Nirvanna Duo Illegally Skydives Off CN Tower for Movie
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- Matt Johnson and Jay McCarrol originated their 'Nirvanna the Band the Show' characters in a 2007-08 mockumentary web series that Vice TV later picked up for two seasons, playing two incorrigible no-hopers trying to land a gig at Toronto's Rivoli club without a single song.
- Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie combines Jackass-style life-endangering stunts, Borat hidden-camera comedy, and a Back to the Future plot: the duo install a flux capacitor in their RV and travel from 2025 back to 2008 to secure the Rivoli slot, inadvertently creating an alternate timeline.
- McCarrol pushed for an illegal skydiving sequence off Toronto's CN Tower EdgeWalk platform — 356 metres (1,168ft) up — to give the film 'scope,' describing the meticulously planned stunt as '90% stressful' with 50 incremental targets to hit.
- Johnson and McCarrol incorporated footage from a real May 2024 shooting outside Drake's Toronto mansion into the film after dashing to the crime scene, with Johnson calling the resulting rough-cut 'the highest high' of the entire production.
- The film's humor marks a tonal shift from the original series: gone are the N-word, P-word, 'comedy' Indian accents, and homophobic insults, though Johnson stops short of fully condemning the earlier material — saying he remains 'animated by that same feeling: show me the edge.'
- Johnson also directed Blackberry and is directing the forthcoming Anthony Bourdain biopic 'Tony' starring Dominic Sessa and Leo Woodall, while McCarrol was formerly half of synth duo Brave Shores, whose song 'Never Come Down' was turned into a 10-hour MAGA-supporting Donald Trump dancing video loop.
Why it matters: The film represents a 17-year arc for Johnson and McCarrol's comedy: they've consciously retired the racist and homophobic edge of their web-era material while preserving the boundary-pushing stunt ethos — now aimed at a theatrical audience and a Rivoli capacity of just 240. The CN Tower base jump and the real-crime-scene Drake footage show the lengths to which the duo will go for material whose payoff is booking a neighborhood bar gig.
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