VALDOSTA – Sonny Shroyer leans forward in his chair. Shoulder muscles bunch behind his neck. Brows furrow. The sparkle leaves his eyes.

In a low voice, full of menace and intimidation, he says: “You Duke boys better be careful. Sheriff Roscoe is going to get you and Boss Hogg is going to bury you under the courthouse. Now, you better git.”

He recalls a producer saying, “Well, you took all the fun out of that.” 

Shroyer laughs at the memory of his audition for happy-go-lucky, good-guy Enos on the popular 1970s-’80s TV show “The Dukes of Hazzard.” 

The audition was a cold read, meaning Shroyer knew little about the premise of the show. He’d been cast as bad guys in several movies and shows. He was taking a quick break from filming the TV mini-series “Freedom Road” where he played a Klan leader who kills a character played by Kris Kristofferson and torments a character played by Muhammad Ali.

He thought Enos must have been a corrupt Southern cop.

“I read it as a bad guy,” Shroyer says. “Like a bad guy threatening Bo and Luke Duke.”

He didn’t know “The Dukes of Hazzard” was an adventure/comedy, of sorts. He didn’t know Enos was a smiling character who liked the Dukes, who wasn’t threatening Bo and Luke but warning them of trouble.

He would get to know both the show and character and know them well. 

“The Dukes of Hazzard” ran from fall 1979 through winter 1985. Shroyer played Enos in “Hazzard” and played the character for one season of the self-titled “Enos” where the country deputy took a job with the Los Angeles Police Department.

Shroyer has acted in several movies and TV shows. He played legendary University of Alabama Coach “Bear” Bryant in “Forrest Gump” and Gov. Jimmie Davis in “Ray.” A few months ago, he played a pacemaker patient in “The Resident,” a Fox TV show.

Now, after an acting career of nearly 50 years, Shroyer, 83, is scheduled to be honored by his native city of Valdosta this week as part of the nine-day 2019 RKDS Film Festival.

“The RKDS Film Festival is proud to honor our very own Sonny Shroyer and show clips of his films and hear him speak about his career in TV and film,” said Roy Kirkland, a Valdosta filmmaker who founded the festival with business partner Doug Sebastian of RKDS Entertainment.

“It’s nice to be recognized, especially in your own hometown,” Shroyer says. “… My mama always wanted the best for me. We lived 50 yards from the railroad tracks. She always wanted more for me. She was a country girl. She was a waitress and Daddy had a fruit stand.”

Growing Up

Otis Burt Shroyer Jr. was born Aug. 28, 1935 to Otis Burt Shroyer Sr. and Idona Shroyer. She called their only son, Sonny.

“Mama said I was ‘sunny’ because I was always smiling when she entered the room,” Shroyer recalled during an interview at his Valdosta residence. He added with a chuckle, “I was hungry, I guess.”

Downtown Valdosta formed the boundaries of Sonny Shroyer’s childhood. He was born in the old Bird Hospital on the corner of Oak Street and Central Avenue. They lived downtown of East Hill Avenue. His dad’s fruit stand was where Miller Hardware is located now on the corner of Hill and Ashley. He attended elementary school and junior high school just across the street from the hospital where he was born.

And the movie theatre was downtown. The Dosta, the place he and his mother would walk to see the movies. She loved musicals. Young Sonny Shroyer loved the Westerns of Roy Rogers, Gene Autry and the comedic cowboy actor Smiley Burnette. 

“I didn’t know they were called B movies at the time,” Sonny Shroyer said. “They were A-plus to me.”

He liked to play cowboys and Indians after watching the movies. 

“I wanted to be a cowboy,” he said.

His mom wanted him prepared for a larger world. She enrolled him in dance lessons, taking ballet and tap, Russian and ballroom. He took piano lessons for about six months.

She enrolled him in elocution lessons downtown. He learned poems such as “Home” by Edgar Guest. 

A poem he can still recite nearly 80s years later. He recited “Home” during the interview, off the top of his head, with great inflection, an impromptu performance over Coca-Colas, seated at his kitchen table.

“It takes a heap o’ livin’ in a house t’ make it home / A heap o’ sun an’ shadder, an’ ye sometimes have t’ roam / Afore ye really ’preciate the things ye lef’ behind / An’ hunger fer ’em somehow, with ’em allus on yer mind …”

Sonny Shroyer took dance and elocution classes throughout his childhood. Entering junior high, he told his mom he was ready for sports. He wanted to play baseball and football.

Weighing 175 pounds, Shroyer said he played second-string defensive tackle his junior and senior years in the early 1950s as a Valdosta High School Wildcat. He went to Florida State on a football scholarship but soon found himself on academic probation.

“I didn’t make my grades and hurt my shoulder and lost my scholarship,” he said.

During a visit back to FSU in the mid 1950s, Shroyer briefly met “Buddy” Reynolds, a star FSU football player. A man who would later be a bigger star known as Burt Reynolds.

“Buddy, Burt, was very fast,” Shroyer said of Reynolds’ football abilities. “He was not a huge guy but fast.”

“I always remembered the meeting,” Shroyer said. “He said he did, too, but I don’t know. I shook his hand and then didn’t see him again for 20 years and he was a big star by then.”

Longest Yard

Shroyer met Reynolds again in the early 1970s while filming “The Longest Yard” inside the Georgia State Prison in Reidsville.

