HOWL & ROAR
Did you hear the one about the actor who went into stand-up comedy, ended up on talk radio instead, and now owns her own record label? Didn’t think so...
When I was a kid, I knew I was destined to be a superstar. I would be an A-list actor in Hollywood and win an Oscar by age 30, and lead a very glamorous life being revered by my many fans. As a teen I acted a lot, and I was happiest and most confident when I was pretending to be someone else. When I was about 18, my older brother started doing stand-up comedy and soon after he encouraged me to try it, too. I thought he was being ridiculous, because I wasn’t funny “like that.” I could make people laugh, sure—by accident. I couldn’t write an actual joke if my life depended on it! But a few years later, I finally agreed to try it. And I fell down the rabbit hole into the magical, perverse, uplifting, infuriating, beautiful, ugly wonderland that is the comedy scene. Although I continued auditioning and acting, comedy really became my primary focus.
Life often gets in the way of the best laid plans, and—spoiler alert!—by 30, I was not in actuality an A-list actor. Instead I was in rehab, trying to stop self-medicating for my mental health issues, which I had been doing in earnest since I had a complete nervous breakdown at age 23. I wasn’t ready to let my unfulfilled dreams go just yet, but if I was going to have a chance at achieving
them, I needed to make a change. And I needed help to do it.
When I got out of rehab, I thought things would magically be different. I mean, I did the right thing: I got clean, and was facing life and being a better person. The universe should reward me! The reality is that the next four years were pretty tough: working multiple jobs to make ends meet, doing stand-up as much as possible, and putting in the work I had avoided for years.
When my break finally came, it was another curve ball: I got a job in talk radio, something that had never been on my radar, but it turned out to be the job I never knew I always wanted. My first few years at Siriusxm Canada were like falling in love; being enamored with this new interest and spending all my waking hours thinking about it. Suddenly comedy stopped being the driving force in my life, and my performances got fewer and farther between. Until one day they stopped all together.
But comedy is like those famous lyrics in “Hotel California” by The Eagles: “You can check out, but you can never leave.” It gets in your blood and becomes part of your identity, so even though I didn’t want to get on stage anymore, I still wanted to support the community I’d been a part of for the last 17 years. Being a comedian in Canada is an entirely uphill battle: other than the encouragement of your fellow comedians, there is little to no support and there’s not much money to be made, until or unless you hit the big time. Complicating matters is the fact that it’s a lot easier for U.S. comics to perform in Canada than vice-versa. That’s why I felt it was important to stay active in the industry.
MAKING VOICES HEARD
To everyone’s surprise, including mine, in 2018 I found myself launching a record label. Howl & Roar Records is a female-centric showcase for diverse Canadian talent. Approximately 70 per cent of our focus and output is women in comedy, and the remaining output is prioritized towards men of colour and/or on the LGBTQ+ community; however, no one is excluded. Our goal is to shine a spotlight on the voices that may not always be heard in this industry. Not having content online can really hold an artist back in today’s Internet age. I mean, if I can’t google you, do you even exist? But many can’t afford to create online content, and so lose out on opportunities to get ahead.
Our goal is to help comedians create content at no upfront cost to themselves, so they have a high-quality album to sell at shows, and a calling card for more opportunities in the industry. As of January 2020 we’ve released ten albums, and have several more in post-production. I have been so incredibly lucky. I continue to host a daily talk show for Siriusxm, as well as a weekly show for their Canadian comedy channel celebrating women in comedy. The skills I learned there have allowed me to launch Howl & Roar, and give back to the community that helped save me.