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Age changes nothing
Kids in the Hall come to the Riverside
By Alex Rewey
Fortunately, their willingness to push the envelope is mainly humorous rhetoric in this instance. Several more hot button issues don’t get off as easily. In a slew of brand new material, their targets: religion, homosexuality, drug use, and more, appeared as familiar territory for fans despite not quite seeming as taboo as they once did.
Despite a few extra pounds, a few extra wrinkles, and more than a few gray hairs, sketch comedy troupe, The Kids In The Hall, seemed anything but over the hill during their performance Saturday night at the Riverside Theater as part of their “Live As We’ll Ever Be” tour.
Playing to a packed house on the second of 40 gigs throughout the US and Canada, all five original members, Dave Foley, Bruce McCulloch, Kevin McDonald, Mark McKinney, and Scott Thompson all appeared as comfortable and sharp as ever.
It’s been nearly fifteen years since the last KITH episode aired and 6 years since they’ve shared a stage with each other. Now, the “kids” are in their late forties, all with debatably varying degrees of career obscurity.
This point is hardly lost on them, as the show began with a taped sketch of the group sitting before a morbidly blank board of sketch ideas, their days of as the fresh, young, and controversial voices of comedy seemingly behind them. Their solution? Rape Kevin in the front of the audience, which they collectively (except for Kevin of course) agree is much funnier than raping say, Bruce. That’s shocking and edgy, right?
Fortunately, their willingness to push the envelope is mainly humorous rhetoric in this instance. Several more hot button issues don’t get off as easily. In a slew of brand new material, their targets: religion, homosexuality, drug use, and more, appeared as familiar territory for fans despite not quite seeming as taboo as they once did. Thankfully however, the sketches were less rehashed ideas than wonderfully matured comedic reviews.
Now, the young, single, and wild gay stereotypes of the “Steps” sketches have been replaced by a middle-aged homosexual couple, played perfectly by Foley and Thompson. The two hilariously bicker while seeking marriage counseling for of all things, closet heterosexuality and emotional ambivalence.
Even familiar characters appeared a little older, but still acted as the troupe’s mouthpiece for semi-serious social commentary. McCulloch and Thompson’s secretarial duo “Kathy and Cathy” returned in a skit about a chance encounter years after their layoff in the final episode from the group’s hilarious send-up of 1980s and 90s corporatization, “A.T. & Love.”
The two’s once chatty and nauseatingly intimate relationship was noticeably replaced by the distance of time, during which McCulloch’s Kathie has become an enthusiastic user of crystal meth to replace her once youthful energy she brought daily to the typing pool.
Yet, the performance always remained comfortably close to the group’s roots in the absurdist tangents to the everyday. Foley repeatedly appeared throughout the performance as a time traveler who is constantly thwarted by his own temptations to use his machine for trivial personal gain, such as repeating last call over and over again.
The whole evening was very much a return to form of the group’s early days performing at the Rivoli Theatre in Toronto. Very few sketches required much more than a prop or two coupled with a modest projected background. However, even a lo-fi setup presented its own unique technical hiccups not quite perfected this early in the tour. Thompson, Foley, and McCulloch each had a few opportunities for improv, proving that they could still role with the punches.
The show’s coup de grace saw the return of McKinney’s “Headcrusher,” equipped with a camera linked to the projection system for the distinctive point-of-view shot of his many victims. The rest of the cast members were then paraded out in POW fashion for a wonderfully self-deprecating roast before each being summarily “crushed” as punishment for their own comedic or career shortcomings.
In an interview with a Columbus publication, Thompson jokingly cited each group member’s mediocrity and failure in all other work as this latest tour’s inception. However, distinctly high levels of enthusiasm and confidence by all the members throughout the performance suggest the lengthy tour is hardly a chore for them.
It also helps that the KITH fan base is the very definition of cult following. Growing up with their reruns, KITH one-liners became a language in and of itself, alienating many a family member or friend in the process. This is probably why looking around the Riverside, I couldn’t remember ever witnessing, or even visualizing so many dedicated fans in any one place.
Even after their 1996 feature film Brain Candy, and two live tours since the show’s demise, the troupe members still seem a bit awestruck and modest about their success and tremendous influence on modern sketch comedy. Foley, McDonald, and Thompson all informally received delighted fans in the lobby after the show, signing autographs, answering questions, and even knocking back a few Riverwest Steins with the crowd.
When asked about the future of the group, Foley admitted that the idea of writing a second KITH film was being excitedly discussed among the group while planning for the current tour. Thankfully, if Saturday’s performance is any indicator, these kids still have a lot of life left in them.
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