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It’s interesting, at least to me, where actors’ careers begin. Especially when you find out they were on some show you had never really heard of. Recently, I’ve been digging into Schitt’s Creek. I have now finished all the episodes currently on Netflix (season six arrives in October). The show is really good, and the main cast is excellent. Of course, the standout, as always, is Catherine O’Hara. Like most people my age, my first introduction to O’Hara was in Home Alone. There she doesn’t even get to be funny. I had no idea I was watching a comedy legend. Since then, I have seen her in the Christopher Guest films, Beetlejuice, and much more. Before all that, though, she had to start somewhere.
Obviously, your first thought is probably “Oh, SCTV.” That is fair. That’s definitely where O’Hara first rose to fame. The Canadian sketch show had a truly legendary cast. It feels like every Canadian comedy legend of a certain age worked on that show. However, before that, and running concurrently with SCTV, O’Hara actually got her first regular role on a show calling Coming Up Rosie.
Naturally, I had to look into the show. Coming Up Rosie was a Canadian sitcom that ran from 1975 through 1978. It’s about the tenants living in a building in Toronto. The main character was Rosie Tucker, played by Rosemary Radcliffe, who is an aspiring documentary filmmaker. Coming Up Rosie ran for three seasons and 32 episodes. The cast, though, is a really stunner looking back at it.
O’Hara was on the show, of course. She played a character named Myrna Wallbacker. However, I didn’t decide to write about this show just because of one eventually famous cast member. Another actor on Coming Up Rosie was John Candy, who played Wally Wypyzypywchuk. He was also on SCTV concurrent with his time on the show. Lastly, there’s the man who played the building’s superintendent Purvis Bickle. That man? Dan Aykroyd. Now, if you do the math you may have questions. To which I say, yes, Aykroyd was on Coming Up Rosie at the same time he was on Saturday Night Live. While he was helping to revolutionize television comedy in the United States, Aykroyd was also doing a role on a Canadian sitcom.
Congratulations to Coming Up Rosie for being probably the obscure Canadian TV show with the best cast of all time.
