Biography
Norm MacQueen is an actor/comedian, educator, writer, cartoon animator, and communications specialist with a proven track record of experience over many years.
While still in his teens, Norm was a writer-performer with Ottawa’s popular Skit Row Comedy Troupe-performing improv and sketch comedy at the Penguin Nightclub, on radio stations CHEZ-106, W-1310, and personal appearances across Ontario and Quebec. His written comedy sketches appeared in Skit Row’s TV series on the New ‘RO and during a limited run at the National Arts Centre. Later Norm starred in a Stratford production of the madcap farce Nurse Jane Goes to Hawaii and the Broadway musical-comedy Pal Joey at the National Arts Centre, directed by Martha Henry.
2-D animation has also featured prominently in Norm’s career. A gifted cartoonist, Hollywood beckoned when he was hired by legendary Warner Bros. director Chuck Jones to work on the Roadrunner theatrical cartoon Chariots of Fur. Heading up the coastline to San Francisco, he later worked on children’s computer games for Brøderbund Software-including Where in the World is Carmen San Diego?
Returning to Ottawa, Norm was hired as a staff animator-writer by Artech Studios to work on a variety of multimedia titles for children and adults alike including My Little Pony, Jeopardy, Trivial Pursuit, and Raze’s Hell. Here he wrote dialogue and comedy for such notables as John Cleese, Whoopi Goldberg, Bill Nye, Brooke Burke, Terry Bradshaw, and others.
Norm’s a professional actor and member of the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television, and Radio Artists (ACTRA). His screen acting credits include Act of War (Atari), Kevin Spencer (CTV), Getting Along Famously (CBC/Colin Mochrie), An Unperfect Christmas Wish (Lifetime), and The Greatest (Amazon Studios). He starred in the award-winning children’s edutainment series Prime Radicals (TV Ontario) and narrated the documentary film Open Doors for the Presbyterian Church of Canada. More recently, he joined the cast of the TV comedy series They Came at Night from Mexico’s 3PAS Studios and Eugenio Derbez. He also starred in the US feature film comedy Love & Chaos from Triad Filmworks and Drew Derry.
Norm has done corporate communications for such diverse clients as the Council for Exceptional Children, the RCMP, the Canadian Aviation Museum, Veterans Affairs Canada, CUPE, the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons, the Chinese Anti-Cancer Association, and the Canadian Society for Yad Vashem.
Norm holds both a Bachelor of Education degree (magna cum laude) and a Master of Education degree from the University of Ottawa. He is a secondary school English, Literary Arts, and Visual Arts teacher with the Ottawa-Carleton District School Board. His educational achievements also include a Film Studies B.A. from Carleton University and a Diploma in Classical Animation from Sheridan College.
Clippings, reviews, demos, etc. available on request. Representation by AMTI, Toronto, Los Angeles, Ottawa.
