Eddie “The Boner” origin
In the third episode of Runaway Radio Rewind, the new podcast brought to us by the 101 KLOL staff that lived the madness, we hear the origin story of Stevens and Pruett co-host Eddie “The Boner.”
Brian Shannon was the comic genius who kept the show together as its producer, and also voiced the now iconic S&P character.
Here is an edited transcript of a portion of what podcast host Cruze talked about with Shannon.
Brian Shannon aka Eddie “The Boner”: It came about as a complete accident. We moved to Houston in 1986. Pat Fant brought us down from Dallas. Martha Martinez myself Mark and Jim, the whole Stevens and Pruett Show. And Jim Pruett had this idea of writing bits based on the old “This is Your Life,” 50s and 60s show that was always on as a way of introducing ourselves in a comedic and fun way to the audience.
So we came around and it was time to do, “Martha Martinez: This is Your Life.” And so he had written this whole section of that, where her long lost boyfriend, because she grew up in San Antonio from Lee Treviño High School in San Antonio, was going to be on the show. And his name was Eddie “The Boner” Sanchez and he was called “Boner” because he was a trombone player in the high school band…wink, wink, wink and all that.
So we do the bit and it starts rolling…all ad lib. We we blocked out everything, we never scripted anything except the Uncle Waldo. Everything else was ad lib and and off the top and off the cuff. So we start off the bit and we’re going through.
And I started doing device and I came on, “Hey, Martha do you remember me?” And she’s playing along.
And it went over really well and we generated a whole lot of funny. I think the bit was supposed to be., two, two and a half minutes because at that time we’re still playing you know 12 minutes of commercials and ten records an hour. And I think it went about seven minutes but it was all hilarious. Well that was it. And we moved on to the next thing. And later in the show, the next day, two or three days later, a week later we would get random phone calls on the request line and they go, “Hey where’s that Boner guy?” And when they would do that I just, you know, “Hey I’m over here.” And it just snowballed, and it snowballed, and then I started throwing in on regular bits and son of a gun, he became my bread and butter and a way for me to be on the show with a completely different voice and different personality. You know Jimmy had that unique voice, Mark had that good baritone voice and Martha, so it was unique and it was a way to contribute. And it just took off but it was purely by accident.
Cruze (interviewer): So before you were back at KLOL there was no Eddie “The Boner” Sanchez? Like when you were in Dallas at The Eagle (97.1 KEGL) and in those days of the show.
Brian Shannon:Yeah. When I originally got with Mark and Jim, it was at Dallas at KEGL The Eagle. I was working overnights. They will work in the mornings and I would get off at 6:00 they come on I’d dug them, I dug them hard, so I would sit and I would write for them. I’d do fake phone calls and character voices on phone calls, things of that nature, but I never did Boner. That was strictly a KLOL thing. I was just Brian “Paraquat” Shannon because that was the early 80s and the Paraquat scare. And we all had the 80s hair and I had still had this beard, but no gray. And hair down here and earring loop earrings in each year and all this stuff so all of that fit.
But they gave me a megaphone, and they gave me a megaphone to mimic the TV version of the producer.
So when they would talk to me I’d do it off camera like this and it gave that megaphone sound and it sounded like the intercom that you would see on television or a movie where the producer in another booth was talking to them. So that was the shtick, and I hate to say gimmick, but it was, you know of my character being on the show there. And at KLOL for a while I did both of that after Boner took off I would do both. But Boner just became so full time but unfortunately the real me got to get pushed to the side. That’s weird to say but it’s the truth.
Cruze (interviewer): Talk about being politically incorrect. If the guys were still around. And the show were on the air somewhere today. How much different do you think it would have to be based on the times that we find ourselves in today versus the 80s and early 90s?
Brian Shannon: I don’t think the show would last 15 minutes. I just don’t think the tolerance is there and the other reason I say that is I don’t think Mark and Jim would want to do a show that way. They never wanted to feel contained or cornered. You know Pat Fant, our general manager, you know butted heads with Mark and Jim quite a bit on some of the things, but if they weren’t into it and they didn’t feel like it was the show that they wanted to, I don’t think they do it. I don’t think they’d want to be on the air and they wouldn’t be on the air.