00:00:00 Mackenzie Charbonneau

Imagine yourself on a stage a glaring spotlight blinding your eyes. Thousands of people screaming your name, and the inescapable army of beloved fans. Where do you think you are? I can promise you you didn’t answer Ottawa. I’m your host, Mackenzie Charbonneau, and in this episode last call, entertainers in Ottawa, we examine how fame is hard to come by in our government.

00:00:20 Mackenzie Charbonneau

town.

00:00:29 Mackenzie Charbonneau

I spoke with three local performers, Adriana expose a drag queen Kareem, an Afro beats musician, and Alex Wood, a comedian. In this episode, we will explore why performers choose to stay in our city, examine why some decide to leave.

00:00:44 Mackenzie Charbonneau

As we seek solutions to this complex issue.

00:00:48 Mackenzie Charbonneau

Our first guest, Kareem, is no stranger to building opportunities for himself, bringing Afrobeats to Ottawa presents challenges, but rather than waiting for the scene to grow, Kareem founded Woke Studios, a space for artists to collaborate and showcase their work. The studio is garnering financial support from the city as well as Canadian broadcasters.

00:01:07 Kar33m

When I moved to Ottawa in 2014, I went to a creatively inclined school. After graduating from the experience that I gained, I started doing shows myself and with a few community leaders like Jakoda, who was an indigenous black rapper as well. So he was one of the first we would put me on platforms.

00:01:30 Kar33m

And teach me you know how to record my music and that and also just introduce me to different people in the other music scene and from practicing with him and just, you know, putting on shows and releasing songs. I gained some notoriety and.

00:01:46 Kar33m

I’m a business owner as well, so I lead a creative collective and I started that after graduating high school as well. So, but yeah, so from creating my business and practicing with Dakota, I got the chance to be nominated for Spirit of the Capital Award from Youth Ottawa and that was great.

00:02:06 Kar33m

And that helps me hone into my business skills and also be in a different league just to understand how the music business is run and how to move as a community leader and not just an art.

00:02:17 Mackenzie Charbonneau

Kar33m thinks that grants are also essential to young musician.

00:02:21 Kar33m

Yeah. So a great resource for Canadian artists is grants. So doing grants is, yeah, that’s it can be a lifeline when you’re starting off and just trying to figure things out.

00:02:33 Mackenzie Charbonneau

Sandra O, the famous Ottawa based actress, was asked a question at Toronto International Film Festival. A fan wanted advice on how to make it big in Ottawa. This is how I responded.

00:02:44

Leave Ottawa.

00:02:47

I’m sorry. I love my hometown.

00:02:50

When I left.

00:02:52 Mackenzie Charbonneau

But this sentiment is not unheard of. Many new entertainers are encouraged to perform in Toronto or Montreal. The most popular show destinations, or move their work to the states. Comedian Alex Wood knows the struggle well, seeking more opportunities in the early 20 tens, he found that Ottawa’s small comedy scene made it difficult to build a brand.

00:03:13 Mackenzie Charbonneau

What made you move to Toronto?

00:03:15 Alex Wood

So yeah, I moved January 2013 and I 100% moved for more career opportunities in Toronto. I still think that if you want to make a living at this, you gotta move to Toronto, where Vancouver still, that’s just sort of the nature of show business. That’s not exclusively Canada.

00:03:38 Alex Wood

Like if you live in America and you wanna really try to get to the next level, you have to move to LA or New York.

00:03:45 Mackenzie Charbonneau

What is your take on the work opportunities available in Ottawa?

00:03:50 Alex Wood

Well, I started in 2005 and the most you could get on stage then was as a brand new comic was twice a month, and that was if you were lucky. And now the scenes involved, there’s tons of shows like there’s open mics, absolute comedy now has a Monday and a Tuesday night.

00:04:11 Alex Wood

For up and coming comics, obviously, like a lot of a lot of them were big name comedians come through Ottawa now too. I think that.

00:04:19 Alex Wood

I remember when Jerry Seinfeld did the NAC. It was like notorious there was lineups like down the street because like a big comic like that so seldom came through Ottawa. So kind of like from the the top down, it’s just it’s a really like thriving comedy scene. Now there’s there’s more people.

00:04:39 Alex Wood

Than ever doing it, there’s more shows than ever, and then now I find out that there’s more than just shawarma restaurants and the senators here, and it seems like it’s actually fun to live in Ottawa now.

00:04:53 Mackenzie Charbonneau

For many, picking up your life and relocating can be challenging, but Ottawa can work for money. Drag Queen Adriana expose is well known in our city, hosting weddings, deejaying and performing locals are a steady audience for Queens like Adriana. But Entertainment isn’t a full time job. Adriana warns potential stars of the risks of show business.

00:05:15 Adrianna Exposee

And even then, like I, I would not recommend anyone ever do drag full time in Canada. But that’s just me. Like, I think it’s really healthy to do drag and have something else as well because there’s nothing for you. Like it’s like any kind of show business. Like you don’t have necessarily insurance, you don’t.

00:05:34 Adrianna Exposee

Of you don’t have like a stable income raise, so something happens to you physically, you’re out of Commission and that’s why, like, personally I try to do as many different things as I can and not just lip synching because I’m always so scared of that. That’s like a a fear of mine is like, what if I get?

