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Billy Bob hits the wrong note in Canada

Hollywood actor-turned-musician cancels tour after 'national insult' provokes a furious reaction

By Guy Adams in Los Angeles

Billy Bob Thornton performing with his band the Boxmasters. He said on radio that Canadian fans were like mashed potatoes without the gravy

AP

Billy Bob Thornton performing with his band the Boxmasters. He said on radio that Canadian fans were like mashed potatoes without the gravy

Sex, drugs and rock'n'roll are no problem. But as Billy Bob Thornton has just discovered, no musician – however famous – can get away with coming to Canada and suggesting that the locals might be ever-so-slightly boring.

The Hollywood actor, who is trying to rebrand himself as a hillbilly singer, has cancelled a tour of Quebec and Ontario after saying in a radio interview that Canadian fans were like "mashed potatoes with no gravy".

During a remarkably cantankerous audience with CBC, the national radio network, Thornton complained that local audiences were "very reserved" and consistently failed to behave in a suitably uproarious fashion when his band takes to the stage.

"It doesn't matter what you say to them," he complained. "It's mashed potatoes with no gravy ... We tend to play places where people throw things at each other. And here, they just sit there."

The comments sparked public outrage when they were aired on Wednesday and Thornton and his band, the Boxmasters, were greeted with a chorus of boos when they arrived onstage in Toronto as the support act for Willie Nelson the following night. The Toronto Star reported that large sections of the audience shouted "here comes the gravy!" while unconfirmed reports suggested that several irate punters decided to take Thornton at his word and throw plastic cups at him.

On Friday, a large crowd in Montreal was gearing up for a similar performance when they were suddenly informed that the Boxmasters had cancelled their remaining Canadian dates. The news was greeted with wild applause.

A post on Nelson's website initially said that "no reasons have been announced" for the withdrawal. But yesterday, Thornton's publicist blamed flu, which he said had suddenly struck down the group's guitarist and several crew members. The band will resume scheduled performances on 14 April, in the safety of their native USA.

It will take some time for Thornton to regain the affections of the Canadian people. The actor, who was once married to Angelina Jolie, launched his tirade against the country after becoming highly upset at the way his "electric hillbilly" band was introduced on CBC's Q programme.

In the opening segment of the show, host Jian Ghomeshi had gently informed listeners that, in addition to being the Boxmasters' lead singer and drummer, Thornton was an "Oscar-winning screenwriter-actor-director".

That apparently contradicted Thornton's wishes that his career outside of music never be mentioned during interviews he conducts with the band. In the remainder of the interview, he greeted most questions with either complete silence, or non sequiturs.

At one section of the appearance, Thornton complained that he had been forbidden from smoking in the radio station's studios – a factor which some blamed for his apparent belligerence.

Some might say that Canada's response to them came dangerously close to protesting too much. However, the famously hospitable nation's concert-goers have a reputation for pushing the envelope: last week, Britney Spears had to leave the stage in Vancouver for 30 minutes after becoming upset by fumes from people in the audience who were smoking marijuana.

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Comments

karma!
[info]radnidge wrote:
Sunday, 12 April 2009 at 11:43 pm (UTC)
BBT's a self obsessed person who thinks the sun shines out of his behind! He had this coming...
Too bad your article didn't go into reason of why he really booed out of Canada... ie: refusing to answer questions on a live radio program, and uttering things that made no sense when asked point blank questions. I mean, how hard is it to answer the question "who influences you mucially?"
The flu? I think the band has had enough of BBT's crap to last a lifetime!
Re: karma!
[info]rayleddy wrote:
Monday, 13 April 2009 at 07:05 am (UTC)
I thought that was funny!! Geddit! "who influences you mucially?"
The flu? Geddit mucially.....mucus??? oh forget it!
[info]dennycranewhu wrote:
Monday, 13 April 2009 at 01:59 am (UTC)
Midlife crisis or what, lol!!
(no subject) - [info] - Monday, 13 April 2009 at 03:29 am (UTC)
Re: Boring Canada
[info]rg335 wrote:
Monday, 13 April 2009 at 03:46 am (UTC)
...and we're all glad you're gone.
Re: Boring Canada
[info]godsavereginask wrote:
Monday, 13 April 2009 at 04:01 am (UTC)
Fuck you and good riddance.
The truth hurts
[info]rosleinrot wrote:
Monday, 13 April 2009 at 10:22 am (UTC)
All together now--name three amusing Canadians. Perhaps because of their predominantly Protestant Scots-Irish and thrifty-French-peasant ancestry, perhaps because of all those wide open spaces, Canadian has long been a synonym for boring. Getting upset because you are called boring is like getting upset because you are charged with having no sense of humour--only a truly boring (or humourless) person would become angry rather than smiling and making a pointed comment. And only people with no self-awareness or sensitivity to the opinions of others (a pretty good definition of being humourless-boring) would make a public issue of such a comment, thereby publicising their babyish petulance to the whole world to laugh at.

What can we do about the Canadians? An airlift of copies of Mark Twain, PG Wodehouse, Flann O'Brien? A Clockwork Orange-in-reverse required course in schools, in which Canadians are strapped into a chair to watch Preston Sturges films and given a rewarding little buzz when they laugh? These people may be ridiculous, but it is unkind just to laugh at them--they must be very unhappy,
Re: The truth hurts
[info]winston88 wrote:
Monday, 13 April 2009 at 11:17 am (UTC)
Amusing Canadians? I don't know about you but Mike Myers and Russell Peters are quite amusing along with but not limited to John Candy, Dave Foley, Eugene Levy, Shaun Majunder, Rick Moranis, Jim Carrey, Martin Short, Colin Mochrie (I think you Brits know him from Whose Line . . . ?) and the Red Green Show or This Hour has Twenty Minutes.

