Borat Voice My Wife

2006catchphraseclassic

Borat Voice My Wife is a catchphrase from Sacha Baron Cohen's 2006 mockumentary Borat that fans first quoted as a movie reference, then flipped by the early 2010s into an ironic joke about lame, out-of-date humor. In 2017 it hit a second life on Twitter through song-lyric edits.

movie quote memescatchphrase memesironic memeslate 2000s memesdelayed virality memes

Overview

Borat Voice My Wife is a catchphrase pulled from Sacha Baron Cohen's 2006 mockumentary Borat! Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan1. In the film, Cohen's Kazakh reporter character gestures at photos of women he calls his wife, stretching the word into a slow, nasal delivery that stuck with viewers for years after release1.

By the early 2010s the quote flipped meaning. Instead of a friendly wink to the film, doing the Borat Voice My Wife bit became an ironic signal that someone had a tired, dad-joke sense of humor, and comedy writers started using the impression as shorthand for the kind of person who still thinks 2006 movie quotes are killer material4.

How It Spread

The bit started showing up in scripted TV as a joke about bad comedy. Bob's Burgers used it in a May 6, 2012 episode where Bob dreams he is stuck in a soul-crushing office and cracks up at a coworker doing the "my wife" impression, treating the reference as the peak of stale humor4. It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia hit the same target on February 1, 2017 when Mac tried the impression on a room of confused TV producers4.

Video parodies pushed the same read. On July 5, 2012, YouTuber TedDidlio uploaded a sketch about a nervous rookie comic who had rehearsed a weak Borat impression, gaining over 6,700 views4. In 2014 Vine user electrolemon posted a run of clips redoing the "my wife" line as Billy Joel and a hard-boiled detective, and an October 6, 2014 IGN forum thread collecting the Vines argued that "My Wife" was the most influential movie quote of the 2000s2.

Twitter carried Borat Voice My Wife into a second life in 2017 with a lyric-swap format. A post by @LeftAtLondon slotted the phrase into The Killers' "Mr. Brightside" and pulled over 70 retweets and 360 likes3, and a November 12 tweet from @KeiferLirette (later @DannyVegito) grafted it onto Hozier's "Take Me To Church" for 13 retweets and 113 likes5.

How to Use This Meme

Typical posts follow a simple template: write out a lyric or dramatic line from a song, poem or movie, then insert "Borat voice: my wife" at the spot where a name or noun would land. The joke works because the exaggerated Borat delivery clashes with whatever earnest source material sits around it, and it doubles as a self-aware jab at the kind of comedy the quote itself is now associated with.

Frequently Asked Questions

Borat Voice My Wife

2006catchphraseclassic

Borat Voice My Wife is a catchphrase from Sacha Baron Cohen's 2006 mockumentary Borat that fans first quoted as a movie reference, then flipped by the early 2010s into an ironic joke about lame, out-of-date humor. In 2017 it hit a second life on Twitter through song-lyric edits.

movie quote memes catchphrase memes ironic memes late 2000s memes delayed virality memes

Overview

Borat Voice My Wife is a catchphrase pulled from Sacha Baron Cohen's 2006 mockumentary Borat! Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan1. In the film, Cohen's Kazakh reporter character gestures at photos of women he calls his wife, stretching the word into a slow, nasal delivery that stuck with viewers for years after release1.

By the early 2010s the quote flipped meaning. Instead of a friendly wink to the film, doing the Borat Voice My Wife bit became an ironic signal that someone had a tired, dad-joke sense of humor, and comedy writers started using the impression as shorthand for the kind of person who still thinks 2006 movie quotes are killer material4.

How It Spread

The bit started showing up in scripted TV as a joke about bad comedy. Bob's Burgers used it in a May 6, 2012 episode where Bob dreams he is stuck in a soul-crushing office and cracks up at a coworker doing the "my wife" impression, treating the reference as the peak of stale humor4. It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia hit the same target on February 1, 2017 when Mac tried the impression on a room of confused TV producers4.

Video parodies pushed the same read. On July 5, 2012, YouTuber TedDidlio uploaded a sketch about a nervous rookie comic who had rehearsed a weak Borat impression, gaining over 6,700 views4. In 2014 Vine user electrolemon posted a run of clips redoing the "my wife" line as Billy Joel and a hard-boiled detective, and an October 6, 2014 IGN forum thread collecting the Vines argued that "My Wife" was the most influential movie quote of the 2000s2.

Twitter carried Borat Voice My Wife into a second life in 2017 with a lyric-swap format. A post by @LeftAtLondon slotted the phrase into The Killers' "Mr. Brightside" and pulled over 70 retweets and 360 likes3, and a November 12 tweet from @KeiferLirette (later @DannyVegito) grafted it onto Hozier's "Take Me To Church" for 13 retweets and 113 likes5.

How to Use This Meme

Typical posts follow a simple template: write out a lyric or dramatic line from a song, poem or movie, then insert "Borat voice: my wife" at the spot where a name or noun would land. The joke works because the exaggerated Borat delivery clashes with whatever earnest source material sits around it, and it doubles as a self-aware jab at the kind of comedy the quote itself is now associated with.

Frequently Asked Questions