"Well, hello, fellow hunker-downers. How y'all doing?"
Drawling out those eight words - with an occasional expletive thrown in for emphasis - in his inimitable style, Leslie Allen Jordan daily welcomes more than 5.4 million Instagram followers to his posts. Twice a day for 160 days since his COVID-19 self-quarantine began, Jordan has regaled followers and lightened their quarantine tedium with stories of his exploits in Hollywood.
Viewers might find him snuggled up with a pillow for Pillow Talk, during which he usually shares one of his true, behind-the-scenes peeks at experiences with famous actors with whom he has filmed. He might be dancing or showing how to use a common household item in some other useful form (twirling a back scratcher works as a baton. Who knew? ) Or it might be Sunday Morning Singing, during which he performs the old hymns he grew up singing at the former Central Baptist Church of Woodmore, accompanied on guitar by Nashville songwriter Travis Howard.
He started the year with about 80,000 social-media followers. Now he has topped 5.4 million in the past six months. And no one could be more surprised than the actor himself. He will be the first to admit he was not tech-savvy when he started this gig.
"I was working on 'The Cool Kids' (a Fox comedy that ran from 2018-19), and I would tell these stories and those publicity girls kept saying you should post it. Post it! I didn't know what they meant. I thought they were talking about the little, yellow, sticky notes," he recalls, laughing.
But the publicists convinced him to start an Instagram account. Within one week he had 20,000 followers. Jordan says he was pretty impressed with that number; the publicists, not as much. But when Megan Mullally (his fellow star on "Will & Grace") reposted one of his remarks, that number shot up to 80,000.
As his followers started climbing into the millions, one of his local friends said, "Leslie, you've gone viral!"
Appalled that his friend thought he might be sick, Jordan says he answered, "No, I"m fine!"
More than fine, actually.
His popular posts have blossomed into a line of merchandise that includes T-shirts, masks, ringtones and "quarantine notebooks" (journals) that bear his signature Instagram lines. Just this week he announced a deal to write a book of essays to be released on Mother's Day 2021 called "How Y'all Doing?"
Will it be similar to his autobiography, "My Trip Down the Pink Carpet," which he wrote in 2008?
"No, I'm going to keep it clean so mama can be so proud of it," he replies.
TUNE IN
* Leslie Jordan is among the homegrown or adopted talents scheduled to entertain during the Best of Chattanooga virtual celebration for charity on Thursday, Sept. 24. Streaming starts at 7 p.m. on Facebook, YouTube and TimesFreePress.com.
And he reveals to the Times Free Press he's also in the process of making record - a direct result of his Sunday Morning Singings. It is a new album of duets with internationally known singers from across multiple music genres who will join the actor in singing Southern gospel hymn favorites.
Jordan says he started his own line of merch at the encouragement of his manager, who called to tell the actor that Etsy was filled with knockoff creations bearing his face and words.
"I had decided I wasn't going to monetize any of it," he says of his Instagram success. "The minute you start that you lose followers because they think you are just in it for the money. But my manager hired a lawyer to go after these people."
It was a process the comedian compares to "circus clowns in a carnival - knock one down and another pops up."
In addition to juggling his Instagram posts, writing a book and getting ready to record, Jordan is heading into production of his newest TV series, "Call Me Kat," which stars Mayim Bialik ("The Big Bang Theory").
"Production starts Oct. 13, and the show airs midseason," he says. "Swoosie Kurtz plays this fancy, socialite mother and Mayim is her daughter. Mayim's unmarried, and Swoosie wants to see her married. When Mayim's dad dies, Mayim takes the money he leaves her and buys a cat cafe. I work in the cafe as a baker. I play a gay man whose partner has left him for a younger man. I'm kind of pitiful, which I like. It's fun to play."
Jordan's amazement over this new chapter of his life opening up at age 65 is obviously apparent as he talks.
"I'm probably the only person that the pandemic has helped their career."
Email Susan Pierce at beagleluvr126@yahoo.com.
ABOUT LESLIE JORDAN
Leslie Jordan is a graduate of Brainerd High School and the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga,He left Chattanooga for Hollywood on a Greyhound bus on Valentine’s Day 1982 with “$1,200 that mama pinned to my underpants,” he likes to quip.Once there, he had guest roles or recurring arcs on 85 sitcoms and dramas ranging from “Ally McBeal” to “Boston Legal” and “American Horror Story: Roanoke.” He was cast as Reba McEntire’s blind date on her sitcom “Reba.” He was one of Candice Bergen’s never-ending turnover of secretaries on “Murphy Brown,”Most notably, he won an Emmy Award in 2006 for his role as Beverley Leslie on “Will & Grace.”Among his many film roles were Brother Boy Ingram in “Sordid Lives,” the newspaper editor in “The Help” and Murray in “Ski Patrol.”In 2008 he released his autobiography, “My Trip Down the Pink Carpet,” on which his traveling one-man show is based.