The Current - How Mark Critch got an accidental exclusive with Justin Trudeau
Episode Date: December 31, 2024Comedian Mark Critch has landed a major political exclusive: an interview with Justin Trudeau, recorded shortly before the prime minister cancelled all his other year-end interviews. Critch shares wha...t Trudeau said about his political future; his Mar-a-Lago dinner with Trump; and why Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre refused the invite for a chat on This Hour Has 22 Minutes.
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In 2017, it felt like drugs were everywhere in the news,
so I started a podcast called On Drugs.
We covered a lot of ground over two seasons,
but there are still so many more stories to tell.
I'm Jeff Turner, and I'm back with Season 3 of On Drugs.
And this time, it's going to get personal.
I don't know who Sober Jeff is.
I don't even know if I like that guy.
On Drugs is available now wherever you get your podcasts.
This is a CBC Podcast.
Hello, I'm Matt Galloway, and this is The Current Podcast.
Now I want to see you eat it.
Excuse me? The hamburger.
The Big Mac, the president of all burgers.
I'm going to make you eat it like a dog with no hands.
Mr. President, I have self-respect.
Not so much, to be honest. I mean, I called and he came like a dog, didn't he? He really did.
Mon ami, I come to you not on bended knee, but as an equal.
30% tariff.
My father taught me to never... 50% tariff! We Canadians are a hard an equal. 30% tariff. My father taught me to never...
50% tariff.
We Canadians are a hearty lot.
60% tariff.
For Canada!
I'm a hungry little puppy.
I'm so hungry for my puppy child.
Oh, that was the 22 Minutes take
on Justin Trudeau's dinner at Mar-a-Lago last month.
And channeling Donald Trump is one of the funniest people in this country, Mark Critch.
He will be part of the 22 Minutes New Year's Eve pre-game special on CBC TV tonight at 8 and 8.30 in Newfoundland.
Hello, Mark.
Hi, Happy New Year.
And to you, you must be feeling pretty chuffed. As far as I can tell, you're the only guy who got a year-end interview with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau this year.
I did. I did get the big year-end interview.
Isn't that sad?
Nothing drives our great esteemed Canadian journalist crazier than when the clown gets the interview, you know?
So what did you have to do to get it, Mark?
Really, I'd been asking for a while and said, you know, hey, we should do something around
the end of the year. We have this special. And they were going, OK, yeah, we try and fit it in
here. We'll try and fit in something. And I think my luck happened in that so much was happening in
the world. There were so many fires that it kept
getting pushed off. And then they said one day, hey, we're going to be in Montreal on Friday,
if you can make it. And I think that was kind of a brush off, to be honest. And I was like,
yep, I can get there. And so I went to Montreal to a little restaurant there.
And we had a lovely, lovely chat. Yeah, we talked for ages.
Well, just to explain, of course, that was
before the bombshell announcement by Christy Freeland when he canceled everybody else.
Right before. Yeah, this is basically the Freeland bomb was dropping. You know,
if it was a cartoon, you'd hear, and right before the boom, we did the interview. But we did talk
about Woody stepped down, taking the walk in the snow like his father did.
We talked about all that stuff.
So it was it was it's still quite timely.
Now, he also talked about the famous infamous really dinner at Mar-a-Lago, which you have joked about.
And what did he actually say about that?
Well, he said, you know, it was what Mr.
Trump said when they'd be the 51st state, quite frankly, and let him stay on as the governor.
He was saying that he was, you know, he's making a joke about that and that it was all, you know,
just good natured. But we talked a bit about how, you know, Trump did like him a lot, I think.
And I, oh yeah, Trump seemed to really enjoy Justin and liked him a lot. And I think. And, um, I, well, yeah, Trump seemed to really enjoy, uh, Justin and liked
him a lot. And I think then Justin was caught on camera making fun of Trump to president Macron
and others. And the next day Trump started talking about tariffs. And I think he really liked him
and was hurt because he would have liked Justin because Justin's a famous father. He's well-known,
he's handsome, all things that Donald thinks about himself. He's well-known. He's handsome. All things
that Donald thinks about himself. And then he saw him. It's just like high school. Then all of a
sudden he heard, you know, Justin making fun of him in the hall. And he's like, I'm going to make
tariffs. I really am. Because Trump put out a book, it's a picture book, a coffee table book.
