The old Foghorn Leghorn cartoon has never, to my knowledge, been discussed in The Stranger‘s editorial offices. But when Charles compared a local politician to Foghorn Leghorn five minutes ago, the room exploded in panegyrics to and imitations of the old Southern chicken.

The arts editorial staffers never unanimously agree on anything except the very basics. (Like, you know, “murder is generally a bad idea.”) The fact that so many of us share a deep affection for Foghorn Leghorn is a freak phenomenon, an extreme mathematical improbability.

As Grant said in the middle of the excitement and the I do declare!s: “He’s a straight shooter.”

Brend an Kiley has worked as a child actor in New Orleans, as a member of the junior press corps at the 1988 Republican National Convention, and, for one happy April, as a bootlegger’s assistant in Nicaragua....

26 replies on “Stranger Arts Staff Experiences Foghorn Leghorn Revelation”

  13. “Nice girl, but about as sharp as a sack of wet mice.”

    “That boy’s as thick as a whale sandwich.”

    [knocks the cat down]
    “Stand up, son. You’re fallin’ all over yourself.”

    “Okay, I’ll shut up. I’m not one that has to keep talkin’. Some fellas just have to keep their mouths flappin’, but not me! I was brought up right, my pa used to tell me “shut up” and I’d shut up! I wouldn’t say nothin’!”

    “Well bow, well bow my weavel, I’ll do it.”

    “Let’s bury – I say, let’s bury the hatchet, but not in anyone’s head, boy.”

    “Gal reminds me of the highway between Fort Worth and Dallas. No curves.”

    “She remi – I say, she reminds me of Paul Revere’s ride. A little light in the belfry.”

    “That dog’s like taxes: He just don’t know when to stop.”

    “This is going to cause more confusion than a mouse at a Burlesque show.”

    “That boy’s so dumb, he thinks a Mexican boarder pays rent.” (Okay, just a little racist.)

    “I got, I say I got this boy as fidgety as a bubble dancer with a slow leak.”

    As a northwest boy, Foghorn Leghorn was my first understanding of southern culture.

  15. @13: that’s not racist. “That boy’s so dumb, he thinks the Mexican Border pays rent”. A homonym joke. could have been the Canadian Border.

  16. I consider the Hyper-Chicken lawyer in “Futurama” a Foghorn Leghorn tribute.

    (I’m a great fan of the wolf and the sheep-dog who seem on the best of terms when they’re not on the clock.)

  21. @13, those are fabulous, and it’s “boll my weevil”. Boll weevils were a scourge of the cotton fields, the topic of many a blues song. Leghorn himsefl was a takeoff on a radio comedian’s character Senator Beauregard Cleghorn, who refused to believe the South lost the Civil War. Here’s Senator Cleghorn in what I think was a one-off B picture.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQ35Ajus7…

  22. I can’t believe nobody has mentioned Col. Leghorn in the following context: it’s the moniker ascribed to the abysmal southern accent affected by lousy Hollywood actors and actresses trying to play Southern roles. Examples: everybody in “Steel Magnolias”, Julia Roberts in every movie in which she plays a southerner, and the exemplar: Dan Aykroyd in “Driving Miss Daisy”

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