If rednecks took control of the country, Larry the Cable Guy would make a pretty darn good president. Comedian and actor Dan Whitney’s southern fried persona took the comedy scene by storm in the early part of the decade as part of the Blue Collar Comedy Tour. The tour, which featured Larry alongside comedians Jeff Foxworthy, Ron White and Bill Engvall, became one of the highest grossing comedy tours of all time, and spawned two movies in its wake.
"I’ve got really awesome fans, and I really do appreciate ‘em. I’ve always felt that if you treat your fans good they’ll treat you good. It’s just awesome…I pinch myself every day and there’s nobody more shocked about it as I am."
On April 3 Larry released ‘Morning Constitutions’ - which features themed one-liners dealing with life as a country boy and adult. Whitney has contributed his comic talent to many films, including voice recordings for the tow-truck Mater in Pixar’s Cars, as well as playing himself in Larry the Cable Guy: Health Inspector. Next, Larry will again play himself in the military comedy Delta Farce, which opens nationwide on May 11th.
Larry and the other Blue Collar boys
M&C: Congratulations on the new album!
Larry: Thanks…have you heard it yet? I think it’s one of the best one’s I’ve done so far.
M&C: What were you focusing on this time…the same as before?
Larry: You know, man…it’s the same thing…it’s just all fast-paced one liners. I don’t stray too much from what brought me. That’s what my fans like and that’s what I like to give ‘em. That’s the way my sense of humor is and that’s the way it sticks.
M&C: Any special shows to promote it?
Larry: Just doing the normal stuff…the radio, press, just doin’ show, I think I’m gonna be on Regis and Kelly. That sort of stuff.
M&C: You’ve said before that you’re just out to make people laugh, and that’s it. That’s still your goal?
Larry: Yeah, I mean that’s what it’s all about…I’m a comedian, so that’s what I do. I gotta tell ya, I don’t take myself too seriously.
M&C: What’s it like going from being a regular comedian to a national act?
Larry: You know, I just think it’s really cool. I’ve got really awesome fans, and I really do appreciate ‘em. I’ve always felt that if you treat your fans good they’ll treat you good. It’s just awesome…I pinch myself every day and there’s nobody more shocked about it as I am.
M&C: Any perks?
Larry: Well yeah…I mean, I gotta tell ya, I’m a pretty regular guy. I bought a farm in Nebraska and I live there in the summer and fall and go to all the Nebraska games, and then in the summer I fly back to live in Florida. I mean, there are some things…like you get to meet a lot of people you thought you’d never meet.
M&C: Have you ever thought about updating Larry’s wardrobe? There’s got to be someone out there that makes a nice sleeveless flannel suit…
Larry: [laughs] You know, it’s funny how all that started. I was really just wearing what was comfortable. It’s not like a uniform or anything…when I started the Larry the Cable Guy thing. I mean, I’m overweight, so I wear my shirts on the outside. I don’t tuck ‘em in. I’ve been wearing a baseball cap since I was a kid. You just live as you go. When you’re starting in standup comedy, you go six or seven years and find a persona that fits you. Early on I wore nice slacks and a button-down…I didn’t know what I was doin’.
Health Inspector
The more you do standup, the more you start to get comfortable. And I stumbled on to [this look] and it was good…I grew up a country boy, and so it wasn’t hard to do. I hung out with my buddies and wrote down funny stuff, and that became the act. But the whole sleeveless thing started with the Blue Collar thing…I’d wear long sleeves in the summer and it’d get so freakin’ hot that I just decided to go on stage in a sleeveless shirt.
Then we ended up filming the first Blue Collar movie and it was in July in Phoenix. Everyone started saying, “Hey did you see that guy on Blue Collar with no sleeves?” and that’s how that all started. I went to a meet and greet like six months after that and there were about ten people inside wearing sleeveless shirts, and I had sleeves! They asked me why I wore sleeves…and so I felt like a jackass. And so from that point on I said “If people don’t want me wearin’ sleeves, then by God I ain’t wearin’ sleeves!”
M&C: Just wear what you wear and let everyone else play catchup.
Larry: Plus, I don’t gotta spend a lot of money on clothes.
M&C: Any bad stuff happened since you’ve exploded?
