Comedians Shouldn't Kiss!?!

Deb: I have been a comedic actor all of my adult life and I have performed a huge variety of styles within that gaffaw-ish genre. The one thing I did not sign up for was the bodily entanglement. I am never called upon to kiss or make out. And there’s a reason for that. I am a comedian. We. Don’t. Kiss.

I have done intimate scenes which are sweet and sexy, loving and real. But I have not done the kissing.

My character on Mosque is all about the sex and she talks a good game. So imagine my horror when after five seasons of Little Mosque on the Prairie, my character has been called upon to put her money where her racy mouth is.

She has been given a lover.

This lover comes in the form of one of Canada’s comedic treasures––Peter Keleghan.

I have been Peter’s huge fan and good friend for 25 years. Peter and I have performed together many times over the years playing a romantic couple, lounge singers, swingers and swindlers. But we are comedians. Comedians don’t kiss.

So what do you feel when you are faced with making out with an old friend with whom you have shared nothing but warm hugging and big mugging?

Abject fear.

I am NOT trained in this. I “make” with the faces, not with the “out”!

So there we were in the first passionate scene and we are required to kiss. Big kiss. Long kiss. Legs wrap kiss...ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

So we move in for the money shot and my lips close like a clam in a sand storm. You could not get an amoeba past these clenched lips of mine. And the funny thing about it is that his lips are the exact same. Clenched. Pinched. Pursed.

And I LOVED him for it.

I am not shy when it comes to communication, so why did I not lay it on the line with him and say I was feeling awkward? Maybe because I was afraid that he was all cool with it and that I would look like an idiot. OR, maybe I thought he was all cool with it and by speaking up I would make him feel awkward.

So we kissed, and I use the term loosely.  My lips were sucked up so far in my mouth they were making my tonsils gag. And I don’t even have tonsils.

After our crazy glue kiss, we laughed with relief. Phew. Glad that’s over.

But of course it is television so we had to do it again and again and again, both of us scrambling to put “shtick” in the kiss to divert from the fact that we were actually kissing.

When the scene was over, we hugged our friend hug and said (LYING), “That was fun.”

IT SO WASN’T!

It was fun playing off of each other and enjoying the chemistry and the timing we shared. But it was not fun when we had to make out. At least it wasn’t for me and I am pretty sure it wasn’t for him.

Then as I was heading home after work the unthinkable occurred to me. What if he thinks I really kiss that way? What if he thinks I am a lousy kisser? What if he thinks that my husband is daily subjected to the KLENCH KISS?

OHNO! I am a good kisser. You can ask my husband. He will tell you. I am a damn good kisser.

So I thought, “Well, suck it up, clenchy, and let it go. If he thinks you suck at kissing you are going to have to live with that.”

So I’ve made my peace with it, praying that Peter isn’t the type to clench and tell. And for the sake of my husband and Peter’s beautiful girlfriend, I am proud to say that we partook of the “lame smooch”.

My ego ... well, that’s another story.

Barbara: Oh god, Deb, so very funny. I haven’t had to kiss a lot of actors over my career, but since I’ve been with my husband through the whole of it, there’s always been the tug and pull of Do Your Job Well versus My Head Gets In The Way, Not To Mention My Husband’s. The three-headed monster. So not sexy.

But then, those kisses are only meant to be sexy for the audience. Or at least believable. The beauty is, you can always fake your way through it. And I’m gonna wager that a kiss in a comedy is allowed to be funny. So let’s pretend you were playing it for the laughs all along. Time to embrace (as it were) the on-screen Klench Kiss! It’s the new spit-take. (…ba-dah-bum…)

PS this video is a re-post, but since it features Deb with Peter K and some mad pseudo making out (but not the scene with aforementioned Klench Kiss), we thought it timely to post again. Enjoy!

PPS For anyone trying to post a comment to our static pages (ie About Us or Deco Tips, etc), the comments boxes on those pages have suddenly disappeared.... And we don't know why.... Have sent a message to Blogger, so hopefully that will be cleared up asap. Thanks!

Post Performance Jitters

Deb: I have had to resort to drastic measures when watching sporting events like the Olympics or Hockey.  I can no longer watch them live on TV.  It is just too much.  With the invention of PVR and TiVo, I am––THANK GOD––able to record it and watch it after the fact. But here’s the rub.  I am still just as friggin’ nervous!  I record it, go to bed, wake up in the morning, see the results in the newspaper, and then sit down to watch the taped event.  Cut to: sweaty palms, pounding heart, panicky brain.  The house still rings with shouts of “NO!” and “OH!” and “WHAT?”  My husband will calmly walk by and say, “You already know who won, right?”  Yes.  Yes, I do.  Doesn’t matter.  “OH NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” 

Barbara: Really? You can’t watch sports live? I understand your stress––oh yes, I do! But there’s something so primal about competition, isn’t there? I was never an athlete. Or athletic. Tried out once to be a cheerleader and failed MISERABLY (had to invent a cheer for the tryouts and my ace-in-the-hole was supposed to be, “We’ll never settle for defeat” during which I pas-de-chaseed and pointed to … yes, de feet. Oy. And, if that wasn’t bad enough, I choked and pointed on the next line!) 

I discovered the joys of (watching) sport as a grown woman and I looove a good game. Maybe it was my daughter’s soccer games that converted me. Maybe it’s the thrill of living vicariously through talented champions. Either way, love it. 
But it does need to be live, in the moment. Even better in the stadium, obviously. Live, live, live. Once the moment is over, it’s kinda over for me. And I’m bored.

Deb: I guess because I was active in sports and on teams and a cheerleader, I know the sicky stomach feeling of competition and it stayed with me. Sort of like a "Pavlov's Mascot". And fresh from my days as a grade 8 cheerleader (ahh, the old orange and black) comes this gem: "I saw a cool cat walkin' down the street. I said, Hey cool cat, I don't dig that beat. He said, Oooooh, what a square that's ever been seen, why don't you get on the BRIDLEWOOD TEAM! Yayyyyy Bridlewood!!!”