Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Sugith Varughese: Toronto Mike'd #834

Episode Date: April 13, 2021

Mike chats with actor and writer Sugith Varughese about his role as Mr. Mehta on Kim's Convenience, why the series is coming to an abrupt end, writing for Fraggle Rock and more.

Welcome to episode 834 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. 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. StickerU.com. Create custom stickers, labels, tattoos, and decals for your home and your business. Palma Pasta. Enjoy the taste of fresh homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. CDN Technologies, your outsourced IT department.

Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of the community since 1921. And Mike Majeski, or as I call him, Mimico Mike. He's the real estate agent who's ripping up the Mimico real estate scene. Learn more at realestatelove.ca. I'm Mike from torontomike.com. And joining me this week is Sujith Varughese. Sujith, how did I do there, buddy? Not bad.

I think you get a free, what kind of beer are those? Great Lakes beer. Great Lakes. I think you get a free, what kind of beer are those? Great Lakes beer. Great Lakes. I think you get a free Great Lakes. Speaking of beer, I wish we were doing this in the backyard. Now, we put this together on short notice, and I don't know if you've heard we're in a pandemic. I don't know if you caught wind of that,

but I wish I could be giving you a case of fresh craft beer from Great Lakes. Well, so do I, and not just because of the pandemic, because that would mean there was no pandemic. No, this pandemic has been a real pain in the neck. Trust me. Oh, you're preaching to the choir. But how are you holding up? Do you mind sharing? Are you feeling okay? Is everything relatively okay? Well, I'm grateful that i haven't gotten anything and none of my loved ones have and you know the the hard part is my my mom lives in bc and my sis one of my sisters lives in alberta and you know i haven't seen them in it's almost two years now

right uh and uh life's too short you know you don't know how long you've got. So this better make its round soon because, you know, I mean, I'm lucky in that because I work in film and television and film and television, our protocols are so strict that hasn't shut down. But but a lot of people, people you know their livelihoods are over and it's been tough so uh i have friends who are in rough shape are you uh now this is a personal question a personal health question so you can pass on it but are you vaccinated yet? I mean, at least one jab? I have one jab. Okay. All right, good for you. And I guess one more to go, but that's not happening for a while. No, I guess they've got a good gap. I am very, very grateful to be old enough to get the one jab. Because in our province, you know, the protocols for getting jabs, uh, make no sense to me. Uh, I mean, I, I, I work at home where I'm on a set with, with, uh, everybody wears, uh, face shields and masks and, you know,

it's about as safe as it can be. So I'm less likely to need the jab more than a teacher does. And yet, uh, they're not getting jabbed. So I haven't figured out if anybody's really in charge of this thing because whoever is, is not doing a good job. Now, I know as we record right now, it's about 5 p.m. here in Toronto, and I know that the final Kim's Convenience episode of the series airs in literally in three hours. So I'm thinking if you could possibly turn off that notification because... Yep, I just did. Because it's going to go off like popcorn, I think.

And you know what happens, right? People are on a walk or a jog or a bike ride and they're listening and then they think that's their notification. So that's what happens is they hear the ding on the podcast. Well, you know, I'll tell you, my phone's blowing up today because of all the... Yeah. Well, you know, I'll tell you, my phone's blowing up today because of all the. Yeah. It's interesting because when Kim's when the news first broke.

Yeah. What's it been about a month now? When the when the news first broke, I was thinking about this today. Yeah. When the news first broke, a lot of my colleagues and other actors were congratulating us because they thought it was like a regular TV show cancellation. Right. And, you know, we'd had five seasons and that's better than most. And they were all sort of sending congratulations.

Now, I think once people have really found out what happened, it's grief. And my phone's blowing up with fans from all over the world tweeting and sending messages of real sadness that this thing's ending, and ending really before it should. And they're no sadder than I am. I'm really devastated. Well, let's start here then. I mean, there's lots I want to cover. I could literally do the whole hour on Fraggle Rock, okay? This is the kind of show you're on right now. But let's start with the elephant in the room, as they say. Why

is tonight the final episode of Kim's Convenience? It wasn't expected to be by the cast and the crew. We were renewed for season five and season six at the same time two years ago.

And then with the delay from COVID to start filming season five, so that delayed us at least seven or eight months. So once you add that up, it's been two years since we found out we were renewed through season six. So to find out after season five started airing, I got a call from our executive producer a month ago

and he doesn't call and i went oh wow this must be some fantastic news like we've been renewed for another season or something right and he told me that no we're we're pulling the plug um so you, the official reason, and I believe it, is that the producers lost the key creatives who ran the show. One was given a new show, which is a spinoff. And that's not news anymore. So I can talk about that. A spinoff from Kim's Convenience. And the other one really was burned out, I think, from working on Kim's.

He was the inventor of this whole thing in the first place. Right. And unfortunately, there was no plan B. So most times shows have, you know, people lose showrunners all the time. I was on a show called Little Mosque on the Prairie for four seasons, and we had a different showrunner every season. So it's not a rule that if the showrunner leaves,

you have to end the show. That's actually an exception to the rule. I mean, you can have Roseanne without Roseanne. Well, I was going to say, you know, Seinfeld survived, you know, Larry David leaving. I don't know if he ever left. Yeah, well, he left in some regard. He left for a bit and then came back.

But my point is that I think it's unprecedented for a show to have a season six renewal. And all the money and expectation that that has on the table. I mean, you've got a cast and crew of 200 people who are, you have to be, you know, who are employed basically for two years on that basis. For them to leave that on the table and say, we can't do the show. It's really unprecedented. I mean, I respect the producer's position that they didn't feel they could continue the show with somebody else. But I think that that's perhaps a failure on the part of a lot of people at the top, whether it's the network or the producers or the showrunners themselves to not really think about succession in doing this show. And, and so we've,

we've sort of fallen through a crack that is kind of unprecedented in, in not just Canadian television, but in television period is this doesn't happen. Now, just the other day, I actually recorded an episode of Toronto Mike mic'd with mike wilner okay and mike wilner we were obviously we're talking blue jays baseball what else are we going to talk about but he had just done uh like he had just done a twitter spaces live chat with uh paul who plays uh oppa on kim's convenience and paul's a big by the way big big jays fan big big time baseball fan and

i know well he does, what's that called? Not fantasy baseball, but some kind of baseball league, which is for the super nerds. I can't even remember what you call this thing. Well, Paul is the biggest nerd on so many levels. You know, if you go into his

