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Spencer Rice ponders the legacy of Kenny vs. Spenny by Steve Newton
The last time Spencer “Spenny” Rice played Vancouver, he appeared with bit players from Trailer Park Boys who “dabbed” him so hard that he couldn’t play guitar. Photo by Bryan Egan.
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hen Canadian comedian Spencer Rice picks up the phone at his home in Kingston, Ontario, to talk about his upcoming shows in B.C., another Canadian comedian is the first topic of conversation. Just a day earlier, beloved Canuck comic Norm Macdonald had died, much to the dismay of his devoted fans, who weren’t aware that he’d been battling cancer for years. Earlier that morning, Rice had done an interview with a Calgary radio station about Macdonald, with whom he’d once hung out in Santa Monica. “We had a mutual friend,” says a downcast-sounding Rice. “I’d seen him live several times and, yeah—I was surprised and upset by that news, because like everybody else, I had no idea that he was ill. In fact, I thought he was working, and I think he was working pretty much up till the end with his Netflix show. And I think he was even planning tours still. “Sarah Silverman tweeted that he is his own genre within comedy,” Rice adds, “and I kind of agree with her. He was very experimental, and as a comedian myself I try to understand the math of people’s acts, and his was very interesting and compli-
cated in many ways. So, yeah, [his death is a] terrible blow to the comedy world.” Rice’s own comedy was inspired by the work of edgy artists like Macdonald and Silverman—not to mention Richard Pryor, Andy Kaufman, Tom Green, and Sam Kinison. He’s taking his latest show, Spennaissance Man, on the road to Western Canada, with six B.C. dates scheduled. “It’s basically a comedy show where I talk to the audience, obviously, and I show clips of my career. I guess the modus operandi, creatively, is to sort of get out from under the reputation garnered for myself from Kenny vs. Spenny. There’s some comedic songs and the clips and my version of standup.” When things like a worldwide pandemic don’t slow him down, Rice does quite a bit of touring—so much so that his previous gigs are “a bit of a blur”. That’s was definitely the case with his last appearance in Vancouver, when he got too baked to boogie. “The last time I performed in Vancouver, I was on tour with a couple of the bit players from the Trailer Park Boys,” he recalls, “and my show was interesting in that I was given what’s called a—I don’t know if
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SEPTEMBER 23 – 30 / 2021
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