Larry: You know, not really. I try to stay outta trouble. I travel with my wife and my baby.
M&C: They get into the act?
Larry: Oh yeah, I mean…my wife is hilarious. I’d say she’s just as funny as I am. She’s given me some great taglines and written a couple of good one-liners. She used to be a radio jockey.
I’m the kinda guy, I’m just a nice guy. The one thing getting popular forces you to do is to not go on the internet as much as you used to. Everybody loves to get on there and bash anybody else that gets any sort of notoriety. And I didn’t like to read anything bad, so my decision was juts to not get on there.
I learned that from my buddy Mark Tremonti, he used to be the guitarist for Creed. And I asked him once time, “Dude, how do you handle going on the internet and reading about the band getting hammered?” He was like, “I don’t even get on it… I do what I do, and we’re sellin’ records, so people can say whatever they want.” I mean, I go on there and check my website or stop by my MySpace and say hi to people, but other than that, just checking the Nebraska Cornhusker page. I stay off of blogs and chat rooms and stuff.
M&C: Any more music on the new album?
Larry: You know, I did that guitar thing at the end [of ‘The Right To Bare Arms’] and the jokes in that just wouldn’t fit anywhere else. And so what I did was I would just start playing a song and then stop and say something like, “You know…you never see any fat homeless people.” And then when people start laughing I’ll say, “Yeah, I guess in a country like this you really can eat yourself out of house and home.”
Blue Collar TV
I do a whole bit about Wal-Mart and stuff about having a baby…the price of gas and movies. Often times that’s how I get new material in…I’ll go til the end of the show and just throw ‘em in at the end. Like Lemmy from Motohead says, “Just run it up the flagpole and see who salutes it.”
M&C: So what makes you laugh, besides your own stuff?
Larry: You know man, I crack myself up. I laugh at just the silliest stuff. That’s my sense of humor. I’ve always loved Monty Python. I’ve always loved Jonathan Winters…Early Steve Martin with Let’s Get Small and all that stuff. I also always loved the campy old one-liner guys like Henny Youngman and Milton Berle…Don Rickles.
M&C: Do you get into a lot of today’s comedy…a lot of it’s pretty sarcastic and barbed now.
Larry: You know, I hit on the usual stuff…I mean, I make fun of Rosie…she kind of puts herself out there though. But nah, my stuff is usually just one-liners and stuff like that.
M&C: Have you always felt comfortable about getting up on stage?
Larry: It takes a while, five, six or seven years, to finally get where you can come into your own. I think the first couple of years of stand-up, everybody has a favorite and everyone tries to emulate that favorite. And every comedian just goes through phases…and so I went through those, just started doing this as a little 3-minute part of my act, and then I started calling radio stations and doing commentaries. It just came easy. It was fun to write for and the more I got comfortable the easier it was to get on stage. As I got more comfortable I started to dress like this. And then you just search and find your niche, and I found mine.
M&C: What was it like filming Delta Farce?
Larry: Filming movies is a lot of fun. You get to meet new people…there are long days. I’m not gonna say, “Oh, it was tedious ad strenuous and we worked so hard.” I mean, compared to roofing a house or doing construction, making movies is a piece of cake. I would say the hardest part about filming movies is memorizing your lines. Sometimes you’ve got a whole page of dialogue and you’ve got to do it on camera and you can’t waste film. You do too may takes and you can see the tempers start to get out of shape.
M&C: What can fans expect from you in the future?
Larry: Just getting better and sharper. I’m on the road 260 days a year, 300 shows a year…I don’t just sit on my laurels and rest on my act. I’m constantly updating. I’m a perfectionist and if I do a joke that doesn’t get as big of laughs as I want, I just can it.
Delta Farce
M&C: Any chance of a Health Inspector 2?
Larry: [laughs] Well, you know, I’ve got a movie coming out at the end of the year…I guess it could be called Health Inspector 2, even though it’s not. That’s one of those movies that the critics bashed but it made a ton of cash. Almost a million four, million 5 DVD’s sold.
M&C: Good luck at the show tonight!
Larry: Thanks a lot, man! Git-R-done!
‘Morning Constitutions’ is now available at Amazon. Visit the music database for more information.
Your Talkback on this Story