Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Christmas Crackers, Vol. 6: Toronto Mike'd #1604

Episode Date: December 19, 2024

In this 1604th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike is joined by Retrontario's own Ed Conroy for Christmas Crackers, Vol. 6. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Ridley Funeral Home, The Yes We Are Open podcast from Moneris and RecycleMyElectronics.ca. If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please email Toronto Mike at [e-mail]

Man, that watch is so hot, it's smokin'. Hot? Do you mean to imply stolen? I gave you 50 bucks for it. 50 bucks? No, no, no. This is a Roche Foucault, the thinnest water-resistant watch in the world. Singularly unique, sculptured in design, handcrafted in Switzerland, and water-resistant to three atmospheres. This is the sports watch of the 80s. $6,955 retail. You got a receipt?

It tells time simultaneously in Monte Carlo, Beverly Hills, London, Paris, Rome, and Stade. In Philadelphia, it's worth $50. What up, Miami? Toronto. 50 bucks. Welcome to episode 1604 of Toronto Mic'd! Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times and brewing amazing beer. Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. Palma Pasta!

Enjoy the taste of fresh, homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. Season 7 of Yes We Are Open, an award-winning podcast from Monaris, hosted by FOTM Al Greggo. RecycleMyElectronics.ca a committing to our planet's future means properly recycling our electronics of the past and Ridley funeral home pillars of the community since 1921

Joining me today for our annual Christmas Crackers episode of Toronto Mic'd, it's FOTM Hall of Famer Ed Conroy. Ed Conroy, FOTM Hall of Famer. How the heck are you doing, buddy? I couldn't be better, Mike. How are you doing buddy? I couldn't be better Mike. How are you doing? Well, the only way I could be better is if you were sitting across the table from me here in New Toronto We're doing this remotely because you decided to move a million miles away

This is true. I am a country man now. I don't I don't go into the city anymore. So I Will make it out at some point because I miss, I miss our tete-tets. I miss being in your basement. But for now, this will have to, this will have to do. You know what I say? This is better than I'll take a remote with Retro Ontario over no Retro Ontario. What it takes to get you out, I think it's like a nice breakfast, like David Kine style. Like I gotta do a nice Hollywood sweet breakfast. That gets you to the city. I, you know, it's funny.

I love those Hollywood sweet breakfasts, but I always get COVID when I go to them. I think it's all those Hollywood people getting off jets, you know? Did you get COVID this 2024 breakfast? Yes, yeah. Because I was very close talking to you at that event. So I was exposed possibly to the COVID-19 virus.

Possibly. I mean, it's embarrassing to even admit that that you're still getting it. But yeah, and I got it the year before. So, you know, my wife said I'm not allowed to go to those anymore because I just bring COVID home. Just mask up, you know, just maybe double bag it or something. I still remember, you know, bless her heart, the late great Sue Johansson, I still remember tuning into Q107 for sex with Sue and learning that sometimes you should double bag it. Do you have any? And I remember wondering, double bag it, I'm trying to visualize this and I'm like, oh, it's like I have like a young Mike has this epiphany of, oh, that's what double bag it means.

Well, I remember once Mike, I was on the radio. I think I was on New Stock 1010 and we were doing a story about firemen in northern Ontario and they had some thing that was called a double hat, a double hatter. It's some fireman jingle. But all I could think about was, yeah, double hat was what we used to say derogatory thing about certain girls. If you were going to go with them, you know, double hat. My goodness. I'm sure Sue Johansson had something to do with that. Yeah. Shout out to Ridley Funeral Home.

We'll talk later in this Christmas Crackers episode about some greats we lost in 2024. But before we dive into the Christmas Crackers you brought us here in December 2024, we heard a cold open off the top, Ed. Explain to us what we were listening to there. Oh, I hope you, I hope your listeners know what that was. It's only the greatest Christmas movie ever made. It gets lost in the shuffle, I think, because it takes place over a couple of months. So it does have some prominent Christmas stuff in it. And then it has new years as well. So that's probably why, uh, it's, it's my favorite holiday film. Um, and you know,

there's all this stuff now of people always talking about, you know, your favorite Christmas movie and home alone and die hard and all that, but nobody ever talks about, uh, trading places. And I don't know if that's because the director has kind of been canceled. Uh, you know, he's, he's kind of been forgotten about, but I mean, Dan Aykroyd, uh, as far as I'm concerned is, is an absolute legend and his stature continues to grow the more I find out about his past. Uh, and he, there he was riffing with, uh,

uh, Bo Diddley. Wow. You know, one of the great, great little cameos in that film. So yeah, if you have not seen the great trading places from 1983, check it out. And Dan Aykroyd, and you know, we're gonna recap some of what happened in 2024.

Was Dan Aykroyd was all over that tragically hip documentary that aired on Prime. Did you see it? I did. I actually sold quite a bit of footage to that production so I was there from the beginning working with some of their editors. Yeah I mean Ackroyd was a very early supporter of the hip. I believe he's the one that got them on SNL. 100%. And his fellow Kingston boy. Yes, yeah.

They used to play in his bar in Kingston. And I mean, that's one thing I really admire about Danny is his love of music, right? And he was always down with the tunes. Wonder if he'd love this song, Dan Ackroyd, who once held a door for me at a, I think he might have co-owned the restaurant, but it was at, on Avenue Road. I once was taken by a rich person to a nice fancy restaurant I couldn't afford. And then Dan Aykroyd held the door for me. So that's my Dan Ackroyd story. Do you think Dan Ackroyd would enjoy this jam?

Let me let it flow for a bit. ["Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy"] I think next year, if your wife lets you go, I think when you enter the King Eddie to appear at the David Kines Hollywood Suite Breakfast Breakfast that this should be the song that plays over the loudspeaker. Here comes the Hot Stepper. It's good walk in music for sure. I think, oh come on, Ackroyd would love that track.

He always was a fan of black music. And yeah, I mean, 30 years of the Hot Stepper, man. That's crazy to me. Okay, so this is 30 years old now Hard to believe right? This feels like a fresh jam to me. What's going on here in It is it's one of those moments You know, I guess it happens with more frequency the older you get when you hear about an anniversary That one kind of stopped me in my tracks because I hadn't heard that song in a really long time. And it was everywhere in 94 and you know, it was on electric

circus and it was every Gino in the city was blasting it out of their car. And you know, can you say that term Ed? I don't know anymore. Yeah. I mean, I don't mean it obviously in any way other than that's just back then a certain type of, I mean, I don't mean it obviously in any way other than that's just back then a certain type of, I mean, you could call them a house or I guess, and they would ride a, an I rock is ed. Is that what they rock? Zed, uh, you know, really shitty sound systems blasting this and assaulting people randomly. That's, that's kind of what I remember about 94. And I'm told here by my producer that Italians are fair game so we can go nuts yeah that's what I heard though all right do you think this would have appeared on an extenda mix

not extended mix sorry what was the master tea compilations that extended mix well we send a mix yeah, right. Dance mix 95 maybe. It is it. It might be actually. It seems like exactly the kind of jam that would have made the cut on that series. Have you seen Master T lately? I have not, although I'm working with the Black Archivists of Toronto Society.

I think that's what they're called, but they're doing a big exhibit early next year that's celebrating Master T and Michael Williams and the early Rhapsody days of much. So I'm helping them out with some footage. And once again, it's just awesome to see that respect being given finally, after all these years to those guys, you know?

No, I love that so much. Like, thanks for the heads up. I was just at the Art Gallery of Ontario for the Culture, it was called, and Mishimi was performing and I loved it. I went with a fellow FOTM Hall of Famer, Cam Gordon, who's a member over there. He snuck me in. They don't let me in these cultured places very often, but I got in there. And they had like a picture and it was a photo taken of like the whole, I want to say

Canadian, but basically the whole Toronto rap scene in this photo. And I looked through the photo and I'm like, I know all these people have been over. I love these guys. Although Maestro was noticeably absent. I think he must've been out of town when the picture was taken, but I definitely saw Master T in that photo. And I'm like, what Tony Young's up to now, that guy, that guy is the best. That guy's the best. I, uh, kind of obsessed with Tony's brother, uh, Basil because Basil young, you know, legendary guy, uh, from the city TV days where he was a cameraman. Um, and I think he was Kim Clark, champness is camera guy for a lot of the stuff he did,

but a lot of that really cool camera work that you saw back then was all initiated by Basil. Another guy that doesn't get the props, although I will say at that premiere you were there for 299, the documentary Basil was sitting right behind me. And I think I was more excited about meeting him than I was You were there for 299, the documentary. Basil was sitting right behind me and I think I was more excited about meeting him than I was Strombo or any of those other big hitters.

You appreciate the behind the scenes people and the average, the great unwashed, the average Joe and Jane, if you're not in front of that camera, you're sort of invisible, right? Yes, no, absolutely. And I think it's only taken me about 15 years to figure out that that is the point of Retro Ontario.

It's, it's to celebrate those behind the scenes people that, that didn't, didn't maybe get the credit they deserve. That's what, you know, that's why I do what I do, I think. All right. Quick question, because I've been doing a lot of work with him lately and we've become buds here But I need a definitive answer from you FOTM Hall of Famer at retro, Ontario Conroy Was Dominic Shulow the first videographer in Canada? Oh Yeah, for sure. Okay, cuz he's making the claim and I believe him and I've been saying it as well And then I got a note from somebody who is like saying he wasn't the first, but if you say he's the first and he says he's the first,

he's the first. Well, more importantly, Moses says he's the first. And I think if anybody was going to have credibility on that, uh, it would be Mr. Snimer. But that being said, with anything you get into the weeds and there's all kinds of disputes about who came up with this idea and who first thought of speaker's corner. And I mean, that's part of the fun. It's like Rashomon, right?

You interview six different people. You're going to get six different versions of what happened. And you know, Dominic, I think the first thing he worked on, I think was I am a hotel, which was that weird Leonard Cohen video that was kind of a pilot for Much Music. We talked about it when we did our show in the summer, but that was 82, 82, 83, right? City TV was obviously doing all kinds of crazy, innovative stuff with cameras in the seventies. So before dominant, he'll be the first to admit that there were other people there, you know, that were doing crazy stuff.

But in terms of saying I'm out one reporter, one camera shooting on a mirror, being the host and the cameraman, there's no, no dispute. It was Dominic really pioneered all that. All right. Now, so you already brought up the 2 99 Queen street West dock and you mentioned, uh, you were sitting with in front of Basil Young there. And I'm wondering, uh, if you have any updates, because if you weren't at Roy Thompson hall or at one of the live events where the filmmaker Sean Menard aired it, you haven't seen this because it or at one of the live events where the filmmaker,

Sean Menard aired it, you haven't seen this because it never did make its way to Crave. Do you have any update on whether we'll be able to see 299 Queen Street West on Crave or anywhere else in the future? You know, I keep hearing that it's imminent. And I heard in the summer it's imminent, you know? It's like two weeks it's gonna be on Crave. imminent, you know, it's like two weeks. It's going to be on crave.

