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Derek Edwards

Reviews and Articles

Stand-up comedy is truly a miraculous art form.

With what other method of performance could one be entertained for a full non-stop hour and a half by a single person on a blank stage — and nothing else in his hands but a microphone?

In this day and age where we are blasted with flashy entertainment everywhere we turn, where it seems like there’s now this unspoken rule that says something needs to have extra bells and whistles in order to hold our apparently diminishing attention spans, the sole stand-up comic by his lonesome on the stage is unquestionably a welcomed break.

But I think we’re drawn to it as well because of our innate love of storytelling as a human species — this inborn desire to gather ’round someone, sit back, let them do the talking and have a good laugh at anything under the sun of this weird thing called life and the stupid things we do within it.

In one other odd way, it’s akin to the feeling of watching a bullfight. The bullfight crowd scoffs, "C’mon. Look at this skinny guy being thrown out there. There’s no way he’s gonna’ defeat this huge bull with that flappy red rag and a sword." And then he does. And they are amazed. (And many of us are disturbed …) With stand-up, it’s like, "C’mon. Look at this guy thrown out there. There’s no way he’s gonna’ make us laugh for this whole show." And then he does. And we are amazed, and amused, all at the same time.

Whatever it is, it is obvious from the virtually sold-out crowd of all age groups at the Confederation Centre of the Arts last Saturday night that stand-up is no dying art and many Islanders are aware that Derek Edwards is a comedic genius of grand-scale proportions.

Hailing from Timmins, Ont., this comedian, who has spent now 15 years at the top of the Canadian comedy scene, was recently named Best Standup Comic at the Canadian Comedy Awards.

"Oh, he’s the best in North America for what he does," well-known Island comic Francois Weber said, as I talked to him in the lobby before the show.

"No one can touch him."

Needless to say, this raised up the expectation bar a little more than a hair.

However, by the end of his 90-minute set of absolute hilarity, the all-out numb muscle-burn in my stomach said it all: If Canada were ancient Egypt, this guy would be the Pharaoh of Funny.
To the tune of Stuck in the Middle with You, Edwards made his entrance to the mainstage, just after 8 p.m., as the crowd welcomed him in mammoth applause.

"Thanks very kindly," Edwards greeted us with a smile. "I love Charlottetown. I love any town where you can get persnickety about what Tim Horton’s you might wanna’ go to," he grinned.

From that point onward, as the first laughs rumbled through the theatre, Edwards proceeded to take us on a wild, hot-boxed, Canadian road trip joyride through all that’s bizarre, brainless, annoying and just plain out-to-lunch about us.

The topics touched on included buffalo chicken fingers (and what are they), the absurd abundance of Island knick-knack stores, the oddity of wave pools on P.E.I., prosthetic pet genitalia, the unintelligent mixture of camping/outdoor sports and inebriation, 8:30 a.m. lineups at liquor stores, the pretense of Toronto, the bordering-on-undetectable joys of marriage and getting lost in Loblaws. It was a joyride that always seemed to have one laugh right around the bend to outdo the previous one.

And all the while, it was fueled by Edwards’ impeccable sense of timed punches. Many of the best comics have this, of course.

But with Edwards, it is just so natural — no nerves, as if he’s just hanging out with us, shootin’ the crap, but meanwhile nailing every single line.

He’s a machine of memorized material whose timing is like clockwork.

But, he’s got a quick improv wit on the spot, too, as exemplified in one of my favourite parts of the show, where he said, "I’m from Timmins. Anyone here been to that place?"

"I went to school with you!" shouted a man from the audience.

"You went to school with me?" Edwards put his hand to his brow to see the man’s face through the lights.

"Oh, yeah, I remember you. You burned me on that hash deal in Grade 9," he said, as the crowd erupted in laughter.

Yep. If this were a bullfight, Edwards not only defeated that bull, he dressed it up in a pink bonnet and dress, waltzed to Mozart with it around the ring and had a tea party in the centre of the stadium with it before our very eyes.

He is, indeed, a true matador-conquistador of comedy.

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Last modified: August 18, 2008