In the late 1940s, Broadfoot returned home and participated in
community theatre in Vancouver, eventually gravitating towards comedy. He moved to Toronto in 1952 and for ten years was a writer and performer in the
stage revues
Spring Thaw and
The Big Review. In 1962,
Spring Thaw had a run at the
Hammersmith Theatre in
London,
England under the name
Clap Hands, with a cast that included Broadfoot,
Corinne Conley,
Jack Creley and
Eric Christmas. In the 1950s and 1960s, Broadfoot appeared on several CBC television shows, including
The Big Revue, the
Wayne and Shuster Show, and
Comedy Café, on the
Ed Sullivan Show in the U.S. in 1955, and on radio with
Funny You Should Say That. He also had occasional film roles in the early 1970s, including in the films ''
Hold on to Daddy's Ears (Tiens-toi bien après les oreilles à papa)
, The Rebels (Quelques arpents de neige)
, Enuff Is Enuff (J'ai mon voyage!)
and The Sloane Affair''. From 1973 to 1993 he was a member of the radio version of the
Royal Canadian Air Farce. In addition to stand-up routines in the traditional format, Broadfoot created a number of recurring characters including, most notably: • Big Bobby Clobber, a professional
hockey player who seemed to have taken a few too many hits or else was not very sharp to begin with. • David J. Broadfoot, the Honourable Member of Parliament for Kicking Horse Pass, representing the New Apathetic Party. (
Kicking Horse Pass is a mountain pass in the
Canadian Rockies with a negligible population.) • Sgt. Renfrew of the
Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP). Broadfoot performed this character for the RCMP on a number of occasions, receiving 'promotions' over the years. He was an honorary
Sergeant-Major. Broadfoot also wrote the scripts for a
comic strip adaptation based on this character, which was drawn by Olga Urbansky in the late 1970s. After leaving Air Farce, Broadfoot toured comedy clubs and appeared at the
Just for Laughs festival. He starred in the 1998 comedy special,
Old Enough To Say What I Want, and two years later in
Old Dog, New Tricks, winning
Gemini Awards for both. He wrote an autobiography, also entitled
Old Enough to Say What I Want (). He retired in 2005. Beginning in 2006, the
Canadian Comedy Awards gave the Dave Broadfoot Award for Special Achievement. He also did voices for two animated Christmas specials,
George and the Christmas Star and
Bluetoes the Christmas Elf, and made a guest appearance as a hospital patient in the hit TV series,
Puppets Who Kill. Broadfoot died on November 1, 2016, at the age of 90. == References ==