USC Comedy at the School of Cinematic Arts,
USC Visions and Voices: The Arts and Humanities Initiative,
and the Jack Oakie and Victoria Horne Oakie Charitable Foundation,
invite you and a guest to attend
 

The Jack Oakie & Victoria Horne Oakie
Masters of Comedy Lecture Series
featuring

CATHERINE O'HARA

USC Comedy's 2023 Oakie Award Recipient

Moderated by John Michael Higgins

7:30 P.M. on Saturday, February 25th, 2023

Norris Cinema Theatre at the Frank Sinatra Hall
3507 Trousdale Parkway, Los Angeles, CA 90007

FREE ADMISSION. OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. RSVP REQUIRED.
 

CLICK HERE TO RSVP

Presented during the USC Comedy Festival, Vol. 6,
taking place from February 24th - 26th, 2023

Visit the USC Comedy Festival, Vol. 6 Homepage: http://cinema.usc.edu/ComedyFestival
Follow the USC Comedy Festival, Vol. 6 on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/USCComedy
Follow the USC Comedy Festival, Vol. 6 on Instagram: @USCComedy
Follow the USC Comedy Festival, Vol. 6 on Twitter: @USCComedy

This year, the USC Comedy Festival is pleased to partner with Postmates!
Attendees at the Festival will be eligible to redeem a code good for $25 off your Postmates order.
Codes will be available for attendees only. No order minimum. One per user.

About Catherine O'Hara

Catherine O’Hara is a prolific, multi-award-winning actress, writer, and comedian whose film credits include lead and supporting roles in Beetlejuice, Home Alone, Home Alone 2: Lost in New York, After Hours, Heartburn, The Life Before This, Penelope, Away We Go, Where the Wild Things Are, A.C.O.D., The Right Kind of Wrong, Nightmare Before Christmas and many more.

O’Hara has collaborated with Christopher Guest and co-writer Eugene Levy four times on the critically acclaimed mockumentary films Waiting for Guffman, Best in Show, A Mighty Wind, and For Your Consideration. Her performance in the latter won her the 2007 National Board of Review Award for Supporting Actress. O'Hara has made many guest appearances on top-rated television series including Six Feet Under and Curb Your Enthusiasm. Her role in the HBO’s Temple Grandin earned her Primetime Emmy, Satellite, and Screen Actors Guild Award nominations.

O’Hara first performed with Toronto’s Second City Theatre and later, with fellow alumni including Eugene Levy, created the iconic sketch comedy show SCTV. O’Hara won an Emmy Award® and earned four Emmy® nominations for her writing on the show.

In the final two seasons of the hit CBC series, Schitt’s Creek, Catherine received an Emmy Award® for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series, a Golden Globe Award® for Best Performance by an Actress in a Comedy Television Series, a SAG Award® for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series, a Critics’ Choice Award for Best Actress in a Comedy Series, a TCA Award for Individual Achievement in Comedy, and multiple Canadian Screen Awards for Best Performance by an Actress in a Continuing Leading Comedic Role amongst others. O’Hara also garnered Emmy®, Golden Globe® and SAG® awards in the Best Ensemble categories alongside her cast mates Eugene Levy, Dan Levy, and Annie Murphy.

About John Michael Higgins

John Michael Higgins is one of the busiest, best-known and respected character actors in America.  His wide-ranging forty-year career defines almost the entire gamut of possibilities for the American actor— from Shakespeare to sitcoms, from Broadway to Anime to game shows and video games and pretty much everything in between. Mr. Higgins has indeed “done it all.”
 
Currently the host of SPLIT SECOND and AMERICA SAYS on Game Show Network (for which he has received his second EMMY nomination), highlights of his other television work include Wayne Jarvis on ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT and the ever-growing popularity of his character Chuck Pierce on Tina Fey’s GREAT NEWS (NBC, Netflix). Countless other TV credits include SEINFELD, FRASIER, KATH AND KIM, ALLY MCBEAL, etc. He also provides the voices of many popular animated characters in BOB’S BURGERS, THE LEGEND OF KORRA, HARVEY BIRDMAN, TEENAGED MUTANT NINJA TURTLES, and many others.
 
