Comedian Ivan Decker.

Comedian Ivan Decker.

Ivan Decker in Surrey as comedy show-opener for TV’s ‘Mr. D’

Gerry Dee headlines April date at Bell Performing Arts Centre

Gerry Dee will be joined by some special guest performers on his spring tour, which includes a date at Surrey’s Bell Performing Arts Centre on April 5.

For different shows on the Canadian tour, Kelly Taylor, Erica Sigurdson, Ivan Decker and Darrin Rose have been named as show-openers for the Mr. D star.

In Surrey, Decker will open for Dee, and will also perform in Vancouver (on April 6) and Victoria (April 4).

In Kelowna, the Surrey-raised Sigurdson will perform at the community centre there, on March 30.

The Ontario-based Dee is set to do a “20 Years of Stand Up” tour that promises to include jokes about marriage, fatherhood and his years as a teacher. “Performances are recommended for ages 14 and older,” Live Nation Canada noted in a release Thursday.

Ticket details are posted to gerrydee.com and ticketmaster.com, or call 1-855-682-6736.

No stranger to Vancouver-area audiences, Decker won the 2018 Juno Award for Comedy Album of the Year, for I Wanted to Be a Dinosaur.

Last April, Decker headlined a show at the fledgling Pink’s Comedy Club at Surrey’s Flamingo Hotel, as part of a comedy series planned at the long-established entertainment venue, which has since closed and is slated for demolition.

Dee last appeared at the Bell in November 2015, as headliner of a Just For Laughs tour.

Based on Dee’s real-life experiences as a high school teacher, the Mr. D show follows the misadventures of schoolteacher Gerry Duncan, nicknamed “Mr. D,” as he struggles to keep one step ahead of his students at a private school.

The sitcom debuted in January 2012 to 1.23 million viewers – the highest-rated premiere for a CBC scripted show in seven years. The show ended its eight-year run with a finale last December.

Meantime, Shopbrain has launched a contest as part of Dee’s national tour, “offering fans a chance to win a trip to Toronto to see Gerry Dee live and meet him after the show on May 24,” the company says in a release. “The winner will also receive two roundtrip tickets to Toronto, a two-night hotel stay, and a framed copy of the final Mr. D script signed by Gerry.”

Visit shopbrain.com for details about how to enter on social media platforms.

Surrey Now Leader