Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Steve Patterson: Toronto Mike'd Podcast Episode 1471

Episode Date: April 16, 2024

In this 1471st episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with the host of CBC Radio One's The Debaters Steve Patterson about his career in comedy. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Ridley Funeral Home, The Advantaged Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada, The Yes, We Are Open podcast from Moneris, The Toronto Maple Leafs Baseball Team and RecycleMyElectronics.ca. If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please email Toronto Mike at [e-mail]

this just for me to peruse Toronto May Believes baseball history. You're getting gifts here. Am I really? Hang in there. You're going to leave with so much swag. You're going to be. Nancy will be begging me to have you back next week. OK, here we go. Welcome to episode 1471 of Toronto Miked, proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times and

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Valuable perspective for Canadian investors who want to remain knowledgeable, informed and focused on long-term success. Season 6 of Yes We Are Open, an award-winning Monaris podcast hosted by FOTM Al Gregor and Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of the community since 1921. Today, making his Toronto Make debut is Steve Patterson. How's it going, Steve? Really good, man. Thank you. So many sponsors. This is exciting. There's a lot on the line here. You think you're excited. Your voice, like just hearing your voice right now in the headphones,

I have heard so many episodes of The Debaters on CBC Radio One. I was always wondering, are you like an AI creature, machine learning, but you're a real guy. Yeah, no, I'm not AI, I'm RS, real stupidity. That's what I'm going for. Authentic, love it, but really a pleasure to meet you. Yeah, you too, man.

I love what you do here, and I love a lot of the guests that you've had. I disliked four, and I love a lot of the guests that you've had I disliked for and I'm really happy to be here doing this What took this so long like why? Seriously, cuz I won't dox you except you're not a long drive. Okay, you know, we'll get we'll get to Dan O'Toole in a minute But that man drove from Orrin somewhere near or no I don't know if he was in where he was in the core this somewhere like he told me the drive almost killed him Like literally, but you had a short drive. Why is it episode?

1471 that you're finally, you know showing up in the basement here. I think it's because I was born in 1971 and I wanted there to be synergy. So this is it's all come together at this one. That's a good good answer So what is life like on the other side of 50? How is life? Uh, I really do forget. I might, I just had, my wife had some people over and had a, you know, put out, put out a nice little cake with a five and a three. And I'm like, who's that?

Who's that for? I stopped counting a while ago. Now, and now I think I'm at the age where I will lie about being older, just so people are like, you look great for 63. Right. Yeah. Cause yeah, 67, 67 are like, you look great for 63. Right. Yeah. Cause yeah.

67, 67 today. That's a good move actually. Cause you look fantastic for 67. Thanks buddy. Let me be the first to tell you that. But I asked about the 50 because I'm going to hit it in a couple of months. Oh yeah. 50.

Cause I'm a 74 baby. And you know, I just chatted with, we just did an FOTM cast, which is for the real heads out there. So Steve, I don't know if you'd qualify for that, but you are now an FOTM, so congratulations. Thank you. But he just hit 50 and we were talking about like, that's just the symbolic significance of being,

having your age start with a five. It just feels different than your age starting with a four. Like now you're getting old. It does feel like it should be a milestone. I'll tell you what happened for me to take the sting out of it was it was during the pandemic. So there was no option to celebrate it. So it was just me and a bird staring at each other.

Well, let me get this out of the way before I read some notes that came in from some people that are known to this listenership for sure, including the name I mentioned off the top. But let me just invite you to my 50th birthday party, Steve, because it's going to be at great lakes brewery June 27 from six to nine PM. That is the South Etobicoke campus, not the GLB brew pub, which is at Queens key and Jarvis where I'm going to be Thursday night to hang

out with Joe Bowen because there's a new Holy Mackinac beer from great lakes. Is it here? No, because it launches Thursday. Oh, okay. And it's like limited release. I don't even know if I can get my mitts on one, but that's Thursday night. But June 27 is TMLX 15. Steve, it would be amazing

if Steve Patterson showed up to this event. You'd love it. And you'd get your first beer on the house there. And you would be fed by Palma pasta. Like you get a full Italian meal on the house and would be great to see you. Well it sounds pretty amazing I just have to check with my wife and see what's going on but if I can make it I'll be there. Okay and there is some beer going home with you today frankly. Thank you I love the Canuck, yeah the flying Canuck. Yeah the Canuck pale ale.

Yeah. Yeah that's their stable. It's not flying I guess maybe I was flying last time I drank it. Well if you drink enough, you'll be flying. That's the pledge they make. And also, since I mentioned Palma pasta, I do have a large lasagna in my freezer for you to take home. Oh my God. Thank you so much. I told you there'd be swag.

This is already the best interview I've ever done. We're not even done yet. I'm going to save the rest for later. But Dan O'Toole did write a note when he heard you were coming on. Okay. Toolsy. Which his return to Toronto note when he heard you were coming on. Okay. To see, you know. Which his return to Toronto Mike, which was only like last month. Yes.

Was amazing. Like how many questions do we have about like, what the fuck happened there? And then he just answered them all. Like it was amazing. How do you know Dan? I know Dan from, Jay. So I met Jay first when I was hosting

like a Canadian screen Awards thing back when it was still the genies, the Geminis, I think. And Jay was nominated for something and then he won and then he showed up on the newscast, the sportscast that night with draped in it carrying the thing and I've always liked Jay since then. And then so he had me on in some capacity on the show and and I just got to know him and Dan. Oh you know what? No that's a clip of uh did you listen to CFNY back in the 80s? Oh of course I did. Okay so

Jim Reid was the midday guy so after Pete and Gates he had Jim Reid. He went by the name JR on the air and he just passed away. And tomorrow, which is sad, shout out to Ridley Funeral Home, he left us too soon. He was a big listener of this program too. But tomorrow, and I'll get back to your Dan O'Toole story, but this is not the CBC as I mentioned on the top, okay? But tomorrow- I thought I said something wrong and that was the sound.

No, that's actually production error. But I don't know who's in charge here. But so tomorrow, Scott Turner, who was a very popular personality on CFNY is going to drop by tomorrow morning and we are going to memorialize uh his former colleague the late great Jim Reid Jr. So all the CFNY heads out there tune in tomorrow Scott Turner talking about Jr. My apologies uh I was calling up the live stream you're looking great back to Dan O'Toole. up the live stream, you're looking great, back to Dan O'Toole. Well I went to do, I did their podcast, Jay and Dan's podcast, and then I was randomly

in LA when they were down there with Fox, and so I did their podcast down there, but I thought it was going to be, you know, kind of very, very bare bones scaled back like down here, and I for some reason thought it was at a house, so I showed up with, but it was on the Fox Studios lot, and I showed up in shorts it was at a house. So I showed up with it but it was on the Fox Studios lot and I showed up in shorts with no identification and they had to like your Canadian friend is here Jay, Dan, but then Dan went... Did they ask you a question like can you name three tragically hip songs and if you can't they know you're not his Canadian friend? The only question they asked is what kind of grown man travels without identification. I'm like a Canadian comedian.

But then Dan went the extra mile literally and met me on the boardwalk, like rode down on a bike and met me on the boardwalk for a drink when he was still drinking. And apparently he drank a lot. He did. I heard that. But I bonded with those guys. I really like him. And he wrote in his note was a great human I don't know if he's talking about himself for you, it's unclear but might have been confused

One of you is a great human and a couple more indigo mirage on Twitter wrote F&A That's like a clean way to say fucking a you kept that you've ruined it. He said I'm not on the CBC right now right F&A again, I exist for puns, he's doing God's work. And this ties into what Al Grego, who is now hosting season six of Yes, We Are Open for Meneris, and I'll shut out the new episode later, but because I have another gift for you tied to that. But Al Grego writes, ask Steve

if he's got the same pun writer as Ron McLean. So before you talk about puns with me here, I was gonna pitch you an idea, like a pun off, because these gentlemen are all FOTMs. Ron Sexsmith, Ron McLean, Huxley Workman. I love Huxley, yeah. And now you, what if the four of you had a pun off? And I was like the moderator of this pun off. Any interest in this idea I just thought of last night?

Here's the difference between there Ron Sexsmith in particular is always out there online and I love Ron and I love all those guys actually. Ron McClain's I think needs need some work. I think Ron's are... He needs your pun writer which is probably you right? It's true well here's the thing I I do have, no, it's not. I have writers. I have writers, mostly a guy named, I don't know, the wizard behind the curtain, Gary Jones,

we call Jonesy, writes a lot of those things. And then I might shape them and edge them, but they're written for me, you know? And then I might try to add one out of every 10. So people think that I speak like that all the time, but can you imagine? Well, you get credit for these puns as if you wrote them. Sort of like how the essay at the beginning of Q,

people thought like, Chiangu Meche. Let's not draw that analogy for the love of God. I'll give you a different analogy, okay? Somebody maybe you're closer to, because I know you've been on the program a few times. Humble Howard Glassman. Yeah, I love humble on CF and why used to do, uh, the humble report, the humble report.

