Nickelodeon’s revival of the beloved 90s sketch comedy show All That premieres Saturday, June 15 at 8:30 p.m. (ET/PT), with Kenan Thompson and Kel Mitchell serving as executive producers, and original cast members Lori Beth Denberg and Josh Server set to return for the premiere. The A.V. Club sat down with Mitchell and Server to talk about the revival, and what it’s like to be living, breathing nostalgia!
Also, from EW.com:
Kenan Thompson and Kel Mitchell on returning to their All That roots: 'It gives me chills'
President Trump visits Good Burger. Photo: Scott Everett White/Nickelodeon
It’s been 25 years since All That launched, introducing a group of fresh-faced teens to the world. Some would go on to have their own spin-offs, some would go on to America’s premier sketch show. But now they’re back where it all began. “The first set done was Good Burger,” original star Kel Mitchell says of arriving to work on the revival. “So imagine this empty set and the light is only on Good Burger. It was the weirdest moment, my heart just stopped. It was like, ‘Wow, this was the start.’”
Mitchell, one of the breakouts of the 1994–2000 series, returns to his beginnings in familiar company. He guest-stars in the premiere with fellow alums Lori Beth Denberg and Josh Server, and also serves as an executive producer alongside his All That and Kenan & Kel partner Kenan Thompson. “I couldn’t pass up such a large part of my own history,” says Thompson. “It’s our childhood, like it is everyone else’s, so it has a special place in my heart.”
For Denberg, who recently realized that she had become “nostalgia,” the assumption was that she’d be brought in simply to introduce the new cast. Yet, she, Mitchell, and Server quickly realized that wasn’t the case. “I just look at them and I’m like, ‘Is this happening? Did we ever leave?’” shares Denberg. “I’m doing the Loud Librarian like no time has passed.”
Lori Beth Denberg on Vital Information. Photo: Bonnie Osborne / Nickelodeon
Due to his Saturday Night Live contract, Thompson will most likely appear only as himself, but “it gives me chills,” he says of seeing his longtime friends channeling their most memorable characters. Discussing Mitchell donning the Good Burger outfit again, Thompson fondly observes, “Kel in that wig and outfit, he loves it. He’s in it so much and he looks so happy when he’s doing it.” Adds Mitchell: “It was the no-brainer. I remember when we first started having conversations about this, it was like, ‘Kel, you cool with getting in the wig?’ I was like, ‘Of course!'”
This isn’t the first time that these four have reunited, appearing together in recent years on MTV’s Wild ‘n Out and Nickelodeon’s Double Dare revival. But they know this is different. “This is special,” declares Server. “This is like coming home.”
But their home now has seven new fresh faces eager to re-create the magic of their famous predecessors. “We were all creative kids with these voices in our heads that needed to come out,” recalls Thompson. “So it’s a beautiful thing for a new generation to have that opportunity to spread their quirky wings. I can’t wait to see it.”
All That premieres June 15 at 8:30 p.m. ET on Nickelodeon.
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From Tampa Bay Times:
Welcome to Good Burger! Talking the ‘All That’ reboot with Kel Mitchell
He stopped by the Life of the Party podcast to chat about spending time in Florida, the show’s legacy and what it’s like being the adult in the room now.
Kel Mitchell is really excited for the All That reboot on Nickelodeon.
How do we know? Before we even started recording this podcast, while he was still sitting down and putting on his headphones, he started humming that theme song by TLC. Allllll, ah-ayayay, this is allll that.
Children of the 90s know exactly what we’re talking about.
Mitchell was one of the stars of Nickelodeon’s enduring sketch comedy show for kids. All That was on for more than a decade, a career launchpad for a diverse cast of talented young people. Mitchell and SNL’s Kenan Thompson went on to star in Kenan and Kel and the cult-classic movie Good Burger.
