Advice and Future Projects

It's time for mad rewind Mad Rwind Yeah with your hearth Brandon Hello and welcome to another episode of Mad Rewind. I am your host, Brandy Stillwell . I'm super excited to introduce to you my guest today. As you can tell, we are in my home office because my guest is in Canada . Couldn't make it into Birbing apparently we're doing the best that we can . But Mad Rewine fans, you are in for a treat . My guest today is mister Ron Peterson , you thank so much . Thank you for coming on to do the show. wanted to come to Burbank, but I'm just, I'm afraid of Ice, Brandy, as a Canadian. Who the fuck is it ? Hopefully that fucking nightmare will be over for every human being sick . I'm just gonna start the ball rolling and let's we're gonna I'm gonna do a little intro for you Ron . Ron Peterson joined the cast of Mad TV in season eight appearing in sixty eight episodes for three seasons . Some of Ron's mad TV characters included Grandpa Finkel, over the top Australian verbal spokesperson Roland Backerson and the very lovable and rambunctious cohost of seven AM condo report Clifford Buzzly . We're gonna be talking about Clifford here in a little bit because seven AM condo report my favorite. Oh my god . I want to talk about you being able to control that scooter as well because I can only imagine what could happen. Oh yeah, what could possibly go wrong on a scooter when you're in front of a live body? There were injuries, I recall . Oh, I can't wait to hear. Ron's impressions range from Clay Akin to Prince Harry to Woody Allen to David Eyed Pierce to Saddam Hussein, because you know, why not? Woody Allen and Saddam Hussein . Rit the scooby doo p mask off to Adam Lean to Art Carney just to name a few . After Mad TV, Ron appeared on the Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, the next step when Hope calls DeGrasi the next generation, and he has lent his voice to the animated series sidekick as the voice of Golly G id. But above and beyond all of that, Ron is an actor, improviser, director, and writer who has worked across Canada at multiple prestigious theaters. As an improvisor, Ron has also collaborated with companies in Berlin, Oslo, Vienna, Amsterdam, Chicago, and New York City. Ron is the recipient of multiple Canadian awards such as the Dora Maver Moore Award , the Summer Works Performance Award, the RBC Arts Professional award and is a second city alum. What? High five freeze frame ride. High five . Second City Hollywood, second city Hollywood . Yeah. That's where I'm not as old. That's where it started for that's where it started for me in Los Angeles . Oh, really? What year were what years were you ? I didn't really belong to anyedbody there. That was, you know, that I mean, to get right into the story , I was performing here in Edmonton, Alberta. I'm actually in the theater I worked in before I came to Mad TV , and Joe Flerady , the great Joe Flaherty had invited me . He loved our troupe in Edmonton. He had come and visited and guested with us . What was the name of your truth? It's called It's called Dynasty the Live Improvised Soap Opera , which was my way into improv actually . I had grown up in Edmonton and and was hated hockey . And my parents were, you know, great. I had a great childhood and they put me into acting classes when I was like eight years old . So I was kind of already in it, but by the time I started improvising, I was kind of taking myself maybe too seriously as an actor . But Joe Flairty, the famous Joe Flairty from SETV who I grew up watching became a friend of mine and and he had invited me to Los Angeles because he wanted to he wanted to start up his own improv soap opera . And he ran one for a while out of the second city. It was called The Soap also Rises . Okay . Because it was it was all set in Paris in the twenties Flairy was obsessed with Paris in the twenties . yeah, so and so I was there playing I was playing James Joyce's brother, Jacko Joyce with this Irish accent because Joe Flairy'd seen me in a play as well, in a serious play, a Martin McDonald play. And he said, just do that Irish character . So that's the character I was playing when Mad TV , the casting agent , Julie Ashton came to see came to see Joe's soap because Martin Short had guested it the week before and he called Dick Bilsucci at MedTV. Yeah, it's an awesome. It's an Arrestes Pardon of me ? Dick Wilsuchi and Marty Short are best friends . Yeah , exactly. Yeah, so it's this long SCTV lucky streak that I was on because improvising with Joe, you know, I got to improvise with Marty. I got to improvise with Katharine O'HARA That was amazing. It was I could have died and been done, you know , just doing that. I remember looking down performing and seeing Catherine Hera Katherine Harrah laughing at something I did and, you know, that was heaven. Yeah . Back in the day, I worked at Family Guy and I left Family Guy to take a job Glen Martin DDS, which was a stop motion animated and Catherine played the lead female. She was the mother . So I got to work with her too. And I come, you know, I mean, it's I have a cat named Social Light More Rose. She has new eyes We're not going to rule out that you might have a special guest appearance from Catherine's . But every single day I was in the room with Castrine Ohara was a gush darn treat. It was and I was aware of it . I was there for that one . So I can only imagine . Yes. I mean, I was very starstuck. You know,, and that yeah Fred Willard also came and played it was a really cool time and for a lot and because Marty, you know , called Dick they came to check me out the next week . I And think that I was because I had so much I kind of had my ten thousand hours in Edmonton because we did this improvised soap opera. We did We