Words: Scott Harrell

Some say the YouTube generation is killing the sibling arts of comedy writing and performance, particularly with regard to sketches. It's certainly an arguable position – why would anybody take the time to recruit a cell of like-minded co-conspirators, hone writing and acting skills, and scam a suitable venue when you can stick a half-full bottle of Natty Light in your rectum, have someone videotape you bending over and throwing up, title it “Drinking Cheap Beer in Reverse” and watch the views rack up?

The other side of that coin, however, is user-generated video's built-in ability to expose millions of viewers to classic stuff they might not have seen before. Blogs, easily embeddable viewers and sites like YouTube might be crammed with questionable talent and out-and-out shite, but they've also extended both the shelf-life and fanbases of genius, formerly obscure fare such as British sketch show Big Train (featuring a pre-Shaun of the Dead Simon Pegg), mid-'90s MTV offering The State, and currently-blowing-up Fuse/IFC series The Whitest Kids U' Know.

In short, without the Internet's anarchic uploadability, fringe-comedy fans might not have been treated to this spring's reunion tour by The Kids in the Hall – quite possibly the sharpest and most influential troupe of the last 20 years.

When Saturday Night Live producer Lorne Michaels shepherded Canadians Dave Foley, Bruce McCulloch, Mark McKinney, Kevin McDonald and Scott Thompson to HBO in 1989, nothing remotely like the quintet's singular brand of comedy had been seen on American television since Monty Python's Flying Circus. As SNL settled into current events and pop-culture parody, The Kids in the Hall attacked office politics; dysfunctional family dynamics; ass-probing aliens; homoeroticism among sports fans; Satan; gay lifestyles and more with a wicked mix of biting satire and unhinged absurdity. Their show's most beloved recurring characters – among them a horny lady who was half-chicken, a cigar-smoking womanizer with a cabbage for a head, and a man who defeated his enemies by “crushing their heads” between his fingers from a distance – made Saturday Night's presidential impressions seem tame; their ability to play women without winking incited both homophobic ire and critical acclaim. It's no stretch to say The Kids' bold twists on the genre directly influenced not only virtually every sketch show to come along since, but also the performance-as-theater-workshop vibe of current alternative stand-up shows on both coasts.

The Kids' TV run wasn't a long one. They were picked up by CBS in '92, and the show's final episode aired in '95. Most fans came into the fold via endless reruns on Comedy Central, allowing the troupe's one collective film project,  '96's Brain Candy, to become a cult hit. Since then, they have worked on innumerable film and TV projects individually and occasionally in twos and threes, coming together as The Kids only for a pair of short tours in the early '00s, and a small handful of barely publicized L.A. theater appearances.

Until last year, when Foley, McKinney, McCulloch, McDonald and Thompson reunited for a gig at the 25 th anniversary of Canada's vaunted Just For Laughs Comedy Festival. The group found its unique collaborative energy intact, and the new material generated for Just For Laughs demanded another performance (along with a packed Q&A session) at this year's Sketchfest in San Francisco. Which, in turn, spurred the current North American tour, The Kids' first in six years.

It's impossible to know whether or not their enduring web presence was a crucial factor in the decision to mount another Kids in the Hall tour. But it's also hard to believe that all the sites, chat groups and fan-uploaded videos didn't play a persuasive role. If nothing else, they provide ample evidence of a continued passion for smart, well-crafted fare like The Kids' inimitable take on sketch comedy. And if it has to share cyberspace with 10,000 clips of dancing cockatiels and skaters farting the alphabet, maybe that's still a pretty even proposition.

The Kids in the Hall perform at Orlando's Hard Rock Live on May 22, and Clearwater's Ruth Eckerd Hall on May 23.   

kidsinthehall.com