‘Blue Collar’ guy White uproariously funny at Hanover

By Jorge Bannister, TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF

WORCESTER — The more than 2,000 in attendance Thursday night at The Hanover Theatre for the Performing Arts gave two standing ovations, five minutes apart.

That’s the kind of respect Ron White has garnered from his followers. While most of them are new (stemming from the huge success of “Blue Collar Comedy Tour: The Movie” released in 2003), there are quite a few which started following him in 1996 when he first started to tour nationally with Jeff Foxworthy.

On the road for his “Behavioral Problems Tour,” White — the first of the “Blue Collar” guys to come to Worcester since Larry the Cable Guy in 2007 — delivered a phenomenal 1-hour, 14-minute, set.

With some comics, there are lulls in a set that allow you to turn your brain off and just relax. White’s set is completely the opposite. He’s not one to linger on a particular joke for too long. Always keeping you on the edge of your seat, wanting that next punch line, not once did White disappoint.

Touching on topics such as rude people talking during a theater performance, marriage (of course — every comic who’s married talks about marriage and every comic who’s divorced talks about divorce), the beauty of people in Los Angeles and New Year’s resolutions.

White was very specific about the words he chose to set up and deliver the bit on the beautiful people in Los Angeles.

“A long time ago, in, like, the 1920s, there were beautiful people that wanted to become actors,” he started. “Some of them actually lived the dream. Others found other work there. And, while working, the beautiful met each other. They (had sex) and a good-looking person (having sex) with another good-looking person, naturally, they had beautiful babies. Those beautiful babies grew fond of each other, had sex and they too had beautiful babies. That’s not the case in Kansas.”

White touched on his — ahem — physique as well.

“My New Year’s resolution was to lose weight,” White said. “I was working out yesterday and sprained my fat.”

Closing his set, White touched on his marriage, his wife especially.

“She’s hot,” he said, “but, it’s a dry heat.”

Todd Sawyer opened the night with an amazing set.

The Seattle native seamlessly weaved his jokes through his 20-minute set, including an amazingly funny bit about having a conversation about the birds and the bees.

“The conversation with my dad went a lot simpler than the conversation with my mother,” Sawyer started. “When I was 15, my dad asked me, ‘Son, are you practicing safe sex?’ I looked at him for a beat before responding, ‘Dad, practicing safe sex is putting a condom on a banana. I’m having safe sex.’ ”