As for film, Mr. Higgins was recently seen in Paul Thomas Anderson’s LICORICE PIZZA and is particularly known for his portrayal as John Smith, the clueless and verbose commentator in all three PITCH PERFECT films. But his most ardent fans cite his work as a member of the Christopher Guest company in A MIGHTY WIND and specifically for his portrayal of Scott Donlon, the fabulous Shih Tzu handler, in BEST IN SHOW. They may also mention his award-winning portrayal of David Letterman in the HBO Film THE LATE SHIFT.

Other film credits include THE BREAK-UP (yes, that’s him urging “Come-come, on the kick-drum!”), YES MAN, FRED CLAUS, COUPLES RETREAT, EVAN ALMIGHTY, FUN WITH DICK AND JANE, ALMOST CHRISTMAS, and WAG THE DOG, just to name a few.
 
Before film and television he spent 20 years on the stage, mostly classical theater, starting at the age of eleven in Washington, D.C., and ending up on Broadway. He is a Phi Beta Kappa Summa Cum Laude graduate of Amherst College and is proudest of all to be the husband of Margaret Welsh and the father of Walter and Maisie, two long-time CSArts-SGV students.

About the Oakie Award

USC Comedy at the School of Cinematic Arts is dedicated to recognizing and preserving the legacy of the great comedy artists whose work illuminates, leavens and enriches our lives. In that spirit, USC Comedy hosts the annual The Jack Oakie & Victoria Horne Oakie Masters of Comedy Lecture Series to award a visionary comedian with the Oakie Award for exceptional achievement in film and television comedy. Previous award recipients have included Bill Hader, Nancy Meyers, Kenya Barris, Steve Carell, James Burrows, Paul Feig, Mel Brooks, James L. Brooks, Judd Apatow, Lisa Kudrow, Barnet Kellman, David Isaacs, Phil Rosenthal, and Tim Story.

About the Jack Oakie and Victoria Horne Oakie Charitable Foundation

The Jack Oakie and Victoria Horne Oakie Charitable Foundation’s mission is to follow through with the late Jack Oakie’s wish, “Give the money to the kids,” by underwriting lectures on comedy and scholarships for deserving film and theater students at some of the most prestigious institutions in the country. Mrs. Oakie instructed the Trustees of the Foundation to keep her husband’s legacy alive and enhance the value of visual performing arts education.

Both Jack Oakie and Victoria Horne Oakie were active participants in and during the famous Golden Age of Hollywood. Between them, they acted in more than 122 films over a 60-year period. Their contributions to acting and comedy can now be passed on to a new generation with the help of their Foundation scholarships.

About the USC Comedy Festival, Vol. 6

The 6th Edition of the USC Comedy Festival returns to campus in person this February to celebrate community and share laughter, while exploring the changing nature of comedy in contemporary society.

The festival kicks off with standup comics Niles Abston, Jena Friedman, Alyssa Limperis, Christina Catherine Martinez, and Moses Storm debating the topic: Does Comedy Have to be Funny? with Vulture Senior Editor Jesse David Fox. On Saturday, the Women of Cinematic Arts (WCA) return with the ever popular Women of Comedy panel, this year featuring two unique sessions - one featuring showrunners, writers and directors, including Debby Wolfe (Lopez vs. Lopez), Brittani Nichols (Abbott Elementary), and SCA Alumna Thembi Banks (Only Murders in the Building), and one highlighting on-screen performers, including Emily Hampshire (Schitt’s Creek), Lauren Ash (Superstore), and Andrea Savage (I’m Sorry, Veep). Saturday afternoon, Jesse David Fox will explore The Changing Flavor of Series Comedy with Showrunners Rachel Bloom (Crazy Ex-Girlfriend), Steve Levitan (Modern Family, Reboot), and Gina Yashere (Bob Hearts Abishola). The festival's Saturday night program will honor legendary comic actress and Emmy-winner Catherine O’Hara (SCTV, Beetlejuice, Home Alone, Waiting for Guffman, Schitt’s Creek), recipient of our 2023 Jack Oakie and Victoria Horne Oakie Masters of Comedy Award, in conversation with John Michael Higgins (Best in Show). Our final day will shine a spotlight on the 2023 Best Picture Nominated feature Triangle of Sadness with Best Director Nominee Ruben Östlund, followed by Marvel’s She-Hulk: Attorney at Law with Series Creator Jessica Gao, and conclude with An Evening with Billy Eichner, hosted by Emmy-winner Wayne Federman.

