Jeff Foxworthy (Recorded Live at the Punchline Comedy Club)

brand new episode starts right now. Jamie Bendele Jamie Hearn and Adam Hey. Thank you, sir. We have a very special guest we are recording live at the punch line comedy Club technically adjacent in the landmark diner. We have comedian Jeff Foxworthy joining us this episode. Jeff. Welcome to the program. Thank you so much. Are you buying me dinner? Is it just the show? Oh, no. What we'll do the dinner. We'll do the whole thing we got we got the whole bit. Like how we got that address right off the bat. Yeah, yeah, we're gonna get some of this right. Cuz? Some pie or some surprise? Incredible. Yeah, the format of the show is really actually fairly simple. How many interviews Do you think you've done related to comedy in your career in my life? I have no idea. 10s of 1000s? Probably, I mean, I have, I still have mornings where I will do like 10 or 11 interviews in the course of a morning. Okay. But then you are also the interviewer. Because you have your show on Sirius 97 Jeff and Larry's comedy Roundup, I have a show called a comic mine where I talked to comics. And I mean, it kind of the idea was, it's like, what makes us different? Why do we think the way we do as opposed to everybody else? Why are we able to do this? Are you surprised by the answers that you get? Or the insights you get from other comics? Yeah, you know, it's like, I think, because my first question for everybody is, do you think you're born funny? Or is it a skill set you can acquire? And probably 90% of the people say born funny, like I knew at a very young age that I had this gift. In fact, it's, it's, it's almost hard for me to take credit for it. Because I'm like, I don't know why I can do that. Right. I can't fix my refrigerator. But if you say, Here's a piece of paper, go write me 50 jokes about eating in a diner, I could do that. Right. And I don't know why I can do that. I think that's what Walter Payton said to. He said, I don't know why I can do this. I can't tell a joke to save my life. But I can run past people all the time. But I think we're all gifted. Yep. You know, some people have that gift of being a nurse or a caretaker to old people. I don't have the mentality for that. But it's truly a gift. Yeah. And some people are great at it. Yeah. Just the patience. So the format here for us is we ask a couple of quick lightning round questions. The topics for this evening are that's exhausting. Something's cooking. And yep, that's about right. So start with yep, that's about right, clockwise or counterclockwise. Counterclockwise started with that. All right. Someone is described to you as a jerk. What do you see when they walk in the door that makes you say, yep, that's about right. I got that punch face. And then that's the only thing but it's like when you see that face and you go, oh, I want it. It's just just hit you haunt you. I just want to punch you. Do you think it's possible to overcome the punch face? I you know, maybe like the gift of comedy maybe born with it, but but but you knew what I meant. Yeah, absolutely. Know what you mean. And I wonder always is that a nice guy that's got a punch face. Because I had this conversation with my daughter yesterday. Can there be like super sweet girls that have RBF? Oh, yeah, for sure. Yeah. Oh, definitely. And she said yes. Because one of her friends just bless her heart has RBF you know, and she's a sweetheart. Yeah. Is there a surgical fix to that? I think the plastic surgeons are often are like you have a punch face. I can help you with that. We got to raise these cheeks. The punch. The punch faces a little smugness. Yeah, it's a little too pretty. Yeah, it's a little too pretty by the punch face. I think I would walk around with cookies just to that. Please. I know I have a bunch of fake here. Cookie cookies. I'm not a horrible person. Please don't hit me anymore. I would want to see family pictures. Like is it? Is it just one Is it the one random one or is their multi generational? I think it's multi. I think most like guys that have a punch face. Their dads also have Yeah, they got it from their dad. And they're literally just home just wailing on each other. go to Disney. You know, we can't go out in public with the space. Yeah, we can't go to those kinds of places with these days, especially with your kids. Because yeah, you're multiplying the chances. We're all gonna get punished. Yeah, you know, we don't do amusement parks. Genetic. Alright, so you come home and your wife is furious at you. What did he do that makes you say, yeah, that's about right. For me, it would be I forget to tell her things. You know, she'll come home and she'll go, Okay, now next Monday, where we have dinner with the client and I go, No, I'm going to Arkansas Saturday to look for arrowheads, and she goes in when did you decide to do this? And I go, I told you this like three months ago, she's like, No, you did not tell me because here's the family calendar. Yeah. And you know, you didn't tell her but you're like it was three months ago. It was in passing. You were on the run. You probably didn't hear me but because I knew then it wasn't gonna be met with a I just said it when she was in the shower. The drive was good. Alright, so you