Reynolds starred as an ex-football player serving a prison sentence. The warden taps him to lead a team of inmates in a football game against the guards. The warden wants Reynolds’ character to intentionally lose the game.

Shroyer played Tannen, an addled inmate playing on Reynolds’ team.

“My character was an idiot,” he said. “He was crazy. … It was an interesting line-up. We had real football players, actors and convicts playing.”

The playing could get intense.

“I got two broken ribs out of it, for real,” he said.

Shroyer was also featured in an iconic scene of another Reynolds movie. In an uncredited role, he played the motorcycle cop flipped off by Sally Field.

He said it took three takes to film his reaction to Field’s giving him the middle finger.

The first time, he reacted as if he’d been punched, falling backward. The director said that’s too much. The second time, he reacted with some exaggerated movements; again, too much. The third time, “I pulled back a bit more and that must have been it because that’s the one they used.”

In some ways, Reynolds led to Shroyer being honored at the RKDS Film Festival. Reynolds was the special guest during the 2018 film festival in Valdosta.

“Last year, we reached out to Sonny Shroyer to attend but was told he would be out of town,” Kirkland said. “However Sonny had a change of plans and surprised us all, including Burt when he stood up in the audience and walked over and kissed Burt Reynolds on the forehead. It was a very touching moment.”

Kirkland wanted to honor Shroyer and was surprised to discover the city had never officially recognized its famous son.

“I then asked Sonny if he ever received the Key to the City and if he ever received a proclamation from the State of Georgia? He said he had not,” Kirkland said. “I responded, It is damn time you did. You deserve this recognition. Your contribution and good character has represented our community well. RKDS Film Festoval is going to make this happen.

“I reached out to Mayor John Gayle and he enthusiastically said ‘Yes.’ I then reached out to Gov. Brian Kemp, who although could not fit us into his schedule to visit, was proud to send a proclamation to Sonny Shroyer which will be presented to him by Councilman Andy Gibb on the governor’s behalf.”

Finding his Role

At the time he first met Burt Reynolds in the 1950s, Sonny Shroyer was attending school. He eventually graduated from the University of Georgia, he said.

“It took five years, two universities, a college and summer school to get out of school,” he said.

He met wife Paula in the late 1950s at a party. He said he fell for her quick. They have been married for more than 50 years and have two sons, Mark and Chris Shroyer.

After graduation, Sonny Shroyer worked for the Ford Motor Company, while living in Atlanta. He had a photographer friend who asked Shroyer to model wearing a football uniform while drinking a Coca-Cola. The caption basically read: Halftime Strategy: Drink a Coca-Cola. The photo ran as the back cover of the UGA and Georgia Tech football programs.

Shroyer said he made $25 for 90 minutes work. He began modeling on the side. One photographer suggested Shroyer get a modeling agent and he was booked for even more work, while keeping a regular day job.

While doing a Coca-Cola commercial in New York City, Shroyer joined the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists.

His first film role brought him home. “Like a Crow on a Junebug” was filmed in the early 1970s in South Georgia. His second film role was in the 1972 movie “Payday” starring Rip Torn.

Meanwhile, the Shroyers moved to Valdosta. His father was sick, dying of cancer, and he came home. Sonny Shroyer sold insurance.

“You want to understand rejection, sell insurance and work as an actor,” he said.

He played several small roles, often bad guys. Until that Enos audition came along.

Meet the Dukes

Shroyer almost didn’t take the role in “The Dukes of Hazzard.”

He got the part but was still filming “Freedom Road.” His agent said the “Dukes” producers wanted him almost immediately but Shroyer said he had made a commitment to “Freedom Road” and would not break that commitment.

The agent called the “Freedom Road” producers, Shroyer said, and they said “Oh, we’re killing him off in a day or two. He’s good to go after that.”

The first few episodes of “Dukes” were filmed in the Conyers and Covington areas, he said. Georgia locales not too far from home.

Then, CBS picked up a full season of the show. It would be filmed in California.

“I went out to California and didn’t know how long we’d be out there,” he said.

With the family living in Valdosta, Shroyer had a long commute for the nearly decade-long run of “The Dukes of Hazzard.”

The show was a huge success. So big, producers wanted a spin-off starring Shroyer as Enos. Shroyer said he was reluctant to take a starring role in another TV show. “Dukes” was a known hit and the spin-off “Enos” was an unknown commodity.

He worked out a deal in the contract. If “Enos” was cancelled, Shroyer and the character could return to “The Dukes of Hazzard.”

Shroyer was nominated for a People’s Choice Award for his work in “Enos.” He was nominated the favorite male performer in a new television program category. Shroyer lost to Tom Selleck for “Magnum P.I.”

“Enos” lasted one season. It took a while but Shroyer returned to the “Dukes” set.

When the last day of filming for “Dukes” came in 1985, Shoyer asked veteran actor Denver Pyle who played Uncle Jesse what he was going to do next?

“He said, ‘Sonny, I don’t know. I may never work again,'” Shroyer said. “That’s the way an actor has to look at things. You never know what’s next or if anything is next. Then something may come out of the blue, like the episode of ‘The Resident.’ You never know where your next part may come from.”

Valdosta’s Own Sonny Shroyer

The RKDS Film Festival honors Sonny Shroyer 7-9 p.m. Saturday, July 6, old Valdosta High School Performing Arts Center, 3101 N. Forrest St. It is the first day of the nine-day film festival. More information: Visit www.RKDSMedia.com.