Foghorn Leghorn

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Foghorn Leghorn

"It's a joke, son. Pay attention!"
Species Chicken
Gender Male
Member of Tune Squad
Affiliation Barnyard Dawg
Henery Hawk
Sylvester
Miss Prissy
Egghead Jr.
Bugs Bunny
Daffy Duck
Carol in The Looney Tunes Show
Occupation Farm superintendent[1]
CEO in The Looney Tunes Show
Mayor in Bugs Bunny Builders
Looney Ball Coach in Tiny Toons Looniversity.
Father Unnamed father[2]
Mother Not mentioned
Marital status Single
First appearance MM: Walky Talky Hawky (1946)
Played by Mel Blanc (1946-1989)
Jeff Bergman (1990-1992, 2001, Since 2011)
Greg Burson (1991-2003)
Bill Farmer (1996-2008)
Frank Gorshin (1996-1997)
Billy West (1998)
Jeff Bennett (2000-2011
Joe Alaskey (2006)
Maurice Lamarche (2007)
Eric Bauza (2018, 2021)
File:TTA Foghorn.png
Tiny Toon Adventures
File:SJ Foghorn.png
Space Jam
File:BLT Foghorn.png
Baby Looney Tunes

The Looney Tunes Show
File:NLTS Foghorn
New Looney Tunes
File:LTC Foghorn.png
Looney Tunes Cartoons
File:ANL Foghorn.png
Space Jam: A New Legacy

Bugs Bunny Builders

Tiny Toons Looniversity

Foghorn Leghorn is an anthropomorphic rooster and one of the main characters of the Looney Tunes animated franchise. He was created by Robert McKimson and starred in a total of 29 cartoons from 1946 to 1964, during the golden age of American animation. His voice was originated by Mel Blanc using a Southern accent.

He is characterized for his overbearing and loud-mouthed personality, and is known to go on long ramblings much to the annoyance of some. He also acts as a practical jokester, engaging in antics where he trades wits with Barnyard Dawg and Henery Hawk.

Foghorn's protégé in Tiny Toon Adventures is Fowlmouth.

Character description

Foghorn is strongly based around his larger-than life and talkative demeanor, earning a him a reputation as a blabbering loudmouth. He is characterized as bombastic, unrefined and overconfident, yet he also displays a playful and mischievous spirit when the situation persists.

When he makes an interaction with others, mainly a younger character such as Henery Hawk, Foghorn fancies himself as a lecturer who likes to share any form of advice as if he knows it all, while also acting as a sophisticated person. He usually has the habit of tossing bits of wisdom interjected with phrases such as "Pay attention, son", or "Look at me when I'm talkin' to ya, boy." His speech also consists of various Southern expressions and other vernacular. Despite this, his figure of speech tends to fall back as it often irritates the listener, and Foghorn himself fails to recognize that he talks too much.

Many of Foghorn's cartoons revolve around his pranks with Barnyard Dawg in nearly every short they appear. He is often the initial aggressor that acts out of self-amusement, unlike other rivalries in the Looney Tunes franchise, but he subsequently switches to the "losing" end of the feud when Barnyard gets the winning hand. It is never revealed how or why their feud started in the first place. In spite of their ongoing feud, Foghorn and Barnyard managed to team up on occasion to deal with someone who has caused a problem with both of them (e.g. Daffy Duck in The High and the Flighty and an unnamed fox in Fox-Terror).

Foghorn shares a habit of performing a verse of the song "Campdown Races" by Stephen Foster, humming the lyrics while loudly singing the refrain "Doo-Dahh! Doo-Dahh!", and ending the verse with "Ohh, Doo-Dahh Day!" In some occasions, he sings the song more than once, and sometimes sings his own lyrics if they are related to what he's doing.

Foghorn is often portrayed as a resident of a farm. While the farm in question is unnamed for the most part, it was given the title "Old MacDonald's Farm" in the short A Broken Leghorn. According to Raw! Raw! Rooster!, the farm is situated in Cucamonga, California. While he is never given a formal job within the shorts, he is implied to have one in Banty Raids, in which he was given the title of "Foghorn Leghorn, sup't."

Appearances

TV series

Movies

Shorts

Specials

Comics

Video games

Biography

Debut Series

We're All a Little Looney

Come On and Slam! and Welcome to the Jam!

Foghorn Gets Modern

Going Down the Rabbit Hole

Back to Basics

It's Hard Hat Time!

