McCartney, cats fair game

Everyone was thinking it, so Jay Malone said it. It’s the seal hunt, not timing issues, keeping a certain former Beatle from playing a show on the common.
“That is why Paul McCartney is not coming,” said the Kentville-born comedian.
“We will make him sing his songs on stage while clubbing seals,” he added to chuckles from the more than 400 in Casino Nova Scotia’s Schooner Showroom. “But, we won’t make him do it with a club, but with a prosthetic leg.”
His laughs were just some of the guffaws, giggles and groans heard during the opening gala of the Ha!ifax Comedy Fest. Officially kicked off last night, the weeklong event will see more than 30 comedians stretching their funny bones.
This Hour Has 22-Minutes writer Mark Farrell hosted the gala. A Halifax resident, he started by noting how city council is getting tough on crime.
“Recently, they outlawed cats,” he said. “You’re walking home from Pizza Corner and there are kittens following you. ‘I have no catnip, man.’”
Farrell’s job was to introduce the performers, which included Hatching Matching and Dispatching star Jonny Harris, Comedy Inc.’s Roman Danylo, Scotland’s Fred MacAulay, Knocked Up’s Craig Robinson and Video On Trial’s Debra Digiovanni.
Digiovanni told the crowd how she was starting to make life changes, like giving up drinking and exercising. The first day she joined a gym, she was given a body fat test.
“I am 50 per cent, not a good sign,” she said. “It technically makes me cream. I taste good, but I’ll die alone. I am looking for my coffee mate.”
It was Robinson — known to many as Darryl on the TV series The Office — who really had the audience following his every word. Sitting at a keyboard, he entertained with a musical comedy set.
The audience sang along to If You’re Happy And You Know It as he instructed them to say “hurray,” “hazoo,” and “I adore you” to their partners.
“I am not your lady, sir. Look at your lady,” he admonished a man in the front row.