There's only quotes about three people. One is Melania. The other is Queen Elizabeth, who he
says liked him very much. And the third is Justin.
But he started – his quote about Justin is something like, Justin Trudeau, the prime minister of Canada, is a good guy.
We did some good work together.
I liked him very much.
He's handsome.
But a lot of people say he is the son of Castro, a communist and a horrible guy.
And it makes sense if you think about it.
But I don't know if it's true, but it probably is, is the quote.
Like he had to sit down and write that.
It's a ramble. But I think, yeah, I think he is mad at Canada,
partly because he had a little bro crush on Justin a bit,
and Justin broke his heart.
And now he just loves to poke him at every opportunity. Like he came down to Mar-a-Lago in like one second, I think he said.
Oh, yes, he came down like a dog, quite frankly.
But, you know, in it, when I was talking to the prime minister, I said, look, if I was you, I'd invite him up for the state dinner like you had for Biden, you know, get a couple of Mounties there, have the snowbirds fly over, do the whole thing.
And then he's going to flattery, I think, is a way to get around President Trump.
But also, I don't think much of this is overly real.
He knows he can get a reaction.
He throws things out there.
He wants to have a dragon to slay before he's even president.
I'd say he sets a 25% tariff.
He probably would settle for a 10% or whatever when he gets in.
And it'll come in with a little victory.
But by the time he's president, he'll completely have forgotten about us, I think.
Okay, so give me and our listeners a clue.
You talked to Justin Trudeau about the famous
walk in the snow that his father took when he decided to step down. Did he give you any answer
to that? I asked him, why the hell would you stay in? And he, you know, he said all the usual things,
you know, that because Canadians are in the middle and they're good people and Canadians
understand. But I think he really sees, you know, Pierre Palliev as a dragon.
And I think that he doesn't want to walk away because he thinks he does not want the country
to go that way. And he seemed very serious about staying then. But we did talk about that famous
walk in the snow. And he pointed out to me that when Pierre was Justin's age, he still had another 12 years of being
prime minister ahead of him.
Oh, he thinks he's got 12 years, does he?
Well, to which I replied, God help us. So who knows? But I think that all may have changed
recently. The two big breakups of the year for him, you know, he went through a big breakup
with Jagmeet and now a big breakup with Freeland. So I think, who knows what, I'm sure he did a lot of walking and a lot of snow over the holidays.
So we'll have to stay tuned.
There's got to be a country song in that somewhere.
Oh, absolutely. 100%.
You also talked with Jagmeet Singh in your program on Today.
And what did he have to say?
Well, Jagmeet is a Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt.
And I knew this about him. And I had boxed Prime Minister Trudeau in the past.
And so I asked him if he'd kind of fight me in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. And a story I loved from
the past year was when Jagmeet confronted some convoy protesters outside of parliament who were
calling him a corrupt person. And he kind of got in their face like, you want to go, bro?
Come on, I'll fight you, I'll fight you.
And they backed away.
And that was because he knew he could destroy them.
So I said, do to me what you would have done to them if you could have laid hands on them
and not been arrested.
And he just folded me seven ways like a cheap suit.
I mean, he kicked the crap out of me.
No way.
Oh, yeah.
You get to see, you know, Johnny NDP, which I find funny about him.
He's all like, you know, oh, peace and love and kumbaya.
But then he loves beating people up as a hobby.
And as well, like after he confronted that protester, Pierre Palliev was saying stuff about him in the house.
And he got out of his chair and he walked up to Pierre and got in his face.
I'm right here, bro.
I'm right here, bro. Let's go. I'm right here. I'm like, what the
hell is wrong with you? Calm down. So we talked about that, his year, his kind of breakup with
Justin as well. So we got to have a lot of talk in between chokeholds. Sometimes I couldn't speak
because I was being choked. But when I wasn't being choked, I was able to talk to him.
