At a time when many shows struggle to reach a second season, the Canadian mockumentary sitcom Trailer Park Boys has been quietly churning out one season after another for more than two decades. The long-running series, which premiered back in 2001, chronicles the misadventures of residents of a fictional trailer park in Nova Scotia and their colorful cast of neighbors, allies, enemies, celebrity guests, and law enforcement.
Now encompassing 13 seasons, three films, an animated series, an international touring show, and myriad other spin-offs, Trailer Park Boys has an upcoming special celebrating Canada’s Thanksgiving holiday. The Great Canadian Donair Turkey Day Feast kicks off October 10 and will feature Trailer Park Boys leads Ricky, Bubbles, and Julian (a.k.a. actors Robb Wells, Mike Smith, and John Paul Tremblay, respectively) preparing a “donair turkey” while hosting a nine-hour marathon of episodes from the series.
With The Great Canadian Donair Turkey Day Feast on the calendar and multiple seasons of the Trailer Park Boys available now and coming to various platforms in the near future, the guys from Sunnyvale Trailer Park are keeping busy. Even so, the trio found time to talk to Digital Trends (as their onscreen personas) about the upcoming Trailer Park Boys special, Canadian Thanksgiving, their live performances and new seasons hosted on the SwearNet streaming platform, and how they ended up taking a trip to space.
Digital Trends: Guys, you’ve been doing this show for more than 20 years now. Why do you think people love it so much?
Ricky: I have no idea. It’s kind of strange.
Bubbles: Well, I think it’s just because they see us on TV and they’re like, I wish I could be like those guys because they don’t give a fuck.
Julian: Yeah, basically. Plus, Ricky does a lot of stupid things, and it’s good to laugh at stupid things.
Bubbles: Well, that is entertaining.
Ricky: And it doesn’t take us much to be happy. I think people learn a lot from that.
You’ve got big Thanksgiving plans, but for all the Americans out there, what makes Canadian Thanksgiving different from the American version?
Ricky: It’s only three days instead of four. Which kind of sucks.
Bubbles: You always party at least seven days anyway, Ricky.
Ricky: Well, true. We don’t have big sales at the stores like they do in the United States, which kind of sucks, too.
Bubbles: That’s not what it’s about, Ricky.
Julian: What do you buy anyway? You usually just steal shit.
Bubbles: But he likes to steal things that are on sale!
Fair enough. We’ll be able to watch you make donair turkey on Thanksgiving. How does a donair turkey differ from a standard turkey?
Bubbles: Oh, there’s absolutely nothing similar between a donair turkey and a real turkey.
Ricky: We basically have to make the donair meat and then we form it into the shape of a turkey. So it’s not really a turkey, I guess. But it looks like one.
Bubbles: A real turkey is an animal that was running around. The donair turkey has never been out running around.
Julian: It comes from a cow, Bubbles.
Bubbles: I know! But it was never running around in the shape of a turkey!
Julian: It’s still a cow, Bubs.
Ricky: That would be cool if there was such an animal, though.
Bubbles: A donair turkey? You go hunting for it? That would be amazing. You [could] just grab it and just take a bite right out of it. Dip it in sauce.
The V-Team!🔥 pic.twitter.com/3soFRyhoq6
— Trailer Park Boys (@trailerparkboys) October 5, 2022
There’s going to be a marathon of your SwearNet show on Thanksgiving while you make the turkey. Do you guys have any favorite episodes you’re looking forward to seeing?
Bubbles: I wonder if they’re going to show when you kidnapped Alex Lifeson from Rush.
Ricky: It was not a kidnapping. It was a borrowing.
Bubbles: Same thing, Ricky.
Julian: You don’t borrow people, Rick.
Bubbles: And he went against his will!
Ricky: He was a nice man, though, in the end. I thought he was a dick, but he’s actually okay.
Bubbles: Oh, he’s a good buddy of ours now. I hope they show that one.
Julian: Oh, and Snoop Dogg — us getting into business with him. That was a good one, too.
Ricky: I hope they don’t show anything to do with Conky.