Now, All That is back with Mitchell, Thompson and Kevin Kay as executive producers. A reboot premieres at 8:30 p.m. Saturday on Nickelodeon with an all new cast and guest appearances from Mitchell and other original cast members. And, oh, the Jonas Brothers. Casual.
“We’re doing it in a real way,” Mitchell said. “The 90s fans are going to be super happy. But our 90s fans are parents now, too. They’re introducing it to their kids.”
Mitchell was passing through Tampa for a screening of Good Burger to promote All That. He stopped into the Life of the Party podcast studio for a chat about spending time in Florida as a teen, the show’s legacy, his faith, his friends (Sisqo!) and what it’s like being the one to hand out advice to kids.
“We’re the adults now, man,” he said. “On the show that we got started on. I was just talking to Kenan yesterday about that. It’s so surreal.”
We also cracked open some orange soda and handled the matter of that theme song. Sing it with us, now. Allllll, ah-ayayay, this is allll that.
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From TV Insider:
Cast of 'All That' on the Reboot & Working With Kenan and Kel (VIDEO)
Ever wonder where Saturday Night Live's longest-running cast member Kenan Thompson got his start? All That is the Nickelodeon sketch comedy series where he and Kel Mitchell introduced viewers to "Good Burger," and now the pair are executive producing a reboot set to premiere Saturday, June 15.
Making up the new cast are a crop of talented kids Ryan Alessi, Reece Caddell, Kate Godfrey, Gabrielle Green, Nathan Janak, Lex Lumpkin and Chinguun Sergelen, who are following in the footsteps of the stars that came before them.
TV Insider caught up with the comedic crew at Viacom's Time Square offices to discuss the reboot.
"It's great being part of the new cast of All That," Lumpkin says. "The old cast, they set such a high bar and I'm super excited to try to reach that with this new group of kids. It's phenomenal working alongside them."
Considering the original series aired from 1994 through 2005, most of the 12-15 year-old cast members wouldn't have been alive when the show was airing, but that doesn't mean they aren't familiar with the classics.
"There are a lot of full episodes on Teen Nick right now that keep playing, and I recorded the whole series of the show," Alessi notes. "I think I've probably seen every episode because now they're turning into repeats."
In this new iteration of the series, classic sketches are revisited with a modern update that's sure to have old and new fans laughing. Below, see what the cast had to say about working with the original cast, how their improv experience helped them and more.
[Click here for video]
All That, Premieres Saturday, June 15, 8:30/7:30c, Nickelodeon
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From Vanity Fair:
Kenan Thompson’s 17-Year Itch
Thompson spun child stardom into a record-breaking tenure on Saturday Night Live. Is he finally preparing for his exit?
Thompson during his All That days, circa 1995.
Top, by Tom Hurst/Nickelodeon; bottom, by Douglas Nesbitt/Nickelodeon.
Kenan Thompson looks tired. It’s late on a Thursday night, which means it’s a rough day for everyone working on Saturday Night Live, albeit not the roughest. Mondays are pitch days. Tuesdays are, famously, late nights—the writing deadline is Wednesday morning—though not for Thompson, who’s out by 12:30 A.M. (“I’ve got babies,” he tells me.) Wednesdays are table reads. Thursdays kick off actual rehearsals, which might explain why Thompson, the longest-running cast member in S.N.L. history and one of the current iteration’s most popular, reliably funny performers—even when he’s not the star of a sketch—seems so fatigued.
He’s tired, but not incurious. When we first settle into the surprisingly quiet S.N.L. offices, he takes a look at my phone and immediately asks about my background photo: a screenshot from the recently recovered feminist classic Wanda, by the late Barbara Loden. He’s intrigued by it. Thompson, best known as a comedian, is also an actor’s actor—an outright drama nerd. “I have the drama faces tattooed on me,” he says. “I take it very seriously.”
