Mary Walsh on ‘ambushing’ politicians and the role of satire

“So many people in the West want to have sex with our liberal leaders, it’s remarkable,” said Mary Walsh.

She’s referring to the likes of “F Trudeau” and “F Carney” slogans on flags and bumper stickers across the country.

This is a taste of what you might hear in A Conversation with Mary Walsh, which comes to Yellowknife as part of the Arctic Comedy Festival on May 17.

Walsh, a trailblazer in Canadian comedy and satire, may be best recognized as Marg Delahunty, Princess Warrior – a character she played on CBC’s This Hour Has 22 Minutes.

She created the show, which features a mock newscast in every episode, in 1993. Its name is a parody of a 1960s CBC public affairs show, This Hour Has Seven Days.

Walsh also created the series Hatching, Matching and Dispatching and has been involved in countless other film and TV projects, including Codco, Mambo Italiano, Broad Appeal and more recently, The Missus Downstairs.

A Conversation with Mary Walsh will take audience members through parts of a comedy album, A One Night Stand with Mary Walsh, and a memoir to be published by Harper Collins next year.

You can also expect to hear about Walsh’s storied career.

She said some of the more memorable moments in her work haven’t been jaw-dropping encounters with politicians, such as when she kissed Stephen Harper or played golf with Jean Chrétien in his office on Parliament Hill.

Instead, what stuck with her are the late nights spent working on sketches with original cast members like Cathy Jones, Rick Mercer and Greg Thomey.

“There was just a camaraderie and friendship and shared purpose there that was very warm and wonderful,” said Walsh.

While she works on her own a lot these days, she sees strength in working in a collective.

“I’m not complaining about it, but sometimes it’s just a bit lonely and so just try to enjoy what you got while you got it, because it’s not going to be there all the time,” said Walsh.

At some point in the evolution of 22 Minutes, mild-mannered and easily embarrassed Marg Delahunty – who once asked country singer Garth Brooks if “being on the road all the time makes it hard” – morphed into Marg, Princess Warrior, who would go on to ask politicians the tough questions while wielding a plastic sword around Parliament Hill.

Walsh said the idea came to her while watching Xena: Warrior Princess, when she noticed she had the same bangs as the actor on that show, leading her to pitch a Xena sketch for 22 Minutes.

“Geoff D’Eon, who was our producer at the time, suggested going to Ottawa instead of just doing a sketch and then my brilliant best friend Patti Parsons made my Marg, Princess Warrior outfit based entirely on Xena, but with gold glue and felt,” said Walsh.

She said the encounters with politicians terrified her because she knew that in most cases, she only had one shot – and because the clips were barely edited.

“I knew exactly what I was going to say and really, the worst terror of it was that I would forget what I was going to say, and my big push with it was not to let them say anything, because it was so confusing when they replied that I would often forget where I was,” said Walsh.

This, she said, happened in an interview with the former premier of Alberta, Ralph Klein, which prompted her to pull out a toy gun.

“A terrible thing to do inside the legislature,” said Walsh. “That’s why I say don’t have a gun in the house, because if you get in trouble, you will use it.”

She said people like former prime minister Jean Chrétien, who she feels is naturally funny, made things a little easier.

“There was a certain comfort – if you could call it comfort, because I was always terrified – but there was a certain comfort in ambushing him, because you knew he was going to be funny anyway,” said Walsh.

“Even if you fell very badly, you’d get something out of it.”

She sees a gift for comedy in Mark Carney, too.

“He was so funny on the Jon Stewart show,” she said “He really held his own.”

If she ever has the opportunity to speak with Carney, she’ll tell him she doesn’t envy the prime minister’s

“I’d just as soon put hot needles in my eyes,” said Walsh.

From her perspective, people are watching his every move for a mistake. She said her time ambushing politicians has taught her to empathize with them and the complexities of governing a country.

“I always spoke to people as Marg like I was helping them. Even Harper. I was saying, ‘you can’t keep being against everything,'” said Walsh.

“That’s the way I finally approached it – we’re all human beings. Except I guess I don’t feel that way any more but I felt, when I was doing it, that people were doing their best.”

Walsh expressed concern for the state of politics today, saying that in her view, some of the politicians she sees being most successful are the ones with the least integrity.

On the flip side, politicians she sees as having great accomplishments such as Tommy Douglas, who introduced universal healthcare, and Justin Trudeau, who led Canada through the Covid-19 pandemic, get a bad rap.

She said non-violent protest and satire continue to be a path forward to demand fairness from leaders.

Walsh references Jonathan Swift’s satirical essay, A Modest Proposal, as an example of the power of words and humour to move people.

Even so, she can find silver linings in today’s political turmoil.

“I feel like all these things that Mr Trump is doing … it’s making us fall back more on ourselves and less dependent on them,” said Walsh, referencing Americans.

She said that could have advantages for the film and TV industries in Canada, making them less reliant on an outside force.

“My aunt May used to say: ‘It’s an ill wind that blows nobody any good.’ And of course,” Walsh said, “by that she meant that it’s a very, very bad wind that wouldn’t blow in some good for somebody.”