James Mullinger - Brit Happens: Or Living the Canadian Dream

I dont even like British people, but I love James Mullinger and Brit Happens.

MARY WALSH

In Brit Happens, Mullinger masterfully straddles the line between objective and inclusive, culturally and geographically. He gently pokes us with a stick while being one of us. I cant wait for the Brit to hit the fans!

JONATHAN TORRENS

James Mullinger is my favourite comedian friend who has relocated from England to New Brunswick. And Im not just saying that because he is the only one. Brit Happens is a great glimpse inside the mind of a British man who becomes more Canadian seemingly by the minute and who might just appreciate the magic of the Canadian Maritimes even more than born and bred Atlantic Canadians. Which I realize might be fighting words to Atlantic Canadians. So fight him if you want to, I guess. But youll be fighting one of your own.

STEVE PATTERSON

We should all be curious about the origins, motivations, and unrelenting optimism of James Mullinger. While his contagious good mood still remains a bit of a mystery, all else is laid out here in fine, hilarious form. Brit Happens is a wonderful read.

ALI HASSAN

I would love to hate James Mullinger. Hes hilarious, insightful, giving and seems to have an absolutely endless amount of energy for creative output. And he makes it all look so darn easy! But the truth of it is, I cant. Am I surprised James wrote a book? Of course not. Am I surprised its filled with hilarious and touching stories from his unique and intelligent perspective? Not at all. Does it piss me off that he makes it all look so easy? You bet it does!

DAVID MYLES

The East Coast won the comedy jackpot when James Mullinger decided to make the Maritimes his home. On top of being a brilliant storyteller, James makes me laugh until my stomach hurts.

ALYSE HAND

Brit Happens*

*Or Living the Canadian Dream

JAMES MULLINGER

Goose Lane Editions

Copyright 2022 by James Mullinger.

All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher or a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency (Access Copyright). To contact Access Copyright, visit accesscopyright.ca or call 1-800-893-5777.

Edited by James Langer.

Cover and page design by Julie Scriver.

Cover photograph by Sean McGrath.

Printed in Canada by Friesens.

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Title: Brit happens* : *or living the Canadian dream / James Mullinger.

Names: Mullinger, James, author.

Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20210364068 |

Canadiana (ebook) 20210364130 | ISBN 9781773102412 (softcover) | ISBN 9781773102429 (ePUB)

Subjects: LCSH: Mullinger, James. | LCSH: ComediansNew BrunswickBiography. | LCSH: Canadian wit and humor. | CSH: British CanadiansNew BrunswickBiography. | LCGFT: Autobiographies.

Classification: LCC PN2308.M85 A3 2022 | DDC 792.702/8092dc23

Goose Lane Editions acknowledges the generous support of the Government of Canada, the Canada Council for the Arts, and the Government of New Brunswick.

Goose Lane Editions

500 Beaverbrook Court, Suite 330

Fredericton, New Brunswick

CANADA E3B 5X4

gooselane.com

For Pam, Hunter, and River

The problem with you limeys is that you come over here and think you can change this country. You cant change Canada. Canada will change you.

A Canadian border agent to Mike Myerss Liverpool-born father

Perhaps I was always meant to be a Canadian.

I wanted that to be the first sentence in my book because thats the first sentence Ive written as a Canadian citizen. Thats right. I swore my oath here at my desk just moments ago. Exciting, eh?

See what I did there? The ceremony is already having an effect on me.

Despite this being the beginning of the book, these are really the last words I will write before this tome is published. Its an odd feeling, being here at the end and about to begin the story. But its fitting as well because Im sitting here as a newly minted Canadian reflecting on the journey that brought me to this place. Im looking forward and back at the same time, which, coincidentally, is how this book begins.

And this is a book filled with coincidence.

I have been living and making a living as a comedian in Canada since February 14, 2014, and there hasnt been a dull moment. Around every corner, I have met with the unexpected. Or the unexpected has tracked me down. And recently, out of that chaotic swirl of random events that I suppose makes up the majority of our lives, I learned of another coincidence or possibility or impossibility, I guess that determined what the first sentence of this book would be: this belief that I was meant to be a Canadian.

Now I should first say that this book exists as a result of a rather massive, global twist of fate, a pandemic that changed all of our day-to-day lives. In fact, it turns out that lockdowns and social distancing are an excellent recipe for writing. If youve ever wondered what the writing life is like, well, now you know its lockdown and social distancing.

Anyway, this past year and a half of near-solitary confinement, in which the only thing that seemed to be missing was my bright orange prison jumpsuit, also meant that I couldnt perform in front of live audiences. And it meant I couldnt see my brother, Nick, who lives in British Columbia. So when I was able to get back on the road to perform live, it was a huge relief, and I was overjoyed to travel to BC to perform six sold-out shows in three nights in Lake Country, Penticton, and Kelowna.

You see, by coincidence, Nick, like me, married a Canadian. Well, when I say by coincidence, I really mean he totally copied me, but its a rather fortuitous kind of brotherly imitation because, after not seeing each other for two years, it meant I didnt have to leave the country to see him, and he could drive me to my shows in BC. It also meant I could visit his home in Vernon to reconnect with his wife, Jesie (the Canadian), and my niece Lily (the dual citizen).

While there, I studied the family photographs on the wall, marvelling at how much Lily had grown, laughing at photos of Nick and me as kids, and then noticing an old black-and-white photograph of a young woman swimming in a lake, a smile of pure radiance and joy on her face. She looked intensely familiar. Whos this? I asked Nick, although I had a suspicion.

Thats Mum, he said. He explained that the lake in the photograph was the same lake we had driven past just moments before en route from Kelowna to Vernon.

When my mum was twenty, she was studying to be a physiotherapist at Middlesex Hospital in London, and it was there that she met her best friend, Nancy, a Canadian studying in the UK, who invited my mum to stay with her family in Vancouver one summer. On that trip, they visited the Okanagan Valley and that magical photo was taken.

My mother fell in love with the place, so she returned to the UK to complete her studies but with plans to actually move to British Columbia upon graduation. Months later, however, as fate would have it, on New Years Eve 1971, she met a charming young gentleman and fell in love. That young gentleman was my father (or would soon be my father), and the rest may not be history as such, but its my history, and it meant that my mothers Canadian plans were discarded in favour of our family and life in a London suburb.