And I would listen in the nineties and I just assumed like humble Howard, who's a standup comic like yourself. Like he was like writing these jokes. And then when I got to know Howard and produced the humble and Fred show and he started, you know, giving me the real talk and everything. He disclosed, Oh no, he subscribed to the service where he'd get a fax with all these jokes written for him. And then he would just sort of like, do what you do, like a little massage and shape them a bit. But he wasn't writing these jokes that the humble report had another person

writing it. And I feel just as like disappointed to learn, you're not writing all these puns on the debaters. Well, I didn't come here to disappoint you, Mike, but I've already, you know, that's I get that a lot. So you're used to it. Yeah. And now this gets blows up my idea for the, you know, the pun off because you're not writing your own pun. Yeah. But you know, I can give it a shot. I can, I shaped them as I said, but I got to give shout out to Gary Jones for Jonesy. Yeah. Jonesy for doing those. I gotta get him on the podcast. Please do.

He's like from the Stargate days. He'd get a lot of listeners. Wow. Okay. Ken Reed. Okay, so we started with a big sports media guy, Dan O'Toole, and now we are at Ken Reed. He's from Sportsnet. He goes, please ask Steve

about his love of futuristic trees. That was gonna be the question. What does that mean? His brother is a standup, Peter Anthony. Very funny and based out in Halifax now. He was in Toronto for a while and was in Calgary for a while. And he brought Ken to see a show. I'd never met Kenny, but I knew him

from watching sports all the time. And I did a throwaway joke one night about these statues of trees in downtown Calgary. I just called them futuristic trees and that has stuck with Kent for the entire time he's known me and he just calls me futuristic trees. And he probably assumes every bit you do is about futuristic trees. Like that's your thing. That's the Steve Patterson thing.

Yeah, it's so funny that it was the throwaway line that stuck with him. None of the hours of materialist went over just the throwaway about futurists. Their lamp posts is what they are. Okay, shout out to FOTM Ken Reid. And here's a woman, you're going to explain this to me, because I don't understand this reference either. It's too inside for me. Judith Butler wrote in, ask for the soap. Does that mean anything to you? Like, I'm hoping it means something to you. Otherwise, what is that? I should have brought soap my My wife made something called patter soap, which we're getting it's been very popular so we're in the midst of getting more of it now and She got it for me for my birthday, but then decided to make it into merch

So she designed it all and it smells like my favorite beer Which I'm not gonna name the brewery. It's not Great Lakes. It's not Great Lakes. You can name it. My favorite local beer. Where does your favorite local beer?

It's called the Instigator from Indy Ale House. So they mix that in with eucalyptus and cannabis into some sort of soap, and my wife got it made and kind of mass produced it, and the packaging, I really wish I had one, but we ran out of them. Looks like a pack of But we ran out of them looks like a pack of cigarettes Everyone thinks I'm handing them a pack of cigarettes, but it's it's so it's so and everyone seems to really be into the soap It's actually really good. Did you not think to bring me some soap? Like I've literally given you I know

I'm gonna have to send it to you. That's it's my it's my it's some people do leave behinds I do forgot to bring so well now that I know what neighborhood you live in You know, I know I I'm literally biking it like all the time I'm like he lives there that's not like or no okay get his ass over here but the soap would be like next time you come on to kick out the jams or something yeah bring me some so I'll have a full package available I promise okay and now just to make you feel bad I'm giving you just a couple more gifts here okay. Well firstly Ridley Funeral Home the official funeral home of the Toronto May Believes baseball team by the way and they start

their season May 12 at Christie Pitts and I'm gonna be there and you should be there too. It's a measuring tape man you can measure what you wish. I love it. See if your joke writer was here you'd have something like oh about to measure a measuring joke. To measure yeah well no this looks like a good head measure because it can go around you so you can measure your cranium and see how smart you are how much empty space is size matters size matters this is what I've heard okay now also because I mentioned Al Gregor we had a great question earlier there's a wireless speaker behind the beer there that wireless speaker is

yours that's a Bluetooth speaker it's right right. This is the brown thing. Oh, this. Thank you. And that QR code will let you subscribe to season six of Yes, We Are Open, the award winning podcast from Monaris that all FOTM should subscribe to. I took a note on his most, he went out west and he went to Banff and he visited Ken Mc, I gotta get this name right. Ken McMurdo, owner of Mountain Chocolates. He started his business in 1989 and it hasn't always been a sweet time for Mountain Chocolates.

He was heavily reliant on tourism and you can imagine something happened recently, this pandemic and that wasn't good for the, wasn't good for the Banff tourism. And some other challenges lately involve inflation and supply chain issues. And we're going to find out like how is he managing? This is a wonderful conversation. Al Gregor with Ken McMurdo from Mountain Chocolates. It is on season six of Yes, we are open. So enjoy listening to that on your new wireless speaker. Thank

you very much. Listen on the way home and I'll just measure stuff. Measure everything okay and report back. I want to know what these measurements are. Measure everything and report back. Measure once cut twice? No it's the opposite. Okay James Edgar says never stop doing the debaters and also some of those puns hurt. Yeah keep it up. Here's the thing about puns and I know there's gonna be questions. I do get lots of questions about puns. I do have people pitch me puns on flights which is not... And enough about Ron Sexmith. Ron's great though. He is great. But the thing about puns is people are like, oh that was a bad one. You want it to be bad. The goal of a pun is a groan. So if you're

getting a groan you're doing it right and if if you're not, you're not. And that's- So what's Ron McLean doing wrong? Well, Ron is a nice man that it's just, he just tries to sneak them in at the very, very end. Cause I think in his heart, he knows there's not going to be the reaction. And then people are just looking confused. It's like on his way out, he sneaks it in and then you have to move on. There's no time for a reaction. Is that right? That's right. Or he just, he thinks it's going to get a better reaction than it does and that that's it's like a comedian that pauses for laughter and there is none. So I love I love watching Ron but the I could do without the puns. I don't think he doesn't that much anymore.

Well you're not paying attention. Playoff start by the way did I mention Holy Mackinac beer I'll be at Great Lakes Brew Pub on Thursday to hang out with Joe Bowen. Joe Bowen who who I've had many correspondences with, in fact, his son was in this basement last week to record the latest episode of Between Two Fermenters, the official Great Lakes Brewery, yeah, it's a great title, podcast. But Joe tells me, I don't do any podcasts.

I will not do your podcast until I'm retired. So he's got like a hard no podcast rule. He seems very afraid he'll say something that will get him canceled or otherwise. Right, well my only experience with Joe, I think he's great. I'm a Habs fan so my hockey season is over. Get the hell out of here.

Yeah, no, my hockey season's over. It never started. But he was actually at a golf tournament that I was doing a show at many, many years ago and he was doing the auction and he was trying to he was driving the bids up and that one of the things on the block was all the Masters champions was a picture of them and he said so the bidding was at whatever it was and then he goes you don't understand you're all business owners you all have big offices

you bring people into what you do is you take a picture out from the middle you put your picture in and then you let people sit in the office and stare at that and you go oh yeah I want. I don't talk about it. Which I thought was a great bit. I liked it a lot. No Joe's great. And hopefully we hear some many a Holy Mackinac on this upcoming playoff scene. So you're a Habs fan. So will you follow the Leafs or what's your, what's your deal with the Leafs? I mean, I just can't get my heart in it. There's lots,

lots of friends of mine that are Leafs fans, but I had a Habs flag up the last time the Leafs and Habs met in the playhouse. I don't know if you remember what happened there. But 93. Yeah, they were not nine. No, not 93. There was the pandemic year. You know, all the Canadian. I actually completely blocked that one. I thought we were going back to Gilmore. No, but like they were Leafs wrapped three one and my neighbors were running by and almost egg in my house. And then the Habs came back in one and then they do have a vague recollection of this. I'll take your word for it,

Steve. I'm looking at some looking right now at Wendell Clark areas. Cause I was thinking of the previous playoff match. Oh, it never happened. Obviously we lost to the Kings. It was supposed to happen. It was so lined up that in my mind it happened. Okay. That's how like, you know, fate it felt in 93, but we obviously never got to

play the Habs in 93. That's what Wikipedia tells me anyways. But anyway, I'm here to tell you, Wendell Clark, I'm going to just mention this and then I'll give you this book gift that will be done the gifts and we can talk about the debaters and the tatter dad. It's like Christmas here. I wore the only like dad shirt I could find in my collection. It's like your daddy with Darth Vader. I need a dad shirt. I'm going to wear this one.

