The newly released trailer for the long-awaited small screen return of Canadian comedy troupe The Kids In The Hall care of Prime Video provided glimpses of a few faces well-known to fans of the sketch comedy series’ original 1989-1995 run. While some characters absent from the trailer are assumed to return — such as Kevin McDonald and Dave Foley’s Simon and Hecubus — one is much less likely to reappear, an exclusion worthy of reconsideration.
A semi-recurring character for the first two seasons of the show, Bruce McCulloch’s Cabbage Head was a sexist lech who occasionally presented himself as an enlightened man of the ’90s (albeit one whose knowledge on gender equality stopped with “Women’s Lib”), as a pretense to further ingratiate himself with a desired mate. And when called out for his boorish behavior, as he almost invariably always would be, Cabbage Head would deflect those criticisms against him as personal attacks for his having being born with a cabbage for head. With the trailer indicating the new episodes won’t shy away from the original run’s edgier aspects, the idea of a creepy misogynist using progressive societal trends to pick up women while reversing criticism at every turn is a more pointed and relevant target now than it was decades ago.
Cabbage Head — apparently both a description and the character’s real name — was introduced to the masses in a 1988 CBC/HBO special showcasing a selection of notable sketches from The Kids In The Hall’s live performances at Toronto’s Rivoli Theater. A five-year, 100-episode series followed, with 1996’s feature film Kids In The Hall: Brain Candy book-ending this era for the troupe as they moved on to separate solo projects. Sporadically reuniting for tours, a narrative-driven 2010 series The Kids In The Hall: Death Comes To Town followed. In 2020 the series revival for Prime Video was announced, leaving long-time fans waiting with bated breath to see which of the series’ bevy of popular characters would return.
Bruce McCulloch’s Cabbage Head is an example of peak The Kids In The Hall — a combination of astute cultural observation wrapped up in a nonsensical sight gag. Appearing in two additional sketches across the first and second seasons, Cabbage Head’s fourth and final appearance saw him the target of left-wing paramilitary group Humanoids for Humanism (led by another of McCulloch’s regular characters, Shona). This attack ended with him gunned down, cabbage sprayed across a nearby crowd. Miraculously surviving, Cabbage Head alleged to have turned his life around and became born-again from the experience, while in actuality remaining lascivious as ever.
As one-note a character as they come, Cabbage Head’s sketches revolved around attempts to seduce women with a combination of barely concealed sleazy bravado and half-hearted attempts at charm. On occasion, he’d vary his attempts at evoking sympathy beyond his being born with a cabbage for a head by bringing up a difficult childhood, during which he endured such tragedies as sending away for sea monkeys that got lost in the mail. While many of Kids‘ recurring characters had similarly eccentric hooks, those reappearing across multiple episodes demonstrated growth and development. Even Mark McKinney, best known in recent years as Superstore’s long-suffering manager Glenn, saw his signature character “Chicken Lady” grow across her appearances (however incrementally). Not Cabbage Head. He entered the show a creep and left the show a creep.
While a comedy series first and foremost, The Kids In The Hall wasn’t afraid to wade into areas “mainstream” fare would avoid. This extended beyond the absurd styling that would take hold on fellow forward-thinking sketch series of the era, and into the more substantive cultural matters of the day. In Cabbage Head, McCulloch cannily put an eye toward misanthropic chauvinism with a caricature of a “Rat Pack”-esque womanizer with a bizarre gimmick. As to why Cabbage Head — which, it bears repeating, was his actual name — was born with a cabbage for a head went unrevealed, a fleeting mention that his father was a farmer was the closest the show came to an explanation (and even then, it was during a ploy for sympathy as he revealed his father once drunkenly attempted to harvest his head).
Cabbage Head made one final appearance after a fashion, with McCulloch briefly donning the “cabbage head” at the end of an unrelated monologue in the third season finale. Perhaps a relic of the early years of the show as it transitioned from material originally developed for live performances to content crafted to be filmed in a studio or elsewhere, Cabbage Head is The Kids In The Hall in a nutshell. An example of something rich with insight and awareness crossed with an absurd visual. It also has as much, if not more, to say about gender politics now than it did 30 years ago, and is a character worth revisiting as The Kids In The Hall make their much-anticipated return.
The Kids In The Hall returns on May 13th exclusively on Prime Video.
Read Next
About The Author