Visit the USC Comedy Festival, Vol. 6 Homepage: http://cinema.usc.edu/ComedyFestival
Follow the USC Comedy Festival, Vol. 6 on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/USCComedy
Follow the USC Comedy Festival, Vol. 6 on Instagram: @USCComedy
Follow the USC Comedy Festival, Vol. 6 on Twitter: @USCComedy

About USC Comedy at the School of Cinematic Arts

In 2010 USC became the first university in the nation to offer a program dedicated to training filmmakers in the art of comedy. USC Comedy at the School of Cinematic Arts offers instruction in the writing, directing, production as well as the history and theory of comedy. Students work with a distinguished, award-winning faculty of comedy professionals to discover and develop their comedic voices, while getting unrivaled access to the field through workshops, internships, demonstrations and screenings and festivals.

USC Comedy boasts an award-winning faculty that includes Jack Epps Jr. (The Secret of My Success, Legal Eagles, Top Gun), Barnet Kellman (Murphy Brown, Mad About You, George Lopez), David Isaacs (Cheers, Frasier, M*A*S*H*), Robert Townsend (Diary of A Single Mom, The Parent Hood), Rob Schiller (The King of Queens), Andy Cadiff (Last Man Standing, Spin City), Jay Kogen (The Simpsons, Frasier), Chris Guerrero (BuzzFeed, Super Deluxe), Dave Goetsch (The Big Bang Theory), F J Pratt (Sullivan & Son) and Tim Marx (Young Sheldon), to name just a few.
 
Our students benefit from the expertise and participation of SCA Comedy Alumni such as Jay Roach (Austin Powers, Meet the Parents), Tim Story (Barber Shop, Ride Along), Judd Apatow (Girls, Superbad, Knocked Up),  Paul Feig (Bridesmaids, Spy), Peter Segal (Tommy Boy, Get Smart), Gabe Sachs (Freaks and Geeks), Jason Reitman (Juno, Up in the Air), Nahnatchka Khan (Fresh Off The Boat), Prentice Penny (Insecure), Cathy Yuspa & Josh Goldsmith (What Women Want, King of Queens), Thembi Banks (Only Murders in the Building), Tracy Oliver (Girls Trip, First Wives Club), Jon M. Chu (Crazy Rich Asians), among many other luminaries and industry professionals.

For more information, visit: http://cinema.usc.edu/comedy

About USC Visions and Voices: The Arts and Humanities Initiative

Visions and Voices is a university-wide arts and humanities initiative that is unparalleled in higher education. The initiative was established by former USC President C. L. Max Nikias during his tenure as provost in order to fulfill the goals set forth in USC's strategic plan; to communicate USC's core values to students; and to affirm the human spirit. Emphasizing the university's commitment to interdisciplinary approaches, the initiative features a spectacular array of events conceived and organized by faculty and schools throughout the university. The series includes theatrical productions, music and dance performances, conferences, lectures, film screenings and many other special events both on and off campus. Each program invites students to dialogue and interact with artists, writers, professors and special guests. These interactions provide a dynamic experience of the arts and humanities and encourage active exploration of USC's core values, including freedom of inquiry and expression, team spirit, appreciation of diversity, commitment to serving one's community, entrepreneurial spirit, informed risk-taking, ethical conduct and the search for truth.

Visit the Official Visions and Voices Website: https://visionsandvoices.usc.edu/
Follow Visions and Voices on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/VisionsAndVoices
Follow Visions and Voices on YouTube: @uscvisionsandvoices7970
Follow Visions and Voices on Instagram: @USCVandV
Follow Visions and Voices on Twitter: @USCVandV
Follow Visions and Voices on TikTok: @USCVandV

#visionsandvoices

Contact Information

Name: Alessandro Ago
Email: aago@cinema.usc.edu