Who said Canadian politics was boring anyway?
Man, I tell you, people always say it's so boring.
But I mean, look at what we have.
It's incredible.
It's been an incredible, crazy year.
Now, Pierre Poliev, is he on your show as well?
No.
You know, I make a, I don't know if it's on set on AutoSend now, but pretty much every week we ask him to come on.
He never will.
Of course, he wants to defund and probably destroy DCBC. So we always
ask him. He's been on the show before. Whenever I've met Pierre Palliev, he's always been quite
fine to chat with. But once again, like the wrestler kind of thing, like Mr. Trump, he has
this thing of, I won't do anything with the CBC. But I've noticed, if you look on ex-formerly Twitter,
Pierre Palliev shares more CBC articles than anyone on earth. You know, he'll say, oh,
Justin Trudeau's crooked because of this CBC article. Oh, this is happening at the border,
CBC article. And he watches CBC more than your average man. He's constantly sharing things. So
I don't know what, he'll have nothing to talk about if he defunds the thing, because he's one
of the top fans watching it. So I've always found that very funny.
Now, but in the past, you know, conservative politicians have been on 22 Minutes a lot. I
mean, Stephen Harper kissing Mary Walsh the night he won the conservative leadership. Rick Mercer
went for a sleepover, if I recall, at 24 Sussex. And I think that you talked to Alberta's premier,
Sussex. And I think that you talked to Alberta's premier, Daniel Smith, recently about heat pumps, of all things. No, like it's, what's interesting is, you know, I find a person who will come on
our show and talk to us and a person who can take a joke like Peter McKay, great conservative
politician was always on and always would take it and be very funny. But the person who'll come on
is much more comfortable in their own skin being themselves. And I think if you have an affectation, if you say all of a sudden to decide to get
contact lenses and wear sunglasses on a t-shirt indoors, which is branded with your own logo,
which is like someone from a rock band, ACDC, going around in an ACDC t-shirt with a suit jacket
over it, maybe you're not comfortable enough just to be yourself
in an interview. But we have great politicians. Everybody in Canada gets into it because they do,
I think, at some point think they can make the place different. I have no problem talking to
someone who's a conservative because they might have a different viewpoint, but, you know, it's
a valid one. We'll talk about it. Show me. Convince me. But yeah, Mr. Poliev refuses to come on.
He's shutting you out.
But your castmate, Dan Dillabaugh, caught up with Pierre Poliev at a rally earlier in the year.
He did.
We're going to play a little bit because he didn't get a warm welcome.
No.
Wow, Pierre Poliev, such an honor to meet.
My name is Dan.
I'm with 22 Minutes.
It's so nice to meet you.
Canada's next prime minister and laser eye surgery success story.
Congratulations. I think you're doing an amazing job. If it was up to me, you'd be the leader of
the opposition for the rest of your life. Well, I won't be sadly for you and you and your and your
but you know what? You'll have to earn a living rather than getting it from taxpayers money.
So what do you think of that, Mark? Did he know that Dan was a farce?
See, they asked me to go down,
and I said, I can't really sneak into a rally anymore
because these people know me and stuff.
Oh, Crooches over 22.
But Dan went down.
He's a writer on a show,
young guy originally from Newfoundland
and Labrador, a province that has something to do
with the show in the past.
And Dan went down there very bravely
with people who recorded that on iPhones.
So they just got in regular line. Mr. Polyev, very scripted and his social media,
very well-spoken. But then when you surprise him and talk to him, he goes,
and then he says, you know, you'll have to live off something other than taxpayer money. This
guy's been living off taxpayer money longer than we've been a country. He lives in a $17 million
mansion with 34 rooms in it with a
cook and a driver and all of this stuff. And he's telling, anyway, they try to kick Dan out. Dan
just went back in line and got him a second time, which is funny. They can't even kick a guy out.
I mean, maybe that's part of the reason he's not that interested in coming on.
It could be.
Yeah, but he's welcome anytime. I've always said, I'll go anywhere. I'll do whatever you want me to do.
I'll go whatever.
I just would like to have a chat about the future of the CBC with him and see what happens.