Uh, I, I don't know, Mike, it's one of those things is terribly frustrating. Uh, it had such great momentum, I think, uh, from last fall. It would have been amazing if it had dropped a year ago at Christmas. Everybody was hearing about it. I think now, uh, if it comes out, look, it's, it's a wonderful little piece, but I feel like that momentum is kind of gone. Like it's, it's, it's just now, if anything, it's got this reputation of what happened to it. Like is there something in it that caused all this trouble? And it really wasn't, you

know, there was just a lot of stupid lot of stupid music rights issues, you know? Okay, cause I heard it was shelved because it was suggesting that Erica M was the first female VJ, true or false? I'm just, I'm just- Again, everyone has a different perspective on that. I'm just messing with you. No, I don't think it had anything to do

with any kind of, um, you know, points that were made and you know better than anyone, it pissed off a lot of people for different reasons. There was either too much of this person or not enough of that person. And I think, you know, I know Sean quite well, and I think he's an amazing filmmaker. And I think that's a job well done. If you create a piece that ends up, you know, a lot of questions come out,

that's much better than something that just lands and that's it, you know, there's no debate afterwards. Well, as you know, I am a fire, what am I? No, I'm an arsonist dressed as a firefighter. So I brought that up only to stir the pot a bit because I just spoke. So earlier this week, people can find an episode of Paul Farberman and Paul Farberman dated Katherine McClanahan and got her into the recording of Tears Are Not Enough. And Katherine McClanahan was the actual first female VJ. And I just wanted to shout her out and grind your gears a little bit here before

we get to the Christmas crackers. Yes, I love when you grind my gears, Mike. That's why I tolerate these shows. I'm not even recording this. I'm like, it's not Christmas till I grind you. By the way, and again, I look forward to other people seeing 299 Queen Street West because I know you worked hard on this and a lot of that footage I know comes from your personal collection as opposed to a Bell Media Library. So

one interesting reaction I just want to reference here before we move on is Craig Hellcat who is in FOTM as well but he was like really against the doc until he wasn't like he really had an about face so I guess he saw it. He was against it till he saw it and then then he came around. I've been watching his social media posts. So you won Craig over, Sean Menard at least won Craig over with his doc and I hope people can see it. Yeah. I think, you know, at the end of the day, that is what is the best outcome is to see it and then, and then go on Twitter and make an ass out of yourself. I think what was frustrating to us was people were throwing all these things out there and they don't have a clue What they're talking about really? You know that being said I think there are some major issues

With with the way that the story is told with certain things that were maybe not Discussed but again your mileage will vary. If you just sort of watched much music when you were a teenager, you're gonna love it. If you're like an inside baseball person and you know about all these stories behind the scenes, then of course, that's, you know, that's, it's gonna, it's not gonna tick every box

you want it to tick. Let's put it this way, as I seen the doc It's a great nostalgia trip But if you watch this doc, you would think that 299 Queen was a drug-free zone Yeah, yeah, I mean look that that part I understand I think it's just taken for granted right that was Snowing a lot at 299. I thought I thought you were gonna go somewhere else with that. I thought you were gonna say that you get the impression when you watch it that it was only much music happening in 299.

And I think that's maybe to me, one of the parts if you weren't from Toronto and you were watching that movie, that's, you know, it didn't really get into that synergy that was happening between City Pulse and Much and Bravo and Speaker's Corner and, you know, all those, that ecosystem really was a big part of why all those programs were wonderful. It wasn't just something in isolation.

Right. Now, so the way we're gonna work here is because I have a few rough notes and I definitely have Christmas crackers audio loaded into my soundboard. I just right off the top before we get into a sitcom I watch like crazy in syndication as a young boy. I'm gonna play something festive here to warm us up and then you're gonna kind of give it some context. You ready? Sure. Here we go. Christmas at Kmart, all over the store Christmas at Kmart, Christmas at Kmart People are buying just a little bit more Christmas at Kmart, Christmas at Kmart

So if you're still shopping, with money to spend Christmas at Kmart, Christmas at Kmart How about this album by Rootboy Slim? Christmas at Kmart, Christmas at Kmart The mood-ring counter is all aglow Christmas at Kmart, Christmas at Kmart Alright, Christmas at Kmart, what are we listening to here Ed? So yeah, that's a great underground Christmas anthem by Roo Boy Slim.

I selected that one because again I was startled with something that came into my feed the other day that there are only two K-Marts left in North America And I don't know, Christmas maybe, because it's the ghost of Christmas past and we think a lot about retailers, right? That were a big part of Christmas when you were a child or when you were younger. And yeah, I mean, Kmart was something that, you know, it was all over the place.

It bought a lot of Christmas gifts there and that tune was always cool to hear. But yeah, there's only two left, Mike. Wow. Okay, so yeah, when I think about these retail outlets of Christmas past, first thoughts I have are, for example, consumers distributing was a big deal. Totally. For me growing up, so I'll just shout out a few off the top of my head here, but of course, Zellers, of course, consumers distributing.

Eden's was like, so, you know, Eden's and Simpson's, and I mean, we always, we talk quite a bit about Byway on this show, but. Yeah, yeah. Can you remember Kresge's? Kresge's, of course. Woolco, you remember Woolco? Woolco and Wool's? Of course. What? Wool Co. You remember Wool Co. Wool and Woolworths.

Like they were like, yeah, I feel like it was like a Posse. Yeah. The wool Posse that kind of gave way to the Walmart invasion. Yeah. Yeah. I did set the stage for that, but they all had all those places had their own vibe, right? It was like their own unique feel, which is totally gone. Thanks to globalization. You know, a Walmart that you go into here is pretty much exactly the same as a Walmart that

you go into in California or anywhere. They're all exactly the same. Right. I miss that. I miss those, those, the wool posse shops and a Creskys and you know, and you know they were all great at Christmas time. Absolutely. All right here's a show great at any time of year. Come and knock on our door. We've been waiting for you. The kisses are hers and hers and his Drees Company too Come and dance on our floor Take a step that is new

We've a love of a space that meets your face Drees Company too You'll see that life is a ball again Laughter is calling for you. Down at our rendezvous, down at our rendezvous, Three's Company Two. Three's Company. You remember that one, Mike? Are you kidding me? It was in, I don't know what station anymore, but it was in syndication at a time I was in front of the TV and I would watch that show five days a week. Oh it's CBC. Okay there you go.

Every day 3.30. And I knew the, you know depending on who the third person was and they were living with because we started of course with Chrissy Snow and then I hope I have these right and then her cousin came in for a little bit and then of course, the nurse Tracy, but but yeah, of course I watched Three's Company. Good man. Well, a little bit of a lead up before we go back to Three's Company. The reason why I wanted to talk to you about it today. My big news of the year of 2024. I just wrote my first book. I submitted the manuscript a couple of weeks ago.

It's going to be published next year, probably in the fall. I think it's things take much longer than I had imagined, but it's working with Dunder and press who are fairly reputable Toronto publisher. So very, very exciting. It was based on the exhibit, which I did last year, which you came and we did that wonderful episode with PJ Phil.

Love that, by the way, loved that episode, loved that day. And I think it was either, it was pouring rain, I think, because I remember being completely drenched on that ride there at the studio, but loved that day. And I think it was either it was pouring rain, I think, cause I remember being completely drenched on that ride there at the studio, but loved that exhibit that was on like Kitsch, uh, Degrassi and Mr. Dress Up. And you know, you mentioned the YTV, the, the PJs and, and PJ Fresh Phil was there. That was amazing. Thank you. Um, it was,

it was an awesome experience working with the Myseum of Toronto and, you know, staging that whole thing. But what happened of course, during the exhibit, it was, I just kept finding out more about these shows and more importantly, these people, uh, I was attracted to these stories of the behind the scenes, as we mentioned earlier, people that maybe weren't given their proper due, but also really, Mike, the insane lineage that existed from the very beginning in 1952 in Toronto

that went through all those decades and really culminated with uh, yeah, with YTV to, to a certain degree in the nineties, but it was just, you know, it was like you pull one thread and then I would find out about these other things. And so by the time the exhibit ended, I was like that we've just scratched the surface here. There's so many more incredible facets to this. And so pitched it to Dunderne and obviously built a much more robust story. So of course, the shows you mentioned,

Degrassi and Friendly Giants and Polka Dot Dora, they're all a big part of this book, but I'm much more excited at the stuff that that sort of been uncovered for the first time. And, you know, I found outrees company is basically the reason why, uh, children's television is so fucked right now. Okay. It goes all the way back to the seventies and what happened basically from the beginning of television and not just in Toronto, everywhere. I'm sure you know that children's television

was, it was a very small demographic, right? It was not important to most of the broadcasters. It was a ghetto. It was Saturday morning. That was obviously the, the, the marquee time for, for cartoons and such. And then there was this after school block, right? Sort of three 30 to five o'clock say, and time and time again, they tried everything they could to get that after school audience. They knew the Saturday morning, it's a done deal, right? Kids wake up before their parents,

they're gonna camp out in front of the television. They're gonna watch whatever garbage you put on Saturday morning is gonna get consumed. done deal, right? Kids wake up before their parents, they're going to camp out in front of the television. They're going to watch whatever garbage you put on Saturday morning is going to get consumed. But the after school block, it was like time and time and time again, they tried different things. Nothing ever worked. They, you know, they try cartoons, they try comedies, they try sketch shows, they tried all these different things.

cartoons, they'd try comedies, they'd try sketch shows, they tried all these different things. What happened basically was older programs that had been on in prime time in America, so in the 70s you had things like Charlie's Angels or Heart to Heart or Chips, you know, the motorcycle cops. chips, you know, the motorcycle cops, uh, they started to run those, uh, at like four o'clock and kids generally were much more interested in those programs. I remember the grownup programs then whatever CBC thought, okay, here's a kid's show that's going to be on after school. And threes company comes along.

CBC starts running it Monday to Friday, three 30 and the ratings are just bananas, like 10 times anything else in, in the slot. And of course the CBC is getting a lot of stick because like this is a goofy American sitcom that full of sexual innuendo and all this stuff, but they just said, look, it's basically a license to print money, not just in Toronto, but everywhere in North America is just, they can't get enough of threes company. And if you, I'm sure you have kids, you've been plagued by these awful Disney sitcoms, right? Right. All of them, Nickelodeon, iCarly, all that stuff.