did a thing called a soap thon, which is like fifty hours of improv. And you could sign up and do as many as you wanted and I would just do fifty hours straight. I once did the whole thing, yes , which was a real acid trip, totally hallucinogenic . I highly recommend it . But but yeah, I got a lot of reps and, you know, and and I was also doing Shakespeare and musicals and like I was very lucky. Edmonton, in particular, in the nineties growing up, it was a very culturally amazing city . And there were sketch comedy troops, there was improv, there's the Fringe Festival here, is the biggest in North America . So it's a theater town. So I grew up just saturated in it . And so when I just got there to do Joe's soap on a lark, it was just for fun. I wasn't coming to get a TV show or be famous, but You know, it was it was just to hang out with Joe . And and then everything changed. You know, because improv and comedy was what I thought I did on my day off in a lot of ways. I was like, oh, that's, you know , I was playing Romeo. I was like, you know, again, taking myself too seriously. So it was a big left turn in my life and it was amazing . Well, I'm probably going to circle back to some of that here in a little bit , but off the bat, one of my favorite things I love to ask people is like , when did you know, like Ron Peterson, when did you know that you were funny? Or do you remember your first laugh? That's a great question. I always felt like I had funny people around me. You know, my dad's funny. My mom tells a great story. They were fans of comedy . We laughed together. I think we were always being we still do. We're still kind of a goofy group of people , you know , and we make each other laugh Yeah , I know that when I was about seventeen when I started doing improv and I knew that I could I could get a laugh . Probably in that sopathon. That was when I ventured in. And one of the first characters that I did was Woody Allen. I was like trying to figure out who to be . And my friend I had been doing the impression backstage at a play and he was like, just do that. And there were some glasses and it was a way in to improvise. It was a great it was a great way in to just have a character unfortunately unfortunately it was Woody Allen, but you know , if only it was Steve Martin or somebody that just came back to Well, you know , I mean Steve Martin's, you know, yeah, love him too . But yeah, yeah, around when I was like seventeen or sixteen or seventeen, I I had already been acting and I had already been in some comedies, but I didn't it was around them that people started going, you're funny , you know which was which I embraced, I think . So who were your childhood comedy heroes? Would it have been like your parents because you could make them laugh or you guys laugh together or was it, you know , late night TV? Yeah John Ritter comes to mind when you say that . I was a I was kind of a nut for Three's company as a young kid . Just his physicality and confidence. It's hilarious . And I actually got to meet him in Los Angeles . He was in a bookstore , and I called Nicole Sullivan Sullivan of Mad TV Fame because I knew she had been on Hollywood squares with him . And I said, Nicole, I'm in a bookstore and John Ritter's here and it's like, I'm freaking out man. And like, should I say hi? And she's like, Oh, please go over and say I said hello. And so she gave me this intro and I just walked over and I was like, Mr. Mr. Ritter. And he was like, Hey, how are you? He was immediately engaging. And he talked about MadTV, how much he loved it. And yeah, it was that was amazing to meet it. I mean, that was kind of my Hollywood experience. I got to meet all these people like Katherine O'Hara and Fred Willard and you know, Christopher Guess through Mad TV , is it Eric Idol ? I met all the through Mad TV. So Monty Python was huge for me. Kids in the hall, of course, as a Canadian, kids in the hall was huge . Okay . And so did your parents like let you watch like say SCTV since that was Oh yeah. Kids . Yes, for sure. And I can remember us laughing together at reruns of that of that show. And I remember my parents laughing at it more than I remember laughing at it until later . I didn't really get on to it until later, but it was always it's like we always knew who John Candy and it's part of my consciousness very early. I guess that's being Canadian. And Edmonton, they filmed some of SCTV in Edmont on . Okay , they filmed like a couple of seasons here that they were, I don't know if you know that SCTV story, but they were all over the map taping that show s it was always canceled and then resurrected. And Ed anm onton producer came through and said, Well, you can come here and use our studio . So there's a lot of pride in SETV here. And that's why Joe loved to come to Edmonton. He was always recognized and hailed . So you talked you touched base a little bit earlier on your comedy education and can you just kind of go back through a little bit and like navigate who did was it your parents that were like, okay, you're going to be a theater kid. You can't do hockey . We've seen it. We need to get you on stage . So can you kind of like just guide me through your education ? Yeah. Well in the comments . Yeah. Well, I mean the acting school came out of me talking about pretending all the time , you know, I loved playing indie anna Jones in the backyard and that sort of stuff. So my mom works in a hospital. My dad runs an autobody shop, you know, I'm bizarre to them. They don't they, you know, they kind of figured me out and put me found a place for me. And like I said, theater school, I was, you know, I was having fun with it. It was imaginative and I loved language as well and that was that was part of that . But when