Mark McKinney
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| Mark McKinney | |||||||
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 McKinney holding a producer credit for The 1 Second Film in September 2004 |
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| Born | Mark Douglas Brown McKinney June 26, 1959 Ottawa, Ontario, Canada |
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Mark Douglas Brown McKinney (born June 26, 1959) is a Canadian comedian and actor, best known for his work in the long-running sketch comedy troupe The Kids in the Hall. Following the run of their television series (1989 to 1995) and feature film (Brain Candy), he went on to star in Saturday Night Live from 1995 to 1997. From 2003 to 2006, he co-created, wrote and starred in the acclaimed mini-series Slings and Arrows, a TV show about a Canadian theatre company struggling to survive while a crazy genius director haunted by his dead mentor helps the actors find authenticity in their acting.
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[edit] Early life
McKinney was born in Ottawa, Canada. Since his father was a diplomat, he did a lot of traveling when he was young. Some of the places he lived while growing up were Trinidad, Paris, Mexico, and Washington, D.C. He also attended Trinity College School, a boarding school in Port Hope, Ontario. For a short while, McKinney was a student at Memorial University of Newfoundland where he was a political science major.
[edit] Acting career
[edit] The Kids in the Hall
He started doing comedy with the Loose Moose Theatre Company. There, Mark met Bruce McCulloch. Together they formed a comedy team called, “The Audience.” Eventually, Mark and Bruce moved to Toronto, and met Dave Foley and Kevin McDonald. Dave and Kevin were in the process of forming a comedy troupe. Along with Scott Thompson, who joined after coming to a stage show, and producer Lorne Michaels, The Kids in the Hall was formed in 1989.
Notable "Kids" characters played by McKinney include the Chicken Lady, Darill (pronounced da-RILL), bluesman Mississippi Gary, and Mr. Tyzik the Headcrusher, an embittered Eastern European who pretends to crush the heads of passersby between his thumb and forefinger.
McKinney is a versatile member, who adopts countless different voices, accents, and personalities to match each bizarre skit.
[edit] Saturday Night Live
After the end of Kids in the Hall, McKinney joined the cast of another Lorne Michaels sketch comedy show, Saturday Night Live.
[edit] Movie appearances
He has appeared in several films, including the SNL spinoffs Superstar, The Ladies Man and A Night at the Roxbury. McKinney also starred opposite Isabella Rossellini in Guy Maddin's acclaimed tragicomedy The Saddest Music in the World. He also appeared in the Spice Girls' movie Spiceworld.
McKinney cowrote and starred in the Kids in the Hall movie Brain Candy, in which, among other roles, he spoofed SNL and KITH executive producer Lorne Michaels.
[edit] Theater
His Theater appearances include 'The Ugly Man' with One Yellow Rabbit at the Edinburgh Fringe festival & Glasgow. He was in the cast of The Roundabout theater production of 'Flea in her ear' and David Lindsay Abaire's 'Fuddy Meers' for the Manhattan theater club. During the fall of 2001 McKinney performed the one-man show "Fully Committed" at the Wintergarden theater in Toronto and again in the summer of 2002 at the Centaur Theater in Montreal, Canada.[1]
[edit] Latest appearances
His latest appearances on television have been as a cast member on the CBC comedy Hatching, Matching, and Dispatching, the first season of Robson Arms, as well as on the hit Canadian comedy Corner Gas, as an American who came to Dog River by accident.
From 2003 to 2006, he co-created, wrote and starred in the acclaimed mini-series Slings and Arrows, a TV show about a Canadian theatre company struggling to survive while its crazy genius director haunted by his dead mentor helps the actors find authenticity in their acting.
In 2006-7 he both worked as a story editor on, and appeared in, NBC's Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, playing a writer/story editor for the show-within-a-show. [2]
As well, he directed and appeared on the CBC Radio post-apocalyptic comedy Steve, The First and its sequel, Steve, The Second, for his friend Matt Watts.
In the summer of 2007 he became the producer and executive story editor of 'Less Than Kind' a new Canadian half hour comedy starring Maury Chaykin.
[edit] Family
Mark has two children, Christopher Thomas Russell (born March 4, 1996), and Emma Jane (born 2001). He has two siblings, an older sister, Jayne, and a younger brother, Nick, who was a member of the sketch comedy troupe The Vacant Lot and worked for The Awful Truth, The Daily Show and Insomniac with Dave Attell.
[edit] References
- ^ Barratt, Amy (2002-07-11). "Kid makes good". Montreal Mirror. Retrieved on 2008-07-18.
- ^ Kois, Dan (2006-10-23). "Can Studio 60 Be Saved?". Slate.com. Retrieved on 2006-10-24.
[edit] External links
| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| NAME | McKinney, Mark |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | McKinney, Mark Douglas Brown |
| SHORT DESCRIPTION | comedian |
| DATE OF BIRTH | June 26, 1959 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Ottawa, Canada |
| DATE OF DEATH | |
| PLACE OF DEATH | |