basement, you are in another planet of stuff. So, I mean, between Star Wars and Ghostbusters paraphernalia and Jay's stuff, you know, you're all set. You're all set. But I just made a comment to Mike Wilner about how sad I was. I'm personally sad to see Kim's convenience end this way, like abruptly like that, where, you know, it should be,

you guys should know you're filming your series finale like like well you know you mentioned Fraggle Rock and Fraggle Rock you know this is a show that I did in my 20s I was one of the original writers for Fraggle Rock and we did four seasons of 23 or 25 episodes per season I mean we did episodes total. And at the start of season four, so we're talking 70, episode 72 or 73. Jim told us that he was ending the show at the, you know, 96 would be our last show. And so we should, you know, write to the end. In other words, we, we, now that, that never happened back then, you know, back then shows continued as long as they could and then they got canceled and

they just sort of stopped, you know, Bewitched just stopped. The Beverly Hillsbillies just stopped. But, but Fraggle Rock was, I think one of the first shows, maybe MASH was probably the first show to do this, to actually write its own ending. And that's what we did. By the time you got to episode 96, the last four or five, each of the writers got to do their sort of ultimate ending episode. And Jerry Jewell, who was our showrunner and and genius behind um fraggle rock wrote the final episode and and the show came to its own natural creative conclusion um in modern times you know schitt's creek got to do that modern family got to do that and that's what i thought

you know we were going to be able to do frankly i didn't think we would even end at season six i thought season six was the first six of another six i thought we'd go for i thought the last season would be up of you know having grandkids who took over the store right uh you know i never expected it to happen this way and and it's it's hard for me personally to rationalize how they're saying this is an ending because it wasn't i don't think it was meant to be. And I don't think if you watch it, it feels like that because it wasn't designed that way.

It is an ending for perhaps a season, but I don't think it's an ending for a series, especially one as successful and popular as this one was. So it's a hard day. So you've obviously, have you seen tonight's episode or you only see the script? No, no, I only see the,

I'm a civilian once I shoot my scenes. I only get to see the show once they're aired. Right. Now, out of curiosity, I have so many questions about how this sausage is made, but does Paul get to see the episodes before the air? I think Paul gets to see certain episodes if he wants, and a couple of the other series leads do.

But I'm too low on the food chain for that. Mr. Meta doesn't make the cut there. for that. Miss Jemetta doesn't make the cut there. Now, why did I bring up the Wilner thing with Paul? Only because when I mentioned how sad I was that Kim's Convenience was coming to this abrupt end in what I deemed to be, and you'd agree, of course, a premature end,

he hinted, not hinted, he basically said, there's more to that story than meets the eye. Because I know we've all been fed this whole, and I hope I pronounced his name right, it's Inz Choi? is that how you say it okay so yeah this is a play he's been involved this is his creation

since 2011 because it was a play and then it became the television show we know and love here about to finish its fifth and final season the other creator we're referring to his name is Kevin White and the line we're being fed is that CBC didn't think they could continue the show without these two gentlemen at the helm I guess this And the line we're being fed is that CBC didn't think they could continue the show without these two gentlemen at the helm. I guess this is the

line. I don't know if it was CBC. I think it was Thunderbird, who is the production company that owns the show. And that's who I work for and we all work for. Gotcha. All right. Well, yes, I think there is more to the story than just that. As I said, there are lots of shows that continue on even when they lose their showrunner. And Paul has not hidden the fact that because he's he's been quoted in the press saying that after this happened, the press saying that after this happened uh ince who you know is he's known for 10 years um he uses the word ghosts him wow so he's not been able to even speak to him since this happened

at least as far as his public um what he said in public goes so obviously there's more to this i know that um the last season was a struggle creatively. And I thought that it was a struggle creatively that was then going to resolve in a way that would make future seasons easier to do. But the struggle was an attempt to balance the culturally accurate content with comedy. And I think that balance was well met in the first four seasons. But for some reason, the scripts hit a bit of a roadblock

in doing that in season five. And at the request of some of the series leads, the writers had to go back to the drawing board and redo many of the scripts for season five. So I knew that there were issues. But I think that begs the question, well, given that we have to do a season six, how do we make sure that we don't run into this problem again? And I don't think they ever solved that uh that problem and so when the time came they they didn't have an alternative to to what we've seen play out but it's a real tragedy is there like some top secret uh cast member dm group or something where you guys are

all kind of our chat group or whatsapp or something where you guys are all, the real talk's happening? Not really. I mean, I'm friends with Jean. She lives a couple blocks from my place. So when I run into her, I get some of the gossip. And I knew that she'd had, you know, she'd had struggles because as one of the few, you know, she wanted more Korean content in the writing room. She didn't want the onus to be on Ince to make that all the time. And, you know, Ince is a particular kind of writer.

And Jean, you know, she knew that there were things about the female characters that needed to be emphasized that were getting lost in the shuffle a bit right and she felt that having a female writer especially a female writer with a korean cultural background would have really helped alleviate that pressure on on ins and and probably created a succession plan if ins ever decided to continue. But that wasn't put in place. And it's unfortunate because there are, you know, I recommended a Korean-Canadian writer who wrote on Traveler. She was one of my students when I ran the Bell Media

Diverse Screenwriting Program many years ago. I said, call Ashley. Or there's a Korean-Canadian playwright who's a comedian also who's writing for Saturday Night Live this season. And she was like, you know, probably doing nothing in Canada until Saturday Night Live picked her up. She could have been in the room. So there's so many lost opportunities as far as that goes. And I think the show kept going in spite of that until it couldn't anymore. And I think the show kept going in spite of that until it couldn't anymore.