Well, feel free to call him out right now and just say, Mr. Polyev, you're welcome.
Pierre, if you're listening, which I'm sure you are because you share more CBC articles than anyone I've ever met, come on, show.
Don't be afraid.
It'll be all right.
You can just speak as long as you want.
And according to you,
nobody watches or listens to us.
So why are you afraid?
Because no one will hear you.
But come on,
and we'll have a little chat and see what we can't refund.
Do you think he has a funny bone?
Yeah, he's very funny.
You know what?
Funniest prime minister we ever had
probably was Stephen Harper.
He's very funny, does great impressions.
Very, very witty guy.
But he hid that.
He hid that from the public.
And Pierre is very sharp.
He was on the show before.
We had a great talk.
I think he's very funny.
He's a very witty guy.
Because the thing is, like, they've doubled down the conservatives, I think, on their base, right?
And they want to feed red meat to the base.
And the other Canadians are like, I'm not sure.
But I think if Mr. Polyev showed the side of him when he's not being the wrestler, I think more Canadians would probably go, you know what?
I don't mind that guy because he is very smart.
He knows a lot about politics, blah, blah, blah.
And I think if you saw more of the real Pierre, maybe put the glasses back on, Pierre.
Put the glasses back on.
of the real Pierre, maybe put the glasses back on, Pierre.
Put the glasses back on.
In 2017, it felt like drugs were everywhere in the news.
So I started a podcast called On Drugs.
We covered a lot of ground over two seasons,
but there are still so many more stories to tell.
I'm Jeff Turner, and I'm back with season three of On Drugs.
And this time, it's going to get personal.
I don't know who Sober Jeff is.
I don't even know if I like that guy.
On Drugs is available now wherever you get your podcasts.
Now, we talked about, we joked about really how rich the political experience has been in the last year and really in the last month here in Canada.
But has it become harder to do political comedy in the current political climate?
I don't think so. I think, you know, things are very heated. And I talked to Prime Minister
Trudeau about this, talked about the F. Trudeau flags. And things have to come down because most
Canadians are in the middle. And I think the more we drive each other apart, I think the smaller our audience gets as well.
We're all in the middle.
We need to convince each other.
We need to do what's best for all of us.
And you can't do that on X, you know.
So there's lots to make fun of.
And most people can take a joke.
You know, Mark, when Rick Mercer was on The Current last year, he said by the end of his time at 22 Minutes, he'd moved away from doing segments with political leaders. And I just want to play a little bit from an onstage interview he did with Matt Galloway last year. He said by the end of his time at 22 Minutes, he'd moved away from doing segments with political leaders. I just want to play a little bit from an onstage interview he did with
Matt Galloway last year. Justin Trudeau was never on the show as prime minister. By the time he
became prime minister, I was still on the show. But I just didn't want to have prime ministers
on the show anymore, because unlike the other prime ministers, he would have done it in a
heartbeat, maybe once a week if you get away with it.
But I just didn't want to,
and I didn't want to appear cozy with the liberals at all,
so we didn't do it.
But I always thought it was a good thing.
I mean, there was certainly people,
when I had Stephen Harper on the show,
and he went with this gag that he would kill me with kindness.
There were people who didn't like that government
who were angry with me for making him seem personable.
You know, Pierre Polyev said himself that, you know,
he thinks that this is your show
and others are just propagandists for the PMO.
Do you worry about coming across as too cozy
with one side or the other?
No, I mean, he can come on any bloody well time he wants. I'll cuddle, I can sit on my lap if he wants, but he's afraid to do it. So he's coming
up with excuses. I think sometimes in the past, people do sketches with politicians in them,
and it's a sketch, and they're playing a part, and it's written as agreed upon beforehand, right?
But if you go in there and have a conversation, like I did with the prime minister, we used to
have a conversation. There's no holds barred. They didn't say you can't talk about anything.
And if there was, I wouldn't do it.
And I think Canadians see a different side of people in a show like ours.
They're a bit more relaxed.
I did an interview with Justin where I had him teach me how to snowboard last year because he's a snowboard instructor.
And he was really good.