it came to improv comedy , the Varscona Theater where I was doing plays is where I met. They would also do theater sports here and they did a late night improv show called Chimprov , and then there was Dynasty on Monday. So there was lots of improv around me. And I was doing a play here and somebody said, come and do theater sports one night . And I don't know , I I just started playing. And got to it came to it came to it easily. It was it was very natural, immediately, improvising . And one of my guiders, I guess, I would say, was a guy is a guy named Dana Anderson who is part of Second City, Toronto . He was in Mike Myers' cast and he also opened the second city Santa Monica , which the building is still in Santa Monica, the Mayfair Theater . I think it's still sitting there like with scaffolding around it with a big crack down the front of it because there was a giant earthquake in the nineties and they had to shut down the Mayfair. But the second city so the second city of Santa Monica never really worked out, but he was a part of that cast. And then he moved back to Edmonton and he directed the soaps. So he was kind of my improv guru and he was a del close disciple Very lots of anarchy and he's a very physical improviser. And it was very theatrical, againgain , you know, the jokes would come out of character and and I was really into long form. Long form was my game . And I think that's why I develop characters, you know, with short form, you know, you only get a couple minutes, but you know, long form improvised soap opera, I'd come back every week playing the same character or you could go for hours in the sopathon . We would do improvised plays in the style of playwrights, you know, spoofing them . So it's just a different kind of improv . That was character based . Okay , do you remember the first character that you ever created, not an impression of someone else very first original character that you created. I do, I do. And it was in a it was during the fringe, again, an improvised soap opera and it was a my friend named the character , but it was it was a British sort of performer that was like his name was Simpkin Tines and he had like a boder hat and Searsuck Ser suit. It all came out of the costume, I think. Sears sucker suit and a boater hat and he kind of had a cane and he was kind of a musical performer. But he was as he was very fae and English and fantastical and bizarre, totally absurd characters. So I just went with the absurdity with that one for sure . And I think I was encouraged to do that by because I was afraid to, I think, you know, I hid behind that impression at first and developing characters, improvising , you know, it takes it takes a little bit of craft and thinking and also just jumping off the fucking diving board. So yeah, Simkin . So you kind of touched on this a few minut es ago , but I wanted to know more about the audition process. So Dick Loschi and Martin had come to see Joe at Second City Hollywood . So were you immediately like pulled aside and like, hey, we're doing, you know, and get cattle call or whatever come on in. What was what was the process for that? Well, the real story is we were performing at the Second City Hollywood, which was on Melrose beside the improv, right beside the improv. I don't know if you remember that . And I don't. , two thousand two . And then we went we went upstairs at the improv afterward had a drink. I was having a drink with Marty and Joe . And Joe was like, Marty, we should get you think we should get Ron up at the second city? We should get him on the second city. And Marty was like, yeah, yeah, we should. And then the night went on and Marty left, and Joe and I went home. And I was staying in the Highland Gardens Hotel. I don't know if you know what that is. Used to be called Camp Hollywood. It's where a lot of Canadians would stay . It's right on Franklin, by the Magic Castle. It's by the magic castle . Yeah. And I'm staying hotel now ? Okay , it's where it's it's where Jadis Joplin died. It used to be called the landmark in the sixties . Yeah, that's the magic castle hotel . Right. So I was staying there in this dingy room and Joe calls and he's like, did anybody call you? Did anybody call you? And I'm like, No, he goes, okay, you're going to get a phone call. You're gonna get a phone call. Then he hung up and the phone rang again and it was Andrew Alexander . Guy who runs Second City. And he was like, listen, Marty and Joe really like you and we want to fly to Chicago and you know, we're going to audition you for the main stage and we, you know, we're really excited . And I was like, holy shit . Hung up the phone. Joe phones back. It goes, Hey, did anybody call you? And I'm like, Yeah, and Alexander called. And he goes, Oh, he don't agree to anything Mad TV Mad TV is going to come and see you. So this was the night after Marty. So yeah, Marty had called Dick and he was like, they're going to come see at the next show . So the next show , Julie Ashton. They sent Julie Ashton. I guess Dick must have been there. I think I met Dick. That must have been when I met Dick. Dick and Julie Ashton came and they were like, yeah, so so can you come in on Monday with five characters and an impression, right? That's the that was the usual protocol . And And I was like , yeah, no problem . Because of again, those ten thousand hours I had Simpkin Tines, which I didn't use, I don't think, but I had a bunch of absurd characters . And I was just I wasn't nervous about any of it because it was just sort of unfolding in this in this Taoist way . And I just went with it. So yeah, so then I did the five characters for Julie Ashton on that Monday and then I think the next day I did it again for Dick and I must have met Lauren Dombrowski