But I haven't had any heart to hearts with any of the series leads about this other than Gene. And, you know, I just am sort of wallowing in my own feelings of grief at never being able to be Mr. Meta again, because I, I gotta tell you, I love being him. And I, and I felt that my whole career had kind of built to the point where I could play this guy without breaking a sweat and, and given the writing it was just a joy and given Paul working with him and, you know, it was just like a great gig and it's a shame. Well, you guys had great chemistry together and really like, well'll tell you a little story about that i mean you know i i auditioned for another part when the show was first starting uh which was a friend of mr kim's

he had a different name and uh i didn't get that part um so i went oh well that's too bad and then about halfway through season one they called my agent and said you know there's a new part we're going to show CBC his original audition because I guess they hadn't and if they like it he's going to he can play this new part for one episode and so that's what happened the next they called the next day and said okay he's booked for one episode to play this character named Mr. Meta and can he come in to have a half hour rehearsal with Paul? And so I did. And Paul and I had worked on a movie together about six months earlier. We were playing background parts almost. And so most of the filming when we were in this movie

was on other people. So we kind of bonded one night over, you know, making up a movie of our own while they were filming everything else around us. Right. So when we when I went in to meet him, you know, we we knew each other and we instantly had, I guess, that chemistry. And after this rehearsal, they called back and said, OK, he's booked for another two episodes this season before I even shot anything. So when I got the scripts for the later two episodes, I noticed that the dialogue that the character of Mr. Meta had was the same dialogue as I had auditioned for that original part. So clearly what happened was they had cast somebody, the chemistry wasn't there between them and Paul or whatever. And so they rejigged things and I became Mr. Meta and,

and became, you know, recurred in half the episodes for the rest of the series. And, and I think that's a, you know, that's an interesting story about how TV works. No,

no doubt. And you were, you were great in the role. We loved seeing you. And I just, a fun fact I'd like to share about another, uh, Kim's convenient patron,

if you will, uh, Derek McGrath. Derek McGrath comes in as Frank. He's also a fun character. Derek and I worked on Little Mosque together, too. The fun fact I have, which I think is remarkable, and it's not even on his wiki page,

it's not widely known, I don't think, is that the only reason we're here today, Sujith, we're talking about Andrea Martin as a member of SCTV is because she was dating Derek at the time, and that's why she ended up in our country, Canada,

because of her, she was dating Derek, and then because she's here with Derek, God's spell happens, and then next thing you know, SCTV, and the rest is history. so we can thank derrick for that you know that i mean that's the thing about uh our business is that uh you know these connections like i i've known gene for years i've known paul for years i i've known derrick for years i mean you you you know, you know, with the, with the younger

cast and the younger writers, you really, you know, they're, they're just discovered and made stars, but, you know, us, us vets, you know, we've been playing this game a long time and it's a joy when you get to work together because you've, you done it before it's like uh you know it's it's a colleague thing you know and it's fantastic so you know when when i and and i would see other actors i've worked with in other contexts like bill um bill webster who played that grumpy customer he was sort of the heavyset the grumpy customer right well Bill and I have done plays at Soul Pepper Theater together. And I've known him because I actually knew his sister, who's married to a friend of mine, for 25 years. And I've known Bill since then. You know, and Bill shows up on set to do his part. I'm

there the same day. And we have a whole thing that they should actually, and we got to be in a scene together a little bit too, but you know there's that builds the connection that you see on screen that you cannot invent, you know you can't rehearse that, you can't buy that, it's earned through history, you know it's earned through knowing and working and being part of a community of artists, a community of actors and writers and directors and crew. The crew you've worked with on other shows, and that matters too, right? It's all a synergistic, holistic thing that you're trying to invent, trying to create and those intangible connections that you have through past relationships they they end up uh actually mattering and emerging on screen i think now sujith i was reading earlier today that the the actual kim's convenience store which is on i guess queen just a little bit uh

east of sherbourne uh is for sale like the the physical. Yeah, I read that today. And I tweeted out, as soon as I saw that, I retweeted the sale notice and said, somebody should buy this and turn this into the Kim's Convenience show museum. And, you know, the inside of the actual store is not the same as our. Well, that's my question. I need to know this. You'd have to get the real store,

move our set into it and set it up the way it was. But what would be great about it is that all the products that we sold in the show store, they're fake products. The art department was genius in creating these imaginary products

that we could use in the show. And I think fans would love seeing because you never really saw them you just sort of saw them in the background but the detail and the specifics that went into all of that stuff on the show it should be memorialized and that would be a great way to do it i think you're you're onto something there now let me ask you though for us, like, is it just the exterior shots that are filmed at this store and are all the interiors on a, like a soundstage? Is that how it works? Yeah. The, the, the 90% of the show is set in the store. That's a set that's set up in a soundstage. And in fact,

there's a little mini street just outside the door with a big projection of the actual street across the street from the actual store so if you look out the window you're seeing the same view as you would if you were in the real location so the so the show could could actually make it look and we could in uh eventually we could even park cars on that little mini street so that it looked quite real when the door opens and you see a car in the background or whatever right but it's all in the sound stage and the the interior layout of the store is completely different than the interior layout of the the physical store that they shot the exteriors on. And in fact, that store in real life was called Mimi's Variety.

And the owner kept the Kim's Convenience sign, which is the show's sign, up after the show became a hit. And so it became the Kim's Convenience store. Well, I literally would go off. There's bike lanes on Sherbourne, but I'll go down just to take a picture of the store. Like it's become kind of a Toronto landmark of sorts. I know, I know. And I am not kidding when I say somebody should buy it and turn it into the show museum.

Now that Bruce, Bruce runs, Bruce owns the, we invite that family, Bruce and his family to our wrap parties when we could have them. And he's a lovely guy and he loved the show and I think it would be great if he could sell it to somebody who could turn it into the show museum.

I'm a CBC Gem guy so I watch my Kim's Convenience on CBC Gem. So tonight's not, to me even though 8 o'clock tonight, I know it's the series finale, I'm not caught up enough that I won't be watching it tonight. Cause I need to, you know,

go in order and I'm still making my way through season five here, but I was reading like John Doyle's globe and mail headline. It was, uh, the tragic undertow to the final episode of Kim's convenience. So whenever the, whenever the real, and I know you've hinted at it and I've,

I've heard this and that through the grapevine, if you will. But when the, the real story is told on all this, I just think that this is just a travesty because what you have here is what I, in my opinion, was the next Schitt's Creek. Like,

you know, the, the, the buzz around your show, uh, it's, it's a, it's a Toronto show,

but it appeals to people across the globe. And, uh, just the whole spirit of the show I think it was just like on the verge of following the footsteps of Schitt's Creek and Breaking Worldwide. Well in terms

of our ratings we got our ratings are always higher than Schitt's Creek. Yeah right. But I mean that said there's a study in contrast between how to do a show and serve its audience well versus what happened with us because Schitt's Creek they decided you know six seasons was going to be enough to tell the story and that's what they did and so the last season was this celebration

uh and I you know and you're in tears and you're laughing as you watch these shows unfold in season six we never got that and we should have you know we should have had our own celebration because it it deserved it you know when this show started yeah i thought this is a because i saw the original fringe play i was there know, in the early days, I saw it. And when they said they're doing a series of it, I said, well, you know, this might appeal to people who went to see the Fringe show. Maybe it'll appeal to people who live in the 416 area code, because we have Korean convenience stores on every corner. But how are people in Moose Jaw, or people in Calgary, or people in, you know, white horse going to relate to this

show it's completely it's such a love letter to toronto yes and everybody outside toronto hates toronto to begin with right so why would they want to watch this show well not only did everybody in canada watch this show now everybody around the world watches this show because it's in indonesia i get tweets from indonesia and and you know all over the world and everybody relates to it even though the specifics are very toronto yes but the values and themes are so universal and that's the beauty of of our show and the beauty of any successful show is they made it so specific that anybody got it. Now, okay, so here I'm speaking to you from Toronto, the southwest corner.

