Comedian Donnie Baker performs Friday at downtown Warren's Robins Theatre. (Submitted photo)

A phone call to “Donnie Baker” isn’t answered in rants delivered with a Southern twang and every third sentence punctuated by “Swear to God.”

Baker is the comedic creation of Ron Sexton, who sounded far more mild-mannered than his alter ego. The only one throwing a tantrum on the call was the crying baby in the Sky Club of the Atlanta airport, where Sexton had a layover.

Sexton first started doing Baker when he was hired as a writer and voice actor in 2005 on the nationally syndicated morning radio program “The Bob and Tom Show” (heard locally on 102.9 WYFM-FM).

“I wanted to come up with a caller where you couldn’t tell if it was a caller or a cast member, just going for something a little more authentic than a lot of the stuff that would happen when the phone rang,” Sexton said. “So it’s based on a combination of friends I went to high school with and people watching and trying to pick traits that would fit best for this character who is overconfident for all the wrong reasons, who thought that he knew more than anyone on pretty much anything. I feel Donnie is always growing, and I’m still trying to shape into character and doing what I can to keep it relevant and keeping it fresh.”

Sexton started out as an impressionist, doing real people like Dr. Phil and Morgan Freeman, famous characters like Tony Soprano and other original characters like Floyd the Trucker. Those characters still may turn up on the radio, but for his live performances, including a show Friday at the Robins Theatre in Warren, it will be all Donnie Baker.

“I used to do comedy as myself when I first started but that was kind of the challenge,” Sexton said. “I developed a character who was popular in small snippets on the radio, but then taking that to stage, I had to revamp a lot of the material I was doing as myself and punch it up for Donnie and then in addition to that, write as much new stuff as I could and hope I could remember it.

“I just had to buy into Donnie completely. I know a lot of people who do comedy and say, ‘This next character is …,’ and I didn’t feel I could do that. I had to become him, dress like him from top to bottom. I’m at my best when I focus on becoming the character and not the order of the material, because he’s not going to be a polished comedian. That’s what I was trying to be. Donnie would be very disconnected but somehow find a way to make all the ends meet and try to put a stamp on it.”

He has no regrets about that decision.

“I almost had to unlearn everything I’d learned up to that point in standup. But it’s something I’m so glad I did. I don’t think I ever would have advanced to where I am now doing shows as Ron Sexton.

“I did a lot of impressions, and that’s a rat race. You can ask Frank Caliendo. He has a million impressions, and they’re all incredible, and all people want is what are you doing new, what’s next, what’s next, what’s next? That was a race I knew I wasn’t going to win. Rather than go down that road, I just thought I’m going to take one character and go into it full throttle.”

Full-throttle Donnie ventures into some R-rated topics, but Sexton said he’s been concentrating on less sexual material and more benign subjects — roundabouts, Canada geese, how television has changed — and filtering that material through Donnie’s addled lens.

“I’m trying to make it cleaner,” Sexton said. “I understand that when they come to a live show, people want something a little different than what they can get on the radio, so there are moments in the show that are definitely serving that agenda … However, Donnie’s getting older. He now has a disdain for millennials or TikTok. He’s starting to go ‘Gran Torino’ a little bit, becoming that guy (who yells), ‘Get off of my lawn.'”‘

While Donnie Baker will be on stage locally this Friday, one his idols — Kid Rock — will be in Youngstown on July 29 for this year’s Y-Live concert.

When asked how Baker would prepare for that show, “He’d probably start pregaming a week out. Donnie’s always had a mancrush on Kid Rock and thinks they must be related in some way. He can’t prove it. The joke is, ‘Because they canceled my membership to ancestry.com,'” Sexton said, briefly slipping into his Donnie Baker voice. “But I think he’d be pregaming a week out and telling everybody he knew Kid Rock and has connections and yet he still needs tickets. He’s that guy.”

If you go …

WHO: Donnie Baker

WHEN: 8 p.m. Friday

WHERE: Robins Theatre, 160 E. Market St., Warren

HOW MUCH: Tickets range from $20 to $28 and are available at the Robins box office and online at robinstheatre.com.