The Kids in the Hall: Cast, Best Sketches & 2022 Revival

The Kids in the Hall are a five-man Canadian sketch troupe (Dave Foley, Bruce McCulloch, Kevin McDonald, Mark McKinney and Scott Thompson) whose TV series ran from 1989 to 1995 on CBC in Canada and on HBO and later CBS in the US. They played most of the women themselves, built characters that felt like real, damaged people, and made a sketch show that was by turns surreal, melancholy, queer and very silly. It has aged better than almost anything from its era.

This guide covers how the troupe came together, the cast, the characters and sketches worth knowing, the film, the reunions, the 2022 revival on Prime Video and where to watch it all in 2026.

How the troupe formed

The Kids in the Hall came from two pairs. In Toronto, Dave Foley and Kevin McDonald were already performing as a duo under the Kids in the Hall name. In Calgary, Bruce McCulloch and Mark McKinney were part of a group called The Audience. The two pairs met in Toronto in 1984 and merged. Scott Thompson joined in January 1985, completing the line-up that has stayed fixed ever since. (Paul Bellini, later a writer and on-screen presence on the show, was briefly part of the early rotating line-up.)

The name is a showbiz reference. Sid Caesar is said to have used “the kids in the hall” for the young writers who hovered outside his writers’ room hoping to get a joke into the show. It was misattributed to Jack Benny for years.

The troupe built its act on Toronto stages in the mid-1980s, with a regular following at the Rivoli on Queen Street West. That live grounding matters: like the British performers covered in our history of British alternative comedy, they developed their characters in front of small, loyal crowds long before a camera was involved.

Lorne Michaels and the TV series

Saturday Night Live creator Lorne Michaels, a Canadian himself, took an interest and produced the series. A one-hour pilot aired on HBO and CBC in 1988. The regular series premiered on HBO on July 21, 1989, and on CBC on September 14, 1989.

The show ran on CBC through 1995. In the US, HBO aired the first three seasons and CBS picked up the remainder for its late-night Friday slot from 1993. Reruns on Comedy Central through the 1990s introduced the troupe to a second wave of American fans. Over the run the troupe made more than 100 episodes.

Michaels was a protective rather than controlling producer. The troupe wrote and performed its own material, and the show’s look (lots of film, real Toronto locations, a theme tune by the instrumental band Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet) is unmistakably theirs. The show won Gemini Awards for best comedy series in 1992 and 1993, a Rose d’Or in 1993, and Emmy nominations for writing.

What made it different

A fixed ensemble that played everybody

Five performers did nearly everything, including most of the female roles. Crucially, the drag was rarely the joke. The Kids played secretaries, mothers and office workers as people, not as men in wigs, which gave the sketches an odd tenderness that American sketch of the time almost never had.

Characters with inner lives

Because the cast never changed, characters could recur for years and deepen. Some were one-joke premises that somehow kept working; others felt like short stories. Several sketches simply stop, on a sad or strange note, rather than landing a punchline.

Queerness on screen

Scott Thompson was openly gay at a time when that was very rare for a North American TV comedian, and the show reflected it. His character Buddy Cole was a flamboyant, sharp-tongued gay man who talked to the camera about whatever he liked, and the comedy came from his wit rather than from his sexuality being treated as a punchline. That was unusual in network comedy of the late 1980s and early 1990s, and it is one reason the show still feels modern.

Shot like short films

Much of the show was shot on location rather than on a studio stage, and the troupe were happy to let a piece be atmospheric, musical or dreamlike. That cinematic approach to sketch fed directly into what Mr. Show did a few years later in Los Angeles.

The cast

Dave Foley: the troupe’s most natural leading man, equally good as the normal guy or the unhinged one. Went on to star in the NBC sitcom NewsRadio (1995–1999) and do extensive voice work, including Flik in Pixar’s A Bug’s Life.
Bruce McCulloch: the angriest, most musical and most punk of the five, responsible for many of the show’s songs and monologues. Later directed feature films including Superstar (1999) and Stealing Harvard (2002), and created the CBC sitcom Young Drunk Punk.
Kevin McDonald: the sweet, panicky, slightly lost presence, and a skilled sketch writer. Later known for voice work, notably Pleakley in Lilo & Stitch.
Mark McKinney: the strangest performer in the group and the creator of many of its oddest characters. Joined Saturday Night Live as a cast member from 1995 to 1997, then co-created and starred in the acclaimed Canadian theatre comedy-drama Slings & Arrows and starred in Superstore.
Scott Thompson: the provocateur, creator of Buddy Cole and Danny Husk. Played Brian, Hank Kingsley’s assistant, on The Larry Sanders Show, and later a recurring role as a forensic investigator in Hannibal.

Characters and sketches to know

The show produced dozens of recurring characters. These are the ones people still quote and search for. Descriptions are our own.