are a parent. You So far I have a pretty spotless record right with you feel like wins losses time. Pretty good record when Okay, was there a time when you had to discipline a child where they knew that they were going to get in trouble? They came to you kind of confessed, owned up to their wrongdoing. And you said it's about right. Yeah. You see my oldest daughter, we never had to discipline her because she would tell she was she was the guilty conscience kid. So if she did something wrong, she would five minutes later come to them. Yeah, I'm sorry. She would tell now. Silicone fessor. The little one. The funny one would look you right now as an ally, right. So one day I come home, and they're little, they're like, two and four, or three and five. They're in the bathtub. And I walk in the kitchen and there's Hershey's chocolate syrup. On the floor. On the counter. It's everywhere. Everywhere. I walk back to the bathroom. My older ones sitting there totally clean. The youngest has Hershey syrup on her forehead, her cheeks, shoulders and all. And I said who was playing in the Hershey syrup? Both not. I mean, and I'm and I'm looking at tools. The little one I'm going you really you didn't know anything? Nope. And I said I here's the deal. If nobody comes clean on this. Both of you are not going to get to watch TV for a week. If somebody is honest. They'll get to not watch TV for a day. The prisoner's dilemma is almost the kitchen here comes a little naked jewels out of the tub dad I just remembered. Remembered. Just remember I just had a memory. Now my my father's grandfather. This is what he said when he did something bad. his granddad would say I'm going to spank you for this. I'm not doing it today. I'm going to do it next Thursday. Wow. Okay, so you had like a week to think about it? Yeah. Well, you got the spanking. Lisa gave him a date certain I kind of like that. Because that was it. He said, Hey, he did it. So he would calm down and it wouldn't be emotional. But the the anticipation right. Oh, yeah. You build it up in your head. It'd be worse if they said sometime in the next week. Yeah, because they might be scared to walk through the door. I one of the very when the girls finally got real report cards. Yeah. I used to tell them Beaser below, you sleep in the garage. Oh, okay. And every night before we go to bed, can remember Beezer blow asleep in the garage. Kelly calls me again. She says Avery got off the bus crying today. And I got a call from one of the other moms. What did you tell her about her card? And I said Beezer blow you sleep in the garage? And they said, Yeah, so Avery doesn't know what's on a report card. But she has a report card and she's afraid she has to sleep in the garage. She's terrible. She's like, you can't do that to them. And I said, I feel like it worked. Yeah. Okay. That's, that's your you need to get an R and you need to drive to Pikes and buy it in the corner. And just go go. Yeah, you know, like, yeah, dishtowel to cover up in a bucket. Yeah. Yeah, right. You're like Kelly you don't understand that was a parenting when you think it was a parenting loss. I thought I thought it had no purpose. Kids afraid to come home with a bad boy. Yeah, defected. You know, he facts has no sense of humor. That's right. All right. We will be back with more with comedian Jeff Foxworthy right after this. So we've now been doing our shows live from the landmark diner, which is adjacent to a comedy club, kind of a great punch of like, yeah, one of my favorite things about diners is kind of the different design motifs that they have. And this one I love is they have around the edge of the ceiling, probably 200 different flags at one show. We are going to go through and see how many of these flags we can actually identify. Oh, guest guess flag identification. That will actually be great audio. Great audio. It's got a little bit of a red with a blue adjacent to it. It's kind of a royal blue. Not really a navy blue. We have an old Soviet Union flag up there. It's kind of a classic. It might be seen that flag more often. I couldn't do that again. Anyhow, I love I love these kinds of designs. These places give you the best design like where the bottles are held. I like the flags. I'd like to change to the Whitestone Yeah, timeless classic 24 hour. It is I love it. All right, round two. We have two remaining topics for discussion here with our Comedian guest Mr. Jeff Foxworthy. Okay so our two remaining topics are that's exhausting or something's cooking. Something's cooking. Alright, something's cooking starting with Adam. What's the weirdest thing you've eaten and light? sweetbreads probably, yeah. If you tried sweet I have not. It's a it's a Georgia thing. I grew up in Utah. And then I lived in the Northeast for a long time. They are sweet breads. I think it was a southern thing, isn't it? I don't know. Oh, yeah. My wife's from New Orleans. So maybe, okay. Do you know what sweet breads are? I thought sweetbreads were brains. Now, I don't know what's right and wrong. In you only get them in nice restaurants and in my wife would always order sweetbreads. It's the thymus gland of a cow. Okay. And it just sounds horrible. Yeah. And so for years and years and years, I've watched her eat them. And