Which may just be the secret to how he’s gotten this far, and this good. The Atlanta-raised comedian, now 41, has achieved a unique status on Saturday Night Live, a show whose halls ring with the glories of its massively successful alums, from movie superstars like Eddie Murphy, Adam Sandler, and Will Ferrell to stand-up stalwarts like Chris Rock, to a thriving generation of comic innovators on screens big and small, including Amy Poehler, Maya Rudolph, and Kristen Wiig.
Unlike most of them, Thompson—who finally won his first Emmy last year, as co-writer of the song “Come Back, Barack,” with Chance the Rapper and Chris Redd—was already a star when he landed at S.N.L., thanks to a singular career at Nickelodeon. In fact, he’s one of the few young actors of his generation at that network to land a successful, reasonably long-term career in the industry. And now, after 16 years haunting the halls of Studio 8H, he may just be about to start a new chapter.
Thompson has a production commitment from NBC to star in and executive-produce a new single-camera comedy called The Kenan Show, co-starring Andy Garcia and executive-produced by, among others, Lorne Michaels. This winter, NBC also announced that Thompson would be serving as a judge on the upcoming comedy-competition series Bring the Funny (alongside Chrissy Teigen and Jeff Foxworthy). Weeks later, Nickelodeon revealed that Thompson was also on board to executive-produce a Nickelodeon revival of All That, the S.N.L.-for-kids series from the 90s on which he got his start.
This slew of new projects has led some to speculate that the S.N.L. star may finally be plotting his exit from a show that’s been his home for longer than some of his fans have been alive. But when we meet, he’s mum on that particular subject, which is consistent with his reputation for being an ensemble man rather than a spotlight-hungry star. To think of these next moves as steps on his career ladder would be to miss the point: Thompson himself doesn’t think in terms of this job or that.
With Kel Mitchell in 1997’s Good Burger.
©Paramount/Courtesy Everett Collection
Instead, he tells me, all he really wants is to be funny. “That’s at the very base of it, you know what I mean?” he says. “And everything else is just ... icing.”
Thompson jokes that being an actor was his first and only job, but it really was. He got his first gig when he was 10, and he’s been working ever since, in television, film, commercials—everything but stand-up, which is atypical for an S.N.L. star. He’s never been part of an improv troupe like the Upright Citizens Brigade, either. That marks Thompson as an outlier not only among his castmates but also among black comedians, who have traditionally had to hustle their way through the stand-up circuit for years before catching a break. Thompson’s S.N.L. colleague and frequent sketch partner Leslie Jones spent decades on the road before getting tapped by NBC.
“I witnessed that when I went out to L.A. with Nickelodeon shows,” Thompson says, “but I never engaged in it like that because I was already working, and trying to go to college. So I didn’t have the time to do that hustle, and get up, and work. I never had the chance to pursue that life. I always respected it. I never half-stepped it.”
It also meant that he had to develop a different style. Where other comics, particularly politically-minded black comics, have favored abrasive social commentary, Thompson has favored joy. He’s like the larger-than-life uncle at a cookout who barely gets through his meal because he keeps stopping to make you laugh—the kind of guy whose storytelling always, as if by necessity, involves acting out everything he’s narrating. “I’m just out there trying to be joyous, basically,” he says. “It makes me laugh when somebody is being big and obnoxiously joyous, when everybody else is trying to play it serious.
“I’ve always had a relationship with television of being very colorful. My first love was The Price Is Right. It’s just very joyful viewing. So I always wanted to emulate that in some fashion.”
That first gig, when he was 10, was a commercial for Lee’s Famous Recipe Chicken. “Way too long of a title,” Thompson now jokes. The ad was simple: Thompson played a kid on a fishing trip with his grandfather, and his line was “Grandpa, the fish ain’t bitin’ today.” The grandfather responded by giving him a piece of fried chicken. “I was supposed to take a bite of it and say, ‘Oh, I like this kinda bitin’!’ ” he says. “It was super-racist, and I had a good time.”
