Stark Reflections on Writing and Publishing

EP 408 - Definitely A Chat With Definitely The Real Alex Lifeson (AKA Tony Binns)

Mar 27, 2025

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Mark interviews Tony Binns, an award-winning stand-up comedian and screenwriter whose feature #ROXY was nominated for 3 Canadian screen awards, 3 Canadian Comedy Awards, and took home Best Feature at the Ampia awards as well as Best Feature for Teens at the Kidscreen awards. Tony is also the man behind the parody profile on Facebook called Definitely The Real Alex Lifeson where he pretends to be a guy pretending to be the real guitarist from Rush.

Prior to the interview, Mark reads comments from recent episodes, shares a personal update, which includes a few engagements he'll be speaking at in person and virtually:

IN PERSON: (Brantford, ON) Brantford Public Library (April 2, 2025 from 6 PM to 7:30 PM) – Inside the Writer’s Mind: Mark Leslie Lefebvre on Ghosts and Paranormal Storytelling
VIRTUAL: (Online) The BookFest (April 6, 1:30 PM Eastern). Keynote: Writer, The World Needs You: Why Your Writing Is More Important Than Ever
IN PERSON: (Los Angeles, CA) Writers of the Future. Week of mentoring winning writers and Gala Dinner/Evening celebrating this year's winners on April 10, 2025

Mark then shares a word about this episode's sponsor.

This episode is sponsored by Toronto Indie Author Conference, taking place April 26 & 27, 2025 in Toronto, ON. The schedule appears below

Learn more about Toronto Indie Author Conference 2025 here.

In their chat, Mark and Tony talk about:

How Tony is a multi-faceted nerd who used to tape episodes of SCTV so he could play them back and memorize them
Being big into Monty Python and, of course, Rush
Always thinking that he was going to be an actor and his love of Shakespeare, but always getting the comedic parts
Being a good actor but not being so good at auditioning because he freezes when put in a pressure situation
Founding a comedy sketch troop called Obscene But Not Heard which was partially inspired by his love for Kids In The Hall
Evolving into doing stand-up despite being a shy person
Deciding to leave stand-up comedy around the time that Covid hit
The movie XROXY (a modern tale based on Cyrano de Bergerac) that Tony wrote after he pitched it to some producers he had done some other work for
Having a strength for dialogue but a weakness when it comes to plot
Being brought in to help punch up an episodic YouTube series that was a campy horror flick and make it funnier (TRUCKSTOP BLOODSUCKERS)
Tony's most recent script entitled SAVING MR. CHRISTMAS and how it evolved into a completely different movie than the one that he originally pitched
The "we love this, change everything" thing that happens with movies
Tony's WAITING FOR WAITING FOR GODOT which is a show about two women waiting for a production of the play Waiting For Godot which never happens, and how that play was inspired by the way that days could blur together for people, particularly as we get older and "become that guy"
Being a Rush fan since he first heard "Spirit of Radio"
How Tony was inspired to create a fake Alex Lifeson account on Facebook after he's seen a fake Geddy Lee account
The relation between ADHD and being "all in" on something -- like Rush, Monty Python and Rush for Tony
How, during Covid Tony did a one-man reading of Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Doing a Canadian overdub of Dragonball Z
Adapting a pilot from a Canadian novel called The Smeltdog Man by Frank Macdonald and leveraging the "Deadpool" style of breaking the fourth wall
Advice that Tony would give to the young nerdy Mark and Tony
How Tony used to write sketches even though he didn't have an outlet for them
The Dungeons & Dragons podcast that Tony is a part of called The +2 Rodcast
And more . . .

After the interview Mark reflects on a few things that came up in the discussion.

Links of Interest:

The introductory, end, and bumper music for this podcast (“Laser Groove”) was composed and produced by Kevin MacLeod of www.incompetech.com and is Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0