Larry the Cable Guy gets politically incorrect: A Q&A with one of comedy's biggest names

His name is Larry the Cable Guy, and one of a group of down-to-earth, everyday-guy comics that have taken the country by storm.

From a country boy growing up in Nebraska to a TV and stand-up superstar, he's had a meteoric rise to the top of a comedy world that is becoming more and more crowded every day. Larry, along with comics like Jeff Foxworthy, Bill Engvall and Ron White, have changed the face of comedy, bringing the down home to a nation hungry for country values.

On Oct. 22, Larry is making his return to the Show Me Center, where he performed for a packed house last year. Now he's part of the hit show "Blue Collar TV" and has a new book coming out.

Last week Larry phoned in from his home in Florida for an interview with OFF! Magazine and talked about his rise to the top, shoe shines and the evils of political correctness.

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You probably do hundreds of shows a year, but do you remember being in Cape Girardeau before?

Yeah, I was there, man I know I was there what, about a year-and-a-half ago? It was awesome. I got great fans, I don't complain about any of my fans, and I remember it was a great show, too. We did almost 4,000 people, and that was back when we started getting big crowds. Back then it was like "Wow, 3,800." Now we're averaging, it depends, in the winter we were averaging about 8,000 a show.

I guess that has to do with the fact that the Blue Collar Comedy Tour and "Blue Collar TV" has taken off so well?

Yeah, it's just that fact, all that stuff just keeps piling up.

How many shows do you do in a year's time?

You know what, last year I was on the road 287 days and did about 300-something shows.

This year, I'm on vacation now, but that started about two weeks ago, and I was on the road every day since January 10. I've been going crazy, that's for sure.

You seem like a pretty hard working guy.

You know what, there's just been projects coming. I don't turn them down, I do different things and I like working.

It seemed like you just burst on the scene with the Blue Collar Comedy Tour. How did that come about?

I started stand-up in '85. And about '90 or '91 I started calling radio stations doing social commentaries, and I would get up every morning for 12 years or 13 years, I got up every morning at six o'clock, five days a week, 365 days a year, every week and called morning shows. The most I ever had at one time was 27. I stayed around the 17 to 21 mark because there's just so many to call, but the biggest it was was 27 stations.

It wasn't syndicated, I would call every station, so I'd be on the phone from about six to about 11:30 every morning for 13 years doing social commentary, just getting my name out, and it paid off. I did it for three-and-a-half years before I ever got paid to do anything.

Around '95 I started selling out comedy clubs, so it took about four years to catch on.

I was doing 300 nights selling out clubs. When you're on Blue Collar tour, you do a show on a Friday night and a Saturday night, and you're doing 8 to 9,000 a night, so you end up doing 18,000 on a weekend instead of 2,100 over a whole week.

Is the persona you have on stage pretty much how you are in real life?

It's kind of a mixture. I put my accent on a lot thicker. I'm one of those guys that can go in and out of an accent easy. I just put my accent on thicker, other than that, that's how I dress normally, I always wear lace-up ropers, I always wear jeans, I always wear something sleeveless and I always wear a baseball cap with a hook on it. It's pretty much me.

Did you always know you wanted to be a comedian?

Well, I was a comedian before I started calling the morning shows. I did it as a way to get bigger crowds. Comedy was a big craze in the mid-80s then it started dying out in the mid-90s because it was over-saturated. You could see stand-up comics everywhere.

So a lot of the clubs were dying out because everybody and their sister was a comedian, so unless you could put seats in that comedy club you weren't going to make very good money. If you can draw you can make money.

I basically figured out, "Hey, people like what I do on the radio." I never toured as The Cable Guy, but people knew The Cable Guy, so I'd be stupid not to work as The Cable Guy, because it's easy to remember, people know who it is, people want to see me from hearing me on the radio. So it would be an easy draw, so that's when I picked up the moniker The Cable Guy and started doing stuff.

You can be the funniest guy in the world and if nobody knows who you are it's the same.

Was being a comic something you had thought about?

I liked it. I didn't know how to do it, I didn't know anything about it, I didn't know anything.

My friends dared me to go on stage one night, and I went on stage, and then I got hooked. Once it's something you think you want to do and you get up and you do it, if it's in your system, it's in your system, and that's gonna make you want to do it even more.

Why has Blue Collar comedy gotten so big in the last few years?

Number one, we're just regular guys, you can tell that. We grew up just like people who are coming to our shows. We do humor we think is funny, even if it's not politically correct we'll do it. You know, people are sick and tired of that garbage. People just want to come, sit down and be entertained with mindless entertainment.

That's why "Blue Collar TV" is doing so good, you can't sit down and watch TV anymore without Hollywood trying to cram some liberal crap down your throat.

I know I want to watch a show and not be preached to about what as a**hole I am. "Blue Collar TV" can do that, just like Benny Hill. Benny Hill was one of the dumbest shows on the planet, but Benny Hill was around for 30 years because it was funny.

Now that you have all this fame, and everybody knows who Larry the Cable Guy is do you still try to stay that same down-to-earth guy that grew up in Nebraska?

Hold on, I got this guy shining my shoe here. Just kidding (laughing). I'm totally grounded. I hang out with the same friends, same buddies, nothing's changed.

I've still got the same problem everybody else has, that's just one problem I eliminated was the money problem. Everything else is the same.

Do you ever delve into politics in your show?

If I do politics on stage I'm not going to do it unless I get a laugh with it. But, yeah, when I'm off stage I totally delve into all that stuff. Somebody has to keep the country straight, Rush can't do it all by himself.

So your politics kind of lean to the right?

Oh, yeah. I'm a John Wayne, Ronald Reagan man.

Anything else you'd like to say?

Git-R-Done!

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Just the facts

What: Larry the Cable Guy

Where: Show Me Center

When: Oct. 22, 8 p.m.

Tickets: 651-5000