I like that one. I'm going to get you set up, buddy. You've got me so many things here. I'm going to wrap powder soap need a dad shirt. I'm gonna wear this one. I like that one. I'm gonna get you set up, buddy You've got me so many things here. I'm gonna wrap powder soap in a dad shirt I want just boxes of these soaps. I don't want to ever be stinky again. Like smell drunken high without actually being drunken high. I get it. Sounds like a you know pre sobriety Dan O'Toole That's what that sounds like to me. Okay You know pre sobriety Dan O'Toole is what that sounds like. Okay Shout out to Dan. Okay, so I'm here to tell you Wendell Clark is going to be at Christie pits on May 12th for this aforementioned season The opener for the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team and there's so many interesting people coming out

I've got Pagan coming out. I got Hebsi coming out. I got Peter Gross coming out I got Stephen Brunt coming from Hamilton. I love Stephen. He's gonna be there I'm telling you there's no no ticket. Like this is free. You can just show up in this and you're there. Uh, that's how it works. Everyone, you just show up and you're at a baseball game and it's, uh, it's going to be a lot of fun. Uh, Rod Black, of course, is going to be there. His mustache is going to be there. Well, his mustache too. He promised he'd grow it back from a 12, but Wendell Clark's going to be there.

And Rick vibe by the way, like this is the other leafs that'll be there. And who else said I want to shout out? Who's going to be the and Rick Vive, by the way, like this is the other leafs that will be there and who else that I want to shut out who's going to be the Rick Emmett. So Rick Emmett from triumph is going to make the trek from Burlington and he's going to be honored before the game and I am where I'll just tell the FOTMs I'm working on the national anthem being performed by Biff Naked. So like that's in front of Biff now she's pondering it. Imagine that Oh Canada from Biff Naked. I'd love to see that. But that book is yours.

It is the history of the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team. It's a hardcover, a great book. You've got, you're going to need like a rent a truck or something to get this stuff home. It's a lot of stuff. All right. So now enough from me. Let me hear from Steve Patterson. Uh, if you don't mind, because we're going to talk about the debaters obviously, and

we're going to talk about pattern dad. Is that a pattern? That pattern had had it we're going to talk about the debaters, obviously, and we're going to talk about pattern dad. Is that pattern dad pattern dad? I want to talk about pattern dad, but I do hope you'll share with us. Like When did you realize you wanted to be in comedy? Like did you have a moment you realized you were funny? Like I just want to know the path maybe the path to the debaters if you like go back Oh, like yeah, like give me a little bit like was there a day in school where everyone laughed at your joke? And you're like, oh this is what I can do?

Almost the exact opposite. I was in university at York first year. Okay. The student council president then was he who shall not be named, who later hosted a radio show. And- Did he write those essays? Oh no, God.

But I was always making jokes in residence. I was at Founders College, and then my dorm mates signed me up for comedy night without telling me. So the first night that I went to a show, I just got called out of the audience and went up with completely unprepared and spoke for five minutes. So it probably wasn't the greatest set that I've ever had.

But it did get, strangely, more laughs than some people who had known they were going up that night. So it gave me the confidence to kind of go back and try it. And eventually I realized I could do it. You know, I was writing advertising for a while and I realized... You were like Don Draper wannabe. Yeah, well, he's less handsome obviously, but I realized that there's a lot of rejection in advertising

and you can be funny to a point, but not really in advertising because there's too many people to answer to. So I just wanted to be funny for the sake of being funny, and comedy's the best thing for that. The audience judges you, and they'll laugh or they won't, but then you can recover, and yeah, I like it. It's been a while now. Now here's the big question, like off the top here.

Did you quit that? Off the top, what the hell have we been doing? Was I supposed to record that? That was like the get to know you pre-interview. Did you quit that copywriting job or were you fired from that copywriting job? Oh, that's a good question. Wow, you're going back there.

I heard stories. No, I was definitely, it was almost simultaneous, which is like, we broke up with each other, but my boss at the time, a man named Peter, was like, you're really, really funny. You should do that all the time. And sort of, but he gave me what the greatest thing was, is he gave me access to the agency, knowing all the, all the agency stuff, knowing that I would not be there in a couple months. So I had the best posters of any beginning comedian in the world.

Oh, you're printing on their machines. Yeah, printing on the printing press and getting, getting like senior copywriters to write my ads for shows. So it was, uh, it was a really nice transition. Actually. It was, it was a lot of fun. So I, uh, shout out to Pete Tarpey. If he's out there from Taylor Tarpey, I'm sure he's listening right now. Please. Uh, just for laughs has been in the news lately for all the wrong reasons, I suppose. I'm curious to know like the role of Just For Laughs in your career at this point when

you leave the copywriting job in the mid-90s and what maybe like a word or two what you think of the current state of Just For Laughs. It's really unfortunate. It's kind of the pinnacle for Canadian comics to aim towards, right? You want to get to Just For Laughs. When you say you do comedy in Canada, people are like, Oh, have you been on Just For Laughs? They don't ask, Oh, have you, have you played the, the giggle, the giggle box in their city or something? Um, and, and you know,

Just For Laughs is a great springboard for Canadian comedians or was, so it's very sad in that way. But what they, you know, kind of didn't do that I think they could have done better is they didn't really get behind Canadian comedians and help launch them into other markets the way that they brought American comedians into here because they kind of just listened to the American management and they would bring whoever they wanted. So they'd have a marquee American name and then a bunch of a bunch of Americans

and the number of Just for Laughs shows that I've seen a Canadian open for an American that they were funnier than is in the high hundreds. So I wish them the best. I hope someone steps in and gives Canadian comics something to aim for again. But the younger generation of comics, the current generation, the online, they really don't need Just For Laughs anymore. They build their own following online and they can go and you don't really need comedy. I don't want to say this, comedy clubs are still necessary, but people can self produce shows and fill up rooms pretty easily.

I had a gentleman here very recently, his name was Hassan Fills, and he was talking about how, like yeah, he does this comedy, it's called, You Idiot, like a play on the word Eid, Mubarak. Yes, yep, I have seen that now. And he's, I think he was telling, like you know, it started where they just had, And he's, I think he was telling like, you know, it started where they just had like, like, like they just,

any place that can hold people, they book it. And then they promote it themselves and they, they sell the tickets, they fill it up. So it is interesting this just for laughs, you know, is it necessary, but back in the nineties, like the late nineties, I'm wondering like, what role does Just For Laughs play in your career as a comedian?

Like, I know you played in Montreal in 1999. Yeah, it's big. I don't want to belittle that, you know, it was, it was a very, it was bigger. Yeah. And it was a traditional stepping stone where you went to the festival to meet people from outside of Canada to help you with your career. And most Canadians are looking to meet American agents, which I never was. And I was doing a set about my dad being Irish

and I got booked on an Irish tour. So to me, that was my goal of the whole thing was to get over to Ireland doing comedy. So I owe them a debt of gratitude for that. But the amount of American agents that come up and are in your face, they're just as disgusting and slick as you would think. So it was that part of it I didn't enjoy, obviously.

But the people that can play the game the greatest are the ones that get ahead in comedy, not necessarily the funniest. So that was a good example. Okay, so you parlayed your way into a tour of Ireland. And then at some point you got to play the, not too far away from there, you got to play the Edinburgh Festival in Scotland.

I did, but I didn't do a full run like a lot of comics do. I would fill in and do shows here and there. And it's a really fun festival to be part of. But it's a real grind on comedians, because you're self-producing the show. You've got to find a place to stay. You've got to rent the room yourself. It's not what I would call a moneymaker for young comedians.

And they're hoping to get booked to play around the UK. So as soon as I found out from my Irish agent, what's the goal of this thing? And they said it's to play around the UK. So as soon as I found out from my Irish agent, what's the goal of this thing? And they said it's to play around the UK. I'm like, oh, I have no desire in that. So I don't wanna do the rest of this, but I admire everyone that has a good run at Edinburgh. And as any Fringe Festival, you see some great shows,

and some of them later become big things, so it's great. And it looks good in the bio, right? Like sometimes you get to stick these keywords in the bio. Edinburgh, Fringe, yes, yeah. There was a guy, sorry, I'm going off. No, right? Like sometimes you get a stick, you got to stick these keywords in the bio. And for interest, yes. There was a guy, sorry, I'm going off. No, I like it when you do that. Sorry. Please continue.

