What was birthed in a beautiful moment of ADHD impulsion has transformed into a life-long passion of building things that matter in Canadian Comedy. We're coming up to the 3 year anniversary and it's clear at this point the The Other Comedy Company is just one point in a much-larger constellation of work.
Being blessed to be raised in Canada by a Portuguese immigrant, I grew up surrounded by comedy, thanks to the existence of Canadian comedy pioneers like Yuk Yuks and Just For Laughs.
When I started stand up in 2009, comedy was a dream. When I started getting booked professionally, it was a job. The last few years have locked it in for me — at this point — comedy is a way of life. You'll see me mention this in other posts as well but it's a point well-worth making.
I do comedy because I love comedy and everything it stands for. I've been lucky enough to perform across Canada, become regularly rostered at my home-club Absolute Comedy and come up initially in Hamilton, ON which has one of the most unique comedy landscapes in all of Canada.
At this point in my career, it's less about ticking boxes and reaching milestones and more about creating and scaling impact. I started The Other Comedy Company with one idea in mind — to democratize comedy beyond entertainment and into our daily lives.
I don't believe comedy is something that should simply be reserved for a night out or something to watch on TV. I believe it has a role in our children's education, the way we work together and the way we build communities.
That's why we started corporate-only. With the rise of AI, virtual & hybrid workspaces, RTO mandates and shifting market factors — there's a lot of change happening in real-time to the way we work and grow our businesses. This will require higher penchants for discomfort, transparency, innovation and clear communication. That's why our initial program-development was strictly around social and emotional skillsets for adults who work together.
The single piece of feedback we heard the most as we started demo-testing locally in Northumberland County was loud and clear — "This was great but I would love my child to experience this."
That's why this time last year I spoke in front of 80 teachers at the KPR ETFO conference about what our programming would look like if we were to get our programs into schools. This has become built into a longer initiative that shows us the depth and scale of how comedy can serve as a utility tool for human-centred education.
That core message has been packaged into a bookable Founder's Keynote called Feel Good Story that can booked directly through myself or the company to hear directly from myself about my story, the direction of the business and how comedy is a game-changer for our nervous systems and the way we learn.
The ethos is simple.
In a fast-changing world, the sticks and stones of how well we adapt to these circumstances depends on how well we get along despite differences and disagreements.
Comedy itself is the greatest social adhesive to make this happen. The internet has done a good job of tribalising the best of us and creating more disconnection than repair. We believe the way back is through a simple principle we were all told as children: Play Well Together.
This requires being able to:
- accept others who think and speak differently than us
- those with different opinions and ideas
- increasing our threshold for discomfort for the greater good
- to build a community that learns from their mistakes
- realigns for the good of everyone
- and goes back to the state of play
- where our autonomy, interests and natural skills are given the spotlight.
Right now our services are focused on fundamentals: Corporate Comedy Services, Team Building Programs, Keynotes & Seminars. We are currently available across all of Ontario but open to expansion. For the time-being our goals are centred around improving the quality of or programs, seeking R&D partners to streamline our services and discoveries, acquire additional funding to help the business grow and ultimately, make people laugh and learn at the same time. If we did that, we did our job.
As ambitious as I may be at times, now is the time for fundamentals, and taking a slow methodic approach to growing at a pace that will be sustainable for the long-term.
In the meantime, you can look forward to Part Two of my Oddyssey project premiering this Spring on my Youtube for free, enjoy our flagship comedy festival Jokes & Goats as we go into our third year and keep an eye out on the work we're doing with The Canadian Association of Stand Up, Sketch and Improv Comedians as we have some big announcements coming down the pipe. Our partnership with Unifor is about to kick it up a notch and open more doors for Canadian comedians.
If you would like to connect with me directly to learn more about these projects or book me for a speaking/performing function feel free to contact through my site or set up a call directly.
Canada is home to some of the greatest developments in comedy history with its rich history of club, festival and talent development. The next step is community development and if the work I do can lead to a larger tapestry of builders in Canadian comedy getting serious about the funny business and how we can democratize it growing with a changing world — I believe we'll continue making our mark not only on the history of comedy but the history of human development.
Keep laughing, keep playing and keep showing up for one another.
We have good work to do.