Where facts meet funny

Is Big Oil a good thing for Canada? Do butter tarts beat Nanaimo bars? Should Canada become the 51st state? Is Velcro better than laces?

It may sound like you’re overhearing snatches of conversation from both the kids and adult tables of a family party, rather than questions posed on the CBC Radio One program The Debaters.

However, the weekly family-friendly program on CBC’s primary radio news service has always been a little more fun than factual, a little more whimsy than weighty.

“I prefer when it’s got a little bit of meat to it,” says Steve Patterson, the Ontario comedian who has hosted the show since 2007.

“But the ones with the most staying power, and I think, get the most visceral audio reactions from the crowd, are the ones that don’t really matter — apples versus oranges, pie versus cake.”

Twenty years since it was born at the Winnipeg Comedy Festival, The Debaters is back at the city’s flagship Canadian-centric comedy event this year with three separate sold-out presentations.

“The Debaters is kind of like a festival unto itself, and we have a lot of our favourite debaters from over the years,” Patterson says.

This year that includes 10 comedians — including Toronto’s Seán Cullen and Winnipegger Lara Rae, among others — who, following the show’s format, will debate two topics over 30 minutes.

The show recalls BBC programs such as Have I Got News for You, The News Quiz and QI, with their panellists of comedians riffing on current affairs and entertaining trivia.

But where those shows’ wit feels civil in a British key, The Debaters pushes things in a more adversarial direction, a little closer to a roast.

And things sometimes get slightly less family-friendly in the live presentation, with a cleaner, abridged version appearing on radio.

“The only way to know where the line is in comedy is to go past it at one point. And that happens, I would say, at least three times per taping,” Patterson says.

The live show is structured with that in mind, with about four additional minutes of material surfacing on the podcast, where the format is looser than live primetime radio.

Patterson is as delighted as anyone with the success of the show, but talk of podcasts versus radio gets him pensive about the state of comedy today. He suggests that, for all online platforms have done to expand comedians’ reach, “the ease of putting yourself out there degrades the quality of standup.”

“I miss the art form of comedy. I’m still trying to craft shows that are stories that have callbacks and things like that. People post 13-second clips of getting a beer can thrown at them, and that’s how they book Jimmy Kimmel,” he says.

So far, fans have embraced that art form at the Winnipeg Comedy Festival, which runs to Sunday. Nine events have already sold out, with six others on low-ticket alert.

“We’ve also opened up the balcony on three of the five mega shows as well, which we’ve never done,” Anne Dawson, the festival’s director of communications, says of the gala productions at the Burton Cummings Theatre.

She picks a few other highlights from this year’s festival, naming Laughing With the Stars (featuring Free Press reporter Mike McIntyre) on April 22, the all-Indigenous Bannock Bums on Friday, the locally focused Winnipeg Show on Saturday — featuring Spencer Adamus, Rajat Bhateja, Karlee Liljegren and Sarah Jane Martin, among others — and Best of Fest on Sunday, all of which happen at the Gas Station Arts Centre.

The comparative length of The Debaters not only allows comedians to properly develop bits, but to really dig into weightier topics when they arise.

Patterson seems to prefer when these topics are political, and clearly The Debaters isn’t afraid to entertain bipartisan perspectives on big oil, annexation and other hot-button issues.

Though there’s often a level of devil’s advocacy at work here — with each side defending a pre-assigned position, however controversial, with tongue firmly in cheek.

While others stress the role of comedy in building bridges across the political aisle, Patterson emphasizes comedy’s sophistical side — as a tool of political rhetoric.

“I think that just shows a stronger way of thinking: if you can make something funny in a somewhat intelligent way. I think it’s nice that we have a prime minister who seems to have some semblance of a sense of humour. And again, (Manitoba) Premier (Wab) Kinew has it too,” he says, before calling Ontario Premier Doug Ford an “idiot.”

“The CBC takes a hit for a left-leaning sort of thing, (but) for some reason, I don’t know what it inherently is, just a general sense of humour seems to not translate to the right side,” he says.

If Patterson suggests politicians are taking cues from comedians’ style, he also cheekily implies it extends to substance as well.

“It’s always funny to me when the House of Commons is debating something that we debated, though I think ours was way funnier,” he says.

winnipegfreepress.com/conradsweatman