This Hour Has 22 Minutes (commonly shortened to 22 Minutes since 2009) is a weekly Canadian television comedy that airs on CBC Television. Launched in 1993 during Canada's 35th general election, the show focuses on Canadian politics with a combination of news parody, sketch comedy, and satirical editorials. Originally featuring Cathy Jones, Rick Mercer, Greg Thomey, and Mary Walsh, the series featured satirical sketches of the weekly news and Canadian political events. The show's format is a mock news program, intercut with comic sketches, parody commercials, and humorous interviews of public figures. Its full name is a parody of This Hour Has Seven Days, a CBC news magazine from the 1960s; the "22 Minutes" refers to the fact that a half-hour television program in Canada and the US is typically 22 minutes long with eight minutes of commercials. Jones and Walsh had previously worked together on the sketch comedy series CODCO, on which Thomey sometimes appeared as a guest. Mercer had been a notable young writer and performer on his own, touring several successful one-man shows of comedic political commentary. Salter Street Films produced the series until the 2003–2004 season. Salter Street was acquired in 2001 by Alliance Atlantis, and production of the series was transferred directly to Alliance Atlantis in the twelfth season. In 2005 Halifax Film, a new company formed by Salter co-founder Michael Donovan, took over production of the show. In 2006, Halifax Film merged with Decode Entertainment to form DHX Media (now WildBrain), which has produced the show since. In 2019, the rights were sold to IoM Media Ventures, which acquired DHX's Halifax studio the year prior. Recognized with 24 Gemini Awards and 11 Canadian Comedy Awards, 22 Minutes is taped before a live audience in within the old World Trade Centre in downtown Halifax, Nova Scotia. Its 28th season was taped at the Light House Arts Centre in Halifax with a smaller audience and crew. The series, which originally aired on Mondays for several seasons and later on Fridays, currently airs Tuesdays at 8:30 p.m. on CBC. The series formerly followed the Rick Mercer Report.

Cast

Although each cast member's real name was always shown at the beginning of each episode, at the end of most episodes prior to 2006, one cast member would sign off using their anchor character's name, which is noted below where known. This has now been discontinued, and anchors now regularly address each other by their real names.

Current members

For the 2020 season, the show added Nik Sexton, Tom Stanley and Jon Sturge as field reporters covering the 2020 United States elections. In addition several emerging comedians, including Heidi Brander, Adam Christie, Sophie Buddle, Aisha Brown, Nadine Bhabha, Isabel Kanaan, Aba Amuquandoh, Chris Wilson, Brandon Ash-Mohammed, Travis Lindsay, Ajahnis Charley and Leonard Chan, joined the show's writing team and have appeared in sketches as featured players. Wilson was promoted to a full cast member in the 2023-24 season.

Former members

Timeline

Substitute anchors/special correspondents

Substitute news anchors on the series are people who "guest star" on the series for when series regulars are away (from Season 10 onwards).

Regular characters and segments

Crawford's characters

Critch's characters

Hall's characters

Jones' characters

Majumder's characters

Mercer's characters

Mochrie's characters

Thomey's characters

Walsh's characters

Famous stunts

Jean Poutine

1999–2000 – During the 2000 American election, Rick Mercer approached Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush on a campaign stop in Michigan, asking for comment on the news that Bush had received the endorsement of Canadian prime minister "Jean Poutine". The then-prime minister's name was Jean Chrétien, and he had not endorsed Bush – it is standard practice for the Canadian government not to endorse anyone in a foreign election. Bush – who had previously stated that "you can't stump me on world leaders" – acknowledged the purported endorsement with a short statement to the 22 Minutes cameras, which aired as part of the show's regular Talking to Americans feature. The Talking To Americans segments – and eventual one-hour special – were produced and directed by Geoff D'Eon. In his first official state visit to Canada four years later, Bush joked that his "one regret" about the visit was that he'd "hoped to meet Jean Poutine."

Stockwell/Doris petition

2000–01 – Often cited as the show's best joke, the sketch was aired during the 2000 federal election campaign, and consisted of a staged rant by Rick Mercer. During the 2000 federal election, then-Canadian Alliance leader Stockwell Day proposed a mechanism to call for a referendum. A petition on any particular subject which gathered at least 350,000 signatures of voting age citizens ("3% of the electors") would automatically trigger a national referendum. Mercer's "rant" asked viewers to log on to the 22 Minutes website, and sign an online petition asking the party leader to change his name to Doris Day (after the singer/actress). Mercer wanted the petition to involve Day changing his name while the Doris Day reference was suggested by 22 Minutes writer Luciano Casimiri. Producers claim to have obtained in excess of 1,200,000 online votes. This was cheerfully admitted to be a stunt unhampered by the rigours of an Elections Canada-controlled petition. Although the sketch had no effect on Alliance policy, it did obtain international publicity for the show and contributed to the general air of farce surrounding Day's election campaign. Day's response to the petition was, "Que será, será".

Oilers vs Canadiens

2003–04 – Shaun Majumder, in character as "Raj Binder", was sent to report on the 2003 outdoors Edmonton Oilers and Montreal Canadiens old timers game, preceding the night's actual NHL regular season game, which was the first NHL game to be played outdoors (at Commonwealth Stadium in Edmonton). Majumder actually sneaked into all the team photos, causing uproar from the event's unwitting organizers in the days after, when the photos were released to the press.

Marg ambushes Rob Ford

On October 24, 2011, Walsh reprised the role of "Marg, Princess Warrior", conducting an ambush interview of Toronto Mayor Rob Ford at his home, which aired on 22 Minutes the following evening. Ford's reaction and alleged verbal abuse directed at a 911 operator made national headlines. Ford claimed that he had never seen nor heard of 22 Minutes.

Controversies

On November 17, 2004, clips of a sketch for 22 Minutes were released, in which Liberal MP Carolyn Parrish stomped on a George W. Bush doll and performed voodoo on its head, where she said "it would do the least damage". The incident sparked significant outrage from the opposition Conservatives, who argued that it had the potential to damage diplomatic relations between Canada and the United States. As a result of the incident Parrish was expelled from the Liberal Party and sat the remainder of her term as an Independent. Richard Martineau wrote a column in Le Journal de Montréal criticizing a sketch aired October 7, 2007, entitled "Quebec Nation". In the sketch, two characters discussed the state of affairs after a separation from Canada, which left them with "no roads, no towns, not even radio. The only things we take [sic] is our racism". Martineau also discussed the fact that This Hour Has 22 Minutes is broadcast by the CBC and is funded by funds also coming from Quebec. In May 2015, the American sketch comedy series Saturday Night Live aired a sketch in which a contestant on a Win, Lose or Draw-style game show panicked at being asked to draw the Muslim prophet Muhammad, igniting allegations that SNL had plagiarized a nearly identical sketch which aired on 22 Minutes in January.

Specials

DVD releases

Entertainment One has released the first two seasons on DVD in Region 1 (Canada only).