Air Farce: 40 Years of Flying by the Seat of Our Pants [Hardcover]

A staple of CBC television for fifteen years, with diehard fans numbering in the millions, Canada's Royal Canadian Air Farce exemplifies brilliant comedic mayhem. Written by the founding members of Air Farce—Roger Abbott and Don Ferguson—this candid memoir, full of anecdotes, photographs, scripts, and other memorabilia from the authors' private collection describes every aspect of their hard-scrabble early life in 1970 as an onstage comedy troupe, their historic run on radio, and their spectacular success on prime-time television.

With contributions from many of their longtime friends and collaborators, including Dave Broadfoot (whose "When I regained consciousness" tagline is now part of the Canadian vernacular), and the irrepressive Luba Goy, Air Farce takes readers behind the scenes, and onstage, into the day-to-day creative vortex of one of the most popular comedy shows in the history of Canadian television.

• Offers unprecedented access to the intimate workings of Canada's legendary comedy troupe—from their days as "something fun to do on Sunday nights" in theatres to their arrival on Canadian television, as one of its highest rated shows
• The authors share the highlights, lowlights, successes, and tragedies that resulted from their Air Farce collaboration

Offering a no-holds-barred look at the key players that turned comedy talent into prime-time gold, Air Farce offers their legions of fans a genuine keepsake destined to last at least as long as the troupe's forty-year career—if not longer.

Our beloved Air Farce—masters of mimicry and parody, whose send-ups of politicians, pundits and plebeians—provided our weekly fare of laughs for almost four decades. Here, for the first time, is the story of the Farce, from its very beginning—the serendipitous meeting of two thirteen-year-olds on the steps of Loyola College High School in Montreal's west end. Their names were Roger Abbott and Don Ferguson.

Roger and Don were not beneath making fun of their Jesuit teachers, and the seeds of a lifelong friendship and creative partnership were planted. Working with John Morgan and Martin Bronstein in Montreal, Roger helped create "The Jest Society," a satirical parry to Pierre Trudeau's "Just Society." Within a few months the troupe moved to Toronto, where Don Ferguson and Luba Goy joined them and, with the addition of Dave Broadfoot, the troupe evolved into Royal Canadian Air Farce.

In Flying by the Seat of Our Pants, Roger and Don take you behind the scenes to share their stories of their earliest days on CBC Radio, touring the country, and after twenty years of unprecedented radio success, landing on television for yet another incarnation of the Farce. The Farce won the hearts and minds of Canadians—both old and new—because of their uncanny ability to turn headlines into punchlines and find funny nuggets in everything from national scandals to small-town idiosyncrasies. For thirty-five years, millions of Canadians tuned into the CBC for their weekly dose of home-grown humour. They flocked to town halls, high-school gyms and charitable benefits the Farce supported, lined up for the annual Christmas revues at Toronto's Massey Hall, and clamoured for tickets to the New Year's Eve tapings.

Even those who gave the Farce fodder for their comedy—Jean Chrétien, Sheila Copps, Ron MacLean, Doug Gilmour, Joe Clark and Preston Manning, among others—shared in the fun on-stage and on-air.

You will hear the familiar voices of those who were members of the Farce and those who directed, produced and wrote for the Farce. Contributions from Luba Goy, Dave Broadfoot, Perry Rosemond, Jessica Holmes, Gord Holtam and Ivan Fecan, all interviewed by journalist and Farce fan Bill Brioux, bring their own stories and remembrances to the Farce experience. In addition, Roger and Don dug deeply into the Farce archives for a wealth of memorabilia that grace these pages.

As the Farce are so fond of saying, "May the Farce be with you!"