wonderful Lauren Nobski. And they were like, great, Ron. How long are you at LA? And I was like, I'm kind of running out of money. I'm going to go back to Canada. I'm supposed to be in a Shakespeare play . And And they said, Okay, well we'll probably bring you back in a month . And they did. And they brought me back a month later. And I did there was like one more round . It was very interesting because they had a bunch of actors from Chicago , New York. We were all staying in the same hotel, the Grafton Hotel if I remember . And so we all had met each other and then taken a ride over to one of the studi . And then we had a day where we were each going in, doing our characters, reading scenes with other performers . They bought us Chinese food, and this went on all day. And I got to know all these people. They were about sixteen people that were auditioning along with me . And the next morning and then they said, Okay, great, tomorrow is the network test . And so I hung I went back to the hotel . And then the next morning they called, Julie Ashton's office called and said, Hi Ron, just to let you know you will be going to test this morning. And I was like, Oh yeah, I thought I always was. And they were like, No, no, yesterday was an elimination. I didn't realize that the day before was I thought it was like a, you know, they were seasoning us or for but so I went downstairs of the hotel to go to the test and all sixteen other actors were going home . Wow . And Dylan picked me up and I met Dylan and he took me to Fox Studio and I walked into the waiting room and there were sixteen other people I had never seen there . Ike Barnholtz was one of them and Josh Myers was one of them and Simon Hollberg was one of them . Okay yeah. And there was a fellow from Med from Mr. Show there that I recognized. And Ike and I still talk about it because we went we sat right beside each other before going in to do the final test . And I think I said, God, I could use a drink . And he said me too. And then, you know, we both got the show and had a drink months later when we met again. But I remember meeting Ike that way. Did any of the characters that you auditioned with your original characters, did they ever make it to Mad? Hm you know , well , so that Irish character I was doing did make it into the audition . It was an Irish guy at the top who was this zibbers? You couldn't really understand what was saying anyway I was taken what I was fired with. It's just this bit of doing Irish gibberish . But they worked it into commercials around the world. I don't know if you remember that one . It was Aries hosting a show about commercials from around the world. This one was I did the Irish one. This was one of the first things I taped actually . If not the first thing . And so the Irish commercial is an Irish guy and he's at a pub and he's talking directly to the camera, well, you don't know what you're taking if you aren't heading and you're having a savage and you don't know what he's saying. And then suddenly people start jeering at him and then they're throwing garbage at him and he smashes the glass on his head. It's just completely insane . And you don't know what he's saying. And then the chyron comes up and it's a serial commercial. Kracklin McPoof, skitcher, just absurd commercial . And then the next one was the Italian one , which is where I met Mo had the day I met Mo, we had to kiss and make out. It is an Italian , an Italian couple shouting at each other again, it's a commercial and they're yelling at each other, and then suddenly they just start kissing and making out, mama. Oh, that's what it's a mother and son. Mama, gippeto, mama, gippetto. And then they start making out and it's revealed to be a vacuum commercial. Yeah, it was just a very absurd sketch, which is right up my alley . But yeah, that Irish , that Irish guy got in there, and the Woody Allen impression, of course , found its way into some sketches . So since you have an incredible comedy background, how involved were you in sketch writing? Yeah. Well , I think I've listened to your podcast and it's interesting to hear other people talk about, you know, the protocol and the scenario because you weren't encouraged necessarily to write as cast members. They wanted you to pitch an idea and then pair up with the writer and then they would fashion it and I did that a lot. There were quite a there were quite a few things . I can think of the filthy mime . It was just a short little opener. It was a filthy mime that I wrote with Michael Hitchcock. Then he just sends a kitchie. Yeah , yeah. And what else would they be? There was like the Sunday Morning Atheist show where it's like, praise nothing with all the children . Yeah, there were a few things that were pitched and that I had a hand in creating, but yeah, we weren't credited. I wasn't a credited writer necessarily. Okay , do you have a process for creating a character ? Huh ? Well, a lot of my work in comedy is improv based. And so characters in that scenario are immediate, you know ? And you know, it's funny when I teach improv to young children and I say , You're invisible . They immediately accept it. They immediately believe it, they do it and they are invisible. They do the thing. I say to an adult actor, you're invisible. And they say , well, okay, but you know, can the audience see me and when do I when do I you know, they have a lot of questions about the reality of the invisibility and it just doesn't happen. But I think being more like the kid or you're just pretending it where you,'re Indiana Jon in the backyard , you know , that's how I create a character, just jumping for it, going forward, making a choice, making a physical choice and committing to it, an attitude and committing to it