Do you really? I like the tangents and then I try to bring us back, but I do like the tangent. This one is related. There was a Australian comic who I'd met in Edinburgh and then I went and played Australia and he had gotten the best newcomer and I'm not going to say his name because I can't remember it

But he had he had gotten best newcomer that year in Enboro and the news had traveled so quickly back to Australia that his whole thing was a Very low-key comedy set but he had jokes in it But all that all that the young comic saw was oh you just have to be low-key. No energy That's what people like and I showed up to headline an amateur night in Australia and everyone was so indifferent and had no jokes that I got a standing ovation at the end just by process of doing jokes.

So I think the lesson was, don't listen to what others are doing, do something yourself. Yeah, tow your own, hoe your own garden. And I don't know, I was gonna go into tow your own road. How your own, hoe your own, hoe your own road. Tow your own hoe. No, that doesn't sound right. that can get you cancelled very quickly if you mess that up here Okay, here. Let's play a little there's a show

I want to talk to you about I think the listenership are familiar with it But let me play a bit of this if you don't mind Hey everybody, are you ready to slather on the blather? From Studio 40, it's The Debaters! Now, here's the man who never blithers when he dithers, Steve Patterson! Hey! Hello everyone! Thank you! Thank you so much! Hello and welcome to The Debaters! The show where comedians compete and the audience chooses the champ.

I went to a website where you can register to have a star named after you. So I'm proud to announce that Betty White will now be known as Steve Patterson's Hot Nana. But now I know you didn't write that joke. I might have written that one. You might have written that one. I'll bring her down to tell people that the debate in this episode is a tea versus coffee. And that's kind of a typical kind of fun debate. So tell us how you got the gig as host of the debaters on CBC radio.

I think I owe that to largely to the Halifax Comedy Festival because there was a producer, CBC producer named Tom Anico and he had seen me do stand up and said, do you want to host a show like a little pilot? Which I did out in Halifax and had guests on. Mark Critch was one of my guests. And, yeah, he wasn't at the time, but he became it. And Mark Forward, my buddy Mark Forward. Also a big name. Yeah.

Shout out to the Letter Kenny podcast, the produce stand. Absolutely. Yeah, he's great. Him and Jeff too. Anyway, so I was doing that and the pilot, you know, that pilot didn't get picked up But you know Sean Majumder a lot of few things fell into place Sean who's great and as a buddy of mine was moving to the States and couldn't couldn't commit to the show and Sean himself was like you should get Patterson to host it and the producer said I just saw I just had him post another thing

So they had a few guest hosts I think but, but then as soon as I did it, it kind of stuck and I've been doing it ever since. And it's been way longer than I, than I thought anything would, would go. So, but it's still, it's still a new, fresh show every time, which is, so I still like doing it. So not 2007, is that when you become the debaters host approximately? It sounds right. Okay.

Well, Wikipedia had 2007. It's about, I'm at about year 18. So it's pretty close. Yeah. 17, right. Okay, well Wikipedia had 2007. I'm at about year 18 so it's pretty close yeah 17-18. Okay and speaking of Wikipedia I'm here to because we have a Wikipedia editor named Rosie Gray To who listens to every episode of Toronto Miked and then makes edits based on what you know the talent like you clarify. So did you say no to Last Comic Standing? Yes that's true. What's that story? Because I know you qualified for the Canadian finals in Montreal. Like why did you say no? What's going on? That's a big deal. Let me hear the story. Yeah, well, it was pretty simple to me. I had a club gig lined up in Montreal that night

and you know, the people were coming to see me. I'd built a bit of a following and I lived in Montreal for a while and I said, you know, let me, I did the tryouts only cause they were in Montreal cause I didn't really believe in the process of it. And they got me through mostly because I told one of the judges they weren't funny, I think is the reason I got through. But they said, yeah, you have to be here now.

You're in holding and then you do the show tonight. And I said, well, I can't be in holding. I have a show here tonight and they said choose between that or us and I chose the local show so that was that was it was a pretty simple answer to me. There are probably many a comic who would not say no to last comic standing because they're thinking about American TV. For sure and I you know I respect that maybe it was a boneheaded move on my part but I'll tell you the club owner Ernie Butler really appreciated me coming to his club and,

and you know, forgoing that. So it was, it was a no brainer for me at the time. And I think it, I think it still is, you know, you gotta take those chances to jump through hoops, I guess. And then, then you gotta dance with the one that brought you. The Canadian clubs are the ones that brought me. No, absolutely. The question came in from Bob Willett.

Excuse me, Bob Willett better known as Bingo Bob. He used to produce the Humble and Fred show on Sirr and the Y back in the day actually. But he's asking, who is the funniest debater like of all the debaters? And I'll just point out that clip I was playing, I did cut it off early because I think we can listen to the whole episode

and then we can just, you can do like pop-up video. You can talk about, oh, at this point, whatever. But that's Sean Cullen is on that. He's an FOTM. I find Sean Sean Cullen to be very, very funny. This is my opinion. Who do you think is the funniest debater in the history of that? That's impossible.

That's like asking who your favorite child is and you never answer. Who's your favorite child? You never answer to their face. That's my next question. No, we have so many, we have so many great ones and there's so many different styles. There's a few that no one wants to debate against because they're just... Who are they? John Steinberg out of Ottawa. No one wants to debate against him. Very few want to debate against

Derek Sagan because he's a he's a favorite as well and then there's a he's a favor as well. And then there's a woman named Yumi Nagashima out of out of Vancouver that is just Her her delivery is so disarming that it's it's almost impossible against her So there's those three but I could just list You know reams and reams of people that are great and some people that make their debut that I you know, I'm still Discovering that really want to do the show and love it and are great at it. So I'm, I'm really confident on any night of debaters, you're going to see a great show. That's like a one night comedy festival. So I can't, you know, I just did name a few, but I, I,

I shouldn't because everyone's everyone's great. Are the, you know, the the winners predetermined? Of course, scripted element to all this, Humble Howard has let me in on the real talk here. They're not improvising their debates. It's all like, typically it's pre-scripted anyway. That's fine. But at the end of the show, is it audience applause, whoever's got the biggest applause is the winner.

Is that predetermined or is that organic? That's organic. I shouldn't say I hate that. I hate the pressure of it because we do, we have gotten letters. They're like, Paterson got it wrong. Why'd he do that? Well, Humble thinks you got it wrong. Like, literally Humble, I think he's done it a few times

and he's never won, but he says there was one time he got the bigger applause and you gave it to the other guy. What did he have an applause meter in his pants? You know, I love, I love Humble. Or was he happy to see you? I love Humble, but I know when he gets it, people really do wanna win when they're on it, but we don't give them anything.

There's no prize money, they get paid the same. No lasagna for the winner? No, I try to make the best decisions I can. Sometimes I'll pick children in the crowd to be the judges and they'll pick them. So I'm like, this is on you. So send your letters to Jimmy. But it is, you know, we do not predetermine winners. And we've had a lot, a lot of debates that ended up with the person we didn't think would win or a topic that

we didn't think would win, you know, when wins it. And I'm like, this is great. I love it. I love it. It's all in the moment and you never know. You can just have one great line that sticks out and that's what people vote for. Right. And some of this maybe one debater is a more famous person. Do you think that? Uh, that doesn't always work though. It should, but we've had a, we, you know, we did it at Just For Laughs quite a few years and we'd have some pretty high profile American comics and they didn't like the part where another comic gets to heckle you and the crowd gets to kind of vote against you.

So we stopped doing it there, but again, because of American agents not wanting their comics to not look good. But the Canadians that are familiar with the format, or we've had Australians that are really good and British comics that are really good, they love the format. They love getting in a comedy fight. There's no other, there's no other format for it. So everything on the show, you know, yes, they write their opening arguments, but they've never practiced them before because it's not, it's sort of stand up, but not really. So it's, it's got that fresh, you know, that we don't know if it'll work or not energy. And is it truly like this conversation we're having now?

This is all scripted. This is all scripted. Obviously. There's a teleprompter over here for those who can't see it There is a teleprompter here for those who can't see it But what this is warts and all because I literally played something by accident for tomorrow's episode It just you know, I just started playing I opened up the tab in the browser and it was like on autoplay But this is live to tape so like as you're in the room as it happens with the music and everything, as it happens is another fine program on CBC. I do love how your mind works. I've loved trying to keep up with it. Right. But it's all going to be packaged up and then Dan O'Toole is going to listen in Orno and

he's going to be like, oh, that's how it happened on the floor. Like there's no edits involved. But when you record an episode of The Debaters, is it all as it unfolded or will you have redos and edits and stuff for the radio broadcast? Very, very few. The best part about our show is that we kind of leave things in for the most part. Like we tape, you know, we want to get 20 minutes for a debate and we tape like less than 30. So there's not a lot of room for air in there and we just leave some of the mistakes in because we want it to be We don't want it to be overly polished and I by the way

Just so this everyone knows this I do not hear the debates beforehand And that's that's something that they wanted me to do it when I started hosting I said I don't want to do that I'm not an actor because then you have to really fake it like you want to act like you're hearing it for the first time You don't want to fake it. Yeah. No, I want to be an audience member, essentially. Like I'm not recording this conversation, but when we have this for real, you're going to hear me faking it when I'm going to authentically react to everything like I'm hearing it for the first time.