It all can be traced back to Three's Company because basically they eventually just gave in and said, all right, we'll just do sitcoms for kids because that's what they want. And it was a sad day because really before that, there was all kinds of fascinating experimental programs for kids, but they, none of them could stick. None of them could, could go head to head against three's company.

So basically it went from being a show that I kind of fondly remembered to, to really, uh, a villain, a villain that destroyed so many great possibilities that we could have had. Okay, Ed, so a lot there to process, but first and foremost, congratulations on writing your first book. Like, I can't wait to tell the FOTM to go buy this book. So when is it out again?

I believe right now it's scheduled to come out in September. And that's a rush release. Like the way publishing works, it's like it's even more convoluted than production, the film production. But it literally takes a year to go from, you know, the editing stage to the proofs, to the, you know, clearing all the photographs. And, uh, they originally wanted to have it out in, uh, 26, but that to me, just like we were saying about 2 99, I didn't want to lose momentum. Uh, and I think, you know,

a big part of doing this now for me was to speak to as many of these people that are still with us. And unfortunately, you know, even, big part of doing this now for me was to speak to as many of these people that are still with us. And unfortunately, you know, even people from the fifties and the sixties are like mostly gone. Now it's the people from the seventies that we're losing at an accelerated rate. And, uh, you know, it was heartbreaking. So many of these important people, uh, weren't around. However, I had a tremendous breakthrough early on that, that I think made this project, uh, just incredible. Um,

there's this fellow and I know we talked a lot about him when you came to the exhibit, uh, his name was Fred Rainsbury. And he was the first guy that the CBC hired in 1954. And they kind of gave him carp launch and said, you basically come up with a philosophy for children's programming at CBC. And he did, I mean, he moved mountains. He's the guy that, uh, you know, found the friendly giant, you know, found the friendly giant, you know, found Bob Hummey.

He found Fred Rogers, brought Fred Rogers from Pittsburgh to Toronto, workshopped Mr. Rogers. The Mr. Rogers that we know that went back to America was huge on PBS. All came from his work in Toronto at CBC. Obviously Mr. Dress Up came out of that. L. Lee Oost came out of that.

He was hired by Rainsbury. He just did all this remarkable stuff and I couldn't believe there wasn't more information out there about him. Even the Tom Hanks film about Mr. Rogers totally airbrushes all of that out of the story, which is disappointing. And I guess last year there was a documentary about Mr. Dress Up, which had sort of a throwaway

bit about Fred Rainsbury. But I came away thinking, again, this guy's getting done dirty. Like he's not getting, uh, the proper context, I think of all that he did and all this, this world that he created. So that was kind of my starting point with the book. And then I found out his, his son is still with us and his son had come and seen the exhibit we did and reached out to me and said, look, you know, if you want to do any more, you've got the support of the family.

And it turned out that Rainsbury in the early eighties basically had an epiphany that all these people that had worked on the shows from the beginning of the CBC were all getting old and dying. And so he started to go and interview them. He basically had like a podcast before that was a thing. Wow. He went around with a tape recorder and he went to California and he tracked down all these people that had, you know, gone on to have other careers.

So a great example, Alex Trebek, who had started at CBC kids. He interviewed him for a couple of hours. He interviewed Norman Jewison, who at the time was winning Academy Awards, but gave Rainsbury hours of his time. And all these cassette tapes were still around. So I was able to go through all these interviews and use them basically as a starting point for the, you know, the people that were no longer with us. And it just opened up. Yeah,

this amazing world and this amazing, uh, lineage that Nina Keough obviously is a huge part of it, her mom and dad and her grandparents were involved and it ran through all of these shows, whether they were CBC or TV Ontario or YTV. So it all came, it just came together. It felt like this has been to be, um, you know, I'd wanted to write a book for a long time. I had started a few. I, you know, I think I still want to do a city TV book. I don't know how that will manifest itself.

But this one sort of came up. The opportunity came up and it seemed like, OK, now is now is a good time as any. And yeah, I think you're kind of the prime demographic for something like this, but because it encompasses really the fifties, uh, right up to the early two thousands, hopefully there's younger people and older people that will find something of value. And I'm sure when I go on the tour, I will come to Mike's basement. Oh my God. That's what I was hoping.

That will be worth the drive back. Well, again, my brain is racing in a million different directions, but right off the top, I gotta tell you how you're so inspiring to me because you're doing it, man. There's a reason you're the first FOTM Hall of Famer. It's not like I haven't given you your props in the past here. You're, of course, the first FOTM Hall of Famer because what you're doing, and I've

been supporting this since I saw the WNED 17 or whatever YouTube channel, and I'm like, oh this guy's doing it. Like you're doing it. And I'm out there. I just want to tell you an episode you should listen to. Stephen Stone was in the basement a couple of weeks ago. Oh was it maybe one week ago? Stephen Stone was in the basement and also promised his wife is making the next trip to the basement. So like there was a lot of kind of retro Ontario content in that episode. And I just want to shout out Rob Pruse again from Spoons because he reimagined my closing theme, which is lowest of the lows, rosy and gray. And he added in some Easter eggs and one Easter egg he added in for me because he knows

what it means to me is the theme to the friendly giant oh that's in the old people will hear that at the end of this episode in a quick correction I called the nurse who became the roommate of Janet and Jack I called her Tracy and the trouble of Tracy is her name is Terry. Okay, so I got to correct that. And one last thought here. Got so many clips to get to, but Threes company didn't just fuck with children's programming. And I did say programming, but they also fucked the Ropers, right? I feel the Ropers got fucked because they're part of this hit show.

And then they're like, okay we're gonna spin you off into the ropers and Then that doesn't work out and the ropers are like, can we please come back now? And it's like now mr. Furley is here. You guys are gone So dead to us the ropers got royally fucked by threes company. No, no not bringing them back after their spin-off fails It's got a lot to answer for that silly little show. I tell you. Here's a show that might or may or may not have

a lot to answer for. We'll hear from you at the other side. Here we go. Hey, Canadian, speak to me. When he walks down the street, he smiles at everyone. Hey, give me back your king. Everyone that he meets calls him King of Kensington. How you doing, King? Follow me, our king. Take out his king.

He finds his fortune in the faces that surround him. His wife says helping other people brings him luck. But then his mother tells a slightly different story. He's the only king around without a buck. He's a man among men. The people's champion. And when destiny calls him. I'm sorry that line is still busy. He's King of Kensington. What a guy. What a guy.

Wow. Ed, you and our similar vintage. I completely miss King of Kensington. So I caught, like, as a young boy, I'd catch references to it all the time and I knew enough about what it was, but I actually don't believe I've ever seen an episode of the King of Kensington. Oh, and you call yourself a Canadian, Michael. Here's my passport. I feel great shame. Michael. Here's my passport. I'm feel great shame.

No, you know, that's a, it's another program that has been done absolutely dirty by the CBC. It's it's, you know, it had a very important role in the seventies. It was, you know, the first program that really was multicultural. It was a sitcom that spotlighted obviously the Kensington Market and the area. And, you know, a lot of working Canadian actors and actresses got their break on that show. And it's funny because again, when, you know, writing this book and reading interviews and interviewing people, you know, people like Eugene Levy, he's a great example. These people were doing comedy,

but they all wanted to be actors. And the only program that anybody could work on was King of Kensington. So quite often they'd get not even a line of dialogue, they'd just be like standing in the background of the bar or the coffee shop or whatever. But yeah, it's kind of sad. It's like, if you were a working actor, then that was your, uh,

it was either that or, or kids TV. Um, so it kind of got repeated a little bit. I want to say in the early 2000s, I think the comedy network in the CTV comedy network showed it a little bit, but it's been totally forgotten. Which is a shame because I do think it's, it's, it still holds up even just to watch these up and coming actors. You know, Mike Myers, another guy, his very first role, he's a little kid in it.

Uh, you know, Mike Myers, another guy, his very first role, he's a little kid in it. Um, but the reason I brought that clip actually was, uh, our, our good friend, Mark Weisblatt, uh, we were conversing over the weekend, uh, last time. And he mentioned to me that that would be a good topic because I guess there's some discussion now about moving the statue. Uh, there's a statue of Al Waxman, the King of Kensington,

that's in that little parkette. Uh, but it, this is terrible. It keeps getting, uh, defaced. Um, and with, you know, tensions being the way they are now, uh, it, it, it's, it's antisemitic stuff getting put on it. Swastikas and such, um, a little less, uh, aggressive. They, there was a time, and this is probably 10, 15 years ago. It was when I was at blog.TO, uh, somebody defaced the statue and painted it the colors of the Joker. So it had the white face in the green hair. That's OK.

And I was OK. And it was like kind of a shocking image, like the king of guys. He didn't reimagine as the Joker. But yeah. So Al Waxman, you know, he passed away a while ago. But his wife, Sarah Waxman is still very, um, active in the community. And I think she's, I don't know if it's a petition or what, but they, they want to move it away. So it's a very sad, again,

reflection of not only the disrespect and the, the awfulness of, of that kind of antisemitic behavior, but also an iconic, you know, Toronto legend kind of forgotten about, you know? No, I'm glad you brought it up. Firstly, when you have these calls or these conversations of Mark Weisblatt, you know, I need you to record these. Okay. These are episodes unto themselves when Ed Conroy and Mark Weisblatt converse both in the FOTM hall of fame, of course. And just hearing you tell me that they're defacing this statue with anti-semitic room makes me my blood boil

You know what we used to do in my day. We used to punch Nazis in the face That's what we used to do. So I would put up more Al Waxman statues Yes. Yes one on every Toronto block. We need a I'm gonna get going on that project. But And it's just funny how when I talk to you like literally I say, okay I'm gonna have 90 minutes for Christmas crackers And I realized oh like I need like 12 hours for Christmas crackers because even hearing you talk about Mike Myers on King of Kensington Sure, that's probably his acting debut, but the character Wayne Campbell, of course

It debuts on city limits with Christopher Ward. And who do you think? of course, it debuts on city limits with Christopher Ward. And who do you think was the co-writer of those early Christopher Ward yacht rock type songs of the late seventies? Who do you think was his writing partner when Christopher Ward put out music before much music launched? It was Steven Stone, I believe.

It was Steven Stone, of course it was. You know this, that's why you're in the Hall of Fame. But I just think it's wild, we'll have these conversations and then sort of like Lester Freeman in The Wire, I can see all the pieces mattering and connecting here on my wall here, so well done here. Can I play a clip of our favorite children's entertainer to speak about? Oh yes, well we've got to get, this is the heart of the episode here, Michael. Like, could you imagine if we recorded a Christmas crackers and this gentleman didn't didn't come up?

