. 'I mean, were they quietly shitting bricks, thinking they had this smart child who might grow up to be a doctor or lawyer, who's now working for minimum wage and chicken wings. Maybe they had intentions of intervening at some point, but luckily my income grew at a commensurate rate with my responsibilities and expenses, and it all worked out.' The same way Jenkinson used to solicit tips from veteran comics at Rumor's and other clubs he played, young up-and-comers now seek him out for advice. He tells them a large part of it is being in the right place at the right time, and being a person who doesn't drop the ball when an opportunity presents itself. 'It's like any other job, really. Be respectful, show up on time, don't make waves… A lot of it is just being a professional.' During Elections Get campaign news, insight, analysis and commentary delivered to your inbox during Canada's 2025 election. David Sanderson Dave Sanderson was born in Regina but please, don't hold that against him. Read full biography Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber. Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