I don't have that kind of energy. You went to Ireland? Yeah. My motherland? Okay, shout out to Ireland. Beautiful. Absolutely. Okay, so you're not answering who's the funniest debater. I'm not.

Then I'm going to ask you a question you might be able to answer as you would. Is that coffee or tea by the way? Cause that was the debate I was listening to too. Oh yeah, this is, it's coffee from down the road. You can get a nice break right down the road here. Okay, beautiful. Cause I think Sean Cullen was arguing for,

I can't remember, but anyways, I listened to it and I'm like, yeah, this is an enjoyable, I usually listen on the actual terrestrial radio, believe it or not. I have two radios in this house and they're both set to 99.1. So there you go. Lovely. Classic.

There you go. I'm the last man standing. That's another show completely last comic standing. Okay. So Bob will, I won't get his answer, but my question is, do you off the top of your head, do you have an idea of what comics have appeared the most times? Cause obviously there are some returning comics, uh, but there's probably a comic who's been on the show like 200 times or something.

Do you have an idea off the top who is the most frequently appearing debater? Oh, I don't know who it would be, but you know that we have a stable of certainly top five, 10, Derek Sagan again has requested a lot. People love Derek, people love Dave Hempstead a lot. Erica Sigurdsson from BC, Nikki Payne from out East, Charlie Demers, Ivan Decker from out West.

So we've got those kind of names and then we've got some new ones coming up in the stable that are doing more and more debates for us. And it's something that the comedians wanna do. They have fun doing it and we're proud that we've kind of introduced some comedians to the rest of Canada because they don't travel that much like Patrick Leadwell out of PEI or Jen Hamilton from up north. So, you know, we're proud that

we get to introduce sometimes new comedians to people for the first time. And it's, yeah, so I don't know if that answered the question. No, you dropped a bunch of names that we're on frequently. I feel like that qualifies. It'll be better when we do this for real. By the way, you know, I feel I should broker a deal. I can arrange for the winners of these debaters to get at least a wireless speaker from Monaris. Maybe we talk afterwards.

Enough is enough. You win the debate on the debaters and you don't get any parting gifts? That doesn't sound right to me. Well, we do pay them to appear on the show. Okay, now we're learning some stuff here. How much money do I get for being on the debate this next Sunday?

Something called favored nations. It's the same amount for everyone. Okay, so that's a great point. I was upset they weren't getting any fresh craft beer, but you can take your money and buy fresh craft beer. It's like Homer Simpson. It's like you can buy products and services with this money. Okay.

Television. Yes. Television. Yes. Drug of the Nation. That's a song, I think. Okay. Tell me about why did the debaters not work on television when this was attempted in 2011? Because you'd think the debaters would work on television. Yeah.

I think they tried to TV it up and they had some interesting ideas that even the show creator Richard Syde didn't agree with. And it was one of those things where it was being done almost as a fill in for a hockey strike or something. So we taped a whole bunch of them at a time. And had it been a weekly thing where we could have been debating, you know, timely current things, I think it would have worked well. I think that they needed to just let the show be the show and involve the audience as we do on the radio tapings.

And they decided, Nope, we're not going to show the audience at all. We're just going to have people show up in the middle of the day. There's certain people that show up to a radio taping in the middle of the day and they're not always the ones you'd want. And you know, all they really had to do was kind of get out of the way and capture the show and they did not do that. So we're thankful that we can still do the show the way it is and everyone that comes to a taping,

I think is pleasantly surprised usually at the night out that it is. Well, can't we take another run at this and just do it the way that when you would watch the Howard Stern show on TV and it was just the camera in the room and you're just, you know, or Bob McCowen, you'd watch primetime sports or whatever. And it was just a camera in the room, you know, right now, no one's watching. So it's not quite the same thing. Okay. But there's a camera in the room and if people

choose to watch this episode record, they can, but there's no production as you can attest to, there's no production values. This is not a television show. This is an audio presentation, but we have cameras in the room. Why don't we take another run at this, the debaters on TV? It's a great idea, and you know, I will talk to the people at CBC about it. These cameras are not that expensive,

and you can start, we'll stream it on Jam, okay? TV, that word is a little scary sometimes. Let's stream the debaters on Jam. Right, so make it online, yes. I, look, we would love to. I'll do it for you. Yeah, it's pretty Yes. I look, you in, we would love to. I'll do it for you. Yeah. It's pretty easy. You don't have to tell the CBC.

I don't even, I don't think we have to change that much. We, we, our producer, we do now, we do have recently now started videotaping the shows again, not for a TV thing, just videotaping them. And it's a, you know, literally videotaping, right? Like you guys videotape. Yeah, yeah.

No, it's used. It's like, it's the,, right? Like you got video tape. Yeah, yeah. No, it's used. It's like, it's the, and then we play them on a projector. We showed them. It's you record over like tapes that had like the friendly giant on it. That's right. Yeah. And they'll, they'll be in the archives immediately

before they've even aired. But you know, we've started to do stuff online and it's, it's interesting. It's a whole new audience that, you know, some, it's funny to me because a lot of people are like, how, younger people are like, how have I not heard of this show? I'm like, well, it's a radio. audience that you know some it's funny to me because a lot of people like how younger people are like How have I not heard of this show? I'm like, well, it's a radio. No, I don't know but it's been on for a while But there's so many people have grown up with the show which I'm proud of

You know We've had people who are dragged along with their parents when they were seven or eight and now they're in their their late 20s And they're their fans of the show. So we've we've single-handedly brought down CBC's demographic I'd like to think about 40 or 50 years. Well, good for you. I would think that, you know, not every household was a CBC radio household, right? There are many from C to C here, of course. I happen to be a guy who always enjoyed CBC radio. And so, you know, you're going to you can't avoid the debaters if you're listening

to enough CBC radio and you know, typically you like what you hear and you'll enjoy the show. You know, who's this Steve Patterson guy? How do I go to pattern? Dad, we'll get to that in a minute. But I would think if you grew up, I don't know, a CFRB household or whatever, you're like, what, what, what is this liberal propaganda? I'm hearing here. Yeah, you know, I can see it. I think I won't say the number one comment I've heard, but I've, because it streams online and it's its own thing, people are like, oh, we don't listen to CBC at all,

but we love your show. I'm like, well, thanks. I have a fun fact for you. Thanks. You're listening to CBC. We fooled you. It's like, I don't wanna. We won't get into that because I'm sure

that there's some nervous energy in the CBC universe that the next prime minister is not as big a fan as some of us are. I do every show of ours like it's our last. I really do. It's, um, I have second hand. I've never worked for the CBC. I mean, I do enjoy listening to it. So there's that selfish part that I don't want it to be defunded, but I have like secondhand anxiety that, uh, cause I only get one vote. This is a fun fact. And I live in Toronto, which the next prime minister

won't need seats from Toronto, you live in Toronto as well. They won't actually need us, right? So Harper didn't need us and this next prime minister won't need us, but he has pledged to defund the CBC and I have anxiety over it. Like I try not to think on it too much and I hope for the best, but I do have anxiety around it.

Yeah, I think he'll probably, if it is still going, there'll be a show called The Agree-ers. It'll be a very different show and there won't be a lot of what you would call humor. Right, like why the COVID vaccine is not good for you. Yeah, why, is it not good or is it super not good? Right, what degree of evil is this? Okay, by the way, there was a show on CTV

called it's been canceled actually, uh, much like your TV show, but the show is called the debate. Yes. And it was like, I was on it once. It's like literally my only national television appearance was a, uh, and I actually agreed to be on this show called the debate, which was on CTV news channel, whatever that's called today. I agreed to be on it because they told me in the conversation, they said, I could go to 299 Queen Street and do it there. And I have such fond memories of that building from watching Much Music and City TV growing up.

I'm like, I want to be at 299 to do something. Like I've never in my life been at 299 to do any TV stuff. So I agreed to be on the debate against Reshmi Nair, who's an FOTN. I like Reshmi. Yeah, I like her too. Also worked at the CBC at that point. And I was gonna debate her on some time sensitive stuff.

So unlike tea versus coffee, which I could write more jokes maybe, this is like real new stuff. So anyway, long story short is at the very like almost last minute I was gonna bike to 299 and do this thing. They told me there was nobody there to accommodate me and I would have to do it through FaceTime. Like this was like, and at this point I'm like,

I honestly would not have agreed to do the show if it was gonna be on Face, I'm just telling you Steve, cause it's the home of Real Talk. But I did the show and I realized, oh, this is like the debaters if it wasn't funny. Yeah. Yeah. Oops, sorry.