I think there'd be like riots. I mean, you know what I mean? We'd be writing a book about that. And by the way, you absolutely have to come in the basement to promote the book when it's coming out. This is huge for the TMU. And by the way, the TMU in the context I share it is of course the Toronto Mike universe. This is massive. But let's listen to this. Let's carry on with some letters. There's one here from Edie Marie

um, Mumphy and Edie Marie Mumphy. What did she say? Well she's drawing an intersection here and she has all of the things you need. Traffic signals, stop sign, a yield sign over here. She's drawn just everything you could imagine. Perhaps to show the boys and girls there are many different kinds of signs and that we must follow them all. Must obey the signs as well, mustn't you?

Okay, here we go with another picture from Monica Tone of Burford. Now this is good advice for all. Buffalo, I'm sorry, buffalo. For all of you people here, and listen carefully. It says don't take candy from a stranger. Oh, now that's very important. And all the boys and girls should learn that.

And it's up to the mums and dads to teach them. If somebody says to you, if somebody says to you, you know, would you like a candy? What do you say to them? I think the best thing is just say no thank you and keep walking right along. Okay. However, if someone stops and says could you tell me where the corner store was? Sure, they could point it out to them as long as they don't go with them.

Okay, so there's some very good safety rules for the day. Don't forget to keep your letters coming in. John loves to get your letters. Right now we're gonna have this and then come back to Studio Five. Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo, woo, woo, woo. Uncle Bobby. There you have it.

Chillin with big, big John, reading some letters, a very captive audience. There was a bunch of kids in that clip, but they were traumatized. They weren't talking. Well, they're, yeah, they were wondering why their moms keep dragging them to the aging court studio. That's what's going on there. And so uncle Bobby There's a man at Halloween who would be given The big chocolate bars, yeah

yeah, so of course of course there is an extraordinary amount of Uncle Bobby stuff that I uncovered when working on the book. Because as much as we like to joke about him, he actually was a huge part of local children's broadcasting. Oh, my God. Yeah. Like we joke about it because we loved him. Yeah, like I do.

I had admiration. Total. No, I know we have reverence and it's you know know, there's, there's a lot of weird stuff. There's a lot of stuff that's not true. Um, but anyways, yeah, I, I, every time I think I've probably said this to you before Mike, but every time I think I have a handle on Bobby Ash and uncle Bobby, I find out some new bit of information that just blows it all up. So this one was quite amazing.

I tracked down one of his original whack, whack, uh, one of the guys who was a regular, uh, who's basically the last one that's still alive. Um, his name was Barry McKay and he was the guy that drew birds. He painted birds and wildlife and he was a really young guy when I mean the show started in 1963, but he stayed with it the whole time, even to the bitter end. And he's still with us and he's still doing his nature

artwork and he was absolutely gracious and gave me a couple hours, uh, to interview him about all of it, about Bobby Ash's personal life, about the show. And man, it was just one thing after another, uh, that I was thinking of you. Of course, I can't wait to tell Mike Boone all this shit. You know, it just, it was crazy. Well, any teasers? I mean, firstly, is there any content you discovered that was a, you know, fit for the pit? Not,

not, uh, too much for much, as we say on this show, that maybe didn't make the book. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Cause I will clarify. I mean, I, I was quite, you know, going into this project, I didn't want to get into gossipy stuff because I felt that there was so much, um, great information, great stories. It would have been very easy to start talking about all these guys, you know, we're drinking beer, smoking weed or whatever, when they did these things.

Um, do we really need that? No. So there, there was a fair, a fair amount of Bobby Ash stuff that I didn't include, which obviously I'm happy to talk about right now. I think the thing that I found out that kind of explains a lot of him, uh, was the fact that he was married. He had a son. And he was married. He had a son and they abandoned him.

Uh, his wife basically, uh, this was after the second world war, he came back to be in Britain and his wife, uh, basically said, I've met someone else and I don't want anything to do with you and left. And he spent the rest of his life trying to track them down. Um, he hired private investigators. He spent basically all of his money.

I think of it as like, um, that Liam Neeson movie, like he, he was just on a mission to try and find his son and he never did. So that added an element of tragedy, I think to the, to the whole thing. It's badly needed context. And this is why, you know, you and I are cut from the same cloth where we have these two hour conversations with these people because if you just stick to the five to seven minute sound bite, you don't get that perspective.

And even just hearing you suggest that, it kind of starts to explain a lot of the Uncle Bobby that we keep revisiting and hearing about. Absolutely, yeah. And I think he was just so heartbroken that he did turn to alcohol. I mean, that was obviously open, open. Um, Barry was telling me towards the end of the series, he was showing up at, uh,

agent court, uh, just absolutely hammered. And I think, you know, the other thing that was going on with all this was the decline of the budget for the uncle Bobby show. So that was again, speaking of context, I didn't know how it had actually started. Like I knew it started at some point in the early sixties. But basically, you know, I'll do a short version. The long version is, is in the book, but 1960 you have CFTO becomes the first channel, uh, that is not a CBC affiliate that comes on the air in Toronto. Huge deal. Uh, you Bassett family, want to start a network that goes across Canada, competes with CBC, but is a commercial network, not a public broadcaster. And so they had all these grandiose plans for children's shows and they had a ton of

dough. And the very first day they were on the air in 1960, they showed, uh, two hours in every morning, Monday to Friday, uh, this program called the professors fight away. And the professor was again, kind of this goofy character that was played by a man named Stan Francis and Stan Francis, your listeners and you, everybody knows Stan Francis because he was King Moon Racer in Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer, the famous rank and base Rudolph, that comes on every year. And if you hear that voice, you're like, Oh yeah, that guy. So he was kind of a on the level of a Mr. Dress Up, uh, every morning doing crafts and, uh, doing all this stuff. But he got disillusioned by the decline of interest from the Bassets because I

think very quickly, CTV saw the money was in sports, uh, live sporting events. It was in films. It was in films. It was in news. It wasn't in children's and they had an obligation, you know, regulatory obligation every X number of hours a week. We have to show children's content, but they just started to buy cheap cartoons and professor Kitzel and stuff like that. And they stopped paying these hosts. And so by 1963, this poor guy, Stan Francis,

basically has a nervous breakdown on the air and gets fired. And they had the set, they had all this stuff. They're like, well, what are we gonna do? Like, we need to basically be on the air, to get the money from the government every day for children. And lo and behold, there was this guy who was a guest on the professor's hideaway called

Bobby ash. And he played a character called Bimbo the clown. That was his persona. And they said, shit, let's just give it to him. And so he literally the next day came up with the character of Uncle Bobby and took Stan Francis's time slot. And it was just Uncle Bobby. And so that dragged on until, as we know, the absolute, uh, inglorious late seventies and it has no money. Nobody cares about it, but they're still doing it because they had that obligation.

And eventually it got so bad that they wrote him out. Like it was renamed from the uncle Bobby show to kids corner. And uncle Bobby just showed up, you know, for five minutes. And then eventually he just isn't even on it anymore. So it was, you know, hearing obviously a very detailed version of that from when it started to when it ended. It was sad. And I think, again, it gives that context of maybe why

he was a drunk and why, you know it it was a show that a lot of people don't have fond memories of just hearing you talk about you know his alcoholism and What he was dealing with internally and then realizing that oh, yeah, and he drove a school bus Yeah Like that's a bad mix. He drove a school bus. This, okay. I, I, you know, I guess it's, it's, it's funny in a way, but, um, I hosted an uncle Bobby clip on the retro Ontario Instagram,

cause I was basically looking for people to come out and, and talk about their experiences so then I could get in touch with them and see if they wanted to be in the book. And so this one guy posted, Oh, he was my school bus driver, blah, blah, blah. And I messaged this guy and just a crazy small world. He, this guy lived in poor Perry and he had a store, which I was very familiar with on the main street in poor Perry. And he said to me, yeah, come by anytime. Like I'd love to tell you about my experiences.

And so I went and you know, he had all these different stories, but he said, you know, kids would get on the bus and he said, all the troublemakers are at the back of the bus, you know, fighting and such. And it would be, Oh, that's, that's, that's uncle Bobby's our bus driver. No, no, it's not. No, I bet. No, I bet you it is. And then they'd, they'd say, you go ask them. And you know, some poor kid would have to go up and say, are you uncle Bobby? And he would say, yeah, well, yes I am. And this was a time when he also had a couple of daycares,

uh, which were called the Bimbo daycares. And he did that because Mr. Dress Up did that. Mr. Dress Up had the butternut squash daycares. Uh, so this was, again, if you were a children's host, this was a, uh, a very profitable sideline. Um, but one of the things I guess for swag, he had these pens with his logo on the side of the bimbo daycare, but they were also letter openers. So apparently the, the way that uncle Bobby would get these rowdy kids on the bus to settle down is he would offer them these pens that had blades on them.

Well, you, you know where this is going, right? he would offer them these pens that had blades on them. Well, you know where this is going, right, Michael? They carved up the seats and left awful graffiti using these pens. And I thought that's a cool anecdote. So I put that in the book. I don't know if it'll survive. Hook this book to my veins. Can I get like, I don't know if it's gone through the lawyers and all that stuff yet. Like I need the version you've sent to the publisher. Okay. Just in

case it's, I said the same thing to John Gallagher because he wrote his, you know, his Babylon Babel. Yes, that was done. That was done during as well. Okay. So there's a version that he wrote and there's a version that gets published and they're not necessarily the same. It's the Delta that fascinates me. So you got to say, of course. All right. So Uncle Bobby, a lot of content in your new book. Can't wait to talk more about that in 2025. That's of course, Uncle Bobby's filmed in aging court, right? At the, the CIFTO studio. Nine channel Channel Nine Court. Channel Nine Court.

Okay, so I'm gonna kinda call an audible on the line of scrimmage here, and I'm gonna play a clip here in our Christmas Crackers episode for 2024. I want you to get up now. I want all of you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now and go to the window, open it and stick your head out and

yell, I'm as mad as hell and I'm not going to take this anymore. I got goosebumps again listening to Howard Beale there in network, but that's aging court, right? That is correct. And that leads me to what was the most interesting nugget of information that Barry Kent revealed to me is that when Peter Finch filmed that scene, I'm mad as hell at aging court, Uncle Bobby and the whole Uncle Bobby whack pack was standing behind the set watching watching that scene be filmed, because it was a day when they were taping. So that's a very, very famous scene, very famous movie scene.