The Head Crusher (Mark McKinney): Mr. Tyzik, a bitter man who “crushes” the heads of strangers by pinching them between his fingers from a distance, using forced perspective. One of the purest visual gags in sketch history, and one that never wore out.
Buddy Cole (Scott Thompson): monologues delivered straight to camera, usually from a bar, full of gossip, cruelty and surprising insight. The 2022 revival brought him back.
The Chicken Lady (Mark McKinney): a half-woman, half-chicken looking for love, a premise so odd that the sketches become genuinely touching by sheer commitment.
Gavin (Dave Foley): a small boy who attaches himself to strangers and talks at them, unstoppably, about whatever he is fixated on.
Danny Husk (Scott Thompson): a mild corporate everyman at the AT&I company, the troupe’s long-running satire of office life.

Some of the best-loved material isn’t built on a recurring character at all: Kevin McDonald’s song “These Are the Daves I Know,” the brief and baffling “Thirty Helens Agree,” and countless one-off office and family sketches that end on a shrug.

Brain Candy and the split

After the TV series ended in 1995, the troupe made a feature film, Kids in the Hall: Brain Candy (1996), about a pharmaceutical company that markets a drug which locks people in their happiest memory. The production was famously tense, the film did poorly at the box office and the five went their separate ways for a few years. Time has been kind to it: Brain Candy has a real cult following, and its satire of a pill for happiness looks sharper now than it did in 1996. In 2014 the troupe performed a live reading of the screenplay at the Toronto Sketch Comedy Festival.

Reunions: tours and Death Comes to Town

The Kids reunited for a North American tour in 2000, documented in the film Same Guys, New Dresses, and kept coming back: a set at the Just for Laughs festival in Montreal in 2007, a 30-plus-city tour in 2008, and many dates since.

The most substantial reunion before 2022 was Death Comes to Town, an eight-part CBC miniseries that premiered on January 13, 2010 (and on IFC in the US that August). It’s a single, serialised murder mystery set in a small Ontario town, with the five playing almost every resident. It is the best proof that their ensemble chemistry survived the years apart.

The 2022 Prime Video revival

Amazon announced a revival in March 2020, and eight new half-hour episodes arrived on Prime Video on May 13, 2022, billed as the first Canadian Amazon Original series. All five members returned, with Lorne Michaels as executive producer.

The revival is uneven, as any reunion thirty years on would be, but better than many expected. Its strengths are the things that were always strongest: the performers’ total commitment to strange premises, the willingness to let a scene be sad, and Scott Thompson’s Buddy Cole, who adapts easily to 2020s culture. If you love the original, it’s worth your time; if you’re new, start with the 1989–1995 series.

Alongside the revival came The Kids in the Hall: Comedy Punks, a documentary directed by Reginald Harkema that premiered at the Hot Docs festival in 2022 and then streamed on Prime Video. It’s an affectionate, candid history of the troupe, including the tensions that nearly broke them up, and it’s the best single introduction to who these five people are. As of 2026, no second revival season has been released.

Legacy and influence

The Kids in the Hall are a cornerstone of what became alternative comedy in North America. Their influence shows up in three places:

American alt sketch. Mr. Show with Bob and David picked up the idea of sketch as short film, and Tim and Eric took their weirdness further still.
Queer comedy on television. Buddy Cole showed that a gay character could be the smartest person in the room rather than the butt of the joke.
The troupe model. A small, fixed group writing and performing its own material over many years, the same logic behind The State, Stella and many YouTube-era sketch groups.

For the decade around them, see our history of alt comedy in the 1990s.

Where to watch The Kids in the Hall

As of 2026, the original series, the 2022 revival and Comedy Punks are on Prime Video in many regions. Brain Candy moves between rental and subscription services. A complete-series DVD set was released in the 2000s and is easy to find secondhand. Availability differs between Canada, the US and elsewhere, so check locally.

Frequently asked questions

Who are the members of the Kids in the Hall?

Dave Foley, Bruce McCulloch, Kevin McDonald, Mark McKinney and Scott Thompson. All five are alive and all five returned for the 2022 Prime Video revival.

When was The Kids in the Hall first on TV?

A one-hour pilot aired on HBO and CBC in 1988. The regular series premiered on HBO in July 1989 and on CBC that September, and ran until 1995.

Why is it called The Kids in the Hall?

The name comes from Sid Caesar, who reportedly used the phrase for the young writers who hung around outside his writers’ room pitching jokes. The phrase was long misattributed to Jack Benny.

Is there a Kids in the Hall revival?

Yes. Amazon released eight new half-hour episodes on Prime Video on May 13, 2022, with all five original members and Lorne Michaels producing, alongside the documentary Comedy Punks. As of 2026 no second revival season has been released.

Where can I watch The Kids in the Hall?

As of 2026 the original series, the 2022 revival and Comedy Punks are on Prime Video in many regions. Availability varies by country, so check your local services.