Network: CBC Television Network
Broadcast Run: 1969
Broadcast Medium: Television
Aired Saturday evenings, after hockey from Feb. 1 to March 15, 1969
After the cancellation of Barris & Company, this program went in the same timeslot for the rest of the NHL season. Produced in Montreal, it started in black and white in 1968, and went to colour when it went to the network the following winter. The show was filmed in the Versailles Room at The Windsor Hotel, in Montreal.
It was based on the radio show, Funny You Should Say That, starring Barrie Baldaro, Ted Zeigler and Joan Stuart. Comedy Cafe featured the trio and added George Carron and Dave Broadfoot, who later joined Royal Canadian Air Farce.
The program was easily adaptable to television, having proven itself on radio with some success. The show had an English-French dynamic that looked at the news of the day. L’Anglaises, a skit featuring a Franchophone husband and Anglophone wife, often expressed their unique points-of-view. This bit was orginally written by Peter Cullen and Joan Stuart. The show also debuted one of Dave Broadfoot’s most famous characters, The Member of Parliament for Kicking Horse Pass. John Morgan, a contributing writer, also joined Royal Canadian Air Farce later as a writer and performer.
The show also had a regular segment called The Tavern, which featured characters at the local watering hole, expressing their ideas over beer. The show was cancelled after six weeks while the whole unit went on to another show called Comedy Crackers in primetime.
Producer: Dale Barnes
Contributing Writer: Martin Bronstein
Written by John Corcelli – May, 2005