In the very late 1990s, four comedians came together, and created a phenomenon. That phenomenon was a cinematic standup routine known as The Kings of Comedy. Now maybe you liked the likes of Martin Laurence, Bernie Mac… Uh… The other guys on that show. Or maybe you hated their guts and/or found them painfully unfunny. Either opinion is valid, but that’s not the point.
Soon, every quartet of friends who all had one thing in common started making their own version of this concept. There were The Kings of Comedy, the Latin Kings of Comedy, The Queens of Comedy… And somewhere in that jumble, there was The Blue Collar Comedy Tour.
This might shock, possibly even horrify you, dear reader… But I like The Blue Collar Comedy Tour. I’ll give you a minute to process this revelation. I, a guy who’s cut his teeth on Norwegian black metal, thumbed his nose at the likes of Riba MacIntyr, votes for The Green Party despite their motto being “We’ll lose for sure”, and thought cowboy hats were for losers for the longest time, likes The Blue Collar Comedy Tour. I know, I know. I seem like the last person on Earth who’d enjoy such low brow humor… But here I am. What can I say, except even I’M prone to having a guilty pleasure here and there.
To give you an idea of what we’re dealing with here, let’s do a quick little rollcall. In no specific order…
First up, there was Jeff Foxworthy. If you had no idea who anyone else in this group was, you knew who Jeff Foxworthy was. This guy… Maybe wasn’t ALL OVER the 90s per say, but he definitely had a following. In my experience, he was one of those guys you either absolutely loved, or you absolutely hated. No middle ground whatsoever.
Prior to this tour, Foxworthy was known for many things. He had a sitcom at one point that… Uh… Existed, I guess. He had a career in standup, and that career spawned the popular protomeme “you might be a redneck”.
Maybe it’s a bit of a hot take, or maybe everyone agrees whole heartedly, but I would dare to say that this tour right here revitalized this man’s career. I remembered hearing the name at first, and cringed, remembering how hack the “you might be a redneck” bit had gotten at that point. But then he took the stage, I heard his actual, non “you might be a redneck” standup, and honestly, it wasn’t bad. I mean yeah, there were definitely funnier guys on the tour, but Foxworthy actually wasn’t terrible.
Now if we’re talking funny, then this guy right here was funny. If you don’t know, this right here is Bill Ingval. AKA, the “here’s your sign” guy.
I’ll admit, until The Blue Collar Comedy Tour, I had no idea who this guy was. And when I did see his routine, I admit the whole “here’s your sign” thing didn’t make sense right away. But I found the rest of his set to be absolutely hilarious. So much so, I wondered why they didn’t make this guy the main event?
That is, until I heard…
This is Ron White. And out of the entire Blue Collar crew, this dude is the best. Bill Ingval was funny, and Foxworthy was funny, but Ron White? That man was hilarious!
Unlike the others, he didn’t really have a catchphrase, or a shtick, or anything like that. He just had his material, and honestly, his was some of the best the show had to offer.
A lot of people I’ve talked to over the years often wondered aloud: “why is this guy even here? He’s so much better than all these other guys.” Honestly… That’s a good question. I’m guessing he was friends with some of, or even ALL of the other guys on tour.
Last… And certainly least… There was Larry the Cable Guy. I’ll level with you, dear reader: if any of these comedians’ sets qualified as an opportunity for a bathroom break, maybe check out the merchandise booths while you’re at it, Larry the Cable Guy is definitely the one many would say you could afford to miss.
FUN FACT: In the earlier days of his career, I distinctly remember him being a regular on The Johnny Dare Show out here in Kansas City. Do with that what you will, I just thought it was interesting.
Honestly, I didn’t hate Larry. I didn’t LIKE Larry, but compared to most, I didn’t hate him, either. I definitely found some of his bits funnier than others, but I wasn’t about to go on the warpath like David Cross did that one time, either. He was what he was, and you either got the joke, or you didn’t./
To this very day, I couldn’t tell you what it was that I loved about these guys or their shtick. As individuals, I only really liked one or two of them, but when all four of them were on stage together, there was a kind of chemistry and comradery between them that gave them that extra oomph. Hell, even Larry was at least tolerable, what with him basically being the resident hurr-durr of the quartet.
Whatever it was that attracted me to The Blue Collar Comedy Tour, it seemed to attract a lot of other people as well. So much so, in fact, they did another movie version of their standup. And another.
And then, they started giving them ACTUAL movies.
Larry the Cable Guy: Health Inspector was a real blink-and-you’ll-miss-it sort of movie that had people asking: “who is this for?” Even people who LIKE Larry the Cable Guy apparently hated this one. Hell, I couldn’t even convince MYSELF, let alone any of my friends, to go see this cinematic atrocity. And to put things into perspective, my friends and I went to see Meet the Spartans in theaters, and didn’t walk out at any point. And believe me, it was tempting.
Delta Farce was the other movie that got released at the height of their popularity. I never saw this one, either, but the previews pretty much told me everything I needed to know. And… No. Just… No. Not happening.
To be fair, yes, the premise of dimwits joining the military, and chaos ensuing is nothing especially new, but I really felt like Bill Ingval deserved a better movie than this. And that was just from watching the previews! God help anyone who sat down to watch this from start to finish. Even if you were doing it ironically, like all those assholes who keep holding screenings of Tommy Wiseau’s The Room, you deserved better than this.
And, of course, you can’t hit rock bottom until you’ve tried your hand at a TV show. I couldn’t find a decent version of the title card for that one, but I assure you, Blue Collar TV existed. And it was precisely as bad as you probably think it is.
Look, man, I admit to actually catching several episodes of this. I wanted this to be funny… And to be fair, it did get a couple of legit laughs out of me and my friends. But in the end… Yeah, Blue Collar TV didn’t need to exist.
An interesting fact about this show: Ron White was the one member of the group who didn’t take part. I think even HE was starting to realize the horse was dead, and wanted out while the getting was good.
And that was pretty much it for the original Blue Collar Comedy Tour.
I think they tried to revive it at one point, and introduce new acts like the late Ralphy May, among others. I’m going to take a shot in the dark, and say that, outside of the diehards, this newer version of the tour didn’t really do it for anybody. Those first tours with the original four were lightning in a PBR bottle. Second time around, it was kind of like rebooting The Man Show with different hosts, or rebooting popular Disney movies and recasting all the white characters as people of color for no reason. It just doesn’t work. But that first trilogy of tours, I’ll remember the most fondly of all.
Okay, now you can point and laugh.
How About That Thing? 
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