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->''So fair a foul I have not seen!\\
Ancient knave with heart as black\\
as coat you wear upon your back,\\
get thee a pair of glasses, get thee\\
to an optometrist!''
-->-- '''Rocky''' in ''The Shakespearean Baseball Game: A Comedy of Errors, Hits, and Runs''

An early sketch comedy series that went through a number of different incarnations. Hosted by the Canadian comedy team of Johnny Wayne and Frank Shuster. The earliest version was ''Shuster & Wayne'', a radio program they were given as a result of their earlier radio work ''The Wife Preservers''. The next show was ''The Wayne and Shuster Show'' created for Creator/{{CBC}} radio in 1946 after they left the army after the second world war.

There was a weekly television series in the 1950s, but that gave way to the better known appearances on ''Series/TheEdSullivanShow '' (where they appeared ''67'' times!) and their monthly CBC specials that ran from the early 1960s to the 1980s. Later CBC-aired and syndicated compilations of their skits from the 60s-80s are also marketed under this title, as well as ''Wayne and Shuster in Black and White'', which recirculated episodes from the 1950s and 60s. The secret to their longevity was in part that they agreed early on to keep their relationship strictly professional; they otherwise kept each other out of their personal lives to prevent tensions from work affecting them.

Their comedy has been referred to as literate comedy combined with a liberal amount of slapstick. They often mixed classic references, genre parodies, silly puns and bloodless violence in equal parts (not to mention copious references to Canadian culture, at least on their CBC shows). A famous example being the retelling of Creator/WilliamShakespeare's ''Theatre/JuliusCaesar'' as the modern, [[FilmNoir noir-ish]] detective story ''Rinse the Blood off My Toga''. They also parodied and spoofed then current events and popular culture such as ''All in the Royal Family'' (''Theatre/{{Hamlet}}'' with ''Series/AllInTheFamily'') and ''[[Franchise/StarTrek Star Schtick]]'' and even ''Theatre/{{Macbeth}}'' done as an in-period PoliceProcedural. Most of their shows also included a least a couple of comedic musical numbers.

While some of the sketches might be slightly dated, and the style of comedy can seem a little old fashioned, much of their work is still side-splittingly funny and should be watched when the chance is given. The literate nature of much of their comedy, especially their Shakespeare spoofs as well as other skits such as "The Picture of Dorian Wayne" has also gained admirers.

