QUEBEC COMEDIAN BECOMES CHAMPION OF FREE SPEECH
Radio-Canada, gala’s insurers deny censorship
MONTREAL • Mike Ward is a foul-mouthed Quebec comic for whom no target is off limits — not even a disfigured child singer. And now, thanks indirectly to that child singer, Ward has a new role as a champion of free speech.
Quebec’s annual comedy awards, known as Les Olivier, veered into Amnesty International territory Sunday night as dozens of comedians took to the stage wearing surgical masks with a red X across the mouth.
It was a dramatic show of support for Ward, who with fellow comedian Guy Nantel boycotted the gala after being told to tone down a sketch they were set to perform on the theme of freedom of speech.
“If I win a prize, please put it in the recycling for me,” Ward wrote on Twitter Friday, announcing that he would not attend the show. In the end, he won two awards, including comedian of the year, chosen by the public.
The controversy has its roots in a routine Ward performed in 2010 about Jérémy Gabriel, who suffers from a genetic condition that causes disfigurement. Known as “le petit Jérémy,” he became a sensation across the province when he sang for Pope Benedict in 2006 at the age of nine.
Ward’s routine described how he was initially supportive of Jérémy, even if he found his singing lousy. He assumed the child was dying and was “living his dream,” he said.
Years later, with Jérémy still going strong, Ward joked that he felt he had been duped, and went on the Internet to find out what the boy suffered from. “You know what it was? He’s ugly, goddammit!”
To Jérémy and his family, the routine, contained on a live DVD Ward released, crossed the line. In 2012, they filed a complaint with Quebec’s human rights commission. Last February, a rights tribunal finished hearing the complaint, which alleges the boy was “hurt, vexed and humiliated” by Ward’s joke. A decision is expected in the coming months.
Jérémy’s mother, Sylvie Gabriel, testified that Ward’s comedy had damaged her son’s confidence and his singing career. Jérémy said it led to him being mocked at school. “When we make a joke about someone, about a disabled person, we can laugh, we can make comments, but we always have to do that in full respect,” he testified, according to a CBC report.
Ward and Nantel planned to use their Olivier sketch to take on the rights commission, but their jokes — tame by Ward’s standards — proved too dangerous for broadcaster Radio-Canada and the show’s insurers. After writing seven versions, none of which passed muster, they gave up.
The censored sketch became public in a draft script leaked to the Journal de Montréal Friday, and the duo performed a version of it Saturday night at a Montreal comedy club. It begins with Ward saying he won’t tell any jokes because he doesn’t want to get in trouble.
After some prodding from Nantel, Ward shares a joke approved by the rights commission: “You know what the difference is between a homosexual and an Inuit? There isn’t any. Both are fantastic! Long live diversity!” Later Nantel says the rights commission should not even exist, prompting Ward to quickly apologize to the commission. The show included jokes at the expense of a lesbian pop singer and, in the initial script, Jews.
Radio-Canada denied that the decision not to broadcast the sketch was censorship.
It said in a statement that the decision was made after a legal analysis and “out of respect” to the rights tribunal process, which continues. The statement said the show’s insurers refused to provide coverage for the controversial sketch.
The industry association that stages the gala, the Association des professionnels de l’industrie de l’humour, issued a statement Sunday apologizing to Ward and Nantel.
“This situation shines a light on a very disturbing trend, that of ‘Zero Risk,’ which inevitably leads to the restriction of freedom of expression,” it said.