Hello to you. And that means I know it as a CBC show because I watch it. I mentioned CBC Jam earlier, but there was that moment when suddenly you'd log into Netflix and there was our friends from Kim's Convenience. And is it fair to say that at that moment when Netflix kind of picks it up and starts distributing it, suddenly that's when you're hearing from people well beyond the Canadian

borders, right? This is where others... Well, yeah, for sure. I mean, in the olden days, like when I was on Little Mosque on the Prairie or whatever, you had to wait until the show got sold to another country. Now, Little Mosque was interesting because it was sold while we were filming it to other countries so the series leads would do commercials for danish television you know in between setups um but with kim's you know it it wasn't um it started on netflix i think after season one and so

it had an international audience right away you know I've been doing this for 40 years and my cousins in India and Singapore and other parts of the world have no idea I mean they know I work in Canadian television but they've never seen anything I've done

they're all watching Kim's Convenience now because they could see it in Chennai and Singapore and Sydney, Australia. And it's this incredible thing that now, because of streaming, we have the ability to do that in the old days they had to have a sales agent that went from country to country selling shows under you know and you'd get a report as a writer i remember my first shows for cbc back in the 80s you get a you get a report from the cbc once a year listing the countries and the the four dollar sales they would make to have the shows shown in in a foreign country that's all well i remember when i was growing up, I'd always hear, you know, because I loved Danger Bay. Okay. So I'd watch my Danger Bay.

Shout out to Ocean Hellman, by the way. I don't know where she's at, but love that show. But then I would always hear or read in the Petronas Star or something about how, you know, how many other countries would, you know, broadcast Danger Bay or Beachcombers or whatever. And you're right. Yeah. Nowadays, it's like netflix

can just distribute it to whatever countries and bob's your uncle well and and you know when i was writing fraggle rock i mean we were seen in i think 80 countries at the time shortly after it was shown on cbc and hbo uh in north america and it was a big deal. Now, Fraggle Rock is streams on Apple TV Plus, and it's not a big deal. You know, anybody and everybody who has Apple TV Plus can watch what I did 38 years ago. Okay, let's talk about this. Fraggle Rock. I loved it. And so actually, I almost want to rewind just a little bit to give some context because you mentioned Moose Jaw when you were running down all the places that were enjoying Kim's convenience. But you're born in India, but you grew up in Saskatoon, right?

That's right. Yeah, almost exactly halfway around the world to the degree of longitude from where I was born in India. Well, it's no big deal for me. I was a year old when we came. I was going to ask my next question is how old were you? I don't know how my mother and father coped, but they did. So you didn't have to adapt much because at that age you adapt to everything

instantly pretty much. Well, we could talk about what it means to be the only brown kid in school. So there was some issues of belonging that I had to deal with, but nothing like what my parents went through. Well, do you want to share a little there? Because I produced a podcast for Humble and Fred, and the Humble and Humble and Fred is a Howard Glassman who talks about being the only Jew in Moose Jaw.

So he always talks about... In fact, he recently did a show with Ralph Ben-Murgy. I have to check that out. That was what they discussed was growing up in a small town as the different one, as they refer to it. So what was that like growing up in Saskatoon and not being a white dude? Well, you know, I've had to think a lot about that since then. You know, I didn't know I was the only brown kid in school because when you're when you look through the world you look throughout through your eyes right and you just

see the world but i didn't see me in the world you know it's only when i saw the class picture i went oh yeah i'm the only brown kid in the class right but you don't you don't realize what that is other than all of the issues and microaggressions and, you know, the things that you bump up against. The fact that you don't know how to skate because your dad didn't know how to skate. So how do you know how to skate? You have to learn how to skate on your own. And every other kid in the school had been skating since, you know, their older brothers and their fathers and their uncles all taught them how to skate. skating since you know their older brothers and their fathers and their uncles all taught them how to skate right so when you start playing hockey at grade one two three there's a big difference so by the time you're in you're 10 you you can't skate for shit compared to everybody

else in your class and you know so how do you as a kid growing up in saskatoon even you can't play hockey as good as everybody else it's because you're brown and it nobody understands it they just think you're a lousy hockey player and you know you don't you hockey as good as everybody else. It's because you're brown and nobody understands it. They just think you're a lousy hockey player and, you know, you're not worth playing with. So, you know, multiply that. Then there's cultural expectations. I mean, my whole family are doctors. That's how my dad came to this country.

He was an MD in India and he came to Canada to study, to become a neurosurgeon. And the only place that would accept an Indian doctor to train in neurosurgery in the late 50s was the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon. Well, that's why he ended up there. That's why they're so loyal to Saskatoon as growing up, because that was the only place that would accept. I mean, Toronto wouldn't accept him. You know, New York wouldn't accept him. England wouldn't accept him. He was teaching British guys from England how to do his job and then they would become his boss. That's what his life was growing up. And so, you know, all of that, all of that filters down to me as I'm trying to cope through going to school in my own way.

school in in in my own way um and and i and i think that's how i ended up in show business is because i wasn't um i didn't belong and and i thought i did and as a result you know i i was groomed or expected to become a doctor like the rest of my family. I did pre-med as my major in university, but I ticked off drama as a double major, and I never applied for medical school. And it stemmed from this deep sense of somehow or other I'm going to belong. Now, I think I could have belonged if I became a doctor much easier, but I,