finally, one day she's like, do you want to try one little bite? And I went, Oh, crap. This is delicious or good. Me people ordered sweet bread off of the menu and like this sounds really delightful. What I probably thought they were getting a cinnamon roll. Right? But no, it's like, a salted or a fried thymus gland. Yeah. Okay, I just looked it up. It's just like, I was wrong. I was close regionally in the part of the body but was wrong. Okay, yeah. I don't know where the thymus gland is, but I just don't like glands in general. It's not in my food. Me either. I don't sit back boy. David. Why don't we get it some glands on the way home boys. I can just see a butcher saying like, we should eat that too. Let's see if that tastes any good. Like the first one right breaking down that county. He's like, we got this thing here. I bet this tastes good. It's real tender. Come here. Yeah. Jerry. Come on. Try this one. Jerry will try anything. Yeah. All right, Jamie, what you got? Alright, so you're sent to the frontlines of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Oh, boy. And you have to solve the conflict by just cooking one meal that's you're gonna provide to the troops and they're gonna realize we're all just coming together on this one meal. It's peace, not war. You're piecemeal. What's that piecemeal? A barbecue. Yeah, I would do chop pork. I would do Glen Garner's mother's potato salad. Which is really awesome. I would do my mother in law's mac and cheese because she cooks it to where the top that she there's big chunks of cheese in. Burnt like crispy. Shell is B shell. Where you got to get to it first. So you get that part in your Yeah, or anybody else want to be in the back of the line semis eaten all the all the crispy. Then there's the jerk that takes only crispy shell. And then down there buy the farm the hunters pubbed has a peanut butter pie that this grandmother makes every day. So if you can eat that and still want to fight somebody, you're not. You don't know. There's no selling point until the guys got to where there was no more crispy cheese at the top. Oh, if there was a crispy cheese issue, it might escalate. Maybe we could make it in a thinner pan where most of it was crispy cheese. Yeah, exactly. That crispy cheese would stop a war I think yes, it totally could I that meal you just described I don't understand how you walk away from that angry? You can't right so you're just like, you know you guys are okay. We're gonna leave us let's let's revisit this in a month. Let's bring this up. Guys good. Looks like this week. Have you got enough land to get the globe? You got enough land? I got land you got land. I'll see you guys in a month. Maybe we can get Foxworthy to make us another meal. Are you a dessert guy? Do you say you're mostly desserts are your yes I am. I got a sweet tooth. But if I had to pin it down to one thing, it would probably be cookies. Adam runs up to the highlands area to pick up pies at the holiday. There's this place in the highlands cashiers farmers market in the highlands in there do they make pies that will change your life from on top of your head your tongue will beat your brains out trying to get exactly I don't even like pie and we went my wife and I are saying they're the apple pie is to die for it's and it's they're still crisp apples. Not too sweet. Not so it's like syrupy. Just a little cinnamon sugar with a crust that makes you just oh, it's the crispy cheese on the top. That's the best. I have a tingling in my nether region right now. Well, next time I run out there, I'm going to get an extra pie. I can bring it we can do a pie exchange here. Alright, so what is the smell that most reminds you of your favorite place? To be very careful in sharing. Yes. I was saying if something's cooking, oh, something's cooking. Oh, indeed. There's that one. Back in the early days comedy. I used to play a ton of one nighters and there was like there were some that went from Florida and South Carolina and North Carolina. So I have no idea what town this is what part of North Carolina, but I was driving and I could smell barbecue. And I'm like, dang, that smells so nice making something. And I'm like, and I'm like figuring out like at the stop. So which way is the wind blowing? So I find out, I go find this place and it looks like a shag. Yep, had a concrete black and you block that you stepped into and you go in and there's a guy back there just sweating. He's got a meat cleaver just chopping this pork up, and they put clothes on and and I bought a sandwich and I'm going down the road and it's like sex. It was like, oh my god, this is so incredibly good. And I've talked about it for years and years. I couldn't say what town it was. Kinte. So just follow your nose is six, seven years later, my wife and I are driving through North Carolina. And as we're driving I go, there it is. That's it. That's the place. That's the and I still don't know what. So again, we figure it out. We go in, they haven't upgraded one thing. The concrete blog still the guy back there chopping. So I bought me a sandwich or buy my wife a sandwich. And she'd heard me for six years talking about this. And we get down the road about a mile and she says stop. Go back. And we went back and she bought like