Jeff Foxworthy is a comedian for the people, but Hollywood, in his estimation, has lost the plot.
“I don’t think Hollywood has understood that audience in a long, long time,” Foxworthy told Fox News Digital of regular people. “I don’t care where they live or where they stand politically, if you sat people down and said, ‘What do you want out of life?’ I bet we would agree on 85% of the things.”
He said everybody wants to love somebody and be loved, be able to take care of their family and have a little entertainment.
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“We want the same things,” he argued. “But what happened was, instead of celebrating the 85% that we’re all alike, we yell and scream at each other over the 15% that we’re different. Being different is fine. It would be boring as hell if we were all alike and all thought the same way.”
Foxworthy loves being able to talk to people about differing points of view.
WATCH HERE: JEFF FOXWORTHY SAYS HOLLYWOOD HASN’T UNDERSTOOD REGULAR AMERICANS IN A LONG TIME
“I think that was the success of the ‘Blue Collar Tour,’ because when the Kings of Comedy came out, Atlanta was one of the first stops, and they had an article about it in the Atlanta paper. And it said it was a show for the urban hip audience. And I’m like, ‘’Well, I’ve been to all 50 states, and let me tell you, there’s 200 million people that aren’t urban or hip, so let’s do a show for them.’”
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He added, “I just kind of, my comedy comes from this template. I just think if I think something or my wife says something or my family does something, I’m going to assume other people are thinking and saying and doing the same things.”
The greatest compliment he gets, Foxworthy said, is when someone tells him after he’s tried a new bit, ‘Oh my God, you’ve been in our house,’ ‘cause, you know, you’ve made them kind of laugh at themselves. You’ve held something up that they’ve said or thought, and you realize that’s — we all want to belong to something bigger than ourselves.”
That’s when he realizes, “‘Oh, it’s not just me. Other people, other people’s families are as screwed up as ours,’ you know?”
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Foxworthy’s new comedy special “The Joke’s On Me” is streaming now on Fox Nation.
WATCH HERE: JEFF FOXWORTHY DESCRIBES THE INSPIRATION FOR HIS ‘THE JOKE’S ON ME’ COMEDY SPECIAL
The special is unique in that it offers a behind-the-scenes look at his family life and his joke-writing process.
The comedian said he was inspired by the Beatles documentary “Get Back,” which showed the musicians writing the song.
“They were in the studio, and they were trying to write songs and, you know, playing with lyrics and throwing them out and playing with instruments and throwing them out,” Foxworthy said. “And at the end, they all go up on the roof, and they play ‘Get Back,’ and it was so beautiful. I got teary-eyed. I’m sitting there watching it, and I thought: ‘You know, seeing the process didn’t take anything away from the finished product. In fact, it added to it. It made it richer because you saw the struggle that went into creating that.”
It made him realize that “Nobody’s ever done that with stand-up. People just think stand-ups are funny.”
He said people often think stand-ups just grab a microphone and start talking about their day, “And yet to do a 60-minute special, it takes a year of hard work to create an hour worth of material.”
That’s why when Fox Nation first approached the comedian about a 60-minute special, he wasn’t interested.
“I said, ‘But if you’re willing to try something different, if you will show me note cards in hands, going into a club on a Tuesday night or a Wednesday night and just throwing these thoughts out’ – Because one of the things that still fascinates me after over 40 years about stand-up is I still don’t know what people are gonna laugh at.”
He laughed, “You would think after 40 years, I would know. Now I’ll go in there with an idea, ‘Oh, this is really funny.’ And then nobody laughs, or I’ll have a card where I think ‘This is so stupid. I’m embarrassed to say it.’ And you throw it out there and everybody’s beating the tables laughing. And you’re like, ‘Really?’ And so I wanted to show that. And Fox Nation was the first place that ever said, ‘OK, we’ll do it.’”
Friends have told him it’s the best thing he’s ever done and that they’ve never seen anything like it before, he said.
“I love stand-up,” he added. “Every special looks the same, and I wanted — I mean they just do. I’ve seen a thousand of them, and so I’m like, ‘I want this to be different.’ I want something like the Beatles thing. I want someone to watch it and at the end they go, ‘Not only did I laugh, I learned something about the artist in it,’ and I think we pulled it off.”
The 67-year-old has also implied that this special might be his last.
“And by that, I don’t mean that I would quit doing stand-up,” he explained. “I just — at this point in my life, what it takes to create that new linear hour, I’d rather spend that time with my grandkids, or I’d rather spend time on a tractor at the farm.”
He’s said he’s also been on the road nonstop his entire career.
“I laugh at my music friends when they say they’re on tour. I said, ‘Well, tour implies it stops at some point.’ I said, ‘I’ve been on tour since 1984, you know? It just never stopped.’ I still love stand-up. I just don’t know that I’m willing — and to be honest, I’m not sure I can do anything any better than this, which just feels like a good place to stop.”
