The Merkin Sisters

Past ShowsAll

Jan 1

Written By Ingrid Hansen

A picture of performers Ingrid Hansen and Stephanie Morin-Robert wearing black hats and squinting at the camera

two live shows

dark pop album

merkins.

The Album

LIVE PHYSICAL COMEDY SHOWS

Show description

Daughters of the now-defunct Merkin Empire, these formerly-famous sisters leave the house for the first time in a decade as they risk everything to present their Ultimate Work of Art. A mash-up of uncensored comedy, theatre, dance and puppetry, The Merkin Sisters is a vivacious romp sending up our inner caveman and our ultra-queens, smothered with the unique flavour of absurdity that comes from siblings surviving childhood together.

Co-created and Performed by Stephanie Morin-Robert and Ingrid Hansen
Stand-up comedian Stéphanie Morin-Robert, Juno-nominated comedy songstress Shirley Gnome, and physical comedy artist Ingrid Hansen have spent a decade touring their live comedy shows across North America. Then they convened to write a dark-pop comedy album together. The three multi-award-winning femme comedians holed themselves up in an apartment in Winnipeg in the darkest of January, only venturing out for short walks in the perpetual blizzard to buy wine and chocolate. The resulting album, THE MERKIN SISTERS, is a five song genre-smashing EP with the vibes of a high-budget pop album and cheeky, surprising lyrics.

The album features a sweet and sultry french crooner about murdering abusers and fonduing their flesh in chocolate. A trashy pop tune raises a glass to the Diva Cup and its bloody contents. The Merkin Sisters embody their male dirtbag personas for a husky, revved up country jam with a screaming hook, “DON’T EVER APOLOGISE FOR YOUR BODY!”
Hansen and Morin-Robert began touring their no-holds-barred physical comedy duo The Merkin Sisters to sold-out crowds in 2017. Critics describe their work as “hilarious, terrifying and utterly baffling,” (Vue Weekly Magazine) and “wild and unimaginable, but PISS-YOUR-PANTS FUNNY,” (Montreal Rampage Review). Whether smash dancing in full-body-covering curly ginger suits of hair, turning a pastel-pink woolen sweater into a vulva puppet for an operatic birth scene, or divulging the audience’s darkest secrets on stage, The Merkin Sisters broke the brains of audiences and critics across North America and have been looking forward to ‘birthing’ a new project together ever since, thanks to the generous support for the Canada Council for the Arts’ Digital Now initiative.
Merkin Sisters Hansen and Morin-Robert met comedy musician Shirley Gnome touring the Canadian Festival circuit and had an instant appreciation for each other’s uncensored, subversive, and empowering humour. “Shirley made me laugh so hard I snorted beer up my nose,” says Hansen. “We instantly felt a connection and knew we wanted to welcome her into our MERKIN EMPIRE.” added Morin-Robert. “Being in the raucous crowd of their shows felt like a newfound solidarity with likeminded people,” Gnome finished. Gnome has been heralded as “The Queen troubadour of intelligent dark-comedy sex balladry” by the Edmonton Sun. Her latest solo album Decoxification went to #1 on the Itunes Comedy Charts in Canada and was nominated for a Juno Award for Comedy Album of the Year. Chart-topping Fake Shark front man and Juno award winner Kevvy helmed the production of the EP, rounding out this critically acclaimed team.