"SCTV Network" The Great White North (TV Episode 1981) Poster

(TV Series)

(1981)

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This Is The One With The Fantasy Island Sketch
Jimmy_the_Gent49 November 2018
The main story has Bob and Doug scrambling around the studio looking for a new topic.

The first sketch is Norman Gorman doing Shakespeare In The Park in New Yorkeese. He kicks out a punk with a water pistol. Bob and Doug finish their show and run into Brian Johns, who does an interview with a rich guy (Rick Moranis) and Brian keeps asking how much he pays for things. There is a very funny promo for a movie Harry Filth, with John Candy playing a trigger happy cop with REALLY big gun. Johnny LaRue has a funny exercise show where he smokes a cigarette and main exercise is opening the refrigerator door.

A commercial has Andrea Martin serving coffee which contains a laxative (Max Lax). Bob and Doug get "hosed" by LaRue into washing his car, he promises to take them to a night club later. A funny soap opera parody is The Heys Of Our Lives in which Joe Flaherty and Catherine O'Hara keep saying "hey" in all their sentences. Bob and Doug meet LaRue at a night club, joined by Brian Johns. Brian and Johnny get into a fight with two burly thugs and get tossed out. Musical guest The Ian Thomas (Dave's real life brother) Band performs a song Hold On. Andrea does a good impression of singer Anne Murray on her first TV special.

A commercial for mental illness is next; Eugene Levy plays an actor named Don Strom , who is famous for playing villains and psychos in movies. Moranis plays David Susskind in the next sketch. Then a commercial for Mr Mambo (Candy) who lugs around a whole stereo system for his music.

Ian Thomas guests on Great White North when he finds out the guys are Canadian like him, he even talks like Bob and Doug. The band do another song called Pilot.

Here we get my favorite sketch ever on the show Fantasy Island. Levy does a great Ricardo Montalban impression, he sometimes lapses into a Cordoba car commercial, which Montalban was doing a the time "Corinthian leather". Candy is hilarious as the excitable Herve Villachaize Tattoo character. The guests for fantasies include Flaherty and Dave Thomas as two rock stars who want to be comedians. Andrea is a mousy violinist who wants danger and intrigue in her life. O'Hara plays a klutzy jet setter who wants old time glamour. The laughs continue when the two rock stars are turned into Bing Crosby and Bob Hope. The violinist becomes Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca. She does a funny song I Go To Casablanca to the tune of I Go To Rio. The jet setter becomes a 1930s tough talking broad who dances like Ginger Rogers. Montalban gets angry at little Tattoo, kicking him across the room and ripping out his hair. The whole thing then turns into a Wizard Of Oz spoof. There was enough here for several shows and more laughs than any other.

The last scene is Mel Torme (Moranis) singing the national anthem and nearly losing his toupee.
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This was a long time ago, but...
rob-jackson-221 March 2006
...as I recall, Ian Thomas was a musical guest on this episode of SCTV. He and his band performed 2 (I think) songs. One was a Canadian hit single called, "Pilot" from his previous album and the other was his (at the time) current hit called "Hold On" which was recorded by Santana the next year and was a top-20 hit for Carlos. As well as the songs, I'm fairly certain Ian was in a few skits along with his brother, SCTV regular and current successful B-list working actor Dave Thomas - not the least of which was a recurring skit with Bob and Doug MacKenzie (Dave Thomas and Rick Moranis) called, "The Great White North". Ian has enjoyed a prolific, varied career as a songwriter with a successful solo career and also led a band called "The Boomers" to moderate success in North America and huge success in Germany. He is still working on many things including movie and TV scores.
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