PREVIEW
What: Ali Hassan
When: Saturday, 7 p.m.
Where: Sugar nightclub (858 Yates St.)
Tickets: $20 at Lyle’s Place (770 Yates St.) and Ticketfly.com
The comedy of New Brunswick-born, Montreal-raised, Toronto-based performer Ali Hassan has several starting points, the biggest of which is his Muslim faith.
His new comedy show, Muslim, Interrupted, taps into the realities of life as one of the most closely examined minorities in the world, even in a tolerant country such as Canada.
And the results will come as a surprise to many.
“What stops us from being America is that we’re a little more polite and a little more classy,” said Hassan, who is of Pakistani descent.
“We don’t say the things we’re feeling. But make no mistake, we’re feeling it.
“Plenty of times I’ve had people yell out: ‘Go back where you came from, Akhbar!’ And I’m like: ‘Where? Fredericton, New Brunswick?’ ”
Hassan, who performs Saturday in Victoria at Sugar nightclub, has lived in Toronto for six years.
He moved there following stints in Hamilton, Montreal and Chicago. It was his time as an IT consultant in Chicago that set him on his path as a comic.
The job was well-paying but thankless, Hassan recalled, so when his employers laid him off — days before the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001 — he felt relief.
“It was a Friday, so I had a weekend to go through what I wanted to do with my life, so we partied,” he said with a laugh.
“I was laid off on Sept. 7. The 8th and 9th were the weekend, and the 10th was my birthday, so I sat around hungover.
“Tuesday morning, Sept. 11, was when I was going to start a grand plan, so I have the layoff and 9/11 to thank, because there was no work, period. No one was interested in hiring. And a guy named Ali Hassan was not getting a job any time soon.”
He moved back to Canada, completed his master’s degree in business administration, and went into the food industry as a catering chef.
He initially wanted to use standup comedy as a way to get on television, where he imagined he could put his quick wit to work on a cooking show.
“I had to practise being in front of audiences, and the only way to do that was to do things like emcee weddings and open-mike nights,” he said.
At one point, he was balancing burgeoning careers in comedy and cooking, Hassan said.
“It’s pretty unique to have two career choices that both pay so poorly, but those are the ones I chose,” he said.
“And it turns out I was a stereotypical candidate for a cocaine user. I’d meet people, and they would always ask my friends: ‘Does he do blow?’ I am a chef and a comedian, and those are the most typical jobs for cokeheads.”
His plan was to work in catering during the day and pursue comedy at night, but comedy eventually “became its own animal,” Hassan said.
He put catering on hold when he began appearing as a panelist on CBC’s George Stroumboulopoulos Tonight.
He appeared on the program more than 160 times, which opened up opportunities in film and television.
Hassan has parlayed his skills into a wide range of gigs, including recurring characters on the PBS Kids show Odd Squad and the CTV drama Cardinal.
He also hosts Laugh Out Loud and Canada Reads on CBC Radio.
Muslim, Interrupted was born from conversations with his three children.
Hassan is a “cultural Muslim” who identifies with but does not practise Islam, which has made for some revealing chats around the Hassan house.
“My daughter asked: ‘Papa, what is a registry? Why are Muslims being banned?’ ” he said. “And I struggle with what to tell her. I don’t want to be in a world where I have to answer these questions.”
Parents who know Hassan from his Odd Squad appearances will find a different kind of comedy in Muslim, Interrupted.
That’s the point of comedy, Hassan said — to push people outside their comfort zones, in search of truth.
“You don’t always want to be preaching to the choir, so to speak.”
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