six sandwiches. Yeah. And then we had to stop at the first gas station. We can buy a styrofoam cooler and a bag of ice. Yeah, she goes this is the greatest sandwich I've ever had in my life. Follow your nose and the only way I knew was that smell it she's like oh by the way we're going to put a pin on a map here right so we can find this location again. And we still don't know yeah all right, that is it for that second round of questions. We will be back with our very good friend Mr. Jeff Foxworthy right after this so one of the things I like about the new name the comedy round table is that one we are actually sitting at a round table as we do this but it also brings scored images of Camelot right at the round table right and we are kind of the Knights if you will of the round table. Can you self night? I don't think I can self night. So I'm actually not knighted. But there's an expectation as we go further into this that you would probably night. It's like a nickname. I am never calling you sir. And you will call me sir if I'm a night. But we are nights our guests is the gesture. Did you just self knighted? We've talked about this? Why would we not be the jesters? Yeah. And our guests is the night. Yeah. And we like them every time they come by. Now this I like this is dangerously close to making up a fake fraternity. But I think we would have a really cool secret society. So stick around and join our secret society. Let's go back to Jeff. All right, Ben appreciative with the time you've taken with us here this evening, Jeff. So we are now on our last remaining topic. And that is that's exhausting. So we'll start with Adam. We're after the Late Show where you were kind enough to do this after you're set. I'm exhausted right now. And I don't do this for a living. How have you been able over your career to do late shows like this? And do morning interviews and do game shows and do like how do you deal with this late night stuff? At my age? I feel like I want to be in bed by nine o'clock. This isn't hard. But what's hard. It's like when you go out to Vegas. Yeah. And like it's rodeo week. And they don't start it till after the radio rodeo. And so they say the show starts at 10 their time. Well, that's 12 Oh, run here. Right. And you've been up since six that morning. Yeah, your stamina, those amazing, but you can do all that I just always accepted. I'd like I never treated. Treated jetlag like it was a thing. Yeah. whatever time it is. That's what time it is. Yep. And so that's what we tell me what time it is. That's what time it is. Yep. Your body. You tell your body what time it is. Yes. Until you Yeah, good. I don't feel like my question is as interesting as Adams question there but couldn't have been that was a really good question. So you, you you find yourself being chased by a swarm of bees, and you and the sort of v's are moving at the exact same pace. So as long as you can keep moving, the bees are not going to get you how far can you go before you've hit your limit? And your thought is wide open. Run? Oh, god. 15 feet. That's me. I give you 10 yards. I'll give you like 50 yards. I'm hoping I come to the lake before the yards. Yeah, see that football field that I'm looking at. Now. My daughter a couple years ago gave me a beehive for Christmas. I never expressed any interest. But she was like Dad Let's do this together. So I had to do it. Was this like the old and farms where you'd send away for the ants was was it a way for the bees? Okay. Which by the way they deliver in like a screen box with like 5000 Bees. Oh, seriously, and the mailman brings it. Oh my god, that must be the coolest thing in here and I got to the point. Like I would go open the beehive and I would, and I wouldn't wear gloves or the mask or I would just, I kept a very calm beret. Because I felt like the bees just, oh, just felt off your vibe and I would pick them up and Jack and put them back down. You are beekeepers, confidence of a man who's had one of those barbeque sandwiches from that. Carolina. Yeah, because I figured those sandwiches are gonna be in heaven and the bees kill me. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. That's a full beekeeper, though. If you can, if you can do that calm. No screaming Oh, my gosh, you are one with the bees. Did you actually produce honey? Yes, we did. Yeah, yes, we did not as much as I had hoped. I still have the bees, they died. They just died this winter. And somebody told me that kind of happened sometimes. So I gotta get new bees. I have over the years found you to be one of the most gracious people just in the way you interact with people. And I say that because I've got I've had the good fortune to meet a lot of comedians over the years. And my question is, in the span of time since you first went on stage, how many jokes do you think you've been told by people after a show? Oh, my God. Oh, the aftershocks? Oh, no, I have no idea. But get the weirdest is when they tell you your joke. No, I have people tell me my jokes a lot. And I'm never sure what my cuz I don't remember what I wrote. Yeah, so they're, and they know that it's your joke? Yes. And they're saying, Oh, I know your joke. Yeah, here I am. That proves that I'm somehow worthy of you. And then they will. I'm