The Kentucky Fried Movie is a 1977 American independent anthology sketch black comedy film, produced by Kim Jorgensen, Larry Kostroff, and Robert K. Weiss, and directed by John Landis. Among the numerous star cameos are George Lazenby, Bill Bixby, Henry Gibson, Barry Dennen, Donald Sutherland, Tony Dow, Stephen Bishop, and the voice of Shadoe Stevens. According to writer David Zucker on the DVD commentary track, David Letterman auditioned for the role of the newscaster, but was not selected. The film also features many former members of The Groundlings and The Second City. The "feature presentation" portion of the film stars Evan C. Kim and hapkido grand master Bong Soo Han. The Kentucky Fried Movie marked the first film appearances of a number of actors who later became famous, and launched the careers of the Zucker brothers, Abrahams and Landis.

Landis was recommended to direct National Lampoon's Animal House in 1978 based on his work with The Kentucky Fried Movie.The film's writers were the team of David Zucker, Jim Abrahams and Jerry Zucker, who subsequently wrote and directed Airplane!, Top Secret! and the Police Squad! television series and its film spin-offs, The Naked Gun films.