I am not going to lie, Canada IS boring but we are not humourless people. As for Billy Bob, who would go nuts over him? He is an arrogant man in Willie Nelsons support act going through a midlife crisis who decided to be an absolute jerk to Jian ( a very popular radio presenter who handled the situation very professionally). Canadians are simply more laid back and like to enjoy a show without getting in each others face. Britneys foray into Vancouver can attest to that fact.

Re: The truth hurts
[info]ouchxfrx wrote:
Monday, 13 April 2009 at 01:14 pm (UTC)

If you saw the video you would agree the guy is OBNOXIOUS. How you determine that Canadians are humorless from this is beyond me. Most Candians find humor in things that do not involve the denigration of human beings, unlike Americans (your million or so "reality" shows attests to this fact).

Canadians find their greatest humor in regularily kicking American butt in any number of hockey tournaments.

Really though, if Billy Butthead were a Canadian, I would petition the government to keep the guy inside our borders. It's not like America can afford to waste any more global goodwill.
Re: The truth hurts
[info]rg333 wrote:
Tuesday, 14 April 2009 at 12:40 am (UTC)
sounds to me like you are very, very "full-of-yourself". Do you kiss a lot of mirrors?
Re: The truth hurts
[info]rg333 wrote:
Tuesday, 14 April 2009 at 12:55 am (UTC)
Sounds like you're really full-of-yourself, and you probably spend lots of time kissing mirrors.

The only thing interesting about Brits is that, ah.....uh.................., No, sorry--can't think of anything.
[info]frank_brady wrote:
Monday, 13 April 2009 at 11:00 am (UTC)
"All together now--name three amusing Canadians."

Oh, for God's sake. Dan Ackroyd. Stephen Leacock. Jim Carrey.
The truth hurts
[info]godsavereginask wrote:
Monday, 13 April 2009 at 02:11 pm (UTC)
Add Seth Rogen

C'mon Rosie.

What's the source of your animus? A Canadian stood you up once? Left you at the altar? Wouldn't suck on your toes? Was turned off by your halitosis?



Well, yeah.
[info]dreadpiratemel wrote:
Monday, 13 April 2009 at 03:10 pm (UTC)
Canadian audiences ARE boring. It's because we're all high. I have never been a Canadian audience member without being high. Fun for me, boring for the performer. Suck on it, Thornton-hole, the performers are there for us, not vice-versa.
Misleading headline/sub AND article...
[info]quaylewd wrote:
Monday, 13 April 2009 at 08:24 pm (UTC)
The truth is Billy Bob outted himself as a rather stupid, not-so-very-talented Hollywood prima donna who claims to be a musician of Tom Petty calibre - but "you're not to mention my other career, ever" - on a national radio show (Canada's equivalent to the BBC's Radio One). It could've happened anywhere...London, New York, Assleak Arkansas...it was eventually going to happen because he's quite simply a dickhead. He's a no-talent flake with psych issues. End of.

Spin it any you want, but the fact remains, Billy Bob's "career" as a "serious" musician just tanked, and not just amongst Canadians either. The CBC video went viral internationally, and the 95% or so overwhelmingly negative comments on blogs/YouTube are from around the world. He's a joke, and it has nothing to do with Canada or "mashed potatoes". He just happened to show his true colours in Canada.

And he may be coming your way soon my British friends, as he's running out of places to play in North America. So consider this: imagine a washed-up, alleged wife-beating actor whose single claim to fame is playing a Southern sling-bladin' retard (and/or once being married to a one Angelina Jolie), shows up at Bush House for an interview at BBC1. He decides out of the blue that he doesn't like the interviewer's line of questioning, then trying to be all witty and obtuse, "Slingblade" creepily goes off on how the British have "bad teeth" (I use this analogy because saying all Brits have bad teeth is about as ridiculous and cliched as saying all Canadians are boring).

Now, would the reaction to the above in the UK be about "national pride"? Or, would it be more like "WTF is this tosser on about, and exactly WHO is he?" (as we're apparently not supposed to know).

I'm guessing the reaction would be about the same as Canada's.

I do agree with that part of this article that SOME Canadians did take the "mashed potatoes without the gravy" thing a bit too seriously, because from my POV, a) it was the most lame attempt at an insult I've ever heard in my life, and b) I know for a fact "Slingblade" stole the whole thing word-for-word from Goober on The Andy Griffiths Show.
Re: Misleading headline/sub AND article...
[info]lizcoast wrote:
Tuesday, 14 April 2009 at 01:18 am (UTC)
I lived in the UK for years, and what I found boring about the Brits was how they tended to go on and on and on about how Canada was boring whilst simultaneously knowing fuck-all about our country.

The reason that most of us found the interview between Jian and Billy Bob Thornton annoying/rude/ridiculous is because of the petulant way BBT responded to what he perceived as a slight by Gomeshi. In his introduction Jian mentioned in passing that the frontman was also an Oscar-winning actor and this caused BBT to alternate between refusing to answer questions and then answering others with bizarre non-sequitirs. What I think many Canadians found odd was BBT's attitude that Jian was lucky to have him and should kow-tow accordingly. Jian, on the other hand, seemed to feel that BBT would not be being interviewed on our number one morning show if he had not been an Oscar-winning actor. And I tend to side with Jian's reasonable attitude.

I think it brings up interesting issues around interviewers fawning over celebrities because they do not want to taint their next possible "get". Jian was polite and professional, but not quite ready to worship at the alter of celebrity. Though I'd have loved to see our George from The Hour get ahold of BBT. Now THAT would have been confrontational!

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