not a casual fan. And I'm like, Okay. Never say, you know, you should try delivering it this way. I think if you just you know, I don't need a critic, buddy. You're like, yeah, now they're just they they're trying to tell you your job. Yeah, it's they're trying to play inside baseball with you. They're like, we know you, Jeff. I don't imagine musicians have a similar experience. Where after show, right? Somebody says, Let me sing you your song. I love what you're saying. Right. But there's an intimacy. That's very different, I think between an audience and because comedians are so accessible to the people who see the show. Yeah. After the show. Yeah, you get to immediately go and shake hands and say thank you for coming. And so so there is this sort of different relationship that invites it. There's something about me people feel like they know, like, people come up to me in the grocery store. And they don't say, Excuse me, Mr. Franks, were able to come up to me go, Hey, Jeff. Yeah, let me tell you what my brother did. And they will proceed to tell me things, they probably shouldn't tell their therapist. You know, like, there's, so there's that feeling like, I know, you were friends, you know, that love that it makes you very accessible. Like, it's good and bad about it. But it's a lot of good. Because it's a it's a nice compliment, right? Well, so I guess what I was, what I was getting at is, it's, I think that when done really well, how you tell a joke, your relatability your ability to communicate with an audience is like a superpower. Right? And I would say that it has really been a pleasure getting to know and appreciate Clark Kent. And you know, I mean, I really do feel like one of the luckiest guys in the world. Because after 37 years, I still love this. I still love doing it. Yeah. My fear always from the beginning is I don't want to stay too long at the dance. And everybody's seeing the comic that you go, Oh, they were funny. I'm gonna hang up. Yeah. So I never want to be that guy. And my wife always says, just listen, they'll tell you when you're ready. You're not funny anymore. That's right. People talk about it all the time that you've had these opportunities to host a radio show and to host a television show and have very successful television shows and a sitcom and all the other stuff. Is there something that's always most special about the joke in the stage in the audience, without a doubt if, and I've enjoyed I've gotten to do a lot of different things and things I really enjoyed, like the sitcom I didn't like, but I had very young kids at the time, and it was life consuming. And I thought, well, maybe I don't like television. And then years later, we did Blue Collar comedy, which was sketch and I found out a love sketch, because I'd walk in and go, Hey, can I wait 500 pounds and have Elvis sideburns? Yeah, let's do Yeah. Well, there's very few people that can do this really well. I think proportionately like yeah, there's a lot of musicians. There's a lot of actors. There's very few people that make this their life's work. But the passion about this, I think is as strong as anybody who's passionate about music or acting. When you I love to sit around with comics and just listen to him. Talk about what makes a joke good or what makes but after all these Here's this is if you put a gun to my head said you can't do but one I wouldn't have to think about it. I'm gonna stand up. Wow. And I just always seem to me that the magic, the sweetness of hearing somebody else's laughter Yeah, right start with one person, what else would you want to do right? To make somebody laugh to make them feel better? It's like the greatest feeling in the world. You know, when you're done. They feel better than when you showed up. Yep. Yeah, whatever it takes that that moment of actually making somebody laugh is incredibly special. Super feeling music. Yes. It's, it is a super feeling. Yeah. It's like, it's heaven. Nothing. It's like a drug in like, I've done radio shows, but you don't hear the laugh when you're doing radio. Right? Right. When you're doing a sitcom, you're not in front of a live audience. Half the time you don't hear the response. You're just right, rewrite, practice, shoot. And so with this, you know, two seconds after it's out of your mouth. It's either good or it's not. They tell you they're always right. Always. Yeah. To your voice point. Just listen. They'll tell you. And there are nights out remember that that? Like it'll be a big laugh and I'll allow myself just like, half a second ago is the good stuff. Nice. Yeah. Nice. Yeah. That's great. All right. Well, we appreciate you taking the time. Thank you so much, Jeff. I would Hi, bro buddy. Pie pie for everybody. Is there anything you'd like us to plug into my my Netflix special comes out March 22. All right. What's the name of the special? It's called the good old days. Nice. Oh, surely the good old days. Yes. Nice. Yeah. Awesome. Looking forward to that. Yeah. All right. Thank you, sir. All right. That was a fun episode with our guests. Mr. Jeff Foxworthy. Always appreciate him swinging by the punch line comedy club. So for Jamie, Jamie and Adam. In order to find us we'll be back in the corner booths. See you next week right after the show. See