Christine McGlade
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| Christine McGlade | |
|---|---|
 McGlade, circa 1982. |
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| Born | August 25, 1963 Canada |
| Other name(s) | Moose |
Christine "Moose" McGlade (born August 25, 1963) is a Canadian actress and producer, best remembered as the longtime host of the internationally popular kids' sketch comedy TV program You Can't Do That On Television (YCDTOTV). She was with the show from its very beginning as a local attraction on Ottawa, Ontario, television station CJOH in 1979 until partway through the 1986 season. (In 1985 and 1986, Alasdair Gillis was her co-host.) She also served as host for Whatever Turns You On, the short-lived spinoff of YCDTOTV which aired on Canada's CTV network in the fall of 1979.
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[edit] You Can't Do That On Television
McGlade actually got to be a cast member on You Can't Do That On Television by "accident," according to fansite YCDTOTV.com. When show creator Roger Price held auditions for the show in the fall of 1978, McGlade went to the auditions only to support a friend. She had no ambitions in acting or show business, but Price insisted that she either audition or leave. McGlade auditioned and was chosen for the show, although her friend was not.
McGlade was actually much older than most of the other kids on the show. She was fifteen when she started on YCDTOTV, and by the time she left the show in 1986, she was in her early 20s. What allowed her to stay on the show for as long as she did, besides her natural TV talents (even more remarkable given the fact that she had no acting experience beforehand), was the fact that she looked much younger than she actually was, and could believably play 14 or 15 when she was 21.
On YCDTOTV, McGlade was most frequently seen on the familiar blue link set, talking directly to the audience and lecturing on the theme of each program. She didn't appear in as many of the comedy sketches taped off the link set as her younger fellow cast members. During the live, local, hour-long episodes of YCDTOTV aired on CJOH in 1979 and 1981, she often introduced the live contest segments and music videos.
Her "character" on the show frequently had to deal with annoyances and interruptions while she tried to host, mainly from her chatty sidekick, Lisa Ruddy, and from Ross the stage director (played by Les Lye), who loved to place her in unfortunate situations which often resulted in her being slimed (after being tricked into saying the trigger phrase for the slime, "I don't know"), pied, or watered.
McGlade's nickname on YCDTOTV, "Moose," was also her nickname in real life. According to McGlade's blog, she was given the name by a sixth-grade classmate "based on the fact that I was always the smallest kid in the class. I think [the classmate] may have been referring to the character in the Archie comics, the giant blonde one, called Moose." [1]) After she mentioned this to Roger Price, he decided to write it into the show, and thus Christine was known as "Moose" not only to her schoolmates, but to thousands of young viewers in the U.S., Canada and around the world.
[edit] Wig
Throughout all of the 1982 season of "YCDTOTV," McGlade actually wore a wig. After the 1981 season was over, she cut her trademark curly dark hair short and dyed it in a punk style. In most of her scenes in 1982, she wore a wig of human hair that looked a lot like the hairdo she'd worn in 1981. However, since she couldn't get that human hair wig slimed or wet, for scenes involving messy or wet slapstick (including some scenes in which Moose was not the one to be slimed or watered), McGlade had to wear a curly synthetic wig. By 1983, McGlade's natural hair had grown back, and there was no longer a need for a wig.
While McGlade usually played herself on the show, there were instances in which she played other characters. In the 1981 season, she played the old lady at the movie theater, a role that had been originated by Ruth Buzzi on Whatever Turns You On. In the "Fairy Tales" episode in 1986, she played one of Cinderella's wicked stepsisters. In 1989, she did make a brief cameo in a classroom sketch at the end of the "Age" episode.
While never "official" cast members, some members of Christine's family also made cameo appearances on the show - for example, her father in "Work, Work, Work" (1981), and her younger sister and brother in "Cosmetics" (1982). Moose's younger sister Lisa actually played a younger version of Moose herself in a detention sketch, and her younger brother, Michael, was written into a sketch in the doctor's office in which he was brought into the office with a stomachache after eating all of Christine's makeup. Michael reports that, in the doctor's office sketch, he bit Christine's finger considerably harder than in rehearsal and Christine's startled and pained reaction was not acting. Les Lye has said that he suggested to YCDTOTV co-creator Roger Price that Moose's sister could replace Moose herself on the show once Moose got too old, because she looked quite a bit like her older sister, but Price immediately nixed the idea. Lisa McGlade did make a few more cameo appearances, however, in the classroom sketches during the 1985 season of YCDTOTV.
[edit] Later career
After leaving YCDTOTV, Christine starred on Turkey Television, a comedy/variety show aired on Nickelodeon which was also created by Price. In recent years, she has worked for both TVOntario and the CBC in Toronto as director of children's programming.
[edit] Family
McGlade has three children.[citation needed]
