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The Last Polka
''The Last Polka'' is a 1985 comedy television film. It was written by and starred John Candy and Eugene Levy, and directed by John Blanchard. ''The Last Polka'' follows the life, careers, and the final concert of Yosh (Candy) and Stan (Levy) Shmenge, two brothers from the fictional country of Leutonia who become the biggest polka duo the world has ever seen. It is presented as a mixture of live concert performance and filmed scenes. Many fellow '' SCTV'' performers including Rick Moranis, Catherine O'Hara, and Robin Duke appear in the film. Dave Thomas narrates. The live concert in the film is a loose parody of The Band's concert movie ''The Last Waltz''. Special guests and longtime Shmenge collaborators include The Lemon Twins (Duke, O'Hara and her real life sister Mary Margaret O'Hara) doing a medley of their "hits" and also Linsk Minyk (Moranis) performing a medley of road songs that culminates in a version of the Doors' " Touch Me". One scene has The Shmenges performing a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Blanchard
John Blanchard is a Canadian television director and producer. He is best known for his directorial work on the sketch comedy series '' SCTV'', ''The Kids in the Hall'', ''CODCO'', ''MADtv'' and the talk show ''The Martin Short Show'' for which he won a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing in a Talk Show. He also directed episodes of the sitcoms ''Grounded for Life'', ''Wanda at Large'', ''Cavemen'', and ''Unhitched'', as well as a number of television films, one of his notable films being ''The Last Polka'' (1985) starring John Candy and Eugene Levy. - SCTV Guide He also directed the direct-to-video horror comedy '' |
Mary Margaret O'Hara
Mary Margaret O'Hara is a Canadian singer-songwriter, actress and composer. She is best known for the album ''Miss America'', released in 1988. She released two albums and an EP under her own name, and remains active as a live performer, as a contributor to compilation albums and as a guest collaborator on other artists' albums. Music career Early stages O'Hara was born in the late 1950s in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, to a family of Irish Catholic descent. She is the sister of comedic actress Catherine O'Hara. Her early musical tastes included Van Morrison, Dinah Washington, and her father's jazz records. She was a student at the Ontario College of Art and Design in the 1970s and was involved in the music scene as a member of Toronto bands Dollars, Songship and Go Deo Chorus. In 1983, O'Hara left Go Deo and was signed by Virgin Records. Her contract with Virgin continued and eventually led to the 1988 release of ''Miss America''. O'Hara later reflected on the production experience, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1985 Films
The following is an overview of events in 1985 in film, including the highest-grossing films, award ceremonies and festivals, a list of films released and notable births and deaths. Highest-grossing films (U.S.) The top ten 1985 released films by box office gross in North America are as follows: Context The year was considered an unsuccessful one for film. Despite a record number of film releases, many films failed at the box office, and ticket sales were down 17% compared with 1984. Industry executives believed the problem, in part, was a lack of original concepts. Films about fantasy and magic failed, as audiences leaned towards science-fiction. Janet Maslin said the fault for this lay partly with Steven Spielberg, who had created such a successful template with films like '' E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial'' and ''Close Encounters of the Third Kind'' that many fantasy films had imitated them. There was also a saturation of youth-oriented films targeted at those under 18. Executi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1985 Television Films
The year 1985 was designated as the International Youth Year by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 ** The Internet's Domain Name System is created. ** Greenland withdraws from the European Economic Community as a result of a new agreement on fishing rights. * January 7 – Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency launches ''Sakigake'', Japan's first interplanetary spacecraft and the first deep space probe to be launched by any country other than the United States or the Soviet Union. * January 15 – Tancredo Neves is elected president of Brazil by the Congress, ending the 21-year military rule. * January 20 – Ronald Reagan is privately sworn in for a second term as President of the United States. * January 27 – The Economic Cooperation Organization, Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO) is formed, in Tehran. * January 28 – The charity single record "We Are the World" is recorded by USA for Africa. February * February 4 – The Gibralt ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Canadian Comedy Television Films
Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''Canadian''. Canada is a multilingual and multicultural society home to people of groups of many different ethnic, religious, and national origins, with the majority of the population made up of Old World immigrants and their descendants. Following the initial period of French and then the much larger British colonization, different waves (or peaks) of immigration and settlement of non-indigenous peoples took place over the course of nearly two centuries and continue today. Elements of Indigenous, French, British, and more recent immigrant customs, languages, and religions have combined to form the culture of Canada, and thus a Canadian identity. Canada has also been strongly influenced by its linguistic, geographic, and eco ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1980s Musical Comedy Films