Foghorn Sells Out

Foghorn is a guest at Warner Bros.' Burbank lot for its 100th anniversary. While on the set of Friends, Cyborg claims the part of Joey Tribianni, while Foghorn claims the part of Rachel Green, which starts a fight with Yosemite Sam, Taz, and Wile E. Coyote who also want the part.[3]

Development

Forghorn was directly inspired by Senator Claghorn, a fictional Southern politician played by Kenny Delmar on Fred Allen's radio program. Although Claghorn's first appearance on radio succeeded Foghorn on October 7, 1945, ten months before the recording date of Foghorn's first cartoon on January 13,[4] the loudmouthed rooster had adapted much of his personality, including his blustering mannerisms and such catchphrases as "I say…" and "That's a joke, son!"; Delmar's Claghorn character, in turn, was inspired by a Texas rancher who was fond of saying this.[5]

According to Keith Scott, Robert McKimson initially modeled Foghorn's personality on another radio character from the 1930s, known simply as "The Sheriff", who was played by Jack Clifford in the variety program Blue Monday Jamboree. However, McKimson had likely misremembered that connection, as he cited Delmar's Claghorn character as inspiration during a mid-1970s interview and mistook him for the Jamboree's Sheriff character.[4]

Gallery

Main article: Foghorn Leghorn/Gallery

Toys and merchandise

Behind the scenes

  • His first name, "Foghorn", refers to his loudmouthed personality, while the surname "Leghorn" is a reference to a breed of chickens originating from Tuscany, Italy (referred to in Italian as Livorno or Livornese).
  • Blanc's portrayal of Foghorn bears some similarities to Yosemite Sam, namely his accent; and even more so to a Southern sheriff-type character that he voiced in Stage Door Cartoon.
  • A younger version of Foghorn was originally going to be used in Tiny Toon Adventures, according to Tom Reugger. The idea was recieved with no enthusiasim by the production team, however, so the character of Fowl Mouth was created instead, who seemed to share the same "blustery spirit" as Foghorn.[6]

In popular culture

  • In the song "Role Model" from the Eminem album The Slim Shady LP, one of the lyrics used is a verse where Slim "jump[s] in a Chickenhawk cartoon with a cape on, and beat[s] up Foghorn Leghorn with an acorn." This same verse is also shown visually in the music video for "Role Model", depicting Slim jumping into a TV to become a superhero cartoon character, chasing down a rooster resembling Foghorn, and tearing his leg off after beating him with an acorn.
  • In the Family Guy episode "Back to the Woods," Foghorn shows up at a KFC, being lured in by the scent of seven herbs and spices before Colonel Sanders cuts his head off. Foghorn jokes about his headless body running around before realizing it's his own body.
  • In the Justice League Action episode "Follow that Space Cab!," Lobo, an alien bounty hunter who knows Earth culture, makes fun of Hawkman by calling him Foghorn.
  • In the Batwoman episode "Fair Skin, Blue Eyes," young Ryan steals Looney Tunes #233 (with Foghorn on the cover) from Galaxy Comics.
  • In the 2019 film Knives Out, Ransom tells Benoit to shut up "with that Kentucky-fried, Foghorn Leghorn drawl!"
  • In the Helluva Boss episode "Loo Loo Land," a character named Wally Wackford is introduced, who says "I say, I say" at the beginning of his sentences in similar fashion to Foghorn.
  • In The Simpsons episode "Pretty Whittle Liar," a statue of Foghorn is seen at the Hillfolk in Media exhibit at the Hillbilly Pica-ture Palace.
  • In April 2024, Foghorn became a subject of a viral meme where he was put in various anime and would either scold or give pep talk to characters such as Goku from Dragon Ball and Frieren from Frieren: Beyond Journey's End.[7] In response, Eric Bauza posted three videos on his Twitter account where he voiced some of the aforementioned memes.[8][9][10]

References

  1. ↑ Merrie Melodies: Banty Raids
  2. ↑ "Like my, I say, like my pappy used to say, 'Shoemaker, stick to your last.'"- Foghorn Leghorn (Merrie Melodies: Strangled Eggs)
  3. ↑ Teen Titans Go!: "Warner Bros. 100th Anniversary," season 8, episode 24 (2023).
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Scott, Keith (July 24, 2023). "The Origin of Foghorn Leghorn". Cartoon Research. Retrieved March 3, 2024.
  5. ↑ "It's a joke, Son!", AFI Catalog of Motion Pictures Produced in the United States, vol. 1, University of California Press, 1971, p. 1190. ISBN 9780520215214.
  6. ↑ Reugger, Tom (November 21, 2011). "A Tiny Toons Character Who Didn't Make the Cut". Toonatics. Retrieved May 10th, 2024.
  7. ↑ "Foghorn Leghorn Rambling / Speech Pattern Parodies". Know Your Meme. Retrieved April 25, 2024.
  8. ↑ Bauza, Eric (April 23, 2024). https://twitter.com/bauzilla/status/1782845929026121867.
  9. ↑ Bauza, Eric (April 23, 2024). https://twitter.com/bauzilla/status/1782844117736910961.
  10. ↑ Bauza, Eric (April 23, 2024). https://twitter.com/bauzilla/status/1782847606592532864.
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