Get ready to laugh, folks! This week, I'm totally fangirling because I've got the legendary Jeff Foxworthy on the show! 🎉 You know, the guy who made "You might be a redneck if..." a household phrase? Yeah, that dude! We're diving into all the hilarious stuff he’s up to now—spoiler alert: it’s way more than just redneck jokes! 🏆 He’s been doing stand-up for 42 years and still loves it as much as ever! We chat about how comedy is like a release valve for life’s craziness and why stand-up is still his ultimate jam. So, grab your coffee, kick back, and get ready for some giggles and good vibes! ☕😂

Takeaways:

• Jeff Foxworthy still gets a kick outta making folks laugh after 42 years in comedy!
• Stand-up comedy is like the therapy we all need, keeping our boilers from blowing up!
• Foxworthy's jokes may've started with rednecks, but he's evolved into something way deeper and relatable!
• He remembers his first night on stage like it was yesterday, and boy, did it light a fire in him!
• Turns out, even legends like Jeff Foxworthy have been known to embarrass their kids; it's a parent thing!
• His time at IBM was wild—impersonating the boss and winning comedy contests, who knew?!

Good morning.

It's Haystack.

And you know, over the years you get to talk to some pretty cool folks in this line of work.

And this morning I'm fangirling out just a little bit.

I'm getting to talk to one of my comedy heroes, a legendary stand up that you've surely heard of even if you're not a blue collar fan.

The originator, Mr. Jeff Foxworthy is going to be at the Walmart app.

He joins us this morning.

Jeff, thank you so very much for taking the time, buddy.

Hey.

Hey, Stack, thanks for having me, man.

Hey, and also thank you for being on time.

You called on time, which is very rare in the.

In fact, I think you're one minute before our scheduled time.

So I'm a little bit shocked, to be honest.

You see, you've just told people that and now they're going to kick me out of show business.

For years I hosted a country countdown show and people would be supposed to call at noon and then at 1:30 you'd be going, I don't think they're going to call.

You know, well, that's, that's why I barely caught your call.

I'd actually gotten up to go fill up the coffee cup and I got back and saw the phone ringing.

Oh, Lord, he's actually calling on time.

What is this?

What is this, witchcraft?

Well, like I said, you've done messed up my reputation.

I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I apologize.

What I want to know though, you know, of course I set things up.

Talking about the fact that you're of course legendary for the blue collar comedy days and you might be a redneck, if that's the catchphrase.

You know, it's funny.

People know me for the redneck jokes.

I probably hadn't done those on stage in 20 years.

Wow.

But they were one liners, you know, they were easy to remember, they were easy to retell.

You know, my favorite thing when I, when I was doing them was you'd see people turn around and point at each other because the closer you kept them to the truth, the better they were for sure.

But like I just finished two weeks ago, I filmed what's probably going to be my last comedy special.

I mean, that's like the 12th one I've done and it takes so much work.

But I, I am still enjoying it as much as I ever did and it Was cool for me to have old friends who you trust their opinion go, you're as funny now as you were 20 years ago.

You know, which not many people get to do.

Stand up for a long time or they choose not to.

Sure.

Like a lot of people.

A lot of people, it's.

Stand up's a great springboard to do TV or movies.

And once they do TV or movies, they don't ever go back and do stand up again.

But.

And I've done TV and movies and I've enjoyed it.

But stand up, to me was always the top of the mountain because it's live.

You know, you get to interact with people, you get immediate feedback.

And the longer I've done it, I kind of appreciate.

I mean, I don't think comedy makes people's struggles go away, but I do think it's kind of like the release valve that keeps the boiler from exploding.

You know, we're all dealing with crap, but if you're able to laugh just every once in a while, it kind of helps recharge your battery and, you know, you're able to pick up whatever that struggle is when you leave and deal with it a little better.

So this is my 42nd year.

I'm still enjoying it.

I still, every night when those lights go down, I mean, help people clap when I show up to work.

What more could you want?

You're right.

You're right.

Most of us don't get that for sure.

And you've already kind of answered my second question because you've done sitcoms, you've done books, you've done games shows, you.

You hosted a radio show.

Out of all of it, though, stand up is still home base for you, isn't it?

I mean, what.

When you think about your career, is that still the most.

Jeff, thing you've done is to get out there on stage and do stand up 100%.

Yeah.