__NOTOC__ Year 198 (CXCVIII) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Sergius and Gallus (or, less frequently, year 951 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 198 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years. Events By place Roman Empire *January 28 **Publius Septimius Geta, son of Septimius Severus, receives the title of Caesar. **Caracalla, son of Septimius Severus, is given the title of Augustus. China *Winter – Battle of Xiapi: The allied armies led by Cao Cao and Liu Bei defeat Lü Bu; afterward Cao Cao has him executed. By topic Religion * Marcus I succeeds Olympianus as Patriarch of Constantinople (until 211). Births * Lu Kai (or Jingfeng), Chinese official and general (d. 269) * Quan Cong, Chinese general and advisor (d. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Canadian Mockumentary Films
Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''Canadian''. Canada is a multilingual and multicultural society home to people of groups of many different ethnic, religious, and national origins, with the majority of the population made up of Old World immigrants and their descendants. Following the initial period of French and then the much larger British colonization, different waves (or peaks) of immigration and settlement of non-indigenous peoples took place over the course of nearly two centuries and continue today. Elements of Indigenous, French, British, and more recent immigrant customs, languages, and religions have combined to form the culture of Canada, and thus a Canadian identity. Canada has also been strongly influenced by its linguistic, geographic, and eco ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Canadian Musical Comedy Films
Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''Canadian''. Canada is a multilingual and multicultural society home to people of groups of many different ethnic, religious, and national origins, with the majority of the population made up of Old World immigrants and their descendants. Following the initial period of French and then the much larger British colonization, different waves (or peaks) of immigration and settlement of non-indigenous peoples took place over the course of nearly two centuries and continue today. Elements of Indigenous, French, British, and more recent immigrant customs, languages, and religions have combined to form the culture of Canada, and thus a Canadian identity. Canada has also been strongly influenced by its linguistic, geographic, and e ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
English-language Canadian Films
English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the island of Great Britain. Existing on a dialect continuum with Scots, and then closest related to the Low Saxon and Frisian languages, English is genealogically West Germanic. However, its vocabulary is also distinctively influenced by dialects of France (about 29% of Modern English words) and Latin (also about 29%), plus some grammar and a small amount of core vocabulary influenced by Old Norse (a North Germanic language). Speakers of English are called Anglophones. The earliest forms of English, collectively known as Old English, evolved from a group of West Germanic (Ingvaeonic) dialects brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the 5th century and further mutated by Norse-speaking Viking settlers starting in the 8th and 9th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cable Ace
The CableACE Award (earlier known as the ACE Awards; ACE was an acronym for "Award for Cable Excellence") is a defunct award that was given by what was then the National Cable Television Association from 1978 to 1997 to honor excellence in American cable television programming. The trophy itself was shaped as a glass spade, alluding to the Ace of spades. History The CableACE was created to serve as the cable industry's counterpart to broadcast television's Primetime Emmy Awards. Until the 40th ceremony in 1988, the Emmys refused to honor cable programming. For much of its existence, the ceremony aired on a simulcast on as many as twelve cable networks in some years. The last few years found the ceremony awarded solely to one network, usually Lifetime or TBS. In 1992, the award's official name was changed from ACE to CableACE, agreeing to do so to reduce confusion with the American Cinema Editors (ACE) society. By 1997, the Emmys began to reach a tipping point, where cab ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Happy Wanderers
''Second City Television'', commonly shortened to ''SCTV'' and later known as ''SCTV Network'' and ''SCTV Channel'', is a Canadian television sketch comedy show that ran intermittently between 1976 and 1984. It was created as an offshoot from Toronto's Second City troupe. It is an example of a Canadian show that moved successfully to American TV, where it aired for three years on NBC and ABC simultaneously. Premise The show's premise is the broadcast day of a fictitious TV station (later network) in the town of Melonville. Melonville's location is left unspecified; the earliest episodes imply it is in Canada, but most later episodes place it in the U.S. A typical episode of ''SCTV'' presents a compendium of programming seen on the station throughout its broadcast day. A given episode could contain SCTV news broadcasts, sitcoms, dramas, movies, talk shows, children's shows, advertising send-ups hawking fictitious products, and game shows. Several "shows" are seen regularly on ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Second City TV
''Second City Television'', commonly shortened to ''SCTV'' and later known as ''SCTV Network'' and ''SCTV Channel'', is a Canadian television sketch comedy show that ran intermittently between 1976 and 1984. It was created as an offshoot from Toronto's Second City troupe. It is an example of a Canadian show that moved successfully to American TV, where it aired for three years on NBC and ABC simultaneously. Premise The show's premise is the broadcast day of a fictitious TV station (later network) in the town of Melonville. Melonville's location is left unspecified; the earliest episodes imply it is in Canada, but most later episodes place it in the U.S. A typical episode of ''SCTV'' presents a compendium of programming seen on the station throughout its broadcast day. A given episode could contain SCTV news broadcasts, sitcoms, dramas, movies, talk shows, children's shows, advertising send-ups hawking fictitious products, and game shows. Several "shows" are seen regularly ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