an emotion and committing to it. And then out of that, you can find that person . Oh , I love that. See one of the things I, you know, from people like writing in , making comments, I've had several people say to me that they're like, this is a free educational class for me . And that writing so many people needed to hear exactly what you said. So thank you very much. Yeah, you know , so you know, often in comedy improv too , there's always this thing of what if I screw up? What if I say the wrong thing ? What if I, what if I and you know, the trick is to get off of that eye ? And the way to get off of that eye is to be somebody else . You know, and we all have that ability in us to do that pretending with utter commitment that we did in the backyard when we were playing smurfs or, you know, little house on the prairie or whatever your generation is , you know , there is a there is an imagination as children that we have that gets disintegrated , you know Yeah. And you know, and that's what improv and all this sort of stuff is about is getting back in touch with that. But yeah, creating characters is about going for it. Oh, thank you, Scott. And of course , I was like , I Social Light Moore Rose is gonna make a guest appearance. Oh yeah, there she is Kathena O'Hara, Bray Pierce, my blind city . So sorry, she's already jumped up twice and I've been able to get rid of her. We have reached the portion of my podcast where I have a sponsor. So here's the sponsor portion of Madri Wine . So speaking of character development , there's a really great comedy club in Santa Monica called The Crow located at the Bergamont Station Arts Center. It also happens to be a super inclusive five o one C three non profit theater . The Crow is one of the spaces that uses comedy and storytelling for good. I highly recommend catching a show, taking some classes to develop your comedy and your tight en, jump up on one of their open mics or even enroll your kids in their summer comedy camp so they can be the next Ron Peterson or maybe you just want to see a hilarious show in one of their two theaters , so please visit crowcomedy dot com for classes, shows, and tickets. You did it. It was sponsored Ron. What? We call back to May . Well done. Hey, thank you. Do you have a favorite moment that ever transpired from being on mad TV? That's hard to pick , you know , it's such I have such a kaleidoscopic it's like a Falini movie when I think back , you know, because it's such a circus and it was always just the work was always just happening of one particular moment . Yeah, I don't know. Some of those early days, just it was just exciting to be in, you know, Hollywood center studios where Lucille Ball taped her show you know, the history there . I think of meeting a lot of, you know, what was exciting was a meeting a lot of the OG cast because, you know, I watched those first few seasons . I was a perfect age. I was seventeen when it came out and in Canada. And you know, I was just getting into improv and we all tuned in on that first night that it premiered because it was like Mad Magazine, the show . Like it seemed like such a fucking brilliant idea . And then they killed it. That first gump fiction and it was amazing. And so you know , yes, I got to meet Catherine O'Hara and Fred Willard and I'm so grateful, but I got to forge friendships with, you know, Nicole Sullivan and Will Sasso and, you know , and you know, I worship Stephanie where in Mo Collins. It's it's more but a moment. It's just those people, I think, you know, that's what I really think of when I think of ad TV. It's it's just how great they everybody was to me because I was coming from Canada, you know, it was a real it wasn't something I was searching for , you know, okay to be on a sketch comedy show. So just the vibes when I when I joined and how welcoming everybody was and yeah, those early days . What are you most proud of that you accomplished while you were on MANTV? Well I think because it was such a foreign left turn for me , even to be in America and, you know, like it was just a it was different and a big change, a sea change for me . So I'm just proud that I was up for it and that I that I stuck out those seasons because you know, it was that you were always on a fault line of , you know, and certainly those seasons that I was there, people were dropping off left and right, you know coming and going . So, you know, I was glad that I I achieved those seventy episodes or sixty eight as you said . Did you ever since you were one of the actress, they would have you pitch character ideas? Did you ever have anything that was rejected ? And if so, do you remember what it was? Like you're like, this is gonna reinvent the wheel. This is gonna be fantastic. And then they were like, yeah, no, it's Well kind of there was one thing that we almost tested . I don't remember why it got canceled , but it was called undercover mounty and it was like going to be a Canadian a Canadian PI kind of show, but it's really obvious ly a mounty like you could see his hat under the and the idea was that it was cheap it was a Canadian it was a Canadian show. So there was like the set was bad and the you know, which isn't fair to Canadian television , but I think it opened with the CBC logo and Jim Wise said , You're watching Canadian television. Sorry . And it had a theme song and everything , but I don't remember why it was cancelled. There was a set . Yeah, I don't remember, but I think it was like, we're going to do it next time. Maybe we ran out of time or something, or Mo had to go or something. It was a big thing for Mo and I. She was like Canadian . Yeah, I don't remember, but it was certainly yeah canceled. And I also think of this other thing that Jordan Peel and I wrote