Category: Toronto Sketch Comedy Festival

Yeah I know it’s been a weird year, and yeah I get it’s totally OK of all you accomplished this year was staying alive, breathing and not murdering your roommate. I’ve been posting YIRs since 2016 and I’m not going to stop now. If there’s anything we’ve learned in 2020, it’s that among all the chaos, there’s still a whole lot to be grateful for and it’s easy to miss if you don’t take a second to appreciate it.

My lighthouse word for 2020 was NOW. I got into reading some Eckhart Tolle thanks to Pete Holmes and felt it’d be some super great reading for an improviser, an anxious person and for life in general. I think 2020 was the perfect year to have chosen that word, and that NOW couldn’t have come at a better time.

Here’s some of the good to come out of my many NOWs in 2020:

  • Ran two successful in-person editions of Guess Who’s Coming to Improv? & brought it back via Zoom just in time for its’ 6th anniversary.
  • My company held our first corporate events.
  • Continued teaching improv with The Second City Training Centre & successfully transitioned to doing so online since March. During his process, I taught my first Level D class, the highest level I’ve taught thus far.
  • Held my first table read for my sitcom pilot.
Improv Niagara team reading Brie's comedy pilot.
We had La Croix because this was a LEGIT writer’s room.
The cast of Improv Niagara and friends with Colin Mochrie.
Improv Niagara meets our improv hero Colin Mochrie
  • Continued seeing a counsellor to help manage my anxiety.
  • Performed in the Worlds Biggest Improv Tournament with Linda Julia Paolucci as Niagara Balls, and shared that one awesome night playing arcade games and eating garbage.
  • Auditioned a bunch in person, then sent out self-tapes galore.
  • Continued writing sketches with my Utilidors partner David Lahti, closing in on what will one day be an epic themed sketch revue.
  • Maintaining a 17-year tradition of interrupting my friend Curtis in the middle of the Super Bowl.
  • Held a short run of successful Improv Fallout shows at Mahtay Café before things closed down. (Bringing it back via FB Live in 2021!)
  • Held a short run of successful POPAGANDA shows at the John Candy Box Theatre before things closed down. Attempted one online version, which proved to be very complicated.
  • Performed stand-up comedy around the Niagara Region.
  • Recorded seven new episodes of The Constant Struggle Podcast with my brother Nick.
  • Performed many improv scenes and sets in Toronto & Niagara, including a set with the Second City Main Stage cast.
  • Performed in The Vagina Monologues at Camp Cataract (ICYI – I performed the The Woman Who Loved to Make Vaginas Happy monologue – that’s me to the right, in the pleather.)
The Women who performed The Vagina Monologues on stage at Camp Cataract in Niagara Falls, ON.
The incredible cast of The Vagina Monologues at Camp Cataract in Niagara Falls, ON
  • Participated in a Race & Theatre in Niagara workshop, hopeful more work continues on this front.
  • Premiered our pilot “Time Slicers” at the Toronto Sketch Comedy Film Festival.
  • Built up the courage to ask for something I really wanted.

And then, things happened. Life shifted. From home, I created different NOWs.

  • I binge-watched SO MUCH EPIC TV.
  • Many sweaty Sherwarrior workout sessions.
  • Performed many mini-online shows with Improv Niagara in the early days of the pandemic.
  • Began performing in Toronto-based online shows like Duo Derby and Connect 40, which did a great job of bringing the improv community back together in these tricky times.
  • Grew a vegetable and herb garden in my backyard.
  • Held my second official Writers’ Room. This time, digitally.
Zoom meeting of people's faces, reading Brie's pilot script.
Script Read-thru | Round 2
  • Participated in improv jams and classes with people from around the world from the comfort of my own home.
  • Participated in the virtual edition of In the Soil Festival with the women & enbies of Improv Niagara.
  • Held outdoor, socially distanced improv rehearsals in my backyard and in local parks.
  • Protested anti-black racism, police brutality & social injustice.
  • Spent a few weekends in London, ON working on an indie comedy about a cult.
  • Read 50 new, original Canadian comedy plays.
  • Began co-leading improv & mindfulness workshops with Stream Yoga + Meditation
  • Attended the Our Cities on Our Stages symposium online though Bad Dog Theatre.
  • Improv Niagara’s newest Kids’ Instructor, Simon, offered workshops with the Town of Pelham.
  • IN held a series of outdoor, socially-distanced improv shows at Camp Cataract for the summer.
  • Attended my first Zoom bris.
  • Was invited to guest on Tuong La’s Ranked podcast with Dan & Nick.
  • Celebrated 4 years of wedded bliss at the top of the Skylon Tower.
  • Learned how to grow and harvest cannabis.
  • Booked a role on a French web series for TFO & shot it in December (where I got my first swab.)
Selfie of Brie in full make-up, hair done, on set for the French webseries shoot.
On set as Mme. Gisèle.
  • Participated in an online version of Culture Days with Improv Niagara.
  • Participated in the Niagara Leadership Summit for Women and was reinvigorated by it.
  • Took an awesome workshop with my Chicago improv heroines Susan Messing & Rachael Mason.
  • IN participated online in Dunnville, ON’s River Arts Festival.
  • Improv Niagara wrote & performed a virtual sketch for Suitcase in Point’s Community Comedy Series
  • IN’s held our first ever student show, broadcast live via Facebook (because groups of 10+ were not permitted.)
  • Welland finally got a Starbucks
  • I stayed alive.
  • I breathed.
  • I Didn’t kill my roommate.

