A CFTR radio DJ who became one of SCTV's most versatile impressionists
Rick Moranis
Before Ghostbusters and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, Toronto-born Rick Moranis worked Toronto radio and stand-up before joining SCTV, where his Bob McKenzie character became a genuine pop-culture phenomenon.
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Rick Moranis was born in Toronto in 1953 and started his entertainment career young, working as a radio DJ at Toronto stations including CFTR while also performing stand-up and voice work around the city's comedy scene. He joined the Toronto-based sketch show SCTV in 1980, alongside fellow Toronto talents including Catherine O'Hara and Eugene Levy, quickly becoming one of the show's most versatile cast members.
From Bob McKenzie to Hollywood
Moranis and co-star Dave Thomas created the characters Bob and Doug McKenzie, exaggerated stereotypical Canadian brothers whose toque-and-flannel "hoser" routine became a genuine pop-culture phenomenon, spinning off a hit comedy album and the 1983 film Strange Brew. Moranis moved into Hollywood films through the 1980s and early 90s, starring in Ghostbusters (1984), Little Shop of Horrors (1986) and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids (1989), before largely stepping back from acting in the late 1990s to raise his children after his wife's death, a decision that made him something of a Hollywood rarity: a star who walked away near his commercial peak.
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