If you’ve been paying attention at all the last several months, you knew this was coming. Given that I binge-watched ten seasons of Letterkenny in under two months, it was a no-brainer that I was going to catch their touring live show! Yes, this tour was supposed to have happened in 2020, but the pandemic actually worked in my favor this time.
In fact, I even decided to splurge and get a VIP ticket! That means I got show up a few hours early to attend a Q & A with the whole cast! Unfortunately, that night’s show was missing Squirrely Dan (K. Trevor Wilson), Stewart (Tyler Johnston), and Roald (Evan Stern). In their place though, we were given Glen (Jacob Tierney) and Alexander (Jeff McEnry)! The Q & A was fun, although I would have preferred if the audience could actually ask questions, rather than answer pre-submitted questions. Also, the questions were pretty generic. It was cool to learn that creator, Jared Keeso, picks all the music for the show though – he’s got great taste. Aside from that interaction with the cast, the VIP experience also included first access to merch, and we got a VIP badge, signed poster, and signed pilot script! Very cool stuff.
Now, the actual meat and potatoes of the show reminded me more of sketch comedy. Which is fine by me. I think with some of the anticipated changes in the casts’ availability, trying to do an episode all the way through would be difficult. With the absence of the skids, that means we got a lot more Coach than I maybe would have preferred, but I applaud him for stepping up. Alexander also got shoe-horned into the opening sketch, which was really just him getting to say his funniest lines from the show. Everyone else was used pretty consistently, and had Glen interacting with the hicks in Squirrely Dan’s place. My favorite part about that was seeing how often Daryl (Nathan Dales) broke into giggles. Reilly (Dylan Playfair) also couldn’t quite reign it in during Coach’s many sexual recountings. To be fair…the crowd was also roaring with laughter for the whole show, so kudos to all of them for keeping it (relatively) together. Perhaps the only one to keep it totally cool was Katy (Michelle Mylett). I know I saw Wayne (Keeso) and Jonsey (Andrew Herr) crack some smiles in a few skits.
Interspersed between the skits were a few popular flashback scenes from the show, which was nice to see some of those again. We also got to see the bloopers for the most recent season! Spoiler, there were none included for the prostate conversation Wayne and Daryl had and that was super disappointing for me. Still, I love a good blooper reel and there’s are always top notch. We also got two small sets of stand-up from Mark Forward (Coach) and Jeff McEnry. Both were pretty funny, but Forward expertly used his stand-up experience to really heckle the crowd. I liked how these little bits broke up the show without totally messing with the flow. We got about two hours of entertainment overall, and I was pretty pleased with the evening.
There aren’t too many US stops left, so if you’re a fan of Letterkenny, I highly recommend jumping on some tickets in a city near you! Now that this live show is past me, I guess I’ll patiently wait for a new season, which was promised for sometime this year), and hopefully the spin-of show, Shorsey, even sooner!