Now Magazine (July 2004)

Their jest desserts: comics get the last laugh at the Fringe

...Stand up Nile Séguin also uses personal experience in his show, Fear Of A Brown Planet, but his target is the comedy community itself.

In the business for nearly a decade, Séguin, who was born in Ottawa and is part Rwandan, part French-Canadian, was shocked when he was told early on by a club owner that he could be a "black guy who isn't black."

"That was a great note for my career to start on." he jokes, "in retrospect, it was foreshadowing."

Séguin says it is hard being a brown man in a black-and-white industry. His first Toronto agent, he says, tried to get him on Yuk Yuk's monthly All-Black Comedy Night, even though he didn't want that.

One of the low points came when Séguin auditioned for an audio gig but was allowed only to read for the urban American hiphop character and not the French chef, even though he considers himself more French-Canadian than black.

"I guess I never wanted to be a comic who did nothing but race material," he explains.

"The first rule is that you write about what you know. Sure, I'm brown, but I deal with a lof of otherstuff during the day. I like to think that if we all were to wake up and find we're all from the same race, I'd have a lot more than 15 minutes of material."

Séguin keeps the facts straight but tries to avoid naming names.

"I want the show to be funny and intelligent. I don't want to blame. The last thing I want is club owners cowering in the back feeling insulted. That's not fun for anyone."...