Obviously Peter Finch won the Academy Award for that performance of Howard Beale, and that movie is so ahead of its time, but the idea that Uncle Bobby is basically there. So as you're telling that, I actually, I don't know if you get the same when you get these mind blows, but I felt weak in the knees. Like I almost collapsed to the floor that Uncle Bobby was in the room when that icon and you're right, forget the fact it was filmed in Scarborough.

Like if you're watching the Oscars, they might play that clip. Like, what an iconic clip clip from an iconic movie. And Uncle Bobby was like a just speed away, steps away. Just out of frame. Oh my God. Like Ed, you're doing the Lord's work here, okay? That is amazing. And I only played it cause you said an aging court.

And I thought maybe while we're in aging court here This might be a good time to talk about What happened in 2024 with regards to? CP24 Yeah, I mean It's difficult because we knew it was coming right? I mean I remember as far back as right after kovat We knew it was coming, right? I mean, I remember as far back as right after COVID,

uh, when I would go to News Talk 1010, which is not 299, but the chum building right behind. And this was the scuttlebutt, right? That they were moving out of there and going to aging court. And nobody could understand how is that going to work? Like, how can you move from being at the nerve center of a very interesting city to ancient court, which, let's be honest, is the armpit of Scarborough.

Now, I will fully admit, since I moved out to the country, I cut my cord. I never got cable out here because it was just prohibitively expensive. So I don't, other than when I'm in like a dentist office or something, I don't actually get to engage with CP 24. But I have heard from people that, that do watch it, that it's, it's horrible now that it's, it's very, very different. It's, it feels like they turned off a light or something like, so we, you know, forever we're used to, you're're right Queen and John, right?

This is the city that was the whole the heartbeat of the city. They were downtown There we go And now that they're in like agent court is like they're badly imitating that set at 299 Queen Street West and it's yeah It's like a it's awful. Like it really is awful Like I'm not a big CP 24 head But I my wife likes to throw it on sometimes just to have it on in the background when she's noodling on her phone or something like that and so I have seen a lot of this and it's it's like they turned a light out and I know everything changes but it's weird that Bell Media like I'm curious for your thoughts on like how badly does Bell Media want

to be in the media game because They seem to not give a shit about things like having their 24 seven Toronto news station anywhere close to the to downtown. I don't know what your thoughts are on the future of Bell Media and media, be it radio or television like CP 24. I was feels to me who knows nothing all pure speculation like they don't want to be in this game so they don't give a shit and they're not going to spend money on it. You're exactly right. And this is the great tragedy happening not just here, but I think all over the world is that these media empires that

amalgamated broadcast television channels and radio stations and production film production companies and video game studios and all these things. It didn't make sense in the end because you're right. They are much more interested in stadiums and sporting events and telecommunications services. and telecommunications services, the production of content is like so far down the list to begin with, to actually make it interesting. They couldn't give a shit man. And this is the great lament of,

of the last of the great thinkers, like people like Moses Neimer that were able to do both. And that's the frustration I think we all have is you can actually do this cool stuff and push the envelope and make compelling content and be profitable. It doesn't have to be one or the other, but, but this is a very, very Canadian mindset that you can't do that. And so it sucks. And this year, I mean, the moving out of 299, the end of City Line, you know, it was kind

of remarked a bit in the summer when the news came out. You got my man Elton there ready to pop. Yeah, I'm playing it in the background right now. Shadow to Deenie Petty, right? The OG. And you know, that was part of, I think, a really important lineage that went right back to the 70s, frankly. I mean, City Line didn't start until 84, I think 84. But there was City TV was on the vanguard of women's programming, right? Mickey

Moore doing those programs in the afternoon that were not just problem, like not just we're going to cook Rice Krispie Squares and talk about fashion, they were actually about women's issues and it seems very trite now, but nobody was doing that. And City Line had that wonderful run, right? Starting with Deenie Petty, but obviously encompassing many other hosts. Marilyn Dennis. Marilyn Dennis, uh, and then Tracy, uh, and so when that ended kind of unceremoniously, it was just, you know, I mean, we're talking about another big empire now, Rogers, but

it's, um, it was a very sad, uh a very sad end of an era. Well, and it comes out of the same, you know, Moses. And this is actually a gateway to a couple more things I want to talk to you about. But I will agree that when City Line ended, I did feel that pang of like, oh, another Moses thing bites the dust. Like one by one, they kind of fell off for a while. Speaker's Corner goes away. I don't know, Peter Silverman helps, goes away. You know, one by one. And then here's another one kind of falling.

And so a bunch of places I want to go. One is, and I believe like the press release was weird and this just seems to be the new move. Like, oh yeah, we're going to get rid of City Line, but we're going to fold it in as a segment on breakfast television. Like, so it's like, we're not really getting rid of it, but of course you are. Like this is all like PR spin bullshit, which I'm allergic to, as you might know.

Yeah. It's like when, uh, when they showed Martin, oh, the door, I believe the press release said he's going to be doing all these specials for us and he's not really leaving. And then, you know, that was that. Well, that was Kevin Frankish's farewell, right? They in Frankish came over to set the record straight because he bullshitted the FOTM for a while, but we don't we smelled it and he had to come back and own it. But like he gets a tap on like a Wednesday and they're like,

okay, Friday's your last day. And they're like, we can spin it one or two ways. And of course, usually a pride Comet before the fall shout out to Christine Bentley. But suddenly it's like, I'm going to go do documentaries and things for city TV, but it's all a hundred percent bullshit. Like they'd hold the PLPR spin on all these things. Really is what irks me. And there is no more city line.

Just because we're talking about 299 and everything going on there. I was going to ask you about the passing of Jim Waters. And I don't know how much you've written, but Jim Waters passed away like just a week, less than a week ago. And he's the son of Alan Waters, of course. And he was at the helm when CHUM is sold to CTV Globe Media, I think is what it was called there. And I wondered if you speak to that and maybe what you could share, and I know you're still in bed with this visionary, but like his role in the ouster of Moses from Chum City, like I'm just curious your thoughts on all of the above.

Yeah. I mean, look, the Waters family, especially Alan Waters, absolute, unique, one of a kind, brilliant man who did what we just said a minute ago. He was able to be experimental and push the boundaries and create amazing content, but also be profitable. And he and Moses got on, you know, very famously, they got on great. And I think Alan allowed Moses to do, you know,

a certain amount of artistic freedom that he certainly wouldn't find anybody like that now. And when Alan Waters passed away and it became a sort of secession kind of situation with kids involved. Then it gets messy, right? Because this is, we see this time and again, it doesn't matter who the family is, but when you have a big media baron and they die or they retire, the kids tend to fuck it up because they either aren't interested or they just want to get

the most return on this. Well, HBO should make a show about this. I think they did, but yeah, it would be pretty cool. So yeah, you know, the waters ousting or the sun's ousting of Moses is another one of those Rashomon events where I've heard very, very different versions of it over the years, but there's no denying, um, whether Moses left on his own accord or was shown the door, he saw where it was all going. He saw like city TV didn't just turn to shit overnight. Like it had slowly started to, uh,

favor purchasing shows instead of producing their own shows. And with the minute that that happens, it's funny. The parallels with children's television, uh, it's exactly the same. It's the same thing happened to a TVO. They went from producing all of these incredible shows in house to just buying shit basically from England or from America. And then once you do that, you have no identity. Like do you think now a kid is going to ever get nostalgic about what CFTO looks like now

or what city TV looks like now or what City TV looks like now. They have no brand identity. Yeah, no, geez. The character is what I miss the most. That's why I keep talking. That's why I still talk to the great Peter Gross every week. I gotta get a dose of that. By the way, quick teaser,

Lauren Honigman is going to launch a Bob Dylan podcast on the TMDS network. I'm just going to throw that out. That's sort of an exclusive you got there, Ed. That's awesome. Well, look, I wanted to circle back when you were saying nice things about me a little bit ago. Right.

Look, you're doing the Lord's work because I realized when I was transcribing these interviews from the eighties that you are. Interviewing all of these diverse people from all these different media backgrounds or sporting or whatever. And in the future, there's going to be writers and researchers that are going to be digging through your interviews. And they're going to say, thank God this guy did all this because even the most minor thing that you might not, uh, or I know you would've thought it was a big deal, but other people didn't think it was. And you've got all this remarkable archive.

So man, you keep doing what you're doing. It's gold. Well, thank you. Cause at some point someone's going to write a book about, uh, legendary Toronto band, guh, and they're going gonna come to Toronto Mike to get the scoop on that one. So thank you by the way This was revealed Previously, but Ed you are such a busy man You might not be caught up on your Toronto Mike But Jojo Chinto has definitively said no way Jose to his Toronto Mike invitation So I will not have a sit-down with Jo Chinto. And I'm personally very disappointed by that.

Yeah. I did hear about that. And, and I mean, was there a reason given or just, I don't know, but Peter Gross was my, uh, it was brokering this deal. And, uh, you know, Peter is the last man standing who cannot tell a lie. And he, uh, in his best Jojo Chinto voice, uh, gave me the play by play of his reaction and, uh And there's no room for negotiation there. But since we're bringing up the scene here, I need to ask you one more question.

And then I have some more Christmas cracker audio to play. And then we're going to close by remembering some greats we lost in 2024. But I want to ask you about your friend Moses. So I know you're very close to Moses. You're one of the few people who have had one-on-one recorded conversations with Moses. Not that we can necessarily watch this today, but these exist in various canisters

and on hard drives in Port Perry. But Zoomer has been taken private, and I'm just curious if you have any insight into will Moses be as involved in day-to-day? Does that change anything with Moses's role at the zoomerplex? What say you, Ed Conroy? I don't think it will. I think Moses is again, the last of that era whereby he needs to be working nonstop. Like he's, he's one of these people that is a workaholic.

He could never retire because he would probably just disappear. Um, so I don't think it's going to slow him down at all. He's, um, just as full of crazy ideas and initiatives, uh, now as he was, you know, 40, 50 years ago, which is great. Amazing. I don't know how to read into that. I know Wise Blot was speculating that this was what happens before things get sold and maybe that will, but I would imagine, excuse me, that if it were to get sold, you would hear like a day later

that there was a new Moses Nimer enterprise to do with broadcast because he just won't he won't ever stop right. And we don't want him to stop do we? We don't want him to stop. We do not want that man to stop. And you must have seen a few weeks ago an interesting thing happened. Nam from Much Music. I read this. Yeah. Yeah. She did a really lovely little article about him for TV Ontario for their website Just saying what we always say right? Why aren't people talking more about all of these Wonderful things that this but Ed I replied to NAMM on blue sky, which is where I'm hanging out

I would love to see a retro Ontario account on blue sky, by the way. That's my Christmas wish for 2024. Yeah, I've got a few people, but you know, what have you, have you abandoned acts that I only copy and paste promotional blue sky posts. I copy and paste them to the app currently known as X, but I don't actually engage or there's no stream of consciousness postings from yours. Truly. I only post those on the blue sky now But here just quickly my reply to Nam and this is something you will not Have experience because I consider you part of the zoomer family in some regard here

But I find that with Moses part of the reason why he might not be celebrated Like he should be is that he really doesn't do Any media he can't control. Like I know I've tried, as you know, I've tried so many times over the past 10 plus years to get, and I tried different channels, his assistant, his people, administrative assistant, I tried people on the inside, Joel Goldberg,

I've tried so many channels. He won't do any interviews, he doesn't have editorial privilege with, he won't. So- Well, that's not quite true. Okay, tell me, give me, give me an example, give me an example. You know, let's be honest.

