Article content

Talk about timing: A few hours prior to hosting and launching the Just for Laughs festival’s Nasty Show series Wednesday night at Metropolis, Mike Ward learned that he had been slapped with a $42,000 fine from Quebec’s Human Rights Tribunal.

Ward, a crossover vedette in this province, was ordered to pay physically disabled singer Jérémy Gabriel $35,000 and his mother, Sylvie Gabriel, $7,000, in moral and punitive damages for targeting Jérémy in his act from 2010 to 2013, when he was a minor.

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or Ruling against Mike Ward overshadows Just for Laughs Nasty Show Back to video

Needless to say, this judgment cast a pall over Nasty Show proceedings. The spotlight was really on Ward.

So was Ward contrite? You think? Then you don’t know Mike.

Rather than utter a few mea culpas, Ward – host of the Nasty Show for the second straight year – took offence to the ruling.

He argued that mocking Jérémy was fair game, because the singer was a public figure who had sung for the pope and Céline Dion, who had written a book, and who was cover material in the French press.