BCAF 2016 Workshop: Creating a Sketch with Kevin McDonald

Workshop Description:

Join Kevin McDonald of the Kids in the Hall for a 4-hour workshop to learn/improve the sketch writing process.

Students will bring a premise for a sketch and under Kevin’s sage tutelage, the group will analyze and dissect each premise for viability as a full fledged sketch. Students will learn the process of taking a sketch from concept to reality and the hurdles along the way.

For the second half of the class, the class will work together to develop the selected premise(s) into a fully written sketch.

Instructor Bio:

Kevin McDonald is a Canadian comedian, actor and voice artist. He is known as a member of The Kids in the Hall, the voice of Pleakley in the Lilo & Stitch series, Waffle in Catscratch, and the Almighty Tallest Purple in Invader Zim.

McDonald founded The Kids in the Hall with his friend Dave Foley. They met in Toronto at the Second City Training Center, and the two wrote and performed in sketches together more than any other pair in the group. In the troupe’s TV show and stage shows, he portrays several popular recurring characters, such as the King of Empty Promises, Sir Simon Milligan, and Jerry Sizzler. Still, it’s a frequent running gag that McDonald is the least popular member and always struggling not to get kicked out.

Since The Kids in the Hall’s end in 1994, he’s played many roles in movies like Boy Meets Girl, Agent Pleakley in the Lilo & Stitch series, and Harry Potter in Epic Movie. On TV, he has appeared on The Martin Short Show, Ellen (as a radio personality), That ’70s Show (as a confused young cleric, Pastor Dave), Seinfeld, Friends, NewsRadio (on which Foley starred), MADtv, Arrested Development, and Corner Gas. McDonald has also done voice work for various animated series, including Invader Zim (in which he did the voice for Almighty Tallest Purple), The Angry Beavers, Catscratch (in which he voiced Waffle), and Clerks: The Animated Series. He also played an imaginary friend named Ivan in the Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends episode Sight For Sore Eyes, and appeared in the music video for “Roses” by Outkast.

In 2006, McDonald hosted a CBC Television special, featuring several of Canada’s best-known sketch comedy troupes. “Sketch with Kevin McDonald” won a Canadian Comedy Award (Best Taped Live Performance – The Minnesota Wrecking Crew), with The Imponderables nominated for the same award.

He was recently in Montreal as a part of the Just for Laughs Festival with the reunion of The Kids in the Hall, and also with his show “Hammy and the Kids” with Craig Northey, based on his two dysfunctional families, his father (“Hammy”) and The Kids in the Hall.