It was okay. It's okay. I signed an invoice. I did watch a couple of those and yeah, it's tough. I had some friends that were on there. And it's live, okay, where you guys are taping, you can edit. So this is live to TV, completely live. I think you need the energy of being in the same room for a debate. I'll just I'll sort of. You know, it's worse. Can I tell you because I was doing it from I could hear everything. I had no visual of them. So I'm here. It's like the worst thing I've ever. Yeah. So I'm like, and I'm again, I was supposed to be a 299 for this, but I'm here. I'm doing it from I could hear everything. I had no visual of them. So I'm here. It's like the worst thing I've ever had. So I'm like, and I'm again, I was going to be at 299 for this, but I'm here. I'm doing it. I can hear so I can hear when they're doing commercial breaks and I can hear when the host is setting me up and I can kind of not that I'm, you know, they're lucky. I'm, uh, I'm so good at podcasting. I can do this on the fly. And

I did try to do some jokes and I think it turned out fine, but the fact that I couldn't see them and I could only hear them, it was not fun. And they asked me the next day, I think they wrote, I got a note from the producers that said, you were great, we'd love to have you back. And I wrote, yes, I will come back, but my condition remains, I want to do this at 299 Queen Street. Needless to say, this is now a canceled show,

but they could not accommodate me. I don't think anyone ever did it. It didn't maybe the whole. No, no. And I don't even know that the host did. And it's look, I feel for everyone in the latest round of media layoffs there at that place. You know, it's really tough to get

to get quality content of any sort, you know, journalism or comedy on the main, the main networks now, because they're, I don't know what they're doing. And, you know, their numbers are dwindling and dwindling. So that's, that's too bad. But we're, you know, we're trying to, we're going to keep as many people laughing as we can while we still have a format. Well, you know, keep on the pattern, dad thing. Cause Pierre Pauli, I can't take that away from you. That's right. That's yours, baby. Okay, we're gonna get to pattern dad very excited I will just say the host was great on that debate show not not Steve Patterson great, but he was

Pretty great, but I think that show existed It was a 6 p.m. Live thing on the news channel and I think it was like to put on a very inexpensive Yes, not great show because they don't want you watching CTV news channel at 6 I think they want you to go to the local channel and watch the news Like I think this was the philosophy of Bell Media is like stop watching the news channel because you know I was gonna say Ken Shaw. I think he's long gone now, but whoever whoever is delivering the CFTO news Only another guy who's not there anymore But anyway, that's what I think was the logic behind having a crappy inexpensive when you're asking Toronto Mike to do it

But via FaceTime, I don't think you're spending a lot of money on the show You know what I mean? And I didn't any parting gifts either. No, this is this is already been the just the production value of just What you've given me just this tape measure Okay Steve Martin. Yep, funny dude has good taste in comedy. Just before we get you to current day stuff and and and patter ball and leave the debaters here. I did read about your Just for Laughs comedy that you actually got some high praise from Steve Martin. Yeah, that was that kept me going to be honest for I was at a point where I was wondering

That was that kept me going to be honest for I was at a point where I was wondering Should I keep doing comedy at this point or should I just try something else and I was doing just for laughs But I'm not sure what time it was which time which gala I think I'd done maybe maybe two galas before that and Howie Mandel was one of the hosts and that was saying I was okay And then the second time I did it was a host that wasn't really a comedian I can't remember and then I got on the Steve Martin gala and it was okay. And then the second time I did it, it was a host that wasn't really a comedian. I can't remember. And then I got on the Steve Martin Gala and it was 2010 or 2011.

And I really wanted to do a good job on that show. So I put a lot of work in and got to practice it. And we weren't even sure if we were gonna get to meet Steve Martin because he's in a different place backstage than everyone else, but he called me over and I got to chat with him after. Wow, I think Johnny Carson calling over the stand-up. It is and I just let his comment was if I knew he was that he said on stage was if I knew and he was gonna be that good I would have canceled him which is which is what you want to hear from Steve

Martin so that was a huge highlight for me. Amazing and speaking of canceled there's a fun comment on the live stream, live.torontomike.com. Okay. Jeremy Hopkins goes, uh, I now want a CBC show called, uh, it's being canceled. The timing is right. Yep. Love the Steve Martin gala story here. Uh, quick shout out that you have been nominated for many awards, but one I'm

going to focus on is, uh, you won best series writing at the Canadian many awards, but one I'm gonna focus on is you won best series writing at the Canadian Comedy Awards, did you? Did I? Did you? I think you did, I don't know, I got that somewhere. You didn't? No, I'm gonna tell you, which series is it? I'll tell you what happened.

All right, the series you'll tell me in a moment, but I'm gonna read a question that came in from the host of this series, the star of this series, okay? Yes. FOTM John Doar wrote in from Juneau, Alaska. I once asked them, this came up in a recent episode. Uh, do you keep your Juneau and Juneau? That was my question.

I think that's worthy of the debaters. Okay. Ask Steve Patterson. This is John Doar talking, who I think is very funny by the way. I love John. Well, you better hear he's going to ask Steve Patterson why he didn't silence his cell phone when we were on a very somber tour of the John. Well, you better hear he's going to ask Steve Patterson why he didn't silence his cell phone when we were on a very somber tour of the on Frank house in

Amsterdam in 2006. That's a pretty deep cut, but they, uh, yeah, I was sent to do shows for, I'd say our troops, but it was a military station that was in no danger. Um, that was in Amsterdam. They were probably getting high. Yeah, it's true. They were there to guard marijuana probably getting high. Yeah, it's true. They were there to guard marijuana probably. So it was John and I and another very funny community named James Cunningham who I think was there

to make sure we got to the gig. James is funny but we knew he wasn't gonna stray too far. John and I partook in most things that Amsterdam has to offer so we had some champignon and then we went to a weird Dutch improv show And then we ended up at a local bar that had lights from the airplane hanger go up every time a song ended So it was it was a fun evening But then I think I guess it was the afternoon or the next day John and I decided to go to the

to the Anne Frank Museum as you would and And it was the days of like flip phones. And so, you know. Your Motorola? Yeah, it was right at the part of the tour, which is, and then they discovered the hidden wall and the Nazis came up and my phone goes off in the dumbest ring tone. Dink, dink, dink, dink, dink, dink, dink, dink, dink.

Oh my goodness gracious. Even John Doerr who will go along with most things and is one of the funniest people. There's a bridge too far. He just looked at me and shook his head. And so I knew what he got to. And then I could only think to say, I guess it's a good thing she didn't have one of these.

And no one liked it. It was just a great line, but completely inappropriate for that venue at that moment. Just the wrong time. But only John could bring that up because he's the only one that knows that. Well, it's funny, as I just did some further research because I have a crack research staff, it turns out, okay, you did not win the award I was giving you credit for. You have won.

I just want to give you credit. You have won for best male standup at the Canadian Comedy Awards in 2011. Like that happened. And you won best male standup in 2013. So you have won. But in 2008, Steve Patterson won for Best Series Writing for the John Doar Show at the Canadian Comedy Awards. And that Steve Patterson is actually a different human being

than the Steve Patterson I'm speaking to right now. That's right. That's Steve Dillon, he goes by now. His real name is Steve Patterson, but he got into comedy after I did. And then he would show up at gigs and people look at him like, you're not Steve Patterson. And he changed his name because it was because of the confusion it was causing. And I wasn't going to change mine at that point. And I love Steve, but he wrote on the John Doar show. So when you said John Doar wrote in,

I thought he was going to say, ask him about writing for my show. Well, it's too funny that another Steve Patterson won for the John Doar show and John Doar had this experience with you in Amsterdam. It just reminds you how small the Canadian comedy landscape is. It really is. And I lived in an apartment a long time ago when I first came to Toronto. And then it turned out Just through you know of all the apartments that could be in Toronto that Pete Zedlack or my buddy another great Canadian comedian had lived there before me because I got his mail one day

In the exact same okay on this note so in this I don't know how this happens But I produce a show for Donovan Bailey who ran the hundred meter in nine point eight four This is in 1996 you You might remember. You won gold. Fully remember that. I'd be worried if you didn't remember that. Okay. So 984. Okay. And let's take, let's just take aside disqualifications and drugs and everything. Let's move that to the side because Donovan, by the way, who never got caught using anything and always was clean. And I've had a hundred conversations with him. He's always run clean. Okay. so Donovan 984 wins gold. It was the world record at the time, 1996. Next week, Donovan will

not be the fastest human in my basement. So Donovan comes over, we do a show, but next week I have a gentleman in the basement who was clocked going 979 in a hundred meters. Like this is like this little like, I just want to go back in time, Steve, and like tell young Mike that, okay, one day, you know, that guy who won gold, you watched win gold in Atlanta. He will be hanging out with you in your basement, but that same week, the guy you watched win gold in Seoul, Korea in 1988,

we'll ignore what happens a couple of days later. Okay, Mr. Patterson, don't let the facts get in the way of a great story. He did get clocked at 979, which was the world record. Then they stripped it from him for using steroids. We all remember. Ben Johnson is in this basement next Monday. Ben in the house.