I, there was a kind of, it was kind of fuck you. I am going to prove all of you wrong. And if I don't do this, nobody else will because there was nobody else to do it. Right. So I, I, I go into show business, you know, for as a Brown kid from Saskatoon, people from Saskatoon didn't even go on the show business, you know, for, as a Brown kid from Saskatoon, people from Saskatoon didn't even go into show business, let alone Brown kids from Saskatoon. And, and, and so, you know, I mean, whatever that means,

I think that's where it started. So I'm grateful on some level that I didn't, I mean, I have the world's worst show business name for guts. I did practice it several times before. There are so many reasons for me not to do this. And yet that's what I ended up doing. So, you know, there's a whole, there's a whole psychoanalysis that can go into what, what got me through it. But I think a lot of it has to do with the other thing is because I was the

only brown kid, you know, kids who were in Toronto, there was a larger Indian community or Punjabi community or Gujarati community, whatever, you know? So you're growing up at least in a small place of, of other brown families in, in Brampton or wherever you were growing up. So you could retain your cultural roots in a way that I was not able to, because I didn't have that. So I, you know, I grew up being more Canadian than Indian, but I was treated more Indian than Canadian.

Interesting. Fascinating how that could factor into your decision to become an actor and a writer and kind of go into the arts. What I'm saying is I don't want to give myself too much credit. What I'm saying is I didn't know any better.

Right. Which is sometimes the best approach is ignorance is bliss here. If I'd known how hard it was going to be, I wouldn't have done it. But I didn't know any better. And I got in too deep. And I had some success early on. And by then it was too late. Then it was too late. Well, I got to ask you about Fraggle Rock here. But on your name, Sujith. Now, how many people think that the G is a gif?

Yeah, well, and Indian people do. Because my parents decided to be creative. And the traditional spelling is S-U-J-I-T-H. But, you know, we're a Christian family. So my mother's name is Susan. My father's name is George. So they combined Susan with George to be Sujit. And it's soft G, but even Indian people get it wrong.

And then they got that creativity out with me because my younger sisters are Liz and Tina. Did you have any consideration at all? Was there a moment where you said, I'm just going to change it to Sam or something like that? You know, I didn't because when I started in the business, I broke in as a writer and nobody cared what my name was as a writer. Right. And then early on, I think my second or third job, I wrote a movie for CBC in 1980. Best of both worlds. Best of both worlds.

And we couldn't find a brown actor to play the part. They were going to cast Howie mandel at one point and painted brown until i begged them to let me audition and uh i auditioned and got the part so that's how i started acting professionally i mean i'd acted in school but acted professionally right and at that point it's too late to change my name so here you know i've had to live with it for the next 40 years okay so you mentioned that I'm glad They cast you instead of the Who was the actor they were going to Paint brown again

Howie Mandel And this is before Howie Mandel was famous Well you know what I keep thinking of Okay so before the Big TV show he was on Before St. Elsewhere He just moved to LA The casting director had auditioned Whatever Indian actors existed in L.A. at the time.

Right. And she came back saying, I found him. And told the producer, it's this young comedian from Toronto named Howie Mandel. And I said, I don't think that's an Indian name. He's a young Jewish fellow, she said. But he's very funny. So they flew at taxpayer's expense, the producer and the director, not the writer, of course, to L.A. to audition an unknown Howie Mandel, hired a makeup guy who'd worked on a Spielberg movie to paint him brown,

paste on a mustache. And that weekend, I sort of stayed up thinking, well, this is really awful. Because, of course, the whole point of this movie I wrote was about the culture. Right. Right. And so, you know, why are we doing this if we if if this is going to happen? To their credit, the producer and director came back and said, no, that's not going to work out. And that point I said, and then the head of the CBC said, well, then we not going to work out. And then the head of the CBC said, well, then we're going to cancel the movie. And I said, please let me audition. Give me one shot at this.

And they did, and I got the part. Hearing that story kind of makes me even more... I'm already angry about Kim's convenience coming to an M. I'm already riled up about it. Talking to you is just making me angrier. But I'm now even more pissed because this was a show not only was it a good show a funny show but the representation on this show like we talked about it being like a toronto show but i mean i i'm married to a filipino woman so i have children

who are half white half filipino and it's i just love the fact that we can watch a show and here are the family that we see on the show yeah they happen to be of uh of asian descent and like that's now that's gone like this was a successful program what are you doing well you know i i know it's gone and the and the point is that we've been you know i've been kicking this can since 1982 i'm in fact 1980 the very first show I wrote was an episode of a CBC spy drama and starring Don Franks. And and the episode I wrote, a guest starred Phil Aiken, who runs Obsidian or who did run Obsidian Theatre in Toronto. He's a great black film. I mean, like great black actor and director. He directed me in a play last season. And, you know,

he was 24 years old at the time and he played this black spy. And so I've been kicking the can at representation and expanding the sort of definition of what should be on TV since then. And, you know, there've been lots of people who have been doing that. The thing about Kim's Convenience was it was the first time, maybe with the exception of Little Mosque in the Prairie, but it was the first time that something like this became universally popular. And nobody, you know, put it under that spotlight of,

oh, this is a diverse program that we're doing for that spotlight of, oh, this is a diverse program that we're doing for the good of society. It was just this great show that happened to have people that we see every day, the owners of a convenience store, at the center of it, and the customers who are of varying races. And it just reflected the reality of what people

in Toronto live with. So nobody even blinked an eye about whether that was radical or not. It was no longer radical. It was just a great show. And that was the beauty of it. I mean, I'm grateful to have survived in this business this long to have experienced that. It took a long time, but we finally got there. But the hard part's done now. Yeah, the hard part's done. Well, and the hard part's done, and then we, like good Canadians, we shoot ourselves in the foot.

You unplug it. It's like, yeah, when Homer was about to beat Bart at that video game and then Marge unplugged the television. This is what's happened here. Oh, my goodness. Okay, so you mentioned the Howie Mandel, they were going to paint his skin brown, which is hard to believe, except here, let me turn off my phone here.

Okay, that's actually the TDSB probably calling me to say, don't send your kids back to school next week. Okay, I did catch that in the news. But, okay, so what was I going to say? Oh, yeah, it sounds hard to believe until I remember that, uh, cause I was a big fan of short circuit, the movie. The second one was filmed in Toronto, which you probably know, but Fisher Stevens played a South Asian man in that movie. Yeah. Well, you see, and there you go. So, I mean, that was years after. Yeah. Like mid to late 80s, I'd say. Yeah.

