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A rubber chicken is a prop used in comedy. The phrase is also used as a description for food served at speeches, conventions, and other large meetings, and as a metaphor for speechmaking.
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Description
A rubber chicken is an imitation plucked fowl made in a latex injection mold. Popular sight gags and slapstick comedy props, rubber chickens are sometimes used by comics as a mock weapon. They are also sometimes used by jugglers in place of clubs, and (in extremely rare cases) as musical instruments in place of French horns.
Origins
The origin of the rubber chicken is obscure, but is possibly based on the use of pig bladders, which were inflated, attached to a stick and used as props or mock-weapons by jesters in the days before the development of plastic and latex. Chicken corpses were readily available; therefore jesters could employ them as variations of slapsticks.
One account attributes the first use of a prop chicken to John Holmberg, the Swedish black-faced clown of the early 1900s. Holmberg would perform with his pockets full of fake food to mock the gluttony reportedly prevalent among the upper classes at the time. A claim that the symbol originated during the French Revolution with soldiers hanging a chicken from their muskets for luck is printed on the tag of rubber chickens manufactured by Archie McPhee.
A Discordian pseudo-secret society, The International Rubber Chicken Society, formed in New Fairfield, Connecticut, uses the emblem of the rubber chicken as a sight-gag with the initials "R.C." to suggest a link with the Rose Cross (also "R.C.") of Rosicrucianism. Andrés Bustamante also featured rubber chickens during his shows in the 1990s.
A rubber chicken with a pulley in the middle is a gag object found in LucasArts' Monkey Island franchise games. It is also used as a rating system in the TV show Good Game and Good Game-SP.
A rubber chicken was customarily kept behind Johnny Carson's desk on NBC's "The Tonight Show" as a comedic talisman as it was believed that "A rubber chicken always gets a laugh."
Horror host Svengoolie winds up getting rubber chickens thrown at him for bad jokes before the featured film is shown and after to wrap up the show.
Food and speechmaking
The term "rubber chicken" is used disparagingly to describe the food served at political or corporate events, weddings, and other gatherings where there are a large number of guests who require serving in a short timeframe. Often, pre-cooked chicken is held at serving temperature for some time and then dressed with a sauce as it is served. Consequently, the meat may be tough or “rubbery.” Someone who "travels the rubber chicken circuit" is said to do so by attending or making speeches at many such gatherings, often as part of political campaigning.
Rubber chickens in the news
The Rubber chicken and the Hash House Harriers
Hundreds of kennels of the international group of non-competitive running and beer drinking club known as Hash House Harriers, have been using the "Rubber chicken" as one of their main symbols and a major role object during their social activities, where it is used as a "vessel" for drinking beer. It is also commonly featured on shirt prints, patches and other paraphernalia.
The Rubber Chicken Fix
The term "Rubber Chicken Fix" refers to holding a rubber chicken above a problem, often perplexing, and having the problem fix itself. The phrase can be applied to a variety of scenarios. Realistically, the solution to the problem cannot be explained so a rubber chicken is introduced to offer an explanation of how it was corrected.