Bruce McCulloch starts a riot

I was in a dilemma. The witty Bruce McCulloch from Kids in the Hall fame was returning to the Arden Theatre this coming Sunday for a second consecutive year with the same show – Young Drunk Punk.

How could I make it fresh for the reader? Fortunately McCulloch had just released a memoir, a personal collection of essays that overlap into the show.

Strolling through Chapters, I snapped up a copy and cracked open Let’s Start a Riot: How a Young Drunk Punk Became a Hollywood Dad.

After arranging a quick call to the Hollywood Hills where he now lives with his wife-actress Tracy Ryan and their two kids, McCulloch squeezed in an interview with the Gazette before flying to the Yukon for a two-nighter.

McCulloch admits his non-fiction is moderately embellished and is part success story, part cautionary tale. On the one hand it is visceral, on the other it is poignant and touching.

“Everything that happened is true. It’s essentially true and it’s emotionally true. I’ve add a few creative flourishes to some of the stuff and I’ve chosen to give my family anonymity,” said McCulloch.

McCulloch’s troubled youth is old news. His father was an alcoholic and his mother left the family when he was young. In his book he recalls the hell raising days – trying to beat up his dad, and in the Tequila-Fest chapter, he details how he got drunk, trashed his mother’s house and gave her a heart attack.

“In the book I say, ‘Mum taught me to love by not loving me. It’s not that she didn’t love me. It was just the life we had. It was part of us. And when you go in the dark shadows of human archeology, you want to make it interesting for people and for yourself.”

Looking back, he is grateful to have survived by adopting his mother’s tenacity and his dad’s curiosity, humour, love of politics and punkish attitude.

“We were human spirits. Life happened. So let’s just dust ourselves off and keep going,” was a mantra he adopted early in life.

After growing up in a fractured family, the Edmonton outsider discovered a second family in Kids in the Hall. And there’s a lot of hilarity as he talks about their first gig behind bars in Prison Break.

In another chapter, he tells how Saturday Night Live scouts had phoned and asked for tickets. “If you really wanted to see it so badly, you would have bought tickets like other people,” he replied before smartly hanging up.

Turning to see the look on everyone else’s face, he realized his mistake and scrambled to make amends. He and Mark McKinney were hired as writers and moved to New York only to find their short stint disappointing.

While McCulloch paints himself as a jerk in the first part of his life, there’s a teddy bear quality that surfaces when dealing with his wife and children – Heidi and Roscoe (not their real names). Possibly the most heart-warming tale comes when the family dog Lulu dies and his dad tries to comfort his children.

“It’s a story about family. It’s about the family I was born into, my Kids in the Hall family and the family I have with my wife.”

McCulloch has had a tough journey. His youth was full of bravado. His mid years more prudent. But the Strathcona High graduate is always happy to return to home turf.

“It’s great to see people still come and out and see me. When I come back to Edmonton, family and friends always come out of the woodwork. And I’m looking forward to seeing them.”