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Duos in Driver's Seat
By DARYL JUNG, NOW MAGAZINE

November 12, 1998

 

Look Out, Wayne and Shuster. Adventuresome up-and-coming Toronto comedy duo the Cowards aren't afraid of anything. In fact, they find great comfort in the number two. United they stand.

And in less than a year, classically trained actor Mark Richardson and guitar-strummin' Dave Pearce have all but caused a resurgence in the two-headed laugh attack.

Tight and high-strung, the two-some have risen quickly from open-mike nights to opening for such sketch outfits as the Chumps and the Stand-Ins, and gathered a strong following at the Rivoli's ALT.COMedy lounge.

Now, to prove the power of pairs, they've corralled a powerful crew of like-minded maniacs for Duos And Donuts, which the Cowards are calling a celebration of comedy partnerships and deep-fried snacks.

"There were two or three duos that I wanted for the show," says Pearce prior to this weekend's stand at the Tim Sims Playhouse and a spot next week on Marcel St. Pierre's Boot Camp blowout at the Rivoli.

"I wanted Lisa & Shoshana, but they were busy. I wanted Brock & John, but they don't gig that much any more. But I didn't want to leave anybody out. There are so many good duos in this town."

And Pearce wants it known that his commitment to the duo is deeply rooted in a tradition he believes should be preserved at all costs.

"If you go back through classic television up until the 70's you can see the duo was dominant," he says. "Burns and Allen, Rowan and Martin, Martin and Lewis were all great. Then suddenly it stopped when Monty Python, Second City and Saturday Night Live popularized the large sketch troupe."

"Then in the 80's came the stand-up boom. Those seemed to be the forms that funny people would go into, and the duo got neglected. And yet I've found it so much more rewarding. In sketch you have to sublimate your ideas into a larger whole. With stand-up there's none of that theatrical, scenic thrill that anybody who's ever taken an acting class would like to put up there."

"The duo is the best of both those worlds, where you'll always be on stage. If you're greedy about that, the twosome is the best. But you also have the joy of collaboration, and in the economically challenged 90's, you only have to split the cheque two ways."

Pearce adds that a natural chemistry between him and Richardson is the most significant key to their rapid rise. But they're careful to develop two distinct personalities, as opposed to an archaic straight-man-and-goofy-one setup."

"We were friends before we ever became partners," he says. "I was doing improv and Mark was pursuing his acting career. We'd bounce things off each other at parties or a dinner and we suddenly realized we had material as strong as anything we'd been watching live on stage."

"From there it went from friends just goofing around to two guys with enough training to actually make something of it."

"What you could call our signature piece, the 'Royal Shakespeare Company Does James Brown', came out of that process. With Mark's writing ability and my guitar playing, our skills are completely complementary."