If you held a gun to my head and said you can't do but one thing, there would be no hesitation.

Okay, stand up.

I love that.

That's the way I think of myself.

I think of myself as I'm a stand up that hosted game shows, or I'm a stand up that writes books, or I'm a stand up that paints.

You know, that's at least to me, that's my identity.

I love that.

I love that you've built.

And you mentioned relatable.

You know, people hear a joke and they point to someone because it's relatable to them or their friend or their family member.

And you've kind of built your entire brand around relatability.

Did you always know that that would connect more than doing current events, topical political stuff?

Well, you know, I had friends that did political stuff and I was like, dang, dude, as soon as you open your mouth, half the room hates you.

But I was lucky.

And I didn't always know, but I found kind of the template early on and that was that, hey, if I thought something or my wife said something or my family did something, I was just going to trust other people were thinking and doing, saying the same things.

And so I just kind of talk about the things that I think about and my family does.

And it.

And it's kind of the best compliment when people go, oh my God, you've been in our house, I've done that.

Or my wife does that, or.

Cause you've made them laugh at themselves.

You know, you've taken something that they thought are done and they didn't think about it being funny and you make them laugh at themselves and we're all idiots.

Everybody's family's crazy, you know, and nobody's got it figured out, so.

And I think we kind of lost that in this country for a while, that ability to laugh at ourselves.

But, you know, you gotta do it.

Like I said, nobody's got this.

Got this life figured out.

I think you couldn't be more right in that you have to do it and that there's a therapeutic quality to laughter.

And I'm not 1% as good at it as you are, but that's why I try every morning just to get a few chuckles out of people on.

Their way to work.

Maybe they show up in a better mood, you know, so there's this.

Absolutely.

Yeah, it is therapeutic.

It's absolutely therapeutic.

Jeff, thank you so much.

Jeff Fox.

Where are they going to be?

At the Walmart AMP.

There are still some tickets available at walmart amp.com.

Jeff, do you have a few minutes to stick around and do just a little bit more with me?

I got to pay some bills and play a few tunes.

No, I know.

You got to pay the bill.

No, I'm good.

Hey, Stack, go do what you got to do.

Thank you, bud.

We'll be back in just a second with more of Jeff Foxworthy.

Good morning, it's Haystack.

Back with more with Jeff Foxworthy who's being very gracious with his time this morning.

Jeff, thank you so much.

We really appreciate you chatting with us.

Jeff is of course a legend of stand up and he's Going to be at the Walmart amp in Rogers.

There are somehow still a few tickets available.

I'm honestly shocked that there's a seat left in the house.

But if you'd like to get tickets, go to walmart amp.com walmartamp.com the Big show is coming up on Friday night.

And Jeff, I've got this friend, this very rural friend down in Alabama, and her name happens to be Bama.

And we have a chat once a week on the show.

And she was so excited, she hopped on a Greyhound to come up here and see you.

But she said there's nothing more appropriate than Jeff Foxworthy performing at a place called the Walmart amp.

And I think she's right because your comedy's so relatable and everyone knows about Walmart.

I haven't been in one since Saturday.

Yeah, it is a great source of material.

You know, it's a little bit like I always used to tell people, you need to go to the fair.

Once a year, you need to go to the fair because it will make you feel better about your own family.

Yep.

And me and my oldest daughter had to run get something at Walmart.

It was kind of late.

It was about 9:30.

And.

And I thought, this is kind of like the fair.

You know, I thought our family was crazy, but good granny, look around.

We're.

We're okay, you know?

Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.

So now you mentioned your.

Your oldest daughter.

How many do Jeff?

I got two.

I got two daughters and two grandkids.

Oh, nice.

So.

So two daughters.

They grew up with one of the most famous comedians on the planet.

Did they think that you were funny or was it, oh, he's so embarrassing.

Well, when they were little, they thought.

They thought it was funny.

And then I got to.

They got to be teenagers.

I remember one year I was hosting the Country Music Awards and they started the show.

It was right when Dancing with the Stars came out.

So I was dancing with Le Serena with his shirt slit open to the navel and these flamingo pants.

And after the show, I got in the car and I turned my phone on and the first message was, my teenage daughter's going, dad, we have to go to school tomorrow.

Quit doing that stuff.

Those poor girls.

Those poor, poor girls.

Well, but as a parent, your job is to embarrass your children, right?

Absolutely.

And I just thought I was doing an extraordinary job.