Bubbles: I hope they do show Conky. I forgot about that. Those are from years ago!
What will the rest of the park be doing while you’re making turkey? What do you think Randy will be up to?
Ricky: They better not come knocking around here, I know that. Hopefully, they’ll do their own thing.
Julian: Randy will definitely show up. He’ll smell the donair turkey from up the road. He’ll be here.
Bubbles: I don’t think he will. He’s got a bunch of fellas coming over and they’re making a cheeseburger turkey, from what I heard. I don’t think he’ll show up here. He’s got a lot of fellas coming over for Thanksgiving.
Ricky: Were those the signs I saw for the Speedo party?
Bubbles: Yes! That’s Randy’s place!
Ricky: You going to that, Julian?
Julian: No, Ricky, I’m not going to go to that.
Seeing the mail you’ve been getting from fans on the SwearNet show is great. Is there anything you wish fans would send more of — or maybe less of?
Julian: More liquor. More dope.
Bubbles: Cash is nice!
Julian: Cash is a great gift.
Ricky: There’s been some weird sex stuff. We could probably get less of that, maybe.
Julian: Less of the dildos and butt plugs. We’ve had quite a few of those.
Ricky: Although they all seem to get used…
Celebrate The Great Canadian ‘Donair Turkey Day’ Feast with the @trailerparkboys! Starting at 11AM PT on 10/10, watch 9 hours of #TrailerParkBoys: The SwearNet Show & check in LIVE on the guys throughout the marathon as they prep their own turkey dinner! https://t.co/sTcNngq8ye pic.twitter.com/0yhogK4GHH
— Shout! Factory TV (@ShoutFactoryTV) October 3, 2022
You guys were doing live shows for a while, traveling around the world. What was that experience like for you?
Bubbles: Oh, fantastic. We did it for years all over the world, actually. We went to Australia doing that …
Julian: Scandinavian countries …
Bubbles: New Zealand … all over Europe …
Ricky: The response was crazy, actually. I had no idea we had so many fans all over the world.
Bubbles: I think the biggest show we ever did was in Norway, wasn’t it?
Julian: Two nights sold out, yeah.
Bubbles: Two nights at a great big, giant theater!
What’s different about doing the live shows for you guys?
Ricky: Oh, it’s totally different. A lot of it depends on the level of buzz we’ve got on, too. You never know what you’re going to get.
Bubbles: Yeah, we’ve done shows when we don’t even remember being on stage.
Julian: [Sometimes] there are people passing out drunk in the audience, and you have to go wake them up and stuff.
Bubbles: That happened in Ireland.
Bubbles, how has your musical career been going?
Bubbles: Fantastic. I got my band, Bubbles and the Shitrockers, and we’re going to have a record coming out and some stuff like that.
For anyone who was introduced to your show on Netflix, what’s different about the SwearNet show?
Bubbles: It’s really fast-paced with different clips. Basically, it’s for people who are really high.
Julian: Yeah, if you’re sitting around playing poker or something, it’s good to have something like that on the TV. Like, background stuff, right?
Ricky: Yeah, they’re like five-minute bits…
Julian: … And all mashed together, yeah.
Bubbles: People’s brains today, they have no attention span, so you’ve got to keep shortening the clips down. Eventually, it’ll just be one frame flashing by. That’s what people are going to get used to. But [the Swearnet show] is little short clips, just to get you in the groove, and then boom, you’re on to a new one.
We got to see you go animated in the SwearNet show. What was that like?
Bubbles: Yeah, that whole thing was a bit terrifying for me, you know, being on mushrooms…
Ricky: We did a lot of fun stuff, though. We went to space and all kinds of crazy stuff.
Julian: That was mostly in our brain, Ricky, because we were so high. We didn’t really go to space.
Ricky: Well, it felt pretty real to me.
Shout! Factory TV and Trailer Park Boys’ The Great Canadian Donair Turkey Day Feast begins October 10 at 11 a.m. PT and can be viewed on TrailerParkBoys.tv, YouTube, and the Trailer Park Boys Twitch Channel.
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