together that was picked and pushed. Do you remember picked and pushed? Do you remember what that was? That was where they would they would put out the list of the sketches that they picked and then they would kind of put three down on the bottom and go . We this one and we'll probably see this one again. And this idea was picked and pushed, I think twice Jordan and I had this idea , I think we were just fucking around in his trailer of two cops doing their own music . So it's like they're in the car, dun da dun n d, daud deun, done b,onked down, down to and you know, then it cuts to them in the in the chief's office and he's going, listen, you guys, you're out of control. And they're going, Did it, did it da did it, stop back, what you do? Stop it. You know, they're always doing their own soundtrack . And then it built to, and I think the reason that we never made it was because it was too expensive because it built to us hanging off of a helicopter going , no, no, no , no, no , don't And I think Scott King was like, We can't do the helicopter I think it was too many locations. That might have been it. We wrote a sketch that was like it's on a helicopter and then there's a chase and then we're in the off ice and then you know so we didn't figure that out. But I always loved that idea . We'll do what we can to bring it back. Yeah . I believe in it . Did you have a favorite? Maybe Jordan can make it into Maybe Jordan can make it into an entire feature film . Oh, there you go . If only we could get a hold of him. Well, I could call him . You could. Do you need me to call him for you, Brandy? Could you please? In a minute . His popularity has skyrocketed out of my orbit. Well, I still have a sound cool Did you have a favorite cast member to perform with? Wow. Again, you can everyone . Yeah, you know, I love playing with Paul , Paul Vote. We kind of joined the show at the same time and we both had kind of we were paired up a bit. We did the honeymooners and And there were a couple this is a few times that we were paired up that I always had a blast with Paul. I always had a great I mean great time with Mo . Like I said, it was a baptism of fire with Mo. We we always talk about like we literally shook hands and they were like o,kay, and then you're going to make out you know, and and so that that makes comrades pretty quickly Yeah. And you know, and Jordan and and And Kegan , you know, they wrote very funny bits for me to do in those man up sketches. I was always kind of the foil . Stephanie wrote me great things , yeah. I mean, I was just so grateful for that kind of camaraderie. Did you have a favorite guest star memory . You and I were talking we were exchanging we were writing back and forth and you had mentioned that you had like an amazing guest star memory . Well, do you remember flavor flavor? Sorry, I already did it. Flav a flaved, do you remember that night? Yeah , you do. It was I interviewed Yell Gaither yesterday and she brought up Flava Flav. She did yesterday as well. She did . She did that sketch. She must have been in that sketch, right? I can't remember. It was a real motherfuckin' talk and Flava Flav was in it, but he didn't he didn't show up to we were taping. It was the night of the taping And he's late and the taping's happening and I've already done a sketch and now I'm in the we're all in the costumes for real freaking talk and we're in the green room and I've got this fro . I'm like this liberal white guy on Real Motherfick and Talk and Michael McDonald's in it. I think Keegan's in it and Aries and then Flava Flav and shows up and his people are pissed because on the script, which he just read , they mistyped his name and he called him flavor . They called him flavor flavor . So he was outraged. He was like, I can't fucking believe you called me flavor. So the Dickens on the phone to the office. Can you reprint the script? We got to read so they're retyping the thing. And then they realize wait a minute and Flavinflay is there, we're being pushed. We got to go. The sketch is, you know, the sketch has got to happen. The audience is waiting . And they figure, oh wait a minute, the cue cards, they had cuards for Flava flavor and on they checked it was written Flava. So it was written right on the cue card. So they brought the pork cuard guy. Do you remember, I don't remember what his name was . They brought the cuard guy in. He's literally eating a sandwich like , you know, he comes in and he's in the tiny green room with us with these big cards and we're reading the scene and so we get through it and Flava Flav doesn't like there's a joke in it that he's doesn like about Michael Jackson, so we got to fix that. He's he was just being a bit of a diva . But then the sketch was being taped and Aries improvised some Michael Jacks on joke and flavors . I think it was for Jermaine Jackson because Danielle just brought this up yesterday I wasn't on stop for it. Yeah, it might have just been a Jermaine Jackson j oke , but yeah , Flava Flav yelled cut on the set , which is like a huge faux pas for anyone other than the director, never mind a guest star to yell cut in front of a studio audience and then yelled cut and he went off on this monologue about how well he knew Michael Jackson and no he's gonna insult Michael Jackson in front of him and it was just an intense and it felt he kind of had a posse around and they were in the green room sort of intimidating us. I think that was really what it was. It was just we were all just sweating beads because it was just like he was owning the room and owning us . And he was wild. Yeah, he was completely wild. And if you watch that sketch, he's completely wild. You could tell he didn't didn't know what was happening around him. He was bonk . It was awesome . I also remember guest stars like Alanism More set was really awesome. She was just came in and it was so funny and nice I was gonna be here . The Canadians yeah, I was I was Avra Levine's boyfriend in a sketch and yeah, but that yeah, that was a that was a crazy night with Flava Flav. But I mean ins term a great gu est stars, I mean Eric Idel was there. It was cool . Yeah . We was like George Carlin. George Carl is like every now and then I met George Carlin. Right. On Mad TV . Yeah, right. And the spokesman came. I mean, they were, you know, spinal tap, but at the time they were they were promoting a mighty wind. And they, you know, Christopher Guess and Harry Scher and Michael McKean, they all came and hung out backstage. That was so cruel . Yeah Do you did you keep anything from your time at Mad TV? And if you and if so, do you still have it? Hm m but it was like a jacket. Yeah, I an old sweater I think and my dad has a hat. He still wears the Mad TV hat my dad, I think that I gave him. I think I have some of that merch that they gave us. I have a Fox blanket and we always kind of got funny funny gifts. It depended, it depended if the gifts were from Fox, they were a little bit nicer than Girl Group Company, which was the production company. I remember getting the chain with a keychain rubber . That's it, the rubber chicken keychain. They never lived that down . They never lived that down . And I remember we had just heard that that seventy Show cast all got like vespas or something . Yeah, they thought it was either mountain bikes or vespas a mini compar or something . And we got these ski chains. Yeah, I do remember that. Those were yeah . I mean, have you talked about that on any of the podcasts. Like that we had that Mad TV had this strange deal where they were kind of like renting their shows to Fox . Like yeah that's why there was yeah that's why there's no you know billboards or like we were never on the cover of us weekly or like you know we, you know , you think it was Fox product ion . You think that Fox would give us the same exposure as that seventies shower, you know, who were people who were hanging out with and seeing and nothing. No, because I remember every week I would be stalked by Fox to be like, we a rough cut so we can promote it. And then we're like, When, when are you going to promote it? Because we were lucky if we got a thirty second commercial on a Thursday night, then we wouldn't get anything else until the ten o'clock news. We'd get a thirty second spot and that was it. We got two promo commercials a week and nothing else . And they made my life a living hell because they were constantly . Sometimes we wouldn't lock a show until like two, three o'clock in the morning, and it would still have to get to post logic for them to start prelaying for me to do a spotting session at like nine AM on Tuesday . And Fox is like, where's where's our where's our locked show so we can start promoting you for something that we will never do because no one cared ? And was And was that deal ? I mean, was that deal set up? I always felt that that deal was set up so that girl group company or what was the other Quincy Jones company . Yeah, QDE , it seemed like it was set up so that they could have as much power as possible, but then Quincy fucked off , you know, and I don't think they had the leverage that they imagined that they were going to have . Yeah , yeah. I remember I got to meet Rashida Jones once and I was like, why did where did Quincy go? Why did he put leave Mad TV , yeah. That's a mystery. It was messy . It was messy. And the fact that people knew who we were like meant everything . So and the fact that people know who we are today is everything . You know, it's the cool kid that, you know, we're going underground and finding clips and you're like thank you so freaking much for that do you stay in touch with other cast members ? Like you were saying earlier that you're going to hang out with Ike coming up soon. Yeah, I mean just hilariously we were just texting each other randomly and I'll see I'll see Ike probably next month in Toronto . Yeah, I mean, I haven't seen folks in a while, but Instagram is great for just, you know, chatting with a chat with Moe and Paul every now and then and you know, and I've I've texted with Bobby a couple times over the years You know, and you know, a few years ago I was applying for a visa to do a show in New York and Kegan and Jordan wrote me a letter and Kegan also wrote me a letter of an introduction. So we're there for each other. They're there for me, that's for sure. It's awesome Do you have any advice for anyone starting out in comedy today ? Well Wow . Yeah, I always say just get your reps , you know, get stage time . And that's that's a hard thing to do in this day and age, I find . You know, there's all these schools, everybody's fighting for stage time , but that is where it happens, I think. You know, for me, it was just, you know, it's those ten thousand hours they talk about . It's getting up as much as you can. And it's also exploring variety . For me , being able to do Shakespeare and also do you know a music man and then improvise and do a new Canadian play and do a long form improv, do a short form improv . All those things feed into each other , you know , marathons and sprints are important . It just occurred to me that I didn't get a chance to ask you this earlier, so I'm going to backtrack just a moment . You were doing seven AM condo report on the rascal scooter when you were a little rascal on your rascal Did you injure yourself or did you because it just seems like it would it would it would just take off? And yeah, I think you can probably see me run over Josh Meyers foot in one in one of them. I remember that