Now, you mentioned the show and you've mentioned that you've done stuff in addition to the standup.

Be honest, after hosting, are you smarter than a Fifth grader.

Are you actually smarter than a fifth grader at this point?

No.

No.

Well, here's.

People will come up to me sometimes and they'll go, hey, when you were doing that fifth grader show, what was your favorite thing about that?

And I say the part where they handed me the card with the answers to it because I knew none of that stuff.

I want Alex Trebek, you know?

Right.

We.

We had a lady one night, true story.

She had a second grade grammar question, and it was something about an antonym.

And she goes, oh, yeah, I remember there were homonyms and synonyms and antonyms.

She goes, I can't remember the difference in them.

Can you use it in a sentence?

And I was like, my aunt and Em came over for Christmas dinner.

I mean, hell, I didn't know.

You know, I had no idea.

I love it.

I love it.

I wanted to ask you one more thing, kind of apart from the comedy thing, and correct me if I'm wrong, but as I did some digging.

Did you once work at IBM before the comedy thing took off?

I did for like four or five years.

And it sounds more glamorous than I was.

I wore a suit, but I carried a tool bag, fix machines, and a bunch of guys I worked with.

I was the guy in the break room doing impersonations of the boss.

And then you turn around, the boss would be in the doorway.

And they entered me in a comedy competition, not an amateur night, like, for working comics.

They entered me in it and I'm like, oh, crap.

I went home and wrote six minutes about my family, and I went back and I won the contest the first night I ever got on stage, and I had no idea what I was doing, but I just knew this is what I wanted to do.

I quit my job at IBM.

My mother.

My mother's first question was, are you on the dope?

Whatever the dope was, she wanted to know if I was on it.

And five years later, I was on Johnny Carson.

And the same mom is going to.

You knew you wasted all those years at IBM.

I'm like, yeah, whatever, Mom.

Yeah, that relatable point.

If my mom were next to me, I'd be pointing at her because she has asked me that exact question.

Are you on the dope?

Are you on the whatever?

Like the dealers going, would you like to buy the dope?

Yeah, was there now.

Now I.

Every time I get a chance to interview someone who's a professional working comedian, and obviously never to the degree that you've had success, but almost to A single.

Every single one of them have the answer yes.

Was there a specific moment when you realized that this comedy thing would be the career and that you were going to make it?

I knew it was going to be the career the first night, and I didn't know anything about it, but I knew two minutes into it, I'm like, this is my gift.

You know what I mean?

It's like this.

And I.

And I didn't know when I quit IBM, I really didn't think I would get.

Get away with it forever, but I thought, hell, if I got to do it a few years, I'd have a cool story for my grandkids.

Sure.

But like doing the Tonight show with Johnny Carson back then, younger people wouldn't understand this, but, you know, that was.

And.

And then you look over and he's calling you over to the couch.

That's when I'm like, okay, I think I can get away with this for a while.

You know, if.

If Johnny's inviting me to the couch, I'm probably not going to have to get a real job this year.

So, yeah, that.

I mean, and now it's not the same.

But that was a big moment.

Absolutely.

I mean, I'm kind of getting chills hearing you talk about it.

You've probably had to talk about it a thousand times, but, you know, I love Dave Letterman and Jay Leno and Jimmy Fallon and there's a lot of great guys, but there's only one stinking Johnny Carson ever.

And to get that nod is just amazing.

He was kind of like a kingmaker, because if he likes you and he called you to the couch, literally the week after that, like, casinos in Vegas started calling going, you want to come headline here?

And for no other reason than that, Johnny liked you.

You know, he had given you the tap on the shoulder almost.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's amazing.

I love it.

Jeff, thank you so very much for being so gracious with your time and more importantly, for calling on time this morning.

I'm going to rat you out again.

I'm going to try to get you kicked out of show business.

No.

Well, hey, I love Northwest Arkansas because I'm an arrowhead nut.

That's.

That's kind of my hobby is looking for arrowheads.

And I've been out there many times doing that, so I always look forward to coming back.

Well, Jeff, thank you again for taking the time.

Jeff Foxworthy going to be at the Walmart amp Friday night.

You could still find some tickets at walmartamp.

Com.

The legendary Jeff Foxworthy Jeff.

Thanks for taking the time.

Appreciate you.

Hey, St. Great talking to you, buddy.

Have a good week.