MONTREAL—When Sergeants Lajoie and Bourgignon get the call, they hit the streets. They’re fictional language police, passionate, but bungling.
In a dystopia invented by creator Rodney Ramsey, two comedians bring Bill 101 to its extreme. The short video posted on YouTube shows the pair busting two English speakers. In this future version of Quebec, English is prohibited.
The English dictionary found in one of the men’s pockets? That’s two years of mandatory French school. You don’t even want to know the punishment for English muffins.
The wayward Anglophones in the movie refer to the cops as the ‘Poutine gestapo.’ According to Ramsey, events over the past few months in Quebec were too close to fiction not to spoof.
“Really after the whole Pastagate thing happened, it was a no brainer, just the phrase, ‘Language Police,’ you know,” said Ramsey.
He found people are passionate about the language issue, but what he's seen lately has gotten out of hand.
“I've been an English comic for a long time and I’ve always been around French comedians. For us it's not a big deal. We look at it as pure satire and we want to shine a light on it,” said Ramsey.
What they believe keeps it from being offensive, is that the cast is made of both French and English comedians, who proceeded to storm CTV Montreal’s set—in character.
“What's happening here, you have the permission to film in English?” demands comedian Sebastien Bourgault.
The comedian knows it pushes the envelope, but he thinks going after restaurants that sell fish and chips is a lot worse.
“We say fish and chips, we say crazy carpet, sleeping bag,” said Bourgault. “I’m very ashamed for other people outside Quebec who think all French people think like that. We don't think like that.”
Co-star Derek Seguin hopes the series will actually help calm any language tensions.
“Maybe they will see through the satire that this is how we see it. It's a little bit extreme to fine someone $600 for the word pasta,” said Seguin.
The first episode of language police is already on YouTube. More will start appearing on Monday. It may be the first time you find anything funny about Bill 101.
PS. We were warned by the sergeants that CTV now stands for “Caline de bonne T.V.” Shrug.