Dave Thomas (actor)

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See the David Thomas disambiguation page for other people with this name.

Dave Thomas (born May 20, 1949) is a Canadian comedian and actor. He was born in St. Catharines, Ontario, but moved to Dundas, Ontario with his family to attend High School. He attended Dundas District high school and graduated with honors from McMaster University of Hamilton, Ontario.

He is the eldest son of John and Moreen Thomas. John E. Thomas (1926-1996) was a noted medical ethicist, head of the Philosophy Department at McMaster University, and the author of several books. Moreen Thomas was a church organist for 30 years and noted composer of church music. He is the older brother of Canadian singer-songwriter Ian Thomas.

Starting his career at ad agency McCann Erickson in 1974, after a year, he became the head writer of the Coca-Cola account in Canada. He then moved from the Toronto office to New York at the request of agency client Coca-Cola.

He was a cast member of the Toronto production of Godspell along with Victor Garber, Martin Short, Eugene Levy, and Andrea Martin. Paul Shaffer of Late Night with David Letterman was the musical director.

He first achieved fame as a cast member of the Canadian syndicated comedy series SCTV, where he portrayed, among other characters, "Doug" of Bob and Doug McKenzie fame. Bob is protrayed by Rick Moranis. Other memorable characters included angry, if succinct editorialist Bill Needle, Scottish scone-chef/bluesman Angus Crock, speedy ad announcer Harvey K-Tel, Lowery organist/curio pitchman Tex Boil and the unforgettable "Cruising Gourmet".

He introduced John Travolta and his wife Kelly Preston when he put them together for the first time in the Paramount film Thomas directed entitled The Experts (1989).

He wrote for, produced, and starred in the 1990 CBS TV series The Dave Thomas Comedy Show.

In 1991 Dave officially starred in the critically acclaimed Showtime comedy, Public Enemy #2 which made Time magazine's 10 Very Best list for Television that year.

Starting in 1993 he officially co-starred in Grace Under Fire.

In 1996, Thomas wrote the book SCTV: Behind the Scenes.

In 2000, Dave Thomas was chosen to host the first annual Canadian Comedy Awards in Toronto.

As of 2001, Thomas has been the Executive Creative Director of Animax Entertainment [1], an animation studio based officially in Culver City, CA.

As of 2004, Thomas was on the official Advisory Committee for the Comedy program at Humber College, the only such diploma program in the world.

In 2003 Thomas and Moranis reprised the voices of the McKenzie Brothers in Disney's animated feature Brother Bear.

In 2005, Thomas had a guest stint as Uncle Trevor on Fox's Arrested Development.

In 2006 Thomas reprised his voice role in Brother Bear 2 and appeared as himself in the feature film The Aristocrats.

Contents 1 Awards 2 Filmography 3 Trivia 4 External links

[edit] Awards

• ACTRA AWARD for Best Variety Performer in 1978.
• Emmy Award in 1981 for Outstanding Writing in a Variety or Musical Program.
• Canadian Juno Award for Best Comedy Album of the Year in 1981.
• Nominated for a Grammy Award in 1983 for "Best Comedy Album"
• Juno Award in 1983-84 for Best Comedy Album of the Year.
• Golden Reel Award in 1983 from the Canadian Motion Picture Distributors Association.
• With the cast of Grace Under Fire won a People's Choice Award in 1994 for best new show.
• Earl Grey Award in 1995 for his work on SCTV.
• In 2003 he was added to Canada's Walk of Fame.

[edit] Filmography

• SCTV (1976-82)
• Home to Stay Television MOW (1978)
• Stripes (1981)
• Strange Brew (1983)
• Follow That Bird (1985)
• My Man Adam (1985)
• Moving (1988)
• Love at Stake (1988)
• Rocket Boy (1989)
• The Experts - director (1989)
• Boris and Natasha (1992)
• Cold Sweat (1993)
• Coneheads (1993)
• Ghost Mom - director (1993)
• Kidz in the Woods Television (1995)
• Picture Perfect (1996)
• Rat Race (2001)
• New Beachcombers (2002)
• Who's Your Daddy (2003)
• Beethovens 5th (2003)
• Brother Bear (2003)
• Intern Academy (2004)
• White Coats (2004)
• The Aristocrats (2005)
• Santas Slay (2005)
• Brother Bear 2 (2006)

[edit] Trivia

Celebrities impersonated by Thomas on SCTV include:

• Richard Harris,
• Bob Hope,
• G. Gordon Liddy,
• Liberace,
• DeForest Kelley,
• Michael Caine,
• Randy Newman,
• Hal Holbrook (as James Whitmore),
• Carl Sagan,
• Walter Kronkite,
• Ken Osmond,
• Fred Travalena (as Jim Nabors),
• Neil Simon, *Lee Iacocca,
• Al Pacino (as Steve Burns),
• Robert Duvall,
• Lloyd Bridges,
• Red Buttons,
• Benny Hill,
• Bennett Cerf,
• Art Linkletter,
• James Herriot,
• Orson Welles,
• Phil Donahue,
• Alexander Solzhenitsyn, and
• Jerry Brown.

[edit] External links

• Dave Thomas at the Internet Movie Database
• Dave Thomas page at Godspell.ca
• Animax Entertainment
• SCTV on DVD Campaign
• SCTV on DVD Campaign ezBoard
• SCTV on DVD Campaign Blog