And yet nobody sort of went, hey, wait a minute. I mean, so the suggestion for Howie Mandel was not radical. It just upset me. Sure. Well, you wrote the piece. If Howie had been really good, he would have got the part. But he just wasn't, you know, right best of both worlds okay so in the timeline of things where does

Fraggle Rock come into play like Fraggle Rock first of all even share maybe some context like because we think of this universe of you know Muppet Show and Sesame Street and all this we think of it as like we don't think of it as anything that has to do with Canada but Fraggle Rock you you know, was produced here, right?

It was a pretty hefty Canadian content show. So the story of Fraggle Rock was, for me, I'll tell it from my perspective. Yes, please. I did that movie for CBC. And shortly after I did that movie for CBC, it was broadcast in 1983. Fraggle Rock started and after the first 12 started production and after the first 12 episodes, they wanted to hire a Canadian producer because the producer that they were using was from England.

Right. Because they had done the Muppet show in England and they had brought some of had brought some of that administrative staff over to set up Fraggle Rock here. Though the creative was all Muppets, you know, Jerry Jewell and Jim Henson, and the lead puppeteers are all Muppet people, and had worked on the Muppet Show, and had worked on Sesame Street, and worked on those old Muppet specials, like the Musician Muppets of Brayman and, you know, those things that were done in the late sixties and early seventies. So that's the Canadian connection because Jim had shot those specials in Toronto at VTR studios in the late sixties, early seventies. And he liked those, that studio. He also,

when he came up with Fraggle Rock made a you know he said okay we can shoot them there we'll we'll make it a cbc co-production so that cbc provides the crew and um and we will sell the show to hbo and hbo that was is fraggle rock was the very first series that hbo ever commissioned long before the soprranos, Larry Sanders show long before any of that stuff, Draggle Rock was the first HBO TV series. Wow. So that was the deal. And it turned out that the guy they hired to be the Canadian producer was the

same guy who produced my CBC movie. So when he got that job, who produced my CBC movie. So when he got that job, he invited me and every other good writer he knew to try and get on the show. And, you know, it was interesting because at the time, I think every television and working TV writer

in the country, but certainly in Toronto, was lining up to try and get on to write for Jim Henson. I had written that one thing for CBC, the Black Spy Show and the movie that I'd starred in. And that was it. And I got an interview with Jerry Jewell. And he had read or seen the movie, I think, and liked it. And and he just sort of liked me. And he took me around to see the studio. And he took me into this room. And I was agog. I mean, this was an incredible

set and the whole thing. And he finally took me into this little room where they hang the fraggle puppets on little pegs. And it literally took my breath away. And I remember gasping and he noticed me gasping. So he goes off and he sort of chuckles and he takes one of the freggles off the pig and he sticks his hand up in it. He says, you know, without us, these are just socks. And that's when I knew I could be a writer for it. Wow. Because it was ultimately for the Muppets, it was about the writing.

And so then, you know, he invited me to pitch an idea for an episode. And I did. And they liked it. And I ended up writing 10 episodes of the 96. Wow. Okay. Now, did you get to, you know, meet and hang out with Jim Henson regularly? Or was he like an absentee landlord?

Jim directed one of my scripts. Wow. Wow. So what can you share? Because, uh, there's a guy taken from us far too soon, but, uh, you know, I was raised on Sesame street. So, I mean, you know, I mean, I was really young and, and Jim, I mean, we were all young back then, but but Jim was. He was intimidating to me because he was Jim Henson. I mean, even then he was Jim Henson. Right.

But there was nothing he did that was intimidating. It was just me that was intimidated. But at the same time, I fought that to be because he was just a very he's a kind of very quiet, almost shy man, but he was also clearly the boss. I remember we were doing a take. I'll always remember this because we were doing a take from my episode that he was directing, and Sprocket the dog had to do a gag with the dish, with the food dish.

And I took something like 25 takes until jim was happy now any other director they would have said you're not doing any more takes than the stupid shot you know live with what you got but jim got to do his 25 you know uh because it's his money um uh so you know there was that i mean he was clearly in charge and he was clearly a boss but he was also very respectful of all the collaborators on the show i remember and this is something i still use today after the first season he told the writers that i i want you to write on the front page, cover page of every script, the answer to five questions. Whose story is it?

What's their goal? What's their obstacle? What's at stake? And what do we learn? And I want those answers to be on the front page of every script. And I said, well, why do you want that? I mean, we have to do that in order to write the show, but why do you want them on the cover of the script? And he said, so that anybody working on the show knows what it's about not just the show but that particular

episode even if they haven't read the script now the irony is when we did table reads for each episode we would do table table reads every monday morning we would do the table read for the episode shooting that week and we'd do a table read for the episode shooting the next week. The room, we would shoot it, we would do the table read in the studio because every single crew member showed up. There were 80 people watching this table read. The gaffer was watching the table read. You know, everybody was watching this table read. That doesn't happen in television.

But everybody came to watch. So we didn't need to write the questions on the front page of the script because everybody had listened to the table reads twice wow i mean that was the kind of dedication that people had for the show that we worked on it so and what an education for you like to at such a young age to kind of be exposed to this working on fraggle rock with the muppets spoiled me for working on other Canadian TV shows. I mean, it was, there's been nothing like that since. And I always dreamed that if I could get to run a show, I would run it like Jared Jewell ran his show because it was, first of all, it was

writer-centric. And secondly, it was so collaborative. You know everybody was a contributor to the the end product there was no there was no um there were no divas you know uh uh because but everybody was was also the best of what they did right you know i wouldn't say i was the best of what i did but i was working for the best i was working for the best in the world. And I was like, you know, I was a rookie trying to, trying to play with Mickey Mantle for God's sake, and hopefully be able to stay in the lineup. So it was an incredible experience. And all of those people were artists and, you know,

working at the highest level. And I knew at the time I was involved in something special. And since then, I've never been involved in anything as special from top down. Is it possible that Kim's Convenience is number two? There are a lot of number twos. Kim's convenience is definitely in the, in the top five. Okay. Uh, you know,

I mean, the way Kim's ends is. And left a bitter, bitter taste in your mouth. It's not, it's not going to make it into the top two or three, but, uh,

yeah, we, you know, the, um, the, uh, the,

the, the collaborative aspect of it. I mean, I wasn't as involved in Kim's as I was in Fraggle Rock either. You know, the, the, the collaborative aspect of it. I mean, I wasn't as involved in Kim's as I was in Fraggle Rock either. You know, I, I was playing a recurring part, you know, I'd come in once a couple of weeks to do my bit, but, but it's still, you know, while, while you got to do that, it, it had that same, that same feeling of mutual respect, you know, fun i mean you know so much of this business

is so hard and unless you have fun and and and as fun as you think uh kim's or as fun as you think i mean you watch the blooper reel they just posted the blooper reel from i think season two on the internet yesterday and if you watch that you see see, we were having fun, you know, like for all of the high stakes pressure, TV shows that whatever we were having fun. And if you're not able to do that, and that's a function of who's at the top, like Paul, if Paul isn't allowing for that fun to happen. And I've been on shows where number one on the call sheet didn't, and they are tough. If you have that from the top down,

then it makes it easy to do in a way. And Fraggle Rock was totally that. I mean, as much fun, Larry, the producer I talked about who got hired, he always says, as much fun as you think it was, it was more fun. And I would say for all the good projects that I've been involved with, they were fundamentally fun.