He actually got me on a snowboard.
But it completely put him at ease while I'm making fun of him and we're talking because you're in an environment. You see a bit of a weight come off people sometime and you get a truer sense of the person who they were. Sometimes I can start to see the person who they were as they were getting into politics more.
are very shielded, the more power they get. And you have more little people around them who are, you know, aides and stuff like that, who are trying to keep you from getting too close,
keep you from being funny because they don't want to get yelled at, and keep them from revealing
stuff about their true self. The more you can stay away from the staffers and get the person
out doing something that makes them forget kind of the chains of office, I think that's something
that is very unique to our show that gives Canadians a better view at who the person is, not who the politician is.
Mark, you've got a show to do, so I shouldn't keep you too long. But I have to go back to
Donald Trump because I want to know as a comedian and someone who mimics him in the way that you do,
is he an easy character to mimic? I mean, can you break down how you get that voice?
Oh, it's the easiest I've ever
had, because you got to realize that he's just, A, he's not very, he's not thinking much. B,
he is 100% confident about that he is right, while still not knowing what he's going to say.
And then after he babbles for a bit, he'd like to have an insult, like, quite frankly, here I am now
with what you're doing is very good, very nasty.
Your interview is very nasty, quite
frankly. And the CBC
is not very good. The Communist Broadcasting
Corporation. We're going to shut it down,
quite frankly, because what you're doing is a
disaster, really. A lot of people are saying it's
quite frankly the worst. And I agree with them.
The best people are saying it's the worst.
So I'm never going to appear
on CBC Radio ever.
Oh, I think that's not going to happen.
But I'm going to ask you, I'm going to role play with you just a second.
I'm going to be me, the investigative reporter, and you can be him.
Okay.
Some of these things I just have to ask you about, Mr. Trump.
Go ahead.
How do you really think that Canadians want to be the 51st state of the United States?
They're already up there.
They're Canada's hat, quite frankly.
They do very little, very little in their igloos.
And there's not much.
Their dollar is worth, I think, four cents right now.
And we'll come in.
We'll warm it up, quite frankly, is what we'll do.
We'll get a big pipeline.
And I'm going to suck it like a straw and drain them dry.
And then we're going to make them one big province.
We're going to make the city of Alberta is going to be the capital, quite frankly. I know a lot about Canada. Well, maybe some U.S.
states, Mr. Trump, should join Canada instead. Which ones would you like to let go of? We'd like
to let go, quite frankly, of Vermont. It's a terrible state. The city of Buffalo, it's a
terrible state. We'd like to get rid of the California, quite frankly. There are horrible people in all of New York except for Trump Tower.
Now, last time the U.S. invaded, Mr. President-to-be,
Canadians burned down the White House.
What's your plan for takeover this time?
You're a nasty woman. You know that?
You're very nasty, and I said the CBC wouldn't be fair, quite frankly.
What we're going to do is we're covering it in asbestos.
We're doing as best as we can.
We're coming back with the asbestos, which is a thing.
The woke left don't like asbestos, and we love it.
If you worked in an asbestos mine, we're going to get that mine open.
We're going to get all the great asbestos back.
And the woke are not going to like that, the left, like this nasty, nasty woman.
Mark, that's amazing.
Honestly, I think we have to remind the audience that that wasn't Donald Trump speaking.
I hope you have a wonderful, happy new year.
And we'll all be watching the program and the only year-end interview to date anyway that Justin Trudeau has given.
So kudos to you.
Thank you very much for one brief, shining evening.
I will be Canada's premier and most eminent journalist.
So my apologies to all the greats at CBC and CBC Radio.
And thank you so much for having me on.
What a treat.
You can catch Mark Critch tonight on the 22 Minutes New Year's Eve pregame special.
It goes on CBC TV at 8 p.m., 8.30 in Newfoundland.
And right after that, it's the Canada Live Countdown with hosts Adrian Arsenault,
Jan Arden, Ian Hanamansingh and Ali Hassan.
You can catch that on CBC TV as well as CBC Radio, CBC Listen and your local CBC streaming channel virtually everywhere.
For more CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.