MAESTRO FRESH WES + KEN HALL + MAXWELL McCABE-LOKOS

On this episode of the Richard Crouse Show we meet Maestro Fresh Wes. He’s the "Godfather of Canadian hip hop," a record producer, an actor, and author who adds competition show host to his resume with “Race Against the Tide.” He plays host to 10 of the world's best sand sculpting duos and throws down a challenge each week on the show: create show-stopping sculpture at New Brunswick's iconic and beautiful Bay of Fundy, before the world's largest tides flow in and wash their sculptures away. Watch the show on Sundays on CBC and CBC Gem at 8:30 p.m. We’ll also meet Ken Hall. If you are a fan of The Umbrella Academy, the Netflix series about a a dysfunctional family of adopted sibling superheroes who reunite to solve the mystery of their father's death and the threat of an imminent apocalypse, you’ll know Ken Hall. He’s played two roles on the show, Pogo, the talking chimpanzee and analytics specialist Herb. We’ll talk about working on the series and how he went from social work to the business of being funny. Finally, Maxwell McCabe-Lokos, director of a new film called Stanleyville a new darkly humorous social satire now on VOD, stops by. Imagine if Samuel Beckett wrote “Squid Game,” minus the giant Kewpie doll, and you’ll get the idea of “Stanleyville.” It is a social satire, structured around a series of strange games administered by an odd moderator called Homunculus. The contestants are challenged to everything from balloon blowing contests to “writing a national anthem for everybody everywhere through all time.” As the games go on, escalating consequences pit the players against one another. It’s a cool move that is part Squid Game, part Lord of the Flies and part Samuel Beckett.