Because the rest of it is hard work. I got a question about the productions that happened. And to be clear, the Fraggle Rock was filmed in Toronto, right? They made it in Toronto. Yeah, it's VTR Studios and Eastern Sound, which were back-to-back. VTR Studios was on Scholar Street. Eastern Sound, where they recorded a lot of hit records, was on Yorkville. And it was like a maze that connected the two buildings.

That's all gone now. And so it's the Four Seasons Hotel. And I think it's a real tragedy because there should be a plaque with the Fraggles on it on the street there. This was where Fraggle Rock was made. I could get behind that initiative for sure. Now, I guess my question I'm leading up to here is,

is there enough, straight up, is there enough work in this country for an actor like yourself? And I know you do more than just act, but is there enough, straight up, is there enough work in this country for an actor like yourself? And I know you do more than just act, but is there enough going on that you can actually, or have you had, go ahead, sorry.

I mean, I would say that I've been very lucky. I mean, I've made a living writing and acting in Canada for 40 years. I've never had to work as a waiter or I've never had a regular job. But that's me. And I admit that's a lot of luck. But I've never been a star either. You know, like,

people who become series leads are, you know, they're set for a long time with the kind of But in this country, and the reason I ask is my guest tomorrow is, her name is Stacey Metician. And the reason I ask is my guest tomorrow, her name is Stacey Metician, and she played Caitlin on Degrassi in Degrassi Junior High. Yeah, but that was another era. That was a whole other era. Okay, just wanted to, because I know she definitely had to wait tables that whole run if she was going to pay her rent. And I think that there's a big difference between the original Degrassi era and what series leads are getting paid in Canada now. Series leads are getting paid in Canada what they would get in L.A. too. I mean, it's comparable. Maybe not married with children money, but certainly U. u.s prime time middle of the road show

compared to a cbc because they can't afford not to because all of those actors half of them are canadians who live in la anyway did so did you consider maybe you did this and uh you'll tell me now i suppose but did you ever make the move to la and thinking that you need to be based there? I never did. I considered it a few times in the mid-90s, I thought about doing it. At that time, it was the green card era, and you had to get a green card to go. So I'd go to the US consulate on University Avenue in Toronto, and I would read the list on the wall, and it said, OK, for this year, Canadian citizens aren't eligible. So I would come back and then the next year I would say Indian nationals aren't eligible. And I was born in India. So this went on for like two or three years.

I would toggle and it got to the point where I went, you know, I guess it's not meant to be. I didn't try to do, so it wasn't that established in the mid nineties to get what's called an O one or any of these, you know, because you're highly renowned artist. And now, you know, I mean, I sort of made it to this point and I, I don't want to move, but I would have trouble. I have to admit, I would have trouble advising somebody in their 30s whether they should make the move or not, because a lot of people have and have done very well by it. The largest growing chapter of the Writers Guild of Canada is Los Angeles. It's funny because there's a name I'm going to bring up now because I know you worked with him and i'm going to ask you about working with him uh he's an fotm so fotm means friend of toronto

mike you are also an fotm at this point so welcome to the uh the club thank you i look forward to my patch i'm gonna put it on my jacket that's your fifth appearance we get you the jacket so slow your roll there but uh a gentleman who is a Canadian famous comedian who went to L.A. to try to make it and then ended up, he tells a story to me as he was on this program that is a tale between his legs. He comes back home and he's been here ever since. It's Ron James. I know Ron. Ron's an old good buddy. I've been on his show.

I was on his show a couple of times. I was going to ask you. So I noticed, of course, I went to your IMDB, which is very long. so i won't mention the the the many many many programs you've been a part of like from and i look at them and i say oh those are the things i i recognize these names as having filmed here like uh forever night or robocop the series or uh relic hunter like it's a lot of interesting things going on there but what was it like working with ron well, Ron is, Ron's a real artist. You know, we were doing this one scene where he played a kind of right wing radio talk show host. And I was this sort of nerdy professor of racial race issues or something like that.

Anyway, he had this character going in how he did his speech pattern delivery. And in the middle of a take, he says, no, stop, stop. I lost the character. Let me get it back. I've never done that. So, I mean, Ron is ron is great i love ron all right and he's i think one of the greatest greatest monologists and commentators right i mean listening to his act when he's got when he's on a roll it's like um you know it's a it's a it's a word salad of joy

oh that's well put actually yeah i was wondering if you needed any translator when you were talking you know, it's a, it's a, it's a word salad of joy. Oh, that's well put actually. Yeah. I was wondering if you needed any translator when you were talking to Ron James, cause sometimes it gets pretty, pretty heavy, especially if the maritime stuff and, but he's, he's, you know, I mean, he was, he was running that show. I think he, as long as I knew my lines, he was out. Okay. So one last, I know you've been fantastic. And I know this is, you're like, we're only a couple hours away from this series finale.

But are you going to watch it? Like, what do you plan to do at 8 o'clock? I got to tell you, I have mixed feelings. I'm just admitting this in public for the first time. But since I was given the news that we were not coming back, I haven't been able to watch the show. And I would watch it every week, you know, to see the new episode. you know, I don't blame you at all.

I don't know. It's, it's really tough to, to say goodbye to it because it's like a death. It's not like a farewell. Well, I noticed the celebration. I don't think that's even the right word,

but this whole, the whole fact that the series, this beloved series finale is tonight at eight o'clock. If it were like Seinfeld or MASH or all these six shows that get a proper written goodbye, I think there would be so much more buzz and celebration. And I think this would be an event. It doesn't have that event feel

because I think most of us are savvy enough to read between the lines and realize that the actors involved don't have the rights to these character names because they don't own that. So they can't go and just do it. You guys can't just all get together and do it yourselves, right? This is not an option.

