The only person in Hollywood allowed to call Billy Bob Thornton a hillbilly: “There’s a certain stigma”

Billy Bob Thornton says he accepted being called a “hillbilly” by Robert Duvall, his friend and mentor, but objected when people from outside the South used the label. He has described a stigma attached to Southern identity, including assumptions that Southerners are bigoted or unintelligent.

Early in his acting career, Thornton was often offered roles as rednecks or hillbillies, so he began creating his own work to avoid being typecast. Duvall called him “the hillbilly Orson Welles” after they worked together on *Sling Blade*; Thornton tolerated the phrase as a term of endearment, despite Duvall not being Southern himself.