This Hour Has 22 Minutes


This Hour Has 22 Minutes is a weekly Canadian television comedy that airs on CBC Television. Launched in 1993 during Canada's 35th general election, the show focuses on Canadian politics with a combination of news parody, sketch comedy and satirical editorials. Originally featuring Cathy Jones, Rick Mercer, Greg Thomey and Mary Walsh, the series featured satirical sketches of the weekly news and Canadian political events. The show's format is a mock news program, intercut with comic sketches, parody commercials and humorous interviews of public figures.
Its full name is a parody of This Hour Has Seven Days, a CBC newsmagazine from the 1960s; the "22 Minutes" refers to the fact that a half-hour television program in Canada and the U.S. is typically 22 minutes long with eight minutes of commercials.
Jones and Walsh had previously worked together on the sketch comedy series CODCO, on which Thomey sometimes appeared as a guest. Mercer had been a notable young writer and performer on his own, touring several successful one-man shows of comedic political commentary.
Salter Street Films produced the series until the 2003–2004 season. Salter Street was acquired in 2001 by Alliance Atlantis, and production of the series was transferred directly to Alliance Atlantis in the twelfth season. In 2005 Halifax Film, a new company formed by Salter co-founder Michael Donovan, took over production of the show. In 2006, Halifax Film merged with Decode Entertainment to form DHX Media, which has produced the show since.
Recognized with 24 Gemini Awards and 11 Canadian Comedy Awards, 22 Minutes is broadcast on the CBC Television network. It is taped before a live audience in Studio 1 at CBHT in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
The series, which originally aired on Mondays for several seasons and later on Fridays, currently airs Tuesdays at 8:30pm on CBC. The series formerly followed the Rick Mercer Report.

Cast

Although each cast member's real name was always shown at the beginning of each episode, at the end of most episodes prior to 2006, one cast member would sign off using their anchor character's name, which is noted below where known. This has now been discontinued, and anchors now regularly address each other by their real names.

Substitute anchors/special correspondents

Substitute news anchors on the series are people who "guest star" on the series for when series regulars are away.
; Talking to Americans
; No Pun Intended
; Babe Bennett
; Marg Delahunty
; Mark Jackson
; Bas MacLaren
; Misses Enid & Eulalia
; Streeters, aka The Rant.
;Max Pointy: A spoof of CBC personality Rex Murphy's political commentaries for The National, performed by Colin Mochrie. Max would start off with a legitimate political issue but end up on an unrelated and generally inane point by the end of his rant. Discontinued when Mochrie left the show.
;That Show Sucked!: with Ma and Eddie Reardon who make fun of TV shows, with Ma saying that whatever show that Eddie watches "Suck" and constantly demanding that he give her "the G. D. clickerbox". Discontinued when Walsh left the show.
;The Quinlan Quints: four quintuplets who live in Buchans, Newfoundland and Labrador – inspired by the fame of the Dionne quintuplets; portrayed by Cathy Jones, Rick Mercer, Greg Thomey and Mary Walsh. Usually interviewed by Mercer's character J. B. Dickson, the Quints would boast about something outlandish that Dickson has a hard time believing until one of the quints spills the beans and reveals that what they were promoting was really a scam. Discontinued when Mochrie left the show.
;Inside Media Counter-spin: A satirical talk show with the host, Heather Coulter, portrayed by Cathy Jones. The host makes blatantly stereotypical statements about her guests.
;Panic Room with Betty Hope: Host Betty Hope parodies Nancy Grace in "breaking news" style segments, in which she interviews someone knowledgeable about a given threat and then spins the facts to make them sound more dramatic and dangerous.
;The Right Answer: Two conservative commentators debate various issues in the news. When one of them makes a point, they hit a chess timer. Discontinued when Mercer left the show.
;The Special Eds: Mercer and Thomey portray two members of the RCMP – Special Constable Ed Cochrane and Special Constable Ed Codner – with questionable ethics. Discontinued when Mercer left the show.
;Nathan Fielder On Your Side: Nathan Fielder plays a consumer affairs reporter who is socially awkward, speaks in a near-monotone, and tends to make his interview subjects uncomfortable. These segments were the basis for his later American TV show, Nathan for You''.

