Wade Christian McElwain (born June 1, 1972) is a Canadian comedian, writer, and TV producer.[1]
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Wade was born in Mississauga, Ontario to Mary (Hosier) and Harvie McElwain. At the age of 5, Wade and his older siblings brother Brad and sister Leslie moved to the rural acclimes of Heidelberg where he lived in a predominantly Mennonite Community.
Wade attended Waterloo-Oxford D.S.S. in Baden, Ontario where he distinguished himself as a member of the trivia challenge show "Reach for the Top", where his team won the Provincial Championship and earned him a scholarship to the University of Western Ontario.
At Western Wade joined the Pi Kappa Alpha Fraternity where he held the title of Social Director. Wade was also a cartoonist for the Western newspaper "The Gazette".
After finishing his degree, Wade was on to law school until he decided to try his hand at stand-up comedy. His first time on stage in 1996 was at Yuk Yuk's "Crash and Burn Mondays". Within a year however Wade won the title of Yuk Yuk's "Funniest New Comedian in Canada". In the years following he won "Best New Stand-Up" at the 2000 Canadian Comedy Awards, as well as a Just For Laughs "Best Homegrown Comic" award for Southern Ontario. In 2007, Wade moved to London, England and is very active on the massive stand-up circuit. As a headliner he can be seen at 'The Comedy Store'; 'Up the Creek', 'Highlight' and 'The Kingshead'. In August 2011 he premiered his show 'The Littlest Hobo' at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. The show mainly deals with Wade's comedy mid-life crisis as he explores his journey into stand-up and his future in the profession.
After a successful hour-long 'Comedy Now' special Wade was approached by the Comedy Network to come up with some ideas for his own show for the new network. He created "Gutter Ball Alley", and along with executive producer and co-host Johnny Gardhouse they produced 29 episodes of the show. Games like 'What Weighs More than a Midget', 'Who Shat?' and 'Jesus, Buddha Manson' featured appearances from Jordan Prentice, Angelo Tsarouchas, and Darren Frost.
The show caught the attention of Lorne Michaels Broadway Video who optioned the show for US release. The show was never picked up for season 3, despite a cult fan base.
Wade produced, hosted, and distributed "Ultimate Destination", a humorous look at what rambunctious college kids do while on spring break. Thirteen episodes of the program were ordered by mentv, a digital channel, for CanWest media. It did find a home on the National Lampoon Network in the US as well as being syndicated to Turkey and Hungary. The show has found a following online with over 4.5 million views since 2010.
McElwain also write and produced other programs such as the Global TV show "Double Down", Canada's "Gemini Awards", and the Canadian version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire". His trivia background led him to being the creative producer for the Comedy Network's "You Bet Your Ass." He was also a producer for Yuk Yuk's "Great Canadian Laugh Off" which also aired on the Comedy Network. Since moving to the UK in 2007, his company CVS Television has been busy in the ad funded genre producing comedy, travel and cooking series for a variety of clients and networks. In 2011 he began production on "Triviala Live', a unique game show which was the first to migrate from online to TV. This 30 hour series airs February 28 on Showcase.
Wade became engaged to fellow comedian Katherine Ryan in the summer of 2007. Katherine recently won the title of Funniest New Comedian in Britain at the 2008 Nivea Funny Women Awards. They both live in Crouch End in London.