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!!This show provides examples of:
* AnachronismStew: RuleOfFunny prevails in most cases.
* {{Arrowgram}}: In their ''Series/KungFu1972'' parody, a throwing knife with a note attached buries itself in the wall next to the railroad president's head.
* AsideComment: Frequently, especially in Noir parodies.
* AsideGlance: Frequently, especially in Noir parodies.
* BoogieKnights: Wayne and Shuster once had a TV special that parodied fairy tales - they star as a court jester and royal physician, breaking into an impromptu softshoe dance in the dining hall, followed by a knight in armor doing a more vigorous tapdance.
-->"[[IncrediblyLamePun That's not softshoe, that's heavy metal!]]"\\
"[[HurricaneOfPuns My mom told be there'd be knights like this...]]"
* BreakingTheFourthWall: occasionally, the boys notice the audience, the sound effects, the soundtrack... Some skits involve addressing the audience, such as "Rinse the Blood Off My Toga".
* CatchPhrase: "Julie, don't go!" from "Rinse the Blood Off My Toga" became a catch phrase on both sides of the border and was often reprised and sometimes worked into other sketches (though it's always delivered by a female character - usually actress Sylvia Lennick - rather than Wayne or Shuster).
* CowboyEpisode: "A Fistful of Fingers", which was a send-up of {{Spaghetti Western}}s. They also did an episode long parody of the ''Series/KungFu1972'' TV show.
* DealWithTheDevil: The feature story of one episode was about a musician selling his soul to the Devil in exchange for becoming Canada's greatest hockey player.
* DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment: "The Wonderful World of The World".
* DrinkBasedCharacterization: This is the basis of one of the team's most famous jokes:
-->'''Bartender''': What're you drinking?\\
'''Flavius''': Gimme a martinus.\\
'''Bartender''': You mean a martini.\\
'''Flavius''': If I wanted two I'd ask for them
* ExactWords: A parody of ''Literature/TheDevilAndDanielWebster'' features a man making a DealWithTheDevil to become Canada's greatest hockey player. When he becomes sick of hockey and wishes to return to music (like his mother wanted), the Devil holds him to his contract which says he must play at the stadium or forfeit his soul. The Webster character examines the contract and points out that it does not stipulate he must play ''hockey'', so the player becomes the stadium's organist.
* FrontierDoctor: The "Frontier Psychiatrist" bit (most famously used by ''Music/TheAvalanches'' in their song of the same name) features Dr. Tex Rorschach, a wild west psychiatrist who, despite his seeming unawareness of the situations surrounding him, manages to disarm a gun-toting outlaw by talking him down.
* GenderFlip: "[[Music/EltonJohn Cinderelton]]" flips the sexes of all of Literature/{{Cinderella}}'s main characters. Including the Fairy [[Literature/TheGodfather Godfather]], complete with pinstriped suit.
* HisNameIs: A running joke in ''Rinse the Blood off My Toga''.
* HavingAHeart: From "Rinse the Blood Off My Toga":
-->'''Marc Antony:''' Yes. I just made a speech over the body of Caesar. I said, "Friends, Romans and countrymen, lend me your ears!"\\
'''Flavius:''' Yeah?...What have you got in that sack?\\
'''Marc Antony:''' Ears!
* KilledMidSentence: Also a running joke in ''Rinse the Blood off My Toga''.
* LargeHam: Oh, yes, though more Wayne than Shuster, who was more frequently the straight man. There were exceptions, though, where the two switched roles.
* LightsOffSomebodyDies: Parodied in a sketch where Literature/SherlockHolmes and Watson are holding a SummationGathering in a stately country home. Every time that Holmes dramatically announces who the murderer is, the lights go out. When they come back on, the suspect he has just named is dead. After all of the suspects have been killed, Holmes deduces that he must be in the wrong house.
* LikeASurgeon: They did a parody of ''Series/MarcusWelbyMD'' called "Welby Marcus, Master Mechanic". It ends with Welby and his performing an emergency repair on a car engine that is treated with all of the drama and urgency of surgery on the show they were parodying.
* LongRunners: Wayne and Shuster's first show, ''The Wife Preservers'', aired in 1941. They continued to perform until the late 1980s; Wayne succumbed to cancer in 1990, about a year after their final TV show. Shuster continued to act occasionally and host retrospectives until shortly before his own death in 2002.
** Part of the secret to that longevity is that the pair soon realized that they got along best on a purely professional basis, so they agreed to stay out of each other's personal lives outside of work.
* MindScrew: Several. For example:
-->'''Shuster''' Are you sure we're alone?\\
'''Wayne''' Yes.\\
'''Shuster''' Then who's that beside you?\\
'''Wayne''' {{Beat}} That's you!\\
'''Shuster''' Yes. ''But can I be trusted''?
* MisspellingOutLoud: In one Western sketch a deputy repeatedly says "He's dead, Sheriff! D-A-Y-E-D dead," to which the sheriff snaps that he knows the spelling.
* {{Radio}}: The duo started out with radio shows.
* RunningGag: constantly, sometimes including callbacks to previous running gags.
* ShotInTheAss: Their Myth/RobinHood parody ends with King Richard telling Robin to shoot an arrow from the castle window and wherever the arrow lands, he will grant him a country estate. Robin fires the arrow and it hits a peasant in the ass, causing Robin to comment it looks like it will be a country seat.
* StraightMan: Shuster did it more often, but the team traded the role every so often.
* WellThisIsNotThatTrope: SpaghettiWestern parody a "A Fistful of Fingers" begins with a narration about the hero of the story as a typical 1950s matinee cowboy rides across the screen on a WhiteStallion. The narration then goes "This guy is not the hero". Then camera then does a whip pan to Wayne dressed as a scruffy 'Man with No Name' type, and the narration ends "He is!"
* WorldOfPun:
** They ''never'' pass up an opportunity. ''Ever''.
** One skit was based on this, with Wayne playing a man who'd go into a homicidal rage upon hearing a pun. Which proves to be a problem the day he visits Queen Victoria to suggest a street be named in her honor: Victoria Mews. To which Her Majesty replies, indignantly, "I am not a mews." Cue homicidal rage.
* YourMimeMakesItReal: Happens in "Comedy Olympics" special. The case in point is the gold medalist for pantomime. Here, we see a Creator/MarcelMarceau type mime doing his "Walking on Stairs" act and physically ascends about 10 feet off the stage without any physical steps in place.
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