ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, August 5, 1996 TAG: 9608060033
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 2 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: SCOTT MOORE THE WASHINGTON POST
Don't be fooled. Jeff Foxworthy didn't just fall off the truck from Bug Tussle. But Beverly Hills' resident redneck - a former IBM engineer - does delight in driving his new Dodge Ram pickup around the posh community, where he lives ``three doors down from the Clampetts.''
``My wife just laughs at me. She says, `You finally get a TV show, and you can have any car in the world and you buy a pickup truck,' '' the 37-year-old comic said. ``My brother lives in Georgia,and he was griping on the phone, saying, `Man, everybody's got this truck.' But I don't have that problem in Beverly Hills. I stick out.''
Foxworthy certainly didn't fit in at ABC, which never figured out what to do with the sitcom based on the ``You might be a redneck if ... '' portion of his comedy act. Although ``The Jeff Foxworthy Show'' drew large audiences when paired with fellow Atlanta comic Brett Butler's ``Grace Under Fire,'' ABC exiled ``Foxworthy'' to Saturday nights and then put it on long-term hiatus.
``We kept hearing, `We think you've got too much of a blue-collar appeal.' I was like, `Duh! I didn't think I would be the toast of Palm Springs,' '' said Foxworthy, who has sold 6 million copies of his two comedy albums and 4 million copies of his eight books as well as a collection of humorous drawings.
But a funny thing happened to the comedian: Literally two minutes after hearing that ABC had dropped the show, Foxworthy related, he got the news that his show was being picked up by top-rated NBC, to lead off its Monday-night schedule.
``I thought we'd end up somewhere - maybe drift down the food chain somewhat, like being on the Weather Channel every other Thursday,'' he joked. ``But I fell up the ladder.''
Not only that, but from his first meeting with NBC executives, Foxworthy saw a change in attitude.
``Some of the frustration I had [at ABC] was that nobody ever asked my opinion of anything, even though it is `The Jeff Foxworthy Show.' From our first meeting with NBC, they said, `What kind of show do you want to do?' I said, `Really? I think I ought to live in Georgia. I think I ought to work here.'
``They said, `Go do it,' '' he recalled, and NBC has promoted the show recently with a dozen different TV spots.
Getting the green light to be a full-fledged redneck also has restored Foxworthy's confidence. Though he maintained his self-deprecating wit about his acting ability (``I strive to become adequate''), the comic was perplexed by the chaotic atmosphere that surrounded the show in its first season. ``We didn't even have a premise two months into shooting,'' he said.
The result was little more than an imitation of his stage act. He played an air-conditioning technician (named Jeff Foxworthy) whose humor, including frequent redneck references, enlivened an Illinois college town, to the occasional dismay of his pregnant wife (Anita Barone) and 6-year-old son (Haley Joel Osment). Barone's character gave birth in the season finale, which aired after ABC cancelled the show.
However, several of the 18 shows that were shot never aired, including many featuring ``Saturday Night Live'' alumnus Jay Mohr, who joined the cast in January as Foxworthy's brother.
Mohr will return this season, and Foxworthy will have a new, as yet unidentified wife plus a new job on a loading dock and an Atlanta-area address.
Thus, in quick order Foxworthy was divorced from a network and a television wife. Both marriages had had difficulties.
The casting of Barone, a multiple Drama Critic Award-winner, was indicative of the first-season problems. Not only had Barone never heard of Foxworthy before getting the role, she seemed uncomfortable working with a comic whose most significant acting credits consisted of goofy parts in country-music videos.
``I think [the redneck schtick] is really funny, charming and relatable to everybody at some level,'' she said last spring. ``Everybody has a bit of redneck in them or certainly in their family, whether it's someone who is uncouth, or constantly making faux pas.''
Barone - decidedly not the type who would wear a tube top to a wedding - was indoctrinated in redneck ways last Christmas, when her brother Sammy gave her an empty bottle of Redneck Beer. ``I told him, `You might be a redneck if you give a gift without the contents,' '' she said.
The empty vessel seems symbolic in other ways.
By summer, Barone ``wanted to go do movies and things,'' Foxworthy said, ``... and we wanted to get more funny out of the home situation.''
In the second-season opener, Osment will return, but his younger sibling will have miraculously grown up a few years - allowing the cast to resemble more closely the ages of Foxworthy's two daughters, now 2 and 4. The show also will retain Dakin Matthews as Foxworthy's father-in-law and will add G.W. Bailey as six-times-married Big Jim, based on Foxworthy's own father.
Recasting worked for elder daughter Becky on ``Roseanne'' (twice) and for husband Darrin on ``Bewitched.'' As long as the show is funny, Foxworthy knows the audience will adjust.
LENGTH: Medium: 92 linesby CNB