Antoine Dodson Bed Intruder

2010viral videoclassic

Antoine Dodson Bed Intruder is a July 2010 viral news clip and catchphrase from Huntsville, Alabama, in which Antoine Dodson described chasing an intruder from his sister's bed and warned viewers to 'hide your kids, hide your wife.' The Gregory Brothers turned the WAFF-48 interview into an autotuned single that hit the Billboard Hot 100, making it one of the earliest local-news memes to cross into charting music.

accidental fame memescatchphrase memesviral song memesaave memesearly 2010s memes

Overview

Antoine Dodson Bed Intruder is a viral video and catchphrase pulled from a WAFF-48 News segment aired on July 28, 2010 in Huntsville, Alabama1. In the interview, Antoine Dodson described chasing an intruder out of his sister Kelly's bedroom and delivered the line 'hide your kids, hide your wife,' staring straight into the camera with a mix of anger and flair1. The clip took off almost immediately after being uploaded to YouTube, and two days later the Gregory Brothers turned it into an autotuned track called the 'Bed Intruder Song'2.

What made the Antoine Dodson Bed Intruder clip stick was Antoine himself. His phrasing, 'he's climbing in your windows, he's snatching your people up,' was quoted, remixed and printed on shirts for years1. The Gregory Brothers' song then charted on the Billboard Hot 100, one of the earliest cases of a local news bit turning into a legitimate iTunes single2.

Coverage of the meme split from day one. Some outlets treated the WAFF segment as an internet gift, while others asked whether laughing at Dodson skimmed past the fact that an attempted sexual assault was what the reporter had been sent to cover1.

How It Spread

Buzzfeed, Dlisted and Best Week Ever all picked the WAFF footage up within days of the YouTube upload4. The Gregory Brothers, a Brooklyn-based sibling group behind the 'Auto-Tune the News' YouTube series, released their 'Bed Intruder Song' on July 30, 20102. The track hit No. 3 on iTunes' R&B chart and No. 25 on the overall chart2. It also debuted at No. 89 on the Billboard Hot 100 and sold more than 10,000 copies in its first two days2.

The press coverage split into two lanes. NPR ran a piece on August 5, 2010 asking whether the meme was really about 'race, music, comedy, celebrity or a delicate mix of all of the above'1. Jezebel and other outlets pressed on how quickly the attempted sexual assault dropped out of the joke6. WAFF-48 stood by the segment, with reporter Elizabeth Gentle saying 'censoring people like Antoine is far worse'1.

Antoine Dodson leaned into the attention. The Gregory Brothers set up a 50/50 revenue split with him and Kelly on song sales, an arrangement the group applied to every 'unintentional singer' they autotuned2. Wired reported in August 2010 that the group was already working on a pilot for Comedy Central built around the same technique2. CNET, writing in the same window, credited Dodson's 'theatrical flair' as the specific reason the clip translated into music instead of dying as a 30-second joke3.

How to Use This Meme

The Antoine Dodson Bed Intruder meme is typically deployed as a quoted line or a soundboard clip. 'Hide your kids, hide your wife, and hide your husband' is often pulled out as a mock warning about any threat, from raccoons in the trash to a suspicious link, with the 'and hide your husband' tag kept intact for the punchline1. Video edits commonly loop Dodson's cadence and gestures over unrelated footage, while the Gregory Brothers' autotuned chorus is a common backing track for edits and reaction videos2.

Frequently Asked Questions

Antoine Dodson Bed Intruder

2010viral videoclassic

Antoine Dodson Bed Intruder is a July 2010 viral news clip and catchphrase from Huntsville, Alabama, in which Antoine Dodson described chasing an intruder from his sister's bed and warned viewers to 'hide your kids, hide your wife.' The Gregory Brothers turned the WAFF-48 interview into an autotuned single that hit the Billboard Hot 100, making it one of the earliest local-news memes to cross into charting music.

accidental fame memes catchphrase memes viral song memes aave memes early 2010s memes

Overview

Antoine Dodson Bed Intruder is a viral video and catchphrase pulled from a WAFF-48 News segment aired on July 28, 2010 in Huntsville, Alabama1. In the interview, Antoine Dodson described chasing an intruder out of his sister Kelly's bedroom and delivered the line 'hide your kids, hide your wife,' staring straight into the camera with a mix of anger and flair1. The clip took off almost immediately after being uploaded to YouTube, and two days later the Gregory Brothers turned it into an autotuned track called the 'Bed Intruder Song'2.

What made the Antoine Dodson Bed Intruder clip stick was Antoine himself. His phrasing, 'he's climbing in your windows, he's snatching your people up,' was quoted, remixed and printed on shirts for years1. The Gregory Brothers' song then charted on the Billboard Hot 100, one of the earliest cases of a local news bit turning into a legitimate iTunes single2.

Coverage of the meme split from day one. Some outlets treated the WAFF segment as an internet gift, while others asked whether laughing at Dodson skimmed past the fact that an attempted sexual assault was what the reporter had been sent to cover1.

How It Spread

Buzzfeed, Dlisted and Best Week Ever all picked the WAFF footage up within days of the YouTube upload4. The Gregory Brothers, a Brooklyn-based sibling group behind the 'Auto-Tune the News' YouTube series, released their 'Bed Intruder Song' on July 30, 20102. The track hit No. 3 on iTunes' R&B chart and No. 25 on the overall chart2. It also debuted at No. 89 on the Billboard Hot 100 and sold more than 10,000 copies in its first two days2.

The press coverage split into two lanes. NPR ran a piece on August 5, 2010 asking whether the meme was really about 'race, music, comedy, celebrity or a delicate mix of all of the above'1. Jezebel and other outlets pressed on how quickly the attempted sexual assault dropped out of the joke6. WAFF-48 stood by the segment, with reporter Elizabeth Gentle saying 'censoring people like Antoine is far worse'1.

Antoine Dodson leaned into the attention. The Gregory Brothers set up a 50/50 revenue split with him and Kelly on song sales, an arrangement the group applied to every 'unintentional singer' they autotuned2. Wired reported in August 2010 that the group was already working on a pilot for Comedy Central built around the same technique2. CNET, writing in the same window, credited Dodson's 'theatrical flair' as the specific reason the clip translated into music instead of dying as a 30-second joke3.

How to Use This Meme

The Antoine Dodson Bed Intruder meme is typically deployed as a quoted line or a soundboard clip. 'Hide your kids, hide your wife, and hide your husband' is often pulled out as a mock warning about any threat, from raccoons in the trash to a suspicious link, with the 'and hide your husband' tag kept intact for the punchline1. Video edits commonly loop Dodson's cadence and gestures over unrelated footage, while the Gregory Brothers' autotuned chorus is a common backing track for edits and reaction videos2.

Frequently Asked Questions