00:05:49 Adrianna Exposee

Injured or something?

00:05:50 Adrianna Exposee

Like that and I can’t work. Tomorrow I want to still be able to like DJ.

00:05:54 Adrianna Exposee

Or post an event. So I I think you can do it and I know people that do do it and it works out great for them. I think if someone were starting out.

00:06:08 Adrianna Exposee

Here in Ottawa and we’re looking to replace their current job with drag. I would say that’s like that. There would be like a three to four year sort of learning curve between the two things.

00:06:20 Mackenzie Charbonneau

So I have to ask what got you into initiating weddings?

00:06:25 Adrianna Exposee

Yeah, yeah. Great question. When I started doing DJing, I did a lot of research and I was like, OK, what kind of DJ am I gonna be? Am I gonna be a club DJ? Am I gonna be a wedding DJ? So yeah, I decided to be sort of like a mobile DJ and.

00:06:41 Adrianna Exposee

From there I just noticed that I was doing a lot of weddings and I had done like a mock.

00:06:48 Adrianna Exposee

Wedding in terms of marrying two people like they were already married, but they had me dress up and do the ceremony for them. So like for pictures and I looked into it and it seems really easy to get ordained. But it’s there’s so many like.

00:07:05 Adrianna Exposee

Obstacles that you have to go through, like at first I was like, this looks kind of.

00:07:09 Adrianna Exposee

Easy and then?

00:07:11 Adrianna Exposee

All like I’m Jewish. All the churches wanted me to, like, have a baptism. And I was like, that feels sort of like weird to me. I don’t want to.

00:07:19 Adrianna Exposee

Do that.

00:07:19 Adrianna Exposee

So there were only like 5 churches left then, and then three of them were like, oh, we don’t allow you to marry same sex people. And I was like, so I’ve been like on the back end.

00:07:31 Adrianna Exposee

Sort of like.

00:07:32 Adrianna Exposee

Calling and e-mail those those churches back and forth just to understand better while also doing my my ordination.

00:07:38

Yeah.

00:07:39 Adrianna Exposee

Eventually, yeah, I was just like, I kind of want to offer as much as I can in one day and include as many people as I can. So, like, right now I I do like I can marry people. I can. I can see the event. DJ, I have a photo booth that I can rent out. And so as a result like I can.

00:08:00 Adrianna Exposee

I can bring some of my uh, my close friends and like people I already work with like other Queens or, you know, production assistants, and they can help me out with, like, things that I I can’t do all at once and it just makes for a great working environment. So.

00:08:15 Adrianna Exposee

I think I.

00:08:15 Adrianna Exposee

Was.

00:08:16 Adrianna Exposee

Just at first, it was sort of like this seems like a cool thing to do and seems right up my alley. And then the more I did it, the more I realized it was in line with like what I was already working on personally.

00:08:30 Mackenzie Charbonneau

Many residents work in the public sector, where job Security benefits and a steady paycheck are the norm.

00:08:36 Mackenzie Charbonneau

Pursuing entertainment as a career means stepping away from the stability and taking on a financial risk. This can make it harder to build a strong arts community as many potential performers opt for safer career paths beyond individual successes. The city itself is making changes. Ottawa has recently appointed a nightmare, Matthew Granden, tasked with revitalizing nightlife and.

00:08:58 Mackenzie Charbonneau

Advocating for entertainers.

00:09:00 Mackenzie Charbonneau

Musician Kareem is feeling very optimistic about the addition of a nightmare.

00:09:07 Kar33m

So in terms of the nightlife, same verdict, it’s it’s growing, it’s getting better. Now there’s there’s a nightlife community. I hope you know it’s it. Uh, it triples the effort that’s already happening right now. I think the decent amount of opportunities, but for someone who practices in my.

00:09:28 Kar33m

Genre not as much as that should be, so I create our for Beats music and so often we do have to find either ourselves. Making our own shows or we find ourselves.

00:09:44 Kar33m

In different cities for different opportunities. But if you’re an artist and model and you’re practicing rap and you know more in the hip hop side, then opportunities plenty, there’s clubs that you can go to, there’s different people. I think it’s just the city is more primed for hip hop.

00:10:02 Kar33m

Than it is for afrobeats and also it’s it’s great for folk as well. There’s bars. There’s a lot of open mic opportunities but for.

00:10:14 Kar33m

Other genres it might be tougher, it might be tougher, but again, I have faith that the nightlife committee can do, you know, something different and help it grow.

00:10:25 Mackenzie Charbonneau

So does Ottawa deserve its reputation as the city that fun for God? If you ask our guests, the answer is complicated. The scene exists, but it’s less exciting than other Canadian cities for those who stay. It’s a labour of love, and for those who leave, it’s a sign that Ottawa still has a long way to go.

00:10:43 Mackenzie Charbonneau

Make sure to watch our previous episodes covering the cost of good time and consumer reactions to Ottawa struggling nightlife.

00:10:50 Mackenzie Charbonneau

Make sure to check out our website and get to know our guests and more information about downtown Ottawa in the next episode. Habone will cover the politics of partying, exploring the policymakers side of nightlife. That’s a wrap. See you next time.