MONTREAL SKETCHFEST WITH PUN INTENDED! (MONTREAL), CHEAP WINE (TORONTO), & THE UNDERSTUDIES (TORONTO)
Pun Intended! is a Montreal sketch troupe featuring Christian, Gaël, Thomas, Mahsa, and Andrea, five performers with various backgrounds in sketch comedy, stand up, music, improv, clown, theatre and dance.
Though they have crossed paths in various shows and creative projects around the city, this marks the first time they have joined forces as a dedicated troupe. Pun Intended! brings together their different styles and strengths to create fast paced, playful comedy that highlights each performer’s voice.
Expect clever wordplay, musical bits, bold characters, and the occasional burst of physical comedy. With sharp writing and high energy performances, the troupe brings together artists with various backgrounds to create bold, collaborative comedy.
Because when five comedic collaborators walk into a sketch show, the result is exactly what the name promises: Pun Intended!
CHEAP WINE (TORONTO)
Cheap Wine has been described as: “the perfect blend of deadpan and whackadoodle”, “successfully unique”, “joyfully absurdist”, “raunchy and fun”, “so fully alienating that I dissociated”. This show is about doctors.
Cheap Wine is family. For real. As in, two of them lived together as children and two of them live together now as life partners and they’ve all known each other since before they could (legally) buy their own cheap wine. That’s sweet and wholesome, also kind of weird!
They won the Audience Choice Award at Toronto Sketchfest 2025, sold out their wine-tasting comedy show ‘Is It Juice?’ and were voted the 2023 Toronto Sketchfest ‘Sketchiest Sketch Troupe’. They’ve performed in festivals and shows throughout Toronto and across North America together, including most recently at Second City Toronto and Toronto Fringe Festival, and they’ve created award-winning film sketches along the way. This is their 4th Montreal Sketchfest (????????????), and they are so honoured and excited to be here.
They have a website that is www.cheapwine.cheap (yes, really) an Instagram that is @itscheapwine.
THE UNDERSTUDIES (TORONTO)
The Understudies are a seasoned Toronto-based sketch troupe featuring Rob Knox, Meg MacKeigan and Justin Skinner.
Together, they perform fast-paced, polished sketches with characters and scenarios that turn common tropes upside down, peppering familiar scenes with stupidity, strangeness, and occasionally existential darkness. Beyond standard sketch comedy, the Understudies add music, messiness and straight-up madness, though each scene somehow remains grounded and coherent. Expect unexpected twists and turns! Just come along for the ride! They promise it’ll be fun!
Active from 2000 to 2010, the Understudies retired and then resurfaced in 2022 and have since played in the past four Toronto Sketch Comedy Festivals, winning the Producer’s Pick award in 2025. They also founded the TOSF’s Understudies Memorial Sketchiest Sketch Troupe Award in 2011.
They also made the finals of the 2025 Sketch to the Death competition and have performed throughout their sketch careers at Just for Laughs Toronto, the Cream of Comedy, and the We’re Funny That Way Festival, among countless other shows.