I’m thankful for all of the NOWs 2020 brought along and I do wish to continue working in being present and in the moment (luckily I’m in the right field for that.) NOW, my word for 2021 is very different. Stay tuned.

2019 | 2018 | 2017 | 2016

HAPPY 2021!

/ a nerdy THANK YOU NOTE to my sketch partner

In 2011, I was accepted into the Toronto Sketch Comedy Festival with the troupe I was in at Humber’s School of Comedy. We were one of the only active sketch troupes in the 2nd year of the program and were pretty much automatically allowed in by virtue of the fact we’d produced, like, one show outside Humber and a few video sketches (which are no longer available online, and this is probably for the best.)

Ever. since. then. I have been trying so hard to get a sketch project together, and in all honesty, it was not easy for me. I’ve been trying to be self-aware and to figure out why that was. Someone once told me I was difficult to work with; but I don’t think I’m difficult to work with. I work with a lot of people all the time. They don’t seem to think I’m hard to work with. I just don’t want to write sexist or misogynistic bullshit. Does that make me hard to work with?

It’s hard to get that note though. Because that’s the kind of stuff that sticks with you, and affects the way you approach future projects. All the future sketch projects I tried to get together consisted strongly of a constant monitoring of my behaviour to make sure I wasn’t over-Brie-ing it.

I tried a thing with trio that worked for a while, but not long enough to submit an application. We had problems coordinating our schedules and eventually faded out. I tried a duo thing, where we had one show, and it was fun, but it was not my partner’s priority, so that petered out too. I also never wanted to do solo-sketch so figuring it out on my own wasn’t an option either.

I watched as people I had worked with got into the festival with other projects time and again, and thought – well, why can’t I get my shit together and work this out?

Enter Dave Lahti. My sketch-knight in shining armour with bad knees.

There’s a top 10 things I love about working in comedy, and working with Dave is definitely in the top 3. Though we’re both pretty busy people with real jobs and real relationships, and real-life stuff going on in the background, we work really well together as sketch partners. I don’t even think he minds that much when I go all ENFP with scheduling and rehearsals, and well, I guess all the normal stuff a sketch troupe needs to do to succeed that I used to be called “difficult” for wanting to try to figure out.

Dave made traveling to Boston work, even though he had a huge other engagement with a close friend and had to leave the day after our show. He still made the trip super fun and memorable.

He’s performed with me at countless Humber shows even though he’s never stepped foot on the campus. (As far as I know.)

Last year, we applied to Sketchfest & didn’t get in. We’d only had a few sets under our belt, but I panicked this would discourage him from continuing with the project. When I asked him if he still wanted to play together, he gave such a resounding “yes!,” I may have shed a tear. So we powered through; wrote more, played more, drank more tiny bottles of liquor and got to work. He even came to my wedding for Pete’s sake. (Not you, Pete.)

And now, we’ve done it. 6 years later, I finally get to play in the Toronto Sketch Comedy Festival because we’ve earned it. Because I found my sketch partner. And because we paid the $25 entry fee.

If you want to see what this sappy bullshit looks like LIVE, check us out on March 3rd and 9th. We’re real fun. I promise.

screenshot-2017-02-10-21-45-47Here’s our Sketchfest profile, for your viewing pleasure and sexual excitation. (Click on the image.):

 

Sleep deprived driving is dangerous, you guys.

I guess there’s that moment when you realize, as a motorist, that you probably shouldn’t be on the road. Like, for me yesterday, it was about 6:30 pm on my way back from the FedEx depot because apparently my ROE is so important it can’t be sent by regular mail.  It came when I realized I felt dizzy with each push of the accelerator and as I stared out, without blinking at the road ahead and it seemed to widen and retract with every breath I took.

It was starting to feel a little like this:

When my eyes start playing tricks on me, that’s normally a sign that I’ve gone to too much sketch comedy for one week.

I’ve been (trying) to see as many shows at the Toronto Sketch Comedy Festival (henceforth known as TOsketchfest) as possible because a) I’ve been deemed the social media coordinator for the event and b) sketch comedy in Toronto is great and the line-up this year is fantastic.  BUT, I just started a new job, and the process of doing both right now is seriously impeding my health and well-being.  And what I mean by that is, holy crap I’m sleepy!

During my FedEx excursion (FedExcursion) I fought with myself for a good long time about whether or not I check out more shows, or go home, take a nap and see what happens.  The nap won, except it sortof turned into a 2.5 hour snooze, a drowsy phone call, and a return to sleep the rest of the night away.

And when I woke up… I WAS STILL TIRED!

Luckily, it’s Friday because:

  1. No boss at the office today;
  2. I don’t have to work tomorrow;
  3. I don’t have to wake up super early for work tomorrow;
  4. I don’t have to drive tonight

…so I can go out and see as many shows as possible until I pass out in the audience and have a member of some big-time sketch troupe (oxymoron?) staring at me disapprovingly after having been prodded awake by an audience-member disgruntled by my noisy snoring.

So far, the Festival has been fun, but I really wish I was currently more awake and alert so I could be blogging about how amazing Bruce McCulloch’s show was, or how it was dang nifty to meet Eugene Mirman…

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I swear I was going to my car and NOT following him, OK!?

…or how much of a blast it was to perform in Nerd Off, even though I’m not in a sketch troupe participating in the festival this year, but I have a buddy who likes to look out for me! (Thanks Erin!)

I’d love to rave about it!

But I’m so tired.

New jobs, eh?   The worst…

/The best.

Yay for work!

See you tonight @TOsketchfest!