Ron James says he’s doing “pretty good” in light of the precarious state of the world.
“I’m getting ready to go on the road and look for laughs amid the chaos,” said the comedian set to visit London’s Grand Theater on March 30 and Sarnia’s Imperial Theater on April 5 during a tour of Ontario
It follows recent tours of the Maritimes and British Columbia “before Omicron came calling,” James said.
“Everybody was double-vaxxed and masked, sitting shoulder to shoulder processing the trauma of COVID in the language of laughs,” he said about his recent eastern and western tours. “And everyone just felt so good, and I felt good hearing the laughs.”
With restrictions easing, Sarnia’s Imperial Theater and others across the province are back to welcoming audiences in for shows.
Born and raised in Nova Scotia, James spent nine years with The Second City and turned his experience working in LA in the early 1990s into a critically acclaimed television special, Up and Down in Shaky Town.
After returning to Canada, he earned a Gemini Award as part of the writing team for This Hour Has 22 Minutes, and created and starred in the Global TV series Blackfly before returning to the CBC with the Ron James Show.
During the pandemic lockdowns that closed theatres, James said he “managed to keep busy, believe it or not, as much as I could by having shows in my living room.”
One online performance attracted 3,500 people from across Canada on New Year’s Eve “at 30 bucks a pop,” James said.
“The fan base came out in full force and I was able to connect,” although “authentic intimacy” is not a strong point of virtual shows, he said.
“I couldn’t hear the laughs so it was like I was in a space capsule” and “sending jokes back to fellow Earthlings,” James said.
He said audiences are “hungry” for performances “and they’re hungry, I think, for a uniquely Canadian perspective on the experience, and that’s what I’ve always delivered.”
Last fall, Penguin-Random House released James’ first book, All Over the Map: Rambles and Ruminations from the Canadian Road.
James said he was “very diligent” about keeping journals during his more than two decades of touring, and he was approached by the publisher a few years ago.
He finished the second draft during the pandemic.
“It allowed me to see light at the end of the COVID tunnel,” he said, “and I strapped myself to the desk and I wrote it.”
James said the book is “an embrace of people and place, and my travels clear across the country,” as well as his experiences growing up and some of his “adventures in show businesses.”
Information about the Sarnia show can be found online at www.imperialtheatre.net. As of Monday, only a few seats remained available in Sarnia.