Nice. Ben's in the house and Donovan's not at the same time. I don't even, I don't think they get along to be honest, but Ben and Donovan, I think Donovan doesn't want that taint on him, right? Like get that stink off me. OK, so Donovan, Ben are both visiting me to hang out in this basement next week. I just think that's almost a big a mind blow is the fact that Steve Patterson,

almost the Bader's is here right now. They are faster than me. I'll give I'll give them that. But I think I can I think I could be funnier. But Donovan's I've heard him. He's a very engaging guy. Yeah, and he's going to be doing some work for CBC. Is he at the Olympics?

That makes a lot of sense. Yeah. His podcast is called Donovan Bailey running things. And there's a lot of track talk. And Jason Portwanda was his co-host. And it's very good. So people should subscribe to that. What is pattern, Dad?

Can I could I just say this is it's like watching a virtuoso paint all the information you get across and then come back to a quest because I just feel like I'm listening to the episode I forget that I'm supposed to be participating in it but this is it's brilliant. The magic of the headphones. What is Patter Dad? It's a it's a well my book was called Dad Up it was I wanted to call it Patter Dad but then the publishers were like let's call it something different so I called the show Patter Dad was I wanted to call it Patter Dad, but then the publishers were like, let's call it something different. So I called the show Patter Dad because I'm sort of done being a Patter son.

I'm Patter Dad now. How many kids do you have? Two girls, nine and four. I had them late in life, so they're keeping me energetic. Okay. First of all, you only have a couple of years on me. Okay. I have an eight year old.

Okay. So late in life, it's not Ben old. Okay. So you know what I'm talking about? It's not Ben Murgie late. Or you know what? Brezlin. Brezlin late. I was gonna say Pacino. I was gonna even higher, but yes, I'm only talking about people who've been in the basement. Right, right, right. Okay. But you, you know, you're not that old. I'm just here to tell you. You said you were 67. Is it? I thought that was a joke. My next book is going to be I'm not that old and then I'll die at the end of it of natural causes. But yes, Dad up is the was the book. If I got that right. Yes. And a pattern dad show. That's how we're doing. I just looked at my hands of some crib notes there. But pattern dad is something that you, someone listening could buy a ticket and see pattern. They could, they could. CBC gets none of that money, right? I don't get any of it. I just want to make that clear. It's a CBC co-production. Does Pierre Paul you have see a penny? No, he

doesn't. That's a good point. But in some of the markets I'm playing, they'd like it to be fully funded by him. So sure. Um, but yeah, the next, I think we have it at Regina actually next. Uh, I'm going. Next, I'm gonna break this story for you on this podcast. Breaking story. So a stinger or something? No, just give me the story. The reason that I wanted to start this particular tour of this show in Regina was because this is where

our oldest daughter Scarlett started her life. Not knowing it, my wife and I, I had a show at the Grey Cup 2013, and it was in Regina and Saskatchewan was in it. My wife and I, I had a show at the Grey Cup 2013 and it was in Regina and Saskatchewan was in it. So literally the biggest party in Canada. And they won, the riders won that cup handily. And my wife and I celebrated like everyone does. And then I had to fly off to Arizona to do a show the next day. And then Nancy told me she was pregnant. And after I realized good, the baby doesn't look like any of the Hamilton Tiger cats.

Then we celebrated. So it's a kind of a full circle moment to come back and do my full show about dadding in Regina. You got vagina in Regina. Come on, I didn't want to say it, but that is a good rhyme. That's too easy, right? I'll fix that in post. It may be the first edit in the history of the podcast.

That is a good rhyme. I often say that town is too close to the other word. They should have named it runt, which doesn't help. Okay. But those are those jokes, like when the pattern dad jokes, they're going to be like for grandma, right? No, no. Here's how risque does it get in pattern? Here's the thing. This is I'm on, I'm on a course. I'm on a mission with this particular show. Everyone hears the term dad jokes and they think they're bad jokes. They think they're puns, which

again puns aren't necessarily bad jokes. They're intentionally bad and then they become good again. Roaners. But dads can be funny and these jokes I like to think are pretty funny and a lot of it's written on real material from my kids and then I just kind of add on to it. So I'm out to prove that dad jokes can be funny. Just because I'm a dad doesn't mean I can't be funny anymore. And this show is a lot about family life, but then there's also stuff about just being

an old dad to new kids and everything that's going through. And I still get to do stuff about what's going on at the time. So the show is never, never quite the same twice the live show, but the, the album's always the same because it's recorded. Okay. Well, that would make sense. Imagine if it's different each time. Well, you know, you could, you know, streaming, you could do that, right?

You could just patch it. I know that's a new thing now, you know, when an album dropped in our days, Steve, you know, that album was fixed. That's the album. But nowadays like I hear about patches, like literally it's like a software patch. So it's like, oh, oh, who will I pick on? No, let's say Jay-Z drops an album or whatever. And he's, he's added a new verse to this one

or he's changed this one there. And in real time, these patches are applied to the stream. So it's like a living, breathing, isn't that interesting? You could have jokes that are very time sensitive. You could be, I heard Donald Trump fell asleep in court last night or whatever yesterday you could have evergreen content with Patrick's well this is I'm gonna talk to my people at Comedy

Records about that because Steve Paterson you could like literally I can become a new thing I can insert myself into other comedians jokes I like that that's how you get Gen Z man you can. You can't just rely on these Gen Xers. I'm already going Gen AA. I'm already onto the next generation, the tiny batteries of humans. Where can we find out, like when you said the shows are coming up for Patterdad, are there any GTA shows coming up? Where do you want to send us?

Not yet. GTA will be in early 2020, whatever the next year from this one is. Thank you. But I'm going to go out west, like West West, like Vancouver Island I'll be in early 2020, whatever the next year from this one is. Thank you. But I'm going to go out west, like west west, like Vancouver Island. I'll be by the end of the year. No, like El Grego West. We know real, real west. So yeah, the dates are coming up now. We're just kind of putting them in for the rest of this year and then early 2025, right? The next year. Yes. Correct.

We'll come closer to you. Do you know where you are right now. Mr. Peterson not not not always but you're so capable that I don't have to I'm in a basement With a weird goalie mask what could go wrong? You're safe here. You know, you just blink and SOS code in the camera here I have a song I'm gonna play and I have a question that came in from the land, which I think is potentially very interesting. But just before I ask the question and then close with the song, I am going to let you know about a podcast. See, this is tax season, right?

So this is, I'm sure you know, and the Patterson household, it's so taxes are due at the end of the month. There's a great podcast from Raymond James, Canada called the advantaged investor and whether you manage your own financial Investments or you have a person who does that for you you get great insight great advice I know I learned a lot about the the mix of our ESPs and our RSPs and TFSAs All this good info is in the advantaged investor podcast from Raymond James, Canada Hosted by Chris cook see so subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and Mr. Patterson,

I feel like you've got a drawer full of old cables, old electronics, old devices, maybe multiple drawers. Is that possible? Yeah. The junk drawer. I mean, it's certainly been overtaken. Absolutely. Everyone's got the junk drawer, but that the electronics should not be thrown in the garbage when it's time for spring cleaning. You should go to recycle my electronics dot C a and then you put in your postal code and it's like, Hey, there's a place down

the street from you, a Depot we've accredited where you can drop that off and have it properly recycled. So the chemicals do not end up in our landfill. That's yet another assignment for you, Mr. Patterson. I love that. I can't, I'm actually going to do that because we used to just take it into staples, but now that's getting your license. Don't be so surprised you learn something on your Toronto Mike debut here. Okay learning You're gonna learn about the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team. You're gonna change your favorite beer to Great Lakes brewery. Yep. I'm gonna measure Dead thing. What are you measuring over there? It's a casket. It's

Live or dead shut out to Ridley Funeral Home, okay? Shout out. Okay, the question before I get to the music and then we're gonna take the photo by the Toronto tree. Dave Thomas called it the Toronto tree. And I'm actually considering interviewing the Toronto tree. That'll be explained later with FOTM Jesse Hirsch.