More than merely a good time. Thompson already knew he wanted to be a performer, ever since he played the lead role of the gingerbread man in a kindergarten production. But the commercial—which he never saw, as it aired only in surrounding states—was the first thing that paid him, and it paid him well. “Eight hundred dollars,” he tells me. “I didn’t know what to compare it to, because I’d never been paid more than a dollar to go get some candy or shit. Or ‘Thanks for cutting the grass, here’s some lemonade.’ ” Eight hundred dollars may as well have been a million.
As a teenager, Thompson sent in an audition tape for the 1994 film D2: The Mighty Ducks, his first movie, which belonged to a hit franchise that similarly launched the careers of Jussie Smollett and Joshua Jackson. Thompson, who turned 15 while the movie was in production, already had a spark. He played a shit-talker named Russ, who made fun of everyone, from the film’s other young stars to adult anchor Emilio Estevez.
The movie was a stepping-stone; the filmmakers introduced him to producers at Nickelodeon, and that was that. Thompson made a name for himself at the network, with a six-year career on the hit variety show All That—playing characters like Pierre Escargot, a gibberish-speaking Frenchman in a bathtub giving lessons in “everyday French,” and nerdy, Clark Kent-esque Superdude—and with his four-season turn on Kenan & Kel, co-starring Kel Mitchell, and the 1997 film Good Burger.
Thompson was 18 by the time he filmed Good Burger and a bona fide star (at least to the sizable market of kids and their parents), which is another way of saying that Nickelodeon was his brand and it remained so to the public even after his time there ended—to the extent that when he first tried to audition for S.N.L. four years later, Thompson was told he was too young. “I kept sending tapes when I first left Nickelodeon, and was like, ‘I would like to graduate now!’ ” he says. “And they’d say, ‘You look a little young. Check back with us.’ It was a couple years’ worth of that.”
It wasn’t just a matter of age but of experience, something Thompson learned firsthand when, at 25, he finally got the chance to formally try out for the show. “It was terrifying,” he says. “You’re auditioning for a make-or-break job.” To say nothing of the fact that S.N.L.’s audition process requires a stand-up set, something Thompson had never done.
It was, he admits, a disaster. “I didn’t know how to engage the audience,” he says. “I basically started doing sound effects and a phone call between [Al] Sharpton and Schwarzenegger for some odd reason. It was funny to me, but I had no setup, so everybody was just kind of lost from what I was doing.”
Yet he got a callback, and was then asked to do a set at the Laugh Factory against pros like J. B. Smoove and Finesse Mitchell. Then he got the job. (Kel Mitchell recently revealed that he also auditioned for S.N.L. in the aughts, and likewise described his tryout as disastrous.)
Which isn’t to say that his early years at S.N.L. were completely free of baggage. In the beginning, Thompson’s child-star reputation followed him everywhere. “I would go out with him in those early days, in 2006, 2007,” says S.N.L. writer Bryan Tucker, “and I would hear often ‘Where’s Kel?’ or ‘All That’ or whatever.” Over the years, as his star on the sketch series has risen, that’s changed. “Now when I hang out with him,” Tucker says, “every now and then you’ll hear that. But mostly, people just know him as Kenan. He’s kind of defined himself as his own individual celebrity, rather than the characters he plays.”
There’s some irony inherent in that, because Thompson’s most defining feature as a sketch player may be that he’s not intent on being the star. “I’m big on the team thing,” he tells me. “I also respect other people’s talent.” When the topic of Will Ferrell comes up, he can’t help but sing the former S.N.L.-er’s praises, calling him one of the greatest ever—up there with the chameleonic Phil Hartman, another all-around player. Praising other comedians is a way of giving his own career context. “That’s the kind of fan I am,” says Thompson. “I’m very aware of my footprint.”
“It’s stressful enough doing live TV—I might as well have fun.”
