Bob and Doug McKenzie are a pair of fictional Canadian brothers who hosted "Great White North", a sketch which was introduced on SCTV for the show's third season when it moved to CBC Television in 1980. Bob is played by Rick Moranis and Doug is played by Dave Thomas. The duo became a pop culture phenomenon in both the United States and Canada.
The characters were later revived for an animated series, Bob & Doug, which premiered on Global in 2009.[1]
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"Great White North" (originally known as "Kanadian Korner") was a panel show that played upon Canadian stereotypes. Bob and Doug, two dim-witted beer-swilling brothers wearing heavy winter clothing and tuques, would comment on various elements of Canadian life and culture, frequently employing the interjection "Eh?" and derisively calling each other "hoser." Among the topics discussed were snow routes, the Canadian-built robot arm on the Space Shuttle, the inappropriateness of bedtime stories about dog fights, flat tires, and "why there aren't enough parking spaces at take-out doughnut shops."[2]
The sketch was conceived when SCTV moved to the CBC television network. Due to the difference in the amount of time allocated for commercials, each episode to be broadcast on that network was two minutes longer than those syndicated to the United States. The CBC network heads asked the show's producers to add specifically and identifiably Canadian content for those two minutes. Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas thought that this was a ridiculous request, since the show had been taped in Canada, with a mostly Canadian cast and crew, for two years.[2] The request inspired them to create a parody that would incorporate every aspect of the humorous stereotype of Canadians.[3]
The segments were videotaped at the end of a day's shooting, with just Thomas and Moranis and a single camera operator. The sketches were for the most part improvised on the set, after which they would select the best ones for use on the program.[4]
Moranis recalled, "We went on the stage with no preparation, and did 15 [sketches]. Two of them were lousy, in three we cracked up and fell apart... maybe six were keepers."[3] Added Dave Thomas in a 2000 interview, "Rick and I used to sit in the studio, by ourselves –- almost like happy hour –- drink real beers, cook back-bacon, literally make hot snack food for ourselves while we improvised and just talked. It was all very low key and stupid, and we thought, 'Well, they get what they deserve. This is their Canadian content. I hope they like it.'"[5]
To their shock, the comedians found that this filler material had become the most popular part of the show. Though initially intended for Canadian TV only, some of the two-minute "Great White North" segments would find their way into U.S. versions of the 30-minute shows due to a shortage of content that week. When NBC ordered the 90-minute shows for the 1981 season, they specifically cited good affiliate feedback on the "two dumb Canadian characters" and requested that the characters be included in every program.[5]
They rode the crest of a fad, peaking in 1982-83, that produced one comedy album and a movie, Strange Brew. The album, The Great White North, released by Anthem Records in Canada and Mercury Records in the US, went platinum in sales, won a Grammy nomination and broke the top ten on Billboard's Top LPs and Tapes list in March, 1982. It is noted for the song "Take Off" which featured fellow Canadian Geddy Lee of the rock group Rush chorusing between the McKenzies' banter. On this album, they also sing their own improvised version of "The Twelve Days of Christmas", which is frequently played on the radio around the holidays in both Canada and the United States. While hugely popular in the U.S., the album was also #1 in Canada for six weeks, suggesting that Canadians appreciated the duo as an affectionate self-parody.
The Strange Brew movie was released by MGM in 1983. While receiving only minimal praise from critics, it performed fairly well at the box office, earning $8.5 million in the U.S. alone to easily cover its skinny $5 million budget. Subsequent to its initial theatrical release in 1983 Strange Brew was released by MGM in both Beta and VHS formats and subsequently re-packaged and re-released on VHS and Laser disc by Turner which acquired the MGM library in 1985, then also several times on VHS and DVD by Warner Brothers which acquired the library from Turner in 1993. Strange Brew continued to perform for Warner Brothers as a DVD title most likely because of the strong college cult following for this movie.
A second album, a "soundtrack" to their movie Strange Brew, was released in 1983. The album featured dialogue and music from the film, as well as new skits made specifically for the album that centered around the movie. The lead off track was appropriately entitled "This Isn't Our Second Album". The album sold poorly and was out-of-print soon after.[2][6][7]
The sketch's signature "Coo coo coo roo coo coo coo coo" theme, according to Dave Thomas in an interview on CBC News: The Hour, is an exaggeration of the flute music used in 60-second Canadian television nature vignettes, such as Hinterland Who's Who.[8]
Bob and Doug McKenzie continue to maintain a strong cult following for 25 years as evidenced by Internet activity on YouTube and Google searches of the name.
The duo revived the act in two award-winning television commercials for Pizza Hut in 1984 and 1986 and a two-year campaign for the Molson Brewing Company in 1999 and 2000 consisting of more than a dozen television and radio commercials which aired nationally in the U.S. and also a series of commercials for Mr. Lube which aired in Canada in 2002. They played a variant of the act for the Walt Disney Pictures animated feature film Brother Bear and its sequel, with their characters being the voices of a pair of goofy moose named Rutt and Tuke. They also recorded a commentary for the movie that is seen on the DVD.[9][10]
Animax Entertainment, whose interactive division is currently headed by Dave Thomas, began producing a new animated series for the Global Television Network based on the characters debuting on April 19, 2009, simply entitled Bob & Doug. Whilst Thomas reprises the character of Doug in the new series, Moranis chose not to voice the character of Bob, which instead is voiced by Dave Coulier. Moranis is, however, involved in the series as an executive producer.[11]
McFarlane Toys produced Bob and Doug McKenzie action figures in September 2000.[12]
A new Two-Four Anniversary special aired on May 20, 2007, on CBC Television. It was a retrospective on the history of the characters and their popularity, featuring interviews with various celebrities, classic clips, and new material featuring the pair. It includes an introduction by former Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin and a cameo appearance by Rush lead singer Geddy Lee. On November 20, 2007, Bob and Doug McKenzie's Two-Four Anniversary was released on DVD. The DVD, re-edited by Thomas himself, was twice as long as the broadcast and featured several classic McKenzie sketches from SCTV in their entirety, new footage filmed on the Great White North set and an hour's worth of bonus features. A Bob and Doug McKenzie bottle opener was included in every DVD.[13]
In 2007, on Rush's Snakes & Arrows tour, a short film of Bob and Doug McKenzie was shown as an intro to the song "The Larger Bowl".[14]
In Dave Thomas's behind-the-scenes book on SCTV, he reports that he and Moranis disliked the characters because they felt the network forced the characters on them and that they, as actors, were overly identified with the dimwitted, beer drinking duo. However, in an interview accompanying the Two-Four Anniversary premiere, Thomas credited the McKenzie Brothers as a successful comedic creation of which he was quite proud.[13]
Doug: "How's it goin', eh?"[15]
Doug: "Take off!"[15]
Bob: "Hose head/hoser!"
Bob and Doug: "Beauty, eh?" (acknowledgement of something good happening)
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