Skip to content
Brick Wall Comedy
Brick Wall Comedy

My House My Rules

Mike MacDonald

CBC · 1992

An exasperated look at strict fathers and breaking teenage curfews.

Mike MacDonald turns the domestic warfare of growing up under strict parenting into an escalating battle of wills. The core of the set focuses on his youth, specifically the friction of curfews and the absurdity of staying out “more late”. He relies on an aggressive, exasperated delivery to elevate standard family dynamics into tense shouting matches. It is a loud, physical performance built entirely on the simple premise of teenage rebellion crashing into a father’s absolute authority.

Filmed at Toronto’s Winter Garden Theatre and broadcast on the CBC in 1992, the set captured MacDonald when he was arguably the biggest working stand-up in Canada. He was fresh off his sitcom Mosquito Lake and a few years into his sobriety, operating with a clear focus that earned him a Gemini Award nomination. Driven by his high-volume stage presence, the television broadcast serves as a document of why he remained a constant fixture at Montreal comedy festivals for a decade.

The set list

1 bit

  1. Stories about his upbringing and his father's role as a strict military disciplinarian.

    Exaggerating his father's authoritarian discipline for comedic effect.

How it plays

Tone
Targeted and reflective satirical comedy, moving away from purely nasty or angry material.
On stage
Pivoting away from an angry, machine-gun style toward a more deliberate, sniper-like precision, picking specific targets while remaining physically expressive.
About
strict military upbringing, family discipline

What the critics said

The Globe and Mail offered a critical review, advising him to 'quit trying so hard to be loved, go back to being nasty, you\'re a lot more funny and likable when you do.' In contrast, the special was widely embraced by television audiences.

In the room: Strongly connected with broadcast viewers, winning its prime-time slot in Canada and resonating particularly with Black audiences.

Summed up from reviews, articles and listings. Sources: en.wikipedia.org, gloryosky.ca, theglobeandmail.com, secure.e2rm.com, imdb.com, thecomedygreenroom.com.

Backstory

Followed MacDonald's recovery from hard drug addiction and conversion to born-again Christianity; the material drew heavily on his childhood and strict military family upbringing.

Details

Released
Where
CBC
Honors
Gemini Award nomination for Best Writing in a comedy specialGemini Award nomination for Best Performance in a comedy specialCableACE Award nomination for Best Comedy Special and 1 more
Topics

If you liked this