I think it has a lot to do with maybe certain episodes you did with other people, things that might've been said, you know. Look, any great media baron, starting with Charles Foster Kane, is going to control their mythology as best they can. And I think my goodness, I don't know

of any other person that is as willing to sit down for hours, if need be, to talk about this stuff. However, he's... But with third parties? Of course, but he's just extremely selective, and I think, I suspect what might have happened is they do their homework, you know,

they're not just gonna walk into an ambush. Not that you, by any stretch, would be setting a trap, but if they heard certain episodes where Komodos were discussed or whatever, cocaine on the switchboard or any of those things, that's like a red flag, right? They won't put him in a situation where that kind of stuff would come up.

Whereas I know of a fellow very recently who's making a documentary about the CN Tower. He wanted to interview me and then he wanted to interview Moses and I sort of gave him that caveat of like, good luck. He's a really hard get. And this guy, I don't know, golden tongued, somehow got in and interviewed Moses for hours

about the CN Tower. But it's, again, I'm speculating because I have no idea about that interaction, but it's possible that there was a pre-approved deal, like, that he would stick to the CN Tower. Like, it's possible that if he has some control over where the conversation is going, he might agree. I would recommend if you do want to speak to him maybe refocus what it is you want to speak to him about because if you just say it's a Toronto mic sort of classic what do you call it a career ology or yeah but a deep dive a deep dive on all

this that might sound a little sus to them. But if you say, I want to talk very specifically about, I don't know, like radio from these years or, you know, the waters family or something like you might find they're a little more receptive to that. But I know. Great advice. But you forgot who you're talking to because I have no interest in that But I will tell you that I almost had Gordon Sumner the artist also known as sting on Toronto Mike and the caveat from his people was I couldn't ask him about the police and I politely declined

Yeah, I mean Imagine I can't I have a sting on the show and I can't ask him about the police picnic, the show at the horseshoe tavern from the Gary's. But that's the thing, Mike. You know, it's a frustration that I, you know, you mentioned Joel. We've talked about this many times. It's like you, and I don't mean you, but I mean, theoretically, you're a journalist. You have Moses Dimer.

You have this giant brain sitting in front of you, you can ask them about all these crazy things. And what do these people do? They ask them about, do you hire women with big breasts? Or some stupid shit like that, because they wanna get a cheap gotcha. And really, like what a waste of everybody's time.

No, but I agree. And if, I guess I feel like 1600 plus episodes and there's no evidence of a gotcha conversation. I mean, the most gotcha it got was Gord Martino sitting down here and me playing a clip of Anne Raskowski on Toronto Mike saying that he wouldn't talk to her for three years unless the red light was on.

That is absolutely the most gotcha. And that only happened because she already stuck that in the public realm on a Toronto mic episode I only thought it was fair that he have an opportunity to Reply so there's no gotcha going on over here. There's no gotcha But again, we're all in the same gang and if you know you have something a one-on-one of Moses that eventually we can link to That's that's that's good enough for me Yeah, I'd look I have spoken on your behalf many times to, that's good enough for me. Yeah, look, I have spoken on your behalf many times

to say that, you know, if you're gonna do it, do it with the best. And Toronto Mike knows more about this stuff than anybody else. But yeah, I would, you know, I don't need to tell you this. Don't give up, don't ever give up. Don't give up. Oh, that's a shout out to Ziggy.

Have you seen Ziggy lately? I haven't actually, don't give up. Don't ever give up. Don't give up. Oh, that's a shout out to Ziggy. Have you seen Ziggy lately? I haven't actually, because she works remotely. She's in Port Hope, which people always confuse with Port Perry. I can tell the difference, because that's where Wiels' dad lives, Port Hope. That's right. There's a Degrassi connection to him.

Oh, there's a sweet moment. Oh, just again, I talked about Stephen Stone on Toronto Mic, but we did have a sweet conversation about Neil Hope, the, uh, the, the late great actor who portrayed wheels on Degrassi and, uh, apparently he was very close with Linda and we had a good conversation about that. So here I am. I can't tease my upcoming Moses deep dive, but I can tell everybody

listening that the Stephen Stone episode, S T O H N not like stone. Go ahead. that the Stephen Stone episode, S-T-O-H-N, not like Stone. Go ahead. Could we talk a little bit about him because obviously Linda Schuyler and Degrassi all plays a very prominent part in my book. And I think, again, you know, she was influenced creatively in the early days by some really strange things, like,

did you know, did it come up in your podcast with Stephen Stone that Hill Street Blues was the most important show in the Degrassi history because it had serialized storytelling, right? Before, uh, Soap... Well, obviously, it wasn't a soap opera, but, uh, it was the first primetime show that episodes weren't just standalone.

Like, character stuff would bleed into other shows. And they applied that to Kids of Degrassi Street, which, what a cool thing to do. And that got the attention, obviously, of PBS, who then said, look, we need something, uh, out of WGBH Boston. And, oh, by the way, we're going to age the kids up and send them to junior high. And I think having spent a lot of time looking at all that, um, where Degrassi kind of falls off, uh, it was this century, uh, it's it lost sight of its roots, the roots which were hiring people

that weren't actually actors, shooting it almost like a documentary. It became the thing that it was fighting against, which was a glossy American soap opera, right? When they went from having I think that's a really good point. I think that's a really good point. I think that's a really good point. I think that's a really good point. I think that's a really good point. I think that's a really good point. I think that's a really good point. I think that's a really good point. I think that's a really good point.

I think that's a really good point. I think that's a really good point. I think that's a really good point. I think that's a really good point. I think that's I'm sure TV executives would be quick to tell me, I don't know what I'm talking about, that there is a place now more than ever for those kind of small scale, realistic life stories of kids, right? Nobody's doing that anymore. Well, if only there was a zit remedy for those pimple issues. I walked into that one, didn't I?

Well, listen, I was fiercely angry that there was no studio recording of everybody wants something by the zit remedy. So you know, we can't link to a quality recording of that entire song. And that to me, you know, we cannot do that now that Neil Hope is no longer with us. We'll never capture that. But okay, so oh, and back to Degrassi, because there is a new Degrassi coming. It is worth pointing out if you haven't heard the Stephen Stone episode that Linda and Stephen they lost control. They sold. They sold out here. So the next iteration of Degrassi will have nothing to do with the founders and Linda and it'll be some American company will be in

charge of it. And who knows what the future of Degrassi holds, but who really cares? Because. Well, it's funny, because he, Steven Stone wrote a book with Christopher Ward, whatever it takes, I think. Yep, I have a copy behind me, yeah. Okay, so I read that, I read Linda's memoir, The Degrassi Mother, or Godmother, whatever.

And tons of great behind the scenes anecdotes and gossipy stuff and all that. But I still came away thinking there's a lot of missing information here. Now, the girl who directed the film about Sue Johansson, I think her name is Linda Rideout, she's working on a documentary about Degrassi right now. I think it's a three or a four part series

that should be hitting soon. I sold them a bunch of footage. So I'm excited about that because I think there's lots more room to talk about how important those shows were and why they came to be. Well, Ed, since Linda's gonna be in the basement, a a promise Stephen has made to me he's gonna bring her to the basement so I can have my 90 minutes of you know real talk with her. Send me all these questions that maybe send me the questions and I'll literally go one by

one and get these answers for you and for Andy okay shout out to Andy the biggest aggressive fan I know. Hey so here's what we're gonna do because I just I can't believe how easy it is to talk to you about this stuff I love. But I see I'm gonna do four audio nuggets for the Christmas season here in this Christmas Crackers episode, and then you can give a little context after each one. And then we're going to remember some greats that we lost in 2024. How does that sound to you? That sounds great. Alright, here we go. Now go out five steps then turn and I'll throw the ball to you. Okay then I'll go for a touchdown. Ready? One, two, three, four, five, now turn. Car!

Let's try again. Ready? Hup! One, two, three, four, five. Another car! Hey, Joey, why don't we play somewhere else? Yeah, this isn't any fun. You want to go over to the park?

Okay, at least there won't be any cars there. It's too dangerous here. You're right. Let's go! Joey! Jesse! Jesse, do you see what I see? Yes. And I heard what you heard. Talking leaves! These badges are for you.

When you play in the park instead of the street you're playing safely the street isn't a good place for games my folks had never believed this oh the street cleaners after me I've got to go. See you later. Bye. Wow. Wow. Okay. What is that Ed? So, uh, you might recognize one of those voices, uh, as Rudolph, uh, the actress was, her name was Billy May Richards. Most famous, the voice of Rudolph and we had already mentioned Stan Francis was the voice of the King Moon racer, but Billy May was this lovely voice actress who will be forever known as Rudolph and linked to Christmas.

But late in her career, she ended up at TV Ontario doing voices on these very, very odd puppet shows. Uh, it was another thing I knew a little bit about going into the book that I found all kinds of crazy information about, but, uh, it started with read along and you must remember read along the pink shoe and all that. And they kind of, um, turned that into their trademark look, which was these puppets designed by Noreen Young,

who's a puppeteer from Ottawa, and they would shoot them on a green screen and then key it into footage of real life. And because it was shot on video, it looks really distressing. Like these are already kind of grotesque puppets. And then you're sticking them in, you know, footage of, uh, you know, in that case, it was a bunch of cars driving on a street. Um, and so they have this real like psychedelic quality about them. And then they were very good with, uh, making a lot with a little, so they would create the puppets for one show and then they just reuse them in a

different show. And sometimes they were the same characters and sometimes they weren't. So that was a program called calling all safety scouts and that would have been shown in classrooms, uh, you know, the, the basic, uh, road safety and winter safety. And they all had these kind of goofy songs that, uh, you would be encouraged to sing along with. But what, that one was fascinating to me because the, let's say that was the a side, the B side was a program called

We Live Next Door that was, it was made to teach kids about their sort of civic duty. So it took place in a town and it explained everything about like the post office and the police and farming and, but using these totally bizarre puppets. And one of them was a pineapple, was a talking pineapple, who then was spun off into something called Téléfrance. And I don't know if you got that. Yeah, let's listen, let's listen.