going around the circle because we, you know, we were sort of improvising some madness at some point. It got pretty wild. Sometimes they would get a little wild. You know, I remember backing into a thing. I remember once backing up. I think we may have planned this and not told Stephanie, but I found out that if I backed up that the rascal would catch her chair and take her back too yeah, it was yeah it was I hit Lauren Dubruski during rehearsal too, ran right into her. Oh yeah, oh yeah I was felt really bad about that Ran , what the fuck are you doing? I love that woman. She 's what a what a loss that we don't have Hey, and you know, I didn't really talk about Michael Hitchcock and Jim Wise and Rich Teller ico and yeah, man. Bruce McCoy , Kluze. Those guys, you know, all those writers, they were so good to me . Yeah . Every time I would go run up to the writer's side, it was it was always a treat You wouldn't I would never leave to go back to my office without a giant smile on my face or, you know, being up there snort laughing with snack coming out my visit was just Oh yeah. I just love to sit and listen to Rich Telerigo . I need to get him on the show. Oh, and you need to stalk him. Oh, yes. I talk to him sometimes. Oh, you do , well, tell 'em to come on the show. Tell Ike first. Okay, and get Talerica, track me down. Jordan, Ike, we're learning your priorities here. Yes, thank you . Do you have any parting words for fans of Mad TV? Oh God , I love running into mad TV fans. We don't have a lot as many of them in Canada, I feel. I like when I love coming back to going to New York, I always seem to run into somebody that go es, are you that Clay Akin guy ? Somehow Clay Akin was the, you know, I don't know why that is the touchstone for me, but which is funny too. You know, you talk about creating characters . We used to get, you know , impressions thrust upon us . I remember having to do Martin Scorsese , but that Clay Akan I specifically remember going, Who the fuck is this? You know, I had a tape. And it was before it was before a table read and I hadn't looked at the tape. I was like, oh yeah, clay Achen. I had a couple of lines. It was a very short the first time he peered. And I put the tape in and I watched it. It was him on Oprah and they were like, Bron, it's time for the tape reading. Just a second. I'm asking for trying to see Claykin. And he came out onto Oprah and he winked into the camera. And that was it. So that was as you say, you just need one thing and then follow through. So the wink I just started winking at everybody and I still didn't know who it was It's a bigger, bigger and bigger and bigger like Kenny Rodgers kind of started out and just completely morphs into something completely different. That's it. And you know, like those years before I joined MedTV were run by some people that were a bit more absurd . By the time by the time I got there, it was a bit more pop culture parody centric. They were kind of back on track of reality TV and all that sort of thing. But that will sassoe Kenny Rogers, I mean, that is so inspiring. And I did think of that. We did that with Claik. And for some reason, we just made him more glamorous each time you saw him. He was in a fur coat or he'd be we'd just have a little bit more eyeliner on. I don't it wasn't very fair to him, but it was funny. And I met his manager once. I met his manager once at some one of those Fox parties and I was like, does he hate me? And they're like, No, no, we think it's hilarious. So he has a sense of humor. I think so I guess so . Where can fans of Mad TV find you on the socials? Oh yeah. I mean, I'm only kind of on Instagram . I'm Ron Underscore Peterson . You can find me there. I'm going to be doing the Just For Laughs Festival in Montreal if you're there next month . Performing in Heated Rivalry, the Parody Musical , which is running off Broadway right now. My friend has produced it and we're going to do a concert version of it in Montreal and then do a run of it later And here comes your full circle of hockey. And yeah, I'm back to it . Back to being a Canadian hockey player again. Very good . Well on, thank you so very much. Oh my god. Thank you for coming on to the podcast. I really appreciate it. I know we're like fighting your connection with the WiFi there a little bit. Oh really? Oh, dear. I'm sorry. No , it's we're Kyle's a genius. Kyle and Teresa Tucker, the engineers I'm just so far away this foreign country . They know if only there was , you know, a way to communicate better . But thank you so much . I'm like, I'm just gonna throw a hell merry and see if I can get wrong. And you said yes, and I'm like, yes, this is incred ible. So I hope our path cross again in person sometime soon knock on marble table . Me too. And thanks for doing this. It's been really awesome to listen to some of the some of the podcasts and it's, you know, I love I love thinking about MadTV . Oh, thank you . We've hit credit port ion of Mad Rewind . The studio venue is located between the largest Ikea in the United States and the Five Freeway just south of fancy downtown Burbank. Please visit the studiovinue. com for all of your podcast needs. Mad Rewind is produced by Dan Holden and Lily Romero, engineered by Kyle and Teresa Tucker, edited by Kyle Tucker and hosted an executive produced by me. Brandy Stillwell. Woo You guys, thank you so much for spending your time with me. Again, I know that there's so many choices of podcasts these days . So I really, really thank you for paying attention and for liking, subscribing , resharing our little train that kids. So thank you so much . You are so appreciated . Exo exo . Thank you bye. Thank you, Ron. Thank you. Bye . It's time for mad rewind Mad Rwind Yeah with your hearth Brandon