Joe Flaherty Article
Justin Pate
it's a fun read.
http://www.canoe.ca/JamMoviesArtistsF/flaherty_joe.html
Friday, May 16, 2003
SCTV's Flaherty shares his secrets
By PAT ST. GERMAIN -- Winnipeg Sun
Joe Flaherty hardly needs an introduction to most Canadians, but the SCTV
veteran, who is conducting comedy classes in Winnipeg this weekend, says his
name doesn't ring a bell for some students.
"There's always a few that don't have a clue who I am, they just want to
learn comedy," Flaherty says.
Flaherty, his brother David Flaherty and Yuk Yuk's founder Mark Breslin
planned to hold Humber College sketch and standup comedy workshops in
Winnipeg April 5 and 6, but were grounded by an ice storm that shut down
Toronto's Pearson International Airport.
David Flaherty says most of the budding comics who signed up for the
workshops were able to reschedule and join the trio at the Fairmont Hotel
this weekend.
Joe, who played dad Harold Weir in cult-hit but ratings poor NBC series
Freaks and Geeks in 1999-2000, starred in recent feature National Security
and occasionally appears on U.S. cablenet Comedy Central as Jiminy Glick's
half-brother Clay on Prime Time Glick. But he's best known in Canada for his
SCTV roles as Count Floyd, mawkish talk-show host Sammy Maudlin, TV news
anchor Floyd Robertson and station owner Guy Caballero.
Born in Pittsburgh and raised in Toronto, Flaherty lived in Los Angeles
before joining Humber College's School of Comedy last year, after shooting a
pilot for The WB that never made it to air.
He says he'd love to do another sitcom -- it's easy work and the hours and
money are good -- but there aren't many good roles to be had and he skipped
the annual round of pilot auditions altogether this spring.
"I hate it, I hate going out for auditions, and a lot of them are cattle
calls," he says. "A lot of (the producers) are so young they don't even know
what the hell you've done."
He says the comedy workshops are fun, but he sticks to teaching rather than
performing with the students.
"I've been tempted to get up there a couple of times and join in, but I
generally don't," he says, adding comedy courses didn't exist when he got
into the business.
"I certainly would have liked something like this because the only way to
learn is through working, which means you've gotta get a job somewhere."
George Hiebert
"Justin Pate" <JP5...@yahoo.com.nospam> wrote in message
news:EBpEb.136939$Ek.1...@twister.austin.rr.com...
> This isn't really "new" and I don't know if it's been posted before, but
> it's a fun read.
So the CBC parody is his fave SCTV bit. That's interesting.