Bye bye. Teleprosé Bonjour Allo Salut Teleprosé Teleprosé Disé parler avec nous C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique

C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique

C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique C'est magnifique So that's my first track on my new album. Rap remixes of TV Ontario theme songs. Oh, it makes me wonder, how are things going in the world of electric circus? Is there any plans for any Gen X doc on electric circus?

Yeah, so that was another one I was involved with. And as far as I know, is stalled backslash dead. Thanks to the fallout from the two ninety nine film. Bell just said, we don't want to do any more work like this. If you want to license footage of EC, we'll gladly charge you an arm and a leg, but they no longer want to partner. So I haven't, I haven't spoken to the director in a while. I think it's dead, but that's what I alluded to earlier when we were talking about the sorry state of affairs. Because there's all these subjects that I think are ripe for documentaries or for series,

but there's a great reluctance to do them now because of these rights issues. Yeah, it sounds like it would be exorbitantly expensive. And I always wondered about electric circus because when it comes to the much doc You're only dealing with one cable giant But I feel like electric circus is a weird spot because it was a city TV show and then it was on much music But city TV of course owned by Rogers much music owned by Bell like would you have to deal with both? I mean, it just sounds like a nightmare to me It would it would be and we had sort of started to map that out. And I think, you know, if you really want to talk about EC,

you got to talk about Boogie and Boogie was channel 79. Like channel 79 productions was different from city TV. So it gets terribly convoluted. The good news is Rogers seems to be generally less intense about these things than Bell. Not great, but I guess it's pick your poison is what I'm saying. All right. So shout out to Ridley Funeral Home on the Electric Circus documentary. So many Gen X docs pop in here and there.

I got to track all the ones that don't happen here, but here's a Gen X docs pop in here and there. I've got to track all the ones that don't happen here. But here's a Gen X dose. And then I got a fun fact about this I want to ask you about, but let's listen to this. Wow, I love that reverb. Okay, I have the munchies right now. Just hearing that. That was a, uh, that was a jingle, I guess, when you got the munchies, nothing else will do hostess potato chips. That was, that was everything. And we were kids. Well, and they came back. Okay. Well, that's what I'm going to ask you about. I was in a nations. I was in nations in the stockyards this weekend and I saw munchies on the shelf.

And my question is, do these taste like the munchies, the hostess potato chips we would eat in the mid 80s? Yes and no. There's good news and bad news. The good news is there is definitely a throwback to the flavor. There's a lot. Obviously the market is very different now than it was in the 80s. There's no WWF stickers. There's no small bags. I think maybe that was what threw me right. It's like back then it was all about that little bag. Yeah, like it's 40 cents or 45 cents or something. Yeah, a little went well. Yeah.

And the tin foil bag and all the flavor that would get on your fingers they've kind of experimented a bit so there's popcorn munchies and there's this kind of You know not there's the regular chips, but then there's the tortilla chips So it's quite different, but I will say this, Mike, you know, I get brought into a lot of these things that come back. So people are looking to bring back a film or a show or whatever. And they have nine times out of 10, they fuck it up somehow. They, they, they misunderstand what made the original good,

but I'm happy to say I thought the rollout for the munchies coming back was a 10 out of 10. Like it was as good as, as, as you could imagine, they brought the, the characters back. They had a really interesting rollout where they, they took over a space on Queen street and they set up this kind of 80s, 70s and 80s museum where they had relics from the 80s, but then they also had old merchandise of the munchies. And you know, people went in there and took pictures and made TikToks and all this crap, but it was just a great way of acknowledging there was a rich history of these characters. But then, okay, here's the 2024 munchies.

But I think most importantly, they're cheap. Like I'm sure you've noticed. I mean, the cost of everything is crazy, but you know, the idea that a bag of Doritos is $7. Yeah, it's insane. It's insanity, right? So the munchies, the throwback munchies are very aggressively priced. So on that front, it's a big win too.

I had a moment last summer. So actually summer 2024, I think it was, and I'm at the Phoenix for a live to air like anniversary retrospective. Because when I was like a teenager, like 19 or 20, I spent many nights at the Phoenix at these live areas with the, you know, all the Thunder Kiss 65 and Beastie Boys and Rage Against the Machine and all my 90s aggressive alt rock. And I was there, I just biked over to the Phoenix and I'm there and the DJ's spinning the same tracks like it was STP or whatever and I have this I'm there and I'm like Oh like you can't go home again. Like you you can't Recapture that because you're not 19 anymore. Like I was 49 years old

I had four kids in a mortgage and and and running my own business and everything and you simply add the same music the same Kind of vibe in the same room, but you can't go home again because it's so much of it is tied to that stage in your life, that chapter of your life. And you're simply in a different chapter now. So it all kind of hits differently. Absolutely, absolutely. I think you hit on something that is important in what we do talking about the old days or nostalgia and such is when you were young,

those things implanted themselves on, onto you, and they're going to be with you for the rest of your life, right? Uh, for better or for worse. And I think that's what I find interesting about these kids shows is not so much, you know, that I want to watch kids shows all day. Um, it's that these were the first images that I was exposed to, you know, in the late seventies and they stayed with me and I'm so grateful that it was things like today's special and not a Paw Patrol, you know,

like what my kids have. Um, and that's just, like you said, you can't get that feeling again, but you can understand a little more context and be proud of it. So right. And then nostalgia, I believe this, I'm now going to quote Don Draper, but I'm going to misquote Don Draper. But it's like a bittersweet memory of long ago. So you have this, the pangs of like, I remember when I was 19 and I was losing my shit to, you know, killing in the name of at the Phoenix and like two in the morning on like a Saturday

night or whatever. And then you kind of have this feeling of like, oh, you know, now I'm 49 and I've got a million other priorities before that. And it's just just it's a bittersweet feeling the nostalgia that we merchant that we push on people. The nostalgia merchandise, yes. Right, okay. Oh my god, I could easily have Christmas crackers be like a five episode mini series here. Okay, so we're gonna get to the people we lost, but if

you were here Ed and you're not, but hopefully you'll be here when your book comes out, I will get you not only delicious lasagna from Palma pasta palma pasta calm everybody and you love your Italian food right I do and I love home pasta so we'd win and we're about to play one more clip before the memories and I see it's titled beer so I'll just take that opportunity to tell you and I've got great titled beer. So I'll just take that opportunity to tell you, Ed, I've got Great Lakes beer, fresh craft beer from GLB with your name on it, buddy, waiting for you when you get here. Thank you.

And because we're going to go cook with gas until the end here, Merry Christmas, happy holidays, season's greetings. I want to let you know that season seven of Yes We Are Open, which is an award-winning podcast from Monaris hosted by Al Grego, it's dropped those episodes, those tasty nuggets, many of them recorded in Winnipeg. They're all waiting for you. You inspire me, Ed, and we can collectively be inspired by these small business stories that Al Grego has collected for yes, we are open.

All right, one more clip and here we go. Everyone looks so sincere, including the ones on the chandelier. The only way to get in gear is to have a party where there's lots of beer. Chug-a-lug, chug-a-lug, ooh la la, chug-a-lug, chug-a-lug. All right, that's the new Great Lakes Beer commercial. That's why I put it in there for you to knock that one out of the park. That is a really funny little jingle. It's going to tie this into Somebody We Lost, so this is a really funny little jingle. Uh, there's going to tie this into somebody we lost. So this is a good transition. Um, you and I did a show about, uh, earlier this year about, um, Forbes and magic shadows.

And love that by the Forbes family reached out to me to say they, they all listened. It made their, it traveled through email to the Forbes family and they thought you did a wonderful job paying tribute to Harry Forbes. What a great platform. I mean, thank you for organizing that. I think he is the definition of somebody that doesn't get enough credit. But that program, I can't remember

if we talked about this at all, but the writer of the program, Magic Shadows was not actually Elio's. He was the host, um, was a fellow by the name of Ken Sobel. And Ken Sobel was another person that I knew, I knew his name from credits, but when I started to work on the book, I realized he was incredibly important man behind the scenes at TVO, not just writing Magic Shadows. He wrote Dear Anne Agnes, he wrote a tele-fransay, like he created Ananas, he wrote a read along, he created Boot, all this wonderful stuff. But he also did with the puppeteer Noreen

Young, these shows that were for like addictions research Canada. So they were about drugs and about alcohol. That jingle, you know, is a throwaway commercial beer commercial that's in one of them just in the background. But I just love that the craftsmanship of these guys, uh, that they took it that seriously. Like that actually is a cool, I mean, it's a little

bit tongue in cheek, right? Talking about people getting, you know, strung up on chandeliers from drinking too much, but it's just a really cool little bit. And it's like literally a back in the background of this puppet show. So yeah, I mean, I think when I come and see you, when we're properly promoting the book, I'll bring more of that kind of stuff, really revel in it. Well, I love that craftsmanship. And again, it goes without saying that the FOTM, we drink Great Lakes beer.

But when we look at the conglomerates, the big beer companies, there's a jingle for Molson Canadian. This will kind of turn the page here. Shout out to Ridley Funeral Home. But we lost, you know, every year we lose some greats and I look forward to remembering them with you, Ed. But here's a jingle for one of the bigger beer companies.

And now for Molson Canadian, here's Shirley Harmer. Lager beer. It drinks so smooth, it looks so clear. Just right for folks who really know their beer. If you know lager, you'll agree that it has the least in brightness and in quality. So next time you've got a thirst for a lager bright and clear, drink Molson Canadian. Wow, Shirley Harmer. That was the lovely Shirley Harmer who passed away earlier this year. She was known, her sort of stage name was the queen of Oshawa.

She performed, she was from Oshawa. She performed a lot when that was a, well, I guess it still is a big GM town. But her family, it was quite lovely. They reached out to me because that was, uh, speaking at Don Draper, like that was one of the few kind of 1960s beer commercials that I have, uh, because obviously back in the sixties, there was no VCRs. So the only way you can come across these things now is from film, uh, film reels. And I had this incredible reel of old Molson Canadian jingles.

So they sort of said, do you by chance have the one of our mother? And I, thankfully I did. So we put it back online and it went out on Instagram and, uh, it was just nice to see something come back into circulation and to remember the Queen of Oshawa. Amazing. And we lost another queen in 2024. Let's spend a couple of minutes listening to this. Today's special, it's for everyone. Today's special, come join in the fun. With magic everywhere, a world for us to share. And friendly faces hoping that you'll want to meet us there

For today's special It's about to appear It's about to appear Today's special Shout it loud and clear Take it Oscar! For today's special, it's about to appear, it's about to appear. Today's special, shout it loud and clear. Today's special!

