Rick Mercer to ‘talk to Canadians’ in hilarious new memoir
Twenty years after Rick Mercer started ‘Talking to Americans’, he has now switched focus to his home and native land. He joins us this morning with tidbits from his hilarious new memoir ‘Talking to Canadians’.
Mercer says when he started writing his memoir, he had to reflect on his past, which is something he says he wasn’t used to doing. One memory he was most shocked and dumbfounded by was one of the fitness tests he and many other Canadians kids were made to do in school.
“I was not a really reflective guy, I was always busy moving forward,” said Mercer. “But when I started writing about elementary school, I started thinking about [a fitness test], and I was triggered.”
When he called his friends to hear their opinions on the fitness test, their responses were that of complete horror. He says he remembers a certain test called “the flexed arm hang” which was invented by the marines to break their soldiers in training.
“Somehow the Canadian government did it and then posted the results up for everyone to see,” said Mercer.
In the memoir, Mercer refers to himself as being a mediocre kid. Considering where he ended up, he says this memoir is “a blueprint for the mediocre.”
“I was such a poor student and it wasn’t something I was proud of, but it wasn’t something I I could avoid,” said Mercer. “I just couldn’t figure it out, I was always treading water and to this day I have nightmares that I haven’t finished my homework.”
Once he discovered the drama club, he says he suddenly became the most focused person in the room.
When Mercer was in grade ten, the drama club was announced. He remembers a lot of his school peers making fun of the extracurricular. He says he was sure it would be social suicide to join.
“For an entire year I didn’t [join],” said Mercer. “It wasn’t until grade eleven that I guess found the internal fortitude to not care.”
After he joined, he says his life changed. He decided to quit the drama club after working backstage for a play that he didn’t like. His drama teacher said it would be a terrible idea for him to do so. When Mercer asked why, his teacher said he would miss out on the provincial drama festival.
“I said, ‘well, what’s the play?’ and my teacher said, ‘I don’t know, you haven’t written it yet’,” said Mercer.
From that point forward, he stayed and it was his responsibility to write a play for the drama club. He says from that experience, he met people who would eventually become his comedy partners, who would form a comedy troupe and would eventually play in theaters and bars.
“Everything changed and I continued working in comedy ever since,” said Mercer.
When it comes to Talking to Americans, Mercer says it was a fluke how the special came to be. When he was in the Unites States doing stand-up shows, he met a man who was asking him about Canada. Mercer began joking with him and claiming Canadians didn’t know the alphabet among other jokes. When he realized the man believed him, he got the idea to travel around America and interview people in the same manner.
Mercer will be coming to Hamilton on April 28, hosting Just for Laughs at the First Ontario Centre.