Crawford's characters

; Stuart McLean
; Uwe Meyer
; Gunter Wilson
; Natasha Stillwell
; Mark Jackson
; Rob Boberston
; Chantal Hébert

Critch's characters

; Rex Murphy
; Danny Williams
; Don Cherry
; Donald Trump

Hall's characters

; Avery Adams, Single Female Voter

Jones' characters

; Sandy Campbell
; Joe Crow
; Mrs. Enid
; Betty Hope
; Janet Tucker

Majumder's characters

; Raj Binder
; Ian Hanomansing
;Barnibus Pine

Mercer's characters

; Billyatropia "Billy" Smithopolis
; Gus Van Gus

Mochrie's characters

; Max Pointy
; Peter Mansbridge

Thomey's characters

; Jerry Boyle
; Ottawa Gargoyle
;Tim MacMillan

Walsh's characters

; Connie Bloor
; Marg Delahunty
; Dakey Dunn

Famous stunts

Jean Poutine

1999–2000 – During the 2000 American election, Rick Mercer approached Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush on a campaign stop in Michigan, asking for comment on the news that Bush had received the endorsement of Canadian prime minister "Jean Poutine". The then-prime minister's name was Jean Chrétien, and he had not endorsed Bush — it is standard practice for the Canadian government not to endorse anyone in a foreign election.
Bush – who had previously stated that "you can't stump me on world leaders" – acknowledged the purported endorsement with a short statement to the 22 Minutes cameras, which aired as part of the show's regular Talking to Americans feature. The Talking To Americans segments – and eventual one-hour special – were produced and directed by Geoff D'Eon.
In his first official state visit to Canada four years later, Bush joked that his "one regret" about the visit was that he'd "hoped to meet Jean Poutine."

Stockwell/Doris petition

2000–01 – Often cited as the show's best joke, the sketch was aired during the 2000 federal election campaign, and consisted of a staged rant by Rick Mercer.
During the 2000 federal election, then-Canadian Alliance leader Stockwell Day proposed a mechanism to call for a referendum. A petition on any particular subject which gathered at least 350,000 signatures of voting age citizens would automatically trigger a national referendum.
Mercer's "rant" asked viewers to log on to the 22 Minutes website, and sign an online petition asking the party leader to change his name to Doris Day. Producers claim to have obtained in excess of 1,200,000 online votes. This was cheerfully admitted to be a stunt unhampered by the rigours of an Elections Canada-controlled petition. Although the sketch had no effect on Alliance policy, it did obtain international publicity for the show and contributed to the general air of farce surrounding Day's election campaign. Day did, however, have a very appropriate response to the petition: "Que será, será".
It was later revealed by Alastair Campbell, former aide to British Prime Minister Tony Blair, that Prime Minister Jean Chrétien and the Liberal Party had come up with the idea- not Mercer or the show's writers.

Oilers vs Canadiens

2003–04 – Shaun Majumder, in character as "Raj Binder", was sent to report on the 2003 outdoors Edmonton Oilers and Montreal Canadiens old timers game, preceding the night's actual NHL regular season game, which was the first NHL game to be played outdoors. Majumder actually sneaked into all the team photos, causing uproar from the event's unwitting organizers in the days after, when the photos were released to the press.

Carolyn Parrish stomps George W. Bush

In November, 2004, Carolyn Parrish was removed from the Liberal Party of Canada after an appearance on the show in which she stomped on a George W. Bush doll.

Marg ambushes Rob Ford

On October 24, 2011, Walsh reprised the role of "Marg, Princess Warrior", conducting an ambush interview of Toronto Mayor Rob Ford at his home, which aired on 22 Minutes the following evening. Ford's reaction and alleged verbal abuse directed at a 911 operator made national headlines. Ford claimed that he had never seen nor heard of 22 Minutes.

Controversies

On November 17, 2004, clips of a sketch for 22 Minutes were released, in which MP Carolyn Parrish stomped on a George W. Bush doll and performed voodoo on its head, where she said "it would do the least damage". The incident sparked significant outrage from the opposition Conservatives, who argued that it had the potential to damage diplomatic relations between Canada and the United States. As a result of the incident Parrish was expelled from the Liberal Party and sat the remainder of her term as an Independent.
Richard Martineau wrote a column in Le Journal de Montréal criticizing a sketch aired October 7, 2007, entitled "Quebec Nation". In the sketch, two characters discussed the state of affairs after a separation from Canada, which left them with "no roads, no towns, not even radio. The only things we take is our racism". Martineau also discussed the fact that This Hour Has 22 Minutes is broadcast by the CBC and is funded by funds also coming from Quebec.
In May 2015, the American sketch comedy series Saturday Night Live aired a sketch in which a contestant on a Win, Lose or Draw-style game show panicked at being asked to draw the Muslim prophet Muhammad, igniting allegations that SNL had plagiarized a nearly identical sketch which aired on 22 Minutes in January.

Specials

has released the first two seasons on DVD in Region 1.