(Photo by Michael Buckner/Getty Images for Friars Club)
PHOENIX – Nearly nine years after Terry Bradshaw showed his naked rear end to movie audiences everywhere in the 2006 romantic comedy Failure To Launch, the FOX NFL Sunday analyst and Hall of Fame quarterback had his entire life exposed in front of a crowd of people at a Friars Club Super Bowl Roast Thursday.
“Terry has four rings,” host Joel McHale told the audience at the Arizona Biltmore Hotel. “One for each championship and marriage.”
While the roast, which will air in an edited one-hour condensed version on ESPN2 at 8 p.m. ET Friday, was promised to be a little more PG than the ones usually broadcast on Comedy Central, the speakers in attendance refused to take it easy on Bradshaw or each other.
McHale was joined onstage by Bradshaw’s FOX colleagues Curt Menefee and Rob Riggle, ESPN’s Frank Caliendo, Reese Waters and Michelle Beadle and several comedians and roast mainstays who had never met Bradshaw in Jeffrey Ross, Lisa Lampanelli and Jim Norton. Making the mix even more eclectic was the addition of 88-year-old Hollywood legend and Friars Club veteran Jerry Lewis, who sat at the end of the dais.
Even though Norton didn’t know Bradshaw coming into the roast, he told For The Win beforehand that he didn’t think he’d have a problem ripping him to shreds.
“You have a little more personal angle on it when you know somebody. But it’s not that different,” Norton said. “I don’t feel all that different with Terry as I would anybody else. He’s such an easy guy because he’s so iconic and there’s so much information about him. It’s hard if you’re roasting a casino host at a hotel, which I’ve done. That’s an abomination because no one knows anything personal about him.”
(Photo by Michael Buckner/Getty Images for Friars Club)
Before taking his place as the guest of honor, Bradshaw hobnobbed backstage with the roasters and a number of fellow former football players, shouting out to former Steelers teammate Franco Harris from across the room and embracing fellow Hall of Famer Joe Namath in a big bearhug.
“You know the themes that are going to come up,” Menefee predicted to For The Win before the ceremony. “The multiple marriages, the perceived lack of intelligence, which I always tell people is a joke because Terry’s very intelligent. You know everyone’s going to go to the same place so you don’t want to have the same jokes and one-liners as everyone has.”
In addition to the forecasted topics, the roasters sharply attacked Bradshaw’s hairline, his high interception totals as a player and his incessant product shilling, with their target guffawing through every barb. They also spent plenty of time ripping on each other, the NFL’s recent scandals (Deflategate, domestic violence and more) and even the perceived racism of the Super Bowl’s host state, although it’ll be curious to see how many of the jokes about the latter two subjects make it onto ESPN2’s airwaves.
(Photo by Andrew H. Walker/Getty Images for Friars Club)
All of the roasters had their remarks prepared ahead of time in a teleprompter, although many of them were happy to go off-script if the moment called for it.
Here’s a sampling of some of the best one-liners:
“I haven’t seen this many losers since I visited the Tampa Bay Bucs locker room.” – Lisa Lampanelli upon surveying her fellow roasters.
“Terry started playing football in fifth grade and 20 years later he started playing in high school.” – Jeff Ross
“You have the heart of a Patriot, the brain of a Seahawk and the hair of an Eagle.” – Ross
“Friar Tuck called and said you can keep that stupid haircut.” – Rob Riggle
Yet perhaps the most surprisingly hilarious speech came from fellow Hall of Famer Joe Montana, who made a surprise appearance to rib Bradshaw for throwing so many interceptions he “led the league in tackles for three years.”
Much as he did in uttering one of the most amazing one-liners in Saturday Night Live history, Montana cracked up the crowd with a perfectly ribald jab about when Bradshaw first met his wife Tammy.
“Just like the recent storm in New York, she was promised eight inches and only got four,” Montana jabbed.
By the time Bradshaw was welcomed to the podium by his good friend and FOX cohort Howie Long, he was covered in sweat and seemed to have a permanent grin imprinted on his face.
(Photo by Andrew H. Walker/Getty Images for Friars Club)
After reading a few lines from the teleprompter, Bradshaw went completely off-script, making weight loss jokes about Lampanelli, mocking Riggle’s irrelevance and even cracking a few more jokes about his own intelligence.
As he wrapped up, Bradshaw thanked his friends, wife and two daughters, ending nearly three hours of tough love with a bit of sincerity, telling the crowd that “humor is the great equalizer in life.”