Can I wear the mask? I could let you wear the mask. Thank you. Glenn writes in. So take this in, cause I don't know exactly what it all means, but you might know. And I think it's a fair question.

Glenn says, Mike, can you ask Steve why Canadian comedians haven't come out against the online harms bill? They've been awfully quiet on Twitter. Does he think the legislation will affect comedy in Canada? So I know I'm putting on the spot here, not editing this. So if you look dumb, that's on you. Do you know, do you have any insight, any ability to comment on the online harms bill?

No, and I wasn't sure if that, I saw that online and I wasn't sure if that was- You had a headshot, and you still didn't Google it. And I still didn't look at it. No, I feel like I'm not qualified enough to comment, but if it's a serious thing, I'll look into it. Even though you knew, it sounds like you knew days ago that that question was asked on Twitter.

How did I fight the ability to look at it? You must have known I'd ask it. Didn't you wanna sound smart, like really instantly? I think there's enough people out there that wanna sound smart, but are actually dumb. So I'm just gonna stick in the middle, make things funny where I can. That's your thing. That's my thing.

I would like to do more research about that if it's a real thing. In his case, so Glenn, I apologize on behalf of my guest here today. And the return visit when I get my soap, we're going to discuss the online harms act. It sounds serious to me. It does sound serious. And, you know, let me look into it. But I wasn't, I'm sorry, I didn't have, wasn't prepared for this one. Even though you had multiple days heads up.

Listen, I have multiple children, that's the issue. I have four children, okay? I'm here, ready to go here. I'm more concerned about the at home harms right now. That's right. Alright, here's a song. A lot of comics like to try to, this is how they do a show. They start kind of slow. They build and build and build to a big finish. And that's certainly one way to do it. I like to bring it down a bit in the middle. I think that we've all been through a lot of stuff. It's been a very serious time. And as much as I want to do a great comedy show for you

guys, I think it's important to just realize where we are, right in the middle of it. So I'm bringing it down a bit, and I'm going to do a song that I did about loss, someone that I lost that was very important to me in the last few years. And after the song, because it is a bit heavy hitting, we're going to have a video from a professional counselor.

And then we're going to get back into the show. All right? Hope you enjoy. Especially the couples with their hands in each other's crotches. This is a good time for you to really let loose. Hit it, please remember so clear. You were right there with me when I looked in the mirror. So strong and so solid with a confident flair I never imagined one day you'd not be there

And we went through so much, the ups and the downs The smiles of elation, the tears and the frowns. You were there for my proposal, I arranged it just so. If you hadn't been with me, she might well have said no. But she said yes, and you moved in with us, and we lived in bliss. We were blessed because she touched you whenever we'd kiss. And as long as we were together, there's no way we'd miss. Miss But then life took a cruel turn As great men before me had already learned As much as I wanted you

To make it through There was nothing that I could do You were my hairline at the top of my face Now you're disappearing without a trace I wish I could say something that would make you stay instead I'll wear this jaunty hat every You were my hairline, the top of my face Now you're disappearing without a trace Wish I could say something that would make you stay It's on your back now

Instead I'll wear this jaunty hat every day. You're not fooling anyone with that. But I'll still wear this fucking hat every day. Very good Mr. Patterson. Okay, this song is called You Were My because you don't want to give the punchline away in the title of the song. That's right. And it's a great reveal and I do guess it on the way. Like I'm thinking, where is this going? And I don't want you to know I did guess it correctly. You did. Okay.

But still, packs a great punch. Very funny. So what is that from? And then I'm going to kind of look at your hair if you don't mind, just for a moment here. Look, it's losing it at the front, but it's still around the sides. I got the Padre. You have lovely hair. Well this might be so I do have thank you thank you. It's luscious. I have an appointment with an FOTM Andy the barber for five o'clock today.

All right. I've decided I've been. Can I take your clippings? Is that where this is going? Would you like would you like my clippings? Because I am going to get a haircut today because I feel like it's you know, this is it's a bushy now. Yeah. Well, you know, I did last night. I had a shower last night. Congratulations. We're working blue. But I put it up and I tied it up in a bun. It was kind of like when it's wet, it falls in my eye. Like tied up kind of like in a bun. And then I took out the bun and then it was doing what it's

doing right now. But anyway, today at five o'clock, I'm going to cut my hair. So I'm just here to, I know you're like, I wish I could have this problem. Like he's got too much hair. He's got to lose it or whatever. But you are holding on.

Well, we got to try to meet. We got to try to meet in the middle or something. But have you considered shaving your head? No, I haven't. But you know, maybe next. But for right now, I'm on a good run with this song and joke. So...

Yeah, tell me about the song. This was a very, very organic thing where I started. I always noodle around on the piano. I don't play piano, by the way. That's my buddy, Mark Camilleri from Imagine Sound Studios and his wife who always gets the biggest laugh in all my music with some line. So her going, it's on your back now was very organic, didn't write it and she did it. And I tell her, I mean, you know,

I do hour and a half shows, the biggest laugh is your one line in the song. But yeah, no, I just try to be honest about where I'm at now. And having Mark who tours with the Tenors, true story, is he's such a great musician and I can come in with these dumb weird ideas to his studio and he's like yeah we can do that and I'm really quite proud of that one because a lot of the guys coming to my show they can they can you know identify with that. Oh I'm sure a lot of people can can relate to that. Okay so you got you got that's like a musical album people can buy? This is a... That's on the album, a Patter Dad.

Patter Dad. Yeah. And then- All about Patter Dad. Smart to be spending some time on Patter Dad. They can't take that away from you, like I said. Like this is your baby, right? Patter Dad.

That's right. This is my time, goddammit. Patter Dad. So everybody who, you know, Steve Patterson, funny guy, but your live shows, I've heard nothing but great things and people should find a Patter Dad near- Find a Patter Dad near you. Absolutely absolutely and just on the way out here the book of letters I didn't know where to send this is still available this is your debut

album. Did you record it like I do audio version yeah you know I think that one is out with audible my second book Dad Up, was with Penguin Random, who have their own streaming service. So they're on two different streaming services, but I would always write letters in my standup. And then there was an agent who's like, you should put these in a book. I'm like, okay, I will.

The book of letters I didn't know where to send. And there'll be a second one before the end of this year. Before the end of 2024, there's a sequel to that. That's right. Is that exclusive? That isn't exclusive because I just decided now. I don't know if that's even possible, but I think we can do it, sure.

I can help you out with that. Steve Patterson, you're now an FOTM. You knocked it out of the park in your Toronto Mic debut. I thoroughly enjoyed this chat. Thank you. Thanks so much for having me. Appreciate it. And I would love to see you. June 27.

You got that in your notepad there. I can write it down. And you know what? You really should bring the entire family to Christie Pitts on May 12 while we're at it for the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball game. It's going to be a lot of fun. Absolutely. You got lots of orders here. And that brings us to the end of our 1471st show. Woohoo! What should I do for 1500? Something special or should I just treat it like a normal episode just to mess up the system? No, bring in, bring in who? Who am I bringing in? Your fifteen hundredth guest should be your first guest again. Bring it right full circle. Alright, maybe maybe I'll do a monologue. Okay, you can follow me on Twitter and

Blue Sky. I'm at Toronto Mike. You are Patter Balls. Patter Balls. Patter Balls. How does the CBC feel about that Twitter hander? Well, they're only finding out now. On all the other social media, I'm Steve Patterson, comedian, but on X, I'm Patter Balls.

But they're only realizing this now. That's the- Yeah. No wonder they're endangered species over there. Come on, get on the ball, everybody. Much love to all who made this possible. That's Great Lakes Brewery. That beer is really yours. Sometimes people at the end of the show,

they're like, oh, is that for real? I'm like, no, it was a show prop. Give it back. I'm gonna try to shotgun for it once. And get the Holy Mackinac beer, everybody. It's out, I think, Thursday. So, okay. Palma Pasta, they're gonna feed us at TMLX15.

That'll be full when you leave because it's in the freezer. I'll be full shortly after. Recyclemyelectronics.ca, Raymond James Canada, they have the Advantage Investor podcast, the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team, May 12, everyone be there with Rod Black's mustache. Monaris, they've got Yes We Are Open, and of course Ridley Funeral Home. See you all tomorrow when Scott Turner drops by. He just retired from radio. We'll talk about why did you retire? Did you have to retire? Did you get retired? We're gonna talk about the

late-grade JR from CFNY. We've got a lot of ground to cover. Why wouldn't CFNY play the Pixies in 1989? There's a whole bunch of stuff to unload, unpack. See you all then. Shades of grey Cause I know that's true Yes I do I know it's true, yeah I know it's true How about you? All them pickin' up trash And them puttin' down rogues And their broker in stocks

The class struggle explodes