Comedy legend Chris Farley drew upon his real-life experiences during family road trips for the 1995 cult classic Tommy Boy.Farley's cousin Jim Farley revealed the late comedian's Tommy Boy performance was inspired by his own childhood. "People ask if Tommy Boy was based on our family. It was," Jim tweeted. "During the summers Chris would travel on the road with his dad in Wisconsin. Every family has that kid that entertains everyone. Chris was ours. God, we were lucky!"Related: A British Version of Saturday Night Live Is In Development

Directed by Peter Segal, Tommy Boy is a buddy comedy that pairs Farley's buffoonish Thomas "Tommy" Callahan III with David Spade's cynical corporate assistant Richard Hayden on a cross-country sales trip. The film underperformed at the box office, earning $32.68 million on a $20 million budget. It also earned mixed reviews, with critics praising Farley and Spade's performances but criticizing the thin plot. Despite Tommy Boy's initially lukewarm critical and commercial reception, it developed a devoted following once it was released on home media.

Tommy Boy is one of a string of films Farley made throughout the 1990s before his death at the age of 33 in December 1997. This included leading roles in Black Sheep and Beverly Hills Ninja, as well as smaller roles in Wayne's World, Cone Heads, Wayne's World 2 and Billy Madison. Farley appeared posthumously in two more films, Almost Heroes and Dirty Work, released in 1998. The original choice to voice Shrek, Farley hadn't completed recording his lines for the animated comedy before his death and he was ultimately replaced by Mike Myers when the film hit theaters in 2001.

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Tommy Boy is also one of several movies produced by Farley's Saturday Night Live boss Lorne Michaels. Along with Coneheads, Black Sheep and the Wayne's World films, these include other cult classics such as The Three Amigos, A Night at the Roxbury and The Ladies Man. More recently, Michaels has helped shepherd hits like Mean Girls and Baby Mama, as well as SNL-inspired box office bombs like MacGruber.

Despite the failure of the MacGruber movie in 2010, Michaels remains committed to the property. The multiple Primetime Emmy Award-winner is an executive producer on the eight-episode MacGruber TV series that debuted on Peacock in December 2021. He is also credited as an executive producer on three other ongoing series: Apple+ musical comedy Schmigadoon!, NBC sitcom Kenan and HBO Max sketch comedy show That Damn Michael Che. Michaels still continues to produce SNL, Late Night With Seth Meyers and The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon, as well.

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Source: Twitter