A new King of the Hill

Mike Judge’s long-running animated series King of the Hill will be returning after more than 15 years away from screens - with a Kahnawa’kehró:non among the voice cast.

The show’s 14th season will be releasing on Disney+ in Canada on August 4, with Taietsarón:sere Tai Leclaire playing Joseph Gribble, the Indigenous best friend of main character Bobby Hill.

“This is the biggest project I’ve been on in terms of what people recognize. I’ve never experienced something at this level, and it’s just been very surreal. I’m just grateful,” said Leclaire.

He got a blind audition for the show, meaning he did not know what role he would be reading for - thinking, at first, it was for a bit part in a single episode.

“I will play a tree. I’ll do whatever you want. I just want to be in the show. It’s such an important part of my comedy, and I love Mike Judge,” he said.

The newest season is set after a time jump roughly corresponding to the real-world time between seasons, with Joseph and Bobby now being adults after being in their early teens for the original series’ entire run.

Joseph’s role, along with other series regular Kahn Souphanousinphone, was recast for the new season so that these non-white characters are voiced by non-white actors.

Leclaire is taking over from Breckin Meyer, who voiced the adolescent version of Joseph from 2000 to 2010.

“It’s deeply important to me, because as an Indigenous performer, you always want that opportunity, and this was truly an opportunity to perform,” said Leclaire.

“It felt like the right thing to do, and I’m just grateful that they did.”

Working on a legacy show with many longstanding members of the production team made him nervous at first, but he said that everyone had been welcoming and extremely nice to him, and getting to see veteran voice actors on the job gave him a lot of insight.

“I got to sit in to watch Pamela Adlon record Bobby Hill live, and that was the first time we met. Just to watch how she performs, how she acts, the kind of questions she asked when she was in the booth, how she pitches some ideas and some jokes, it really gave me confidence to figure out how to act when I’m recording an episode,” said Leclaire.

Leclaire has been a fan of the show and the character since he was a teenager, and while he did identify with some parts of Joseph’s character, the differences between his real-life persona and Joseph make him an interesting character to perform as.

“I always admired his sort of blinding ambition,” said Leclaire.

“I like his sort of uncensored thinking; he very much is someone who says what he’s feeling. As someone who’s just very reserved and closed off a little bit, at least personally, being able to play someone so out and about is really fun.”

He also enjoys the idea of playing the grown-up version of what he called a “dumb boy.”

“It’s sort of my favorite flavour of character to play, dumb but sweet, and to think about what he would be like as an adult was a fun thing to play,” said Leclaire.

Another interesting aspect of the character to him is the fact that Joseph is essentially ignorant of his own Indigeneity, believing himself to be the biological son of Dale Gribble and Nancy Hicks-Gribble, two white characters, when he is in fact the child of an affair between Nancy and Indigenous character John Redcorn.

“I just think it’s good comedy. It’s a comedy of conflict, and I think not knowing who you are, or not being aware of who you are, is sort of the ultimate conflict,” said Leclaire.

“Joseph’s dilemma of who he really is is always something I cherish, because even as an Indigenous person, even though I know who I am, half the time I’m like, ‘but who am I?’ To be able to ask that question about yourself and really ask what defines you, it’s something I admire, and it’s something about him that I enjoy, that despite this dilemma, he still carries himself well. And I think that’s sort of the ultimate power move.”

During production of the newest season, the voice actors for Dale (Johnny Hardwick) and for John Redcorn (Jonathan Joss) both died before Leclaire could meet either actor.

“I was very much looking forward to it. Obviously, I was shocked by both of their passing, and while I didn’t know them, you could feel how much everyone on the show knew them,” said Leclaire.

“I think the show has a good way of honouring them,” said Leclaire.

He was especially looking forward to meeting Joss, who was a gay Indigenous actor.

“I wasn’t aware that he was also gay. Him just being a Native performer, I was very excited to have a coworker like that,” said Leclaire, who said he is working on writing a tribute of some sort to Joss, who was murdered by a neighbour on June 1, 2025, in what his husband Tristan Kern de Gonzales called a homophobic hate crime.

The 14th season of King of the Hill  will have 10 episodes.

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