Oh yeah. Yeah. It's a sad one, Ed. Personally, this one hit me pretty hard. Yeah, I think, I think it did. I think it hit a lot of our generation so hard because we talk a lot about Sesame Street, the death of Mr. Hooper on Sesame Street. But, you know, I've always felt the episode about death that was produced by today's special, The Butterfly, is much more powerful because it hits you on that personal level.

So, yeah, to find out that Jodie had passed away was a real gut punch. And I don't think I've ever seen on anything I've posted remembering someone's legacy, a reaction that I saw online with Noreen Virgin. And I think that's just because whether it was Today's special or I on Toronto or any of the things that she did, I mean, she was in an episode of littlest

hobo. She was a polka dot door host. She just had this absolutely magnetic personality and everybody looked up to her like a mum. So that was a tough one. Absolutely Noreen Virgin. And I hope Jodie's jumpsuit on Twitter is okay. Yeah, I mean, we were talking about everyone leaving Twitter. I did really answer you. I haven't set anything up on Blue Sky because I feel like there was other places. And it just, I kind of want to see

But you're an Instagram guy anyways really you're you're you're an Instagram guy I'm an Instagram I mean really I YouTube is my mothership of course but they I just want to see where everything lands before I commit there was that terrible threads what was that that Yeah I hated threads with a great passion. Yeah. You know what? I like you. So I've been kind of looking elsewhere since Elon bought Twitter and FOTM Hall of Famer Cam Gordon got gassed along with most of the Canadian office. But I test drove a whole whack of places to see where it felt right for me. And like, because I need to enjoy this shit. And I landed on Blue Sky. But you and Jodie's jumpsuit are not there and not everybody is there. But regardless,

Noreen Virgin, this death, I didn't see it coming. And I had very, very shortly before that tried my best to communicate to Noreen Virgin that I would absolutely love to have her on Toronto Mic'd and I never heard back and now we've lost her. So yeah, that's a big one. And another big one too, although I won't have a piece of audio to accompany it here, but when I graduated with my wonderful degree from U of T, I was at Convocation Hall with, I don't know, a couple of thousand other people and Ivan Reitman did the keynote address at the late grade Ivan Reitman and I got to shake his hand but also on stage to shake hands of all the graduates was Norman Jewison. Oh that's so cool. That's awesome. I didn't know that he did that. He had some title and I forget some honorary

chancellor type title where he would be a part of all these convocation ceremonies, at least in the late nineties when I got my piece of paper there. But we lost Norman Jewison. Yeah. Absolute mountain of a person. Obviously best known for his Hollywood years, his Academy Award winning films. I mean, you know, take your pick.

I think my favorite of his Hollywood movies is probably Rollerball with James Kahn. It's a really weird science fiction movie from the 70s, but he did all this great stuff. And then I started to become very interested in him when we were doing the exhibit with the kids shows, because, uh, um, you know, his name kept coming up as being somebody that was responsible for,

uh, uncle Chichamis, which was the original puppet that came on CBC when they started broadcasting. And it was actually, um, was actually Nina Kehoe who said, Oh, yeah, you've got to, you got to look into him because he gets credited with, he did all these other shows at CBC in the early days, like music, variety shows and all that. But it turns out he actually kind of did all this crazy stuff with puppets, stuff that Jim Henson, okay, gets a lot of accolades for what he did like two decades later.

And thankfully, Fred Rainsbury had interviewed Norman Jewison, and I was able to get that Norman Jewison, and I was able to get that interview and go through it. And he talked in great detail about his work with the puppets. So that's all in the book. He, as you said, I mean, he's involved at U of T, he was very involved in the Toronto Santa Claus parade. He actually saved it when Eaton's went bankrupt and tried to kill the parade. He, he salvaged it. Um, so he was one of these people that even though had a huge career in California and was big, he never lost his Toronto connections. He was, you know, back and forth all the time. Absolute mensch of a guy. absolute mensch of a guy. And his movie about Hurricane Ruben Carter was filmed here and we got to play ourselves here in Toronto. And like I'm often

at, there's a place where Annette turns into DuPont at Dundas and there's a bridge there and he'll point out to my kids, that's the bridge they where they crashed in the hurricane. So shout out to Norman Jewison. Now, a few times

I mentioned the Steven Stone episode, but that was on the heels of the Stu Stone episode. He's a fellow FOTM Hall of Famer, Ed. And I asked Stu Stone about this gentleman who he crossed paths with many times in his illustrious child actor voiceover career. But let's listen to some Inspector Gadget. Sorry about that. What's up, Chief? Here's your assignment. career, but let's listen to some Inspector Gadget. Fuck. Got it, Chief.

Dan Hennessey. Dan Hennessey. You know, Chief Quimby, obviously, Care Bears, a great, great voice actor on cartoons. I think he was one of these people that was at second city. Uh, when, when it started, he was sort of part of that crew, although he didn't go off sort of into space with, uh, John Candy and Catherine O'Hara and the rest of them. Um, he was very, very interestingly in this program, again, get into great detail in the book

That was called doctors Zonk and the Zunkins that was the first show that John Candy was on and Dan Aykroyd was on it and all the we were saying earlier if you weren't on King of Kensington you were on doctors on And Nina Nina Keough was a puppet operator on that show. And so there are all these SCTV people. And it was basically because the producer from CBC was in charge of that afterschool zone that was so, you know, desired, uh, he was going to second city and seeing all these people, these guys are going to be huge.

I got to get them on TV. So he built these kids shows around them. And it drives me nuts that there's so much reverence for SCTV and their careers of Eugene Levy and all this. But those programs are just rotting away in the vault at the CBC when if this was an American thing, it would be everywhere. It would be on YouTube, it would be on DVD, it would be on streaming. So I'm hoping in part, maybe the release of this book

will bring some awareness to some of these very important cultural pieces that are, you know, were frankly paid for by our parents' dollars that that should be more widespread, you know Much agreements here. It's funny to hear you talk about this stuff rotting away on a shelf because you know What else is rotting away on a shelf right now? the Martin Scorsese SCTV documentary

So we've you know common theme here are the docs that don't see the light of day and the docs that do. And the SCTV doc, I don't think, I mean, if you talk to a FOTM Dave Thomas, he doesn't think we're ever going to see this thing. So there's put that on the list. Well, and you know, you, you mentioned, um, that we'll never know the story of that one. I mean, something obviously weird happened because I'm pretty sure that he filmed that, Scorsese shot that whole reunion. That was the whole point of it. Right.

And now we've lost people. Yeah, I was going to say we've, we're now losing people who are at that reunion like Joe Flaherty. So I feel like the longer, the more time that goes by without this thing getting complete, the less likely we'll ever see it. So I don't know what went wrong either.

I'm sure at some point maybe we'll get some insight into that, but it is a damn shame because even Rick Moranis attended that reunion. Well, exactly. And you know what was flirty this year or last year? Last year, I think. I don't think he's this year I think he's last last fall. I think 2023 but Yeah, there's another another great one to lose and it's just saddens me like you talked about how we're losing all these people from

The 60s and the 70s now are going but you know We're gonna be losing more and more of these these SCTV people that we grew up watching in the early 80s, etc. Father time comes for us all. But before we say goodbye, go ahead. Yeah, no, I was going to say, why don't we skip that next thing because I'd rather end on this note. Did you see the movie about the first night of SNL? You know what? Not yet, but it's on my list. My 23 year old, almost 23 year old told me, dad, you got to see this thing.

So I will see it. Have you seen it? Yes. And I enjoyed it. I think it's really interesting. But what it made me think about was, you know, again, here's an American institution that's being, you know, absolutely lionized. And here's this guy that basically from Montreal

cut his teeth in Toronto. Nothing made about that. But what a shame that there isn't a film or something like that for SCTV. You know what I mean? We know that over time it has shown to be so ahead of so many other things. I mean, it has shown to be so ahead of it, of so many other things. I mean, it occurred to me when I was thinking about this recently, the idea

of setting it at a TV station was such a stroke of genius, right? Because again, we're so seeped in all that media criticism now, but back then to basically say, well, we don't have any money. We want to do sketch comedy, but what's the sort of through line that will keep it all hanging together? And oh, it's a TV station. Uh, it's brilliant. And then then we can make fun of all the shit we saw at city TV and, you know, all this stuff that was happening and brought line of hand characters, exactly Brock line and and boogie and Mel's rock pile and

there's loads of it and it's gold and it's so sad to me that even with the clout of Katherine O'Hara and Eugene Levy and all them for whatever reason this we can't get our shit together and put out films or documentaries that are talking about these things. So it is up to you and I, right? We gotta keep the train moving. It's you and I, I will shout out FOTM Paul Myers, brother of the great King of Kensington actor, Mike Myers, but Paul does have a John Candy book coming out.

And so I suspect in 2025, cause he did a great job on the kids in the hall. And that ended up becoming a pretty damn good prime, it was on prime documentary on the kids in the hall, which I felt was something we badly needed here. So I'm hoping we have a similar thing with John Candy and what is going to happen with this new Paul Myers project. But without a doubt, this whole Scorsese SCTV documentary fiasco like I don't know what went wrong where but We need to learn from these mistakes and you and I have to keep carrying the torch and I think we make the Electric circus dock we just we just make it rogue. We don't make any money on it

We air it in like tiny little winter I will go hook up at Palma's kitchen or something and have a viewing party and we just share it with the masses We don't make a penny on it but we do it for love of the game because we deserve as much retro Ontario as we can in our blood veins. Love it. Okay. And we missed Christmas crackers last year and Ed, I'm looking you in the eye now via Zoom because you're in port something. I'm here to, we can never miss another Christmas crackers, okay? I need you to commit on the record. I'm recording. We

will, unless one of us, you know, shouts out Ridley Funeral Home, we need to do this every December until the end of time. All right, I'm in. I'm in. I'm in. Happy holidays, Ed. Happy holidays. I promise. I will grace the hallowed basements to promote my book when that happens next fall. And that brings us to the end of our 1,604th show. Go to torontomic.com for all your Toronto Mic needs. Go to retroontario.com for all your retro Ontario needs. And much love to all who made this possible. That's Great Lakes Brewery, Palm Pasta, RecycleMyElectronics.ca, Minaris, and Ridley Funeral Home.

See you all on Festivus for my annual Elvis Festivus special. Try to say Elvis Festivus five times fast. Elvis Festivus, Elvis Festivus, Elvis Festivus. Easier than I thought. See you all then. So So I'm going to go ahead and get the I'm going to be a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a

little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a The So You