I know people think that. No, it doesn't work that way. It doesn't work that way. I mean, we could do, you could do many things, but, you know. Change the names a little bit. When a show gets, when a a show starts it's a huge thing like they have to build a set they have to you know there's hundreds of thousands of dollars of stuff that has to happen before any of us even have a job you know like it it begins i mean

writing the scripts to begin with and so so to generate that enterprise to begin with, a green light is a huge event in anybody's life who works in television. And then to keep it going is like this great thing. You know, I hope that they had amortized the cost of the set over five seasons, but they wouldn't have over two. You know, if the show had ended after two seasons, they'd't have over two you know if they if the show had ended after two seasons they'd be out of out of pocket on some of this stuff because the

way the finance the money works it's not like cbc pays for the whole show you know the cbc only licenses it and gives them a fee for being able to show it however many times i get to in canada but it doesn't cover the full budget the producers have to raise the rest of the money from other sources like the CMF, which is a government bank that finances television that that is paid for out of the cable companies have to contribute. So we're all sort of kicking in on that. And even then there's a gap and you know,

that's when things like Netflix and all that stuff fill in the gap but there's no guarantee that that gap will be filled so the producers, you've got to give them credit they go into this with some risk and I'm sure by now they're whole but they wouldn't have been whole after season one

it would take some while so when something ends prematurely you know, there's i don't think anybody wanted it to do happen this way and least of all the producers um this was a this was a tough decision under awful circumstances so my final question is about kim's convenience but then uh i realized I never asked you what the hell the Loop Group is. So I was reading about the Loop Group. So hopefully this means something to you. Well, I can explain to you what it is. What is the Loop Group? I've been part of Loop Group since the early 90s. when you uh watch tv and there's more than two people in a

scene say you're two cops in the police station and you're the two series stars but there's about 25 people in the background pretending to be the other cops and cookers and criminals or whatever's in the background right uh all those people when they shot the film or the TV show, were miming. And the only two people who were actually audible were the two stars speaking on camera. But when you watch the show, those other people in the background have to be making some kind of noise. So they bring in a loop group to do all the background voices.

And the loop group improvises, watching the screen miming what the miming people did and makes up stuff that would be credible in the context of the story of the scene that matches the lip flapping of whoever was miming on the day, which is really tricky sometimes because some of those miming background extras were not saying anything real they were just going and then you have to figure out a way to make that actually make sense in case it goes up in the mix a little bit so that it can be audible uh so i've been a part of loop groups since the early 90s. I've looped entire seasons of shows like Forever Night, like Robocop, like Relic Hunter.

I've also been on camera in those same shows. So then you don't get to loop that show or that episode. The biggest and best known one that I've been a loop group in is The Expanse, which is a big science fiction show on Amazon Prime. Started on SyFy in the States and Space Channel here. And I've been looping every episode since the pilot. It's in season five that's airing now. And I got cast on camera in season five. So halfway through the season, you stop hearing my voice in the loop group and you get to see me on screen. But that's what the loop group is. And there are people, actors who actually make their living

just doing looping. Thank you for that great explanation. I just read you were part of the loop group and I'm like, what the hell is the loop group? But that all makes complete sense. I never thought, of course, when you're filming, they're just moving their mouths. They're not saying anything.

But at some point there has to be some- Any crowd scenes or, you know, like on the expanse uh there you have two people on a spaceship but you hear all the comms chatter you know people in other spaceships talking and you all that stuff has to be done by the loop group so we learn the improvised uh space talk and uh or you you learn you know you're in restaurants you have to be the customers in the restaurant or you have to be the cops in the police station, or wherever it is. So, Sujith, here we are,

only less than two hours before the series finale, which I've decided I'm going to join you. I'm going to boycott this. I'm not feeling it. I'm pissed off. I'm not boycotting it. It's just that it's kind of painful. I just don't know if I'm...

And, you know, thankfully, with streaming, it's not the only chance i have to see it i know that paul is going to go online uh i think on youtube to do a a post-mortem stream uh after the episode so i may tune in for that join them there well so my final question before i play some lowest of the low and uh say. You were fantastic, by the way. I really appreciate this. Is this done done in that there's 0% chance of this being resurrected or is there a sliver of hope out there that someone comes to their senses and Kim's convenience returns for a sixth season?

Well, it's a crazy business and one should never say never, but i wouldn't bet money on it i was gonna ask you what your crystal ball was saying there but that's not quite fair is it but uh sujith's amazing uh mr meta is a great character on kim's convenience and i didn't even mention the fact that you're also on Transplant, right? Thank God. I have another gig to fall back on after losing Kim's convenience. But yeah, we're shooting season two of Transplant, which is on CTV in Canada and NBC in the U.S. now. And I'm very glad to be on that show because it's a good show.

Awesome, my friend. Thanks again for giving me an hour of your life here on a very important night, I'm sure, in your industry. And again, shitty decision. We're all less off because of it, but you do great work and I can't wait to see where you end up next, buddy. All right, thank you, Mike.

It was a pleasure being with you and save a beer for me. buddy. All right. Thank you Mike. It was a pleasure being with you and save a beer for me. And that brings us

to the end of our 834th show. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at Toronto Mike. Sujith you're at Sujith Varughese

and I'm going to spell it for people. It's S-U-G-I-T-H. That's Sujith and then Varughese is V-A-R-U-G-H-E-S-E. So a good follow on Twitter. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery are at Great Lakes Beer.

Palma Pasta. They're at Palma Pasta. I owe you a lasagna too. So when we do finally meet, I'll get you the beer and the lasagna. And a Toronto Mike sticker from StickerU. So I'll take care of you. StickerU is at Sticker U. CDN Technologies, they're at CDN Technologies.

Ridley Funeral Home is at Ridley FH. And Mimico Mike, he's on Instagram at Majeski Group Homes. See you all tomorrow when my guest is Stacy Metician. I've been in tears for eight years of tears. And I don't know what the future can hold or do. This podcast has been produced by TMDS and accelerated by Rome Phone. Rome Phone brings you the most reliable virtual phone service to run your business and protect your home number from unwanted calls. Visit RomePhone.ca to get started.