He has a well-earned reputation for being an ensemble player, volunteering—even 16 years into his S.N.L. tenure—to take a backseat to other cast members. “He’s very willing to play service,” Tucker says. “Which means he doesn’t have to be the big star in a sketch. He can be a small part. He can help out with other people. And even now, in year 16, he’s glad to do that. He considers himself part of an ensemble.”
That’s for his own sake as much as anyone else’s. Thompson wants to admire the work of his colleagues, for one thing—during our conversation, he said he was “in awe” of the people he worked with—and make himself available for whatever may come up. Part of being a utility player means being willing to step forward when others might hesitate, which, for Thompson, doesn’t seem like such a big deal. His time at S.N.L. has been instructive in that way, particularly as a black cast member.
“Early on,” Tucker tells me, “he was one of only a few black cast members. So he was asked to do a lot of different things. Whereas if you have five or six different white guys, you can kind of pick and choose whose voice fits where. He had to be versatile just because there were lots of types of roles that only he could do.”
This became a matter of public interest when, in 2013, Thompson—who had by that point played Maya Angelou, Whoopi Goldberg, and Oprah Winfrey on the show—told TV Guide that he and co-star Jay Pharoah had no intention of performing in drag anymore. The show, Thompson and Pharoah indicated, would need to hire black women to play those roles instead. (S.N.L. had not had a black woman on staff since Maya Rudolph left, in 2007; just three other black women had been cast members before Rudolph joined the series, in 2000. S.N.L. has aired continuously since 1975.)
For Thompson, this was as much a push for diversity as it was a matter of practical need. “There was no reason for us to continue doing the Shakespeare version of things,” he says. “Those things start to become pertinent when we needed somebody to play Michelle Obama. We needed a real Omarosa. We really needed people to cover the people that were in the news.”
His stand wasn’t without controversy. In the same interview, Thompson also said that the show’s casting directors didn’t tap more black women because, “in auditions, they just never find ones that are ready.” But the resulting uproar ultimately led to the hiring of Jones and Sasheer Zamata in 2014, the former of whom has become his close friend and essential sketch partner, including in their popular “Black Jeopardy!” skits.
Those bits, scripted by Tucker and Michael Che, are a rehash of an old Will Ferrell franchise, Thompson points out—though Thompson owns the role of host Darnell Hayes (a.k.a. “Alex Treblack”) so completely that I had never thought of it that way. Still, he’s proud of the sketches. “It’s nice when you can make a nice living-room splash like that,” he says, “when it becomes, like, dinner talk: ‘Oh my God, they were so on point with this, or so on point with that.’ ”
The newer hires—even though Zamata has left the show, it’s now got Jones, Che, Redd, Melissa Villaseñor, and Ego Nwodim on its roster—have allowed S.N.L. to explore difficult subject matter (which, to be clear, Thompson has never avoided) with more complexity. Thompson and Jones recently did a sketch based on R. Kelly’s flabbergasting interview with Gayle King, in which the musician claimed innocence against the charges of sexual misconduct that have marred his career for decades. How do you tackle a subject like that, doing an impersonation of one of the most reviled men in R&B without belittling the seriousness of the subject?
According to Thompson, the key is not to worry too much about the impersonation. “It’s like [you] don’t even really want to get that close to being that guy,” he says. “You know what I’m saying? I’d rather point out the absurdities of that interview. But not that the situation is absurd. And then it was written very well down that road, too—him wanting to be called victim and that stuff, too. It just helped play into that ‘I’m innocent, man.’ And that could be anybody. But we all know that it’s R. Kelly because I’m dressed like him, and I’m talking to Gayle.”
Even in a situation like this, what matters most to Thompson is finding the bright spots in a dark story—for all of our sakes. “We want some relief of the pressure of the seriousness of everything,” he says. “You know what I’m saying? Like, I know it’s serious, but that interview is kind of funny. And it’d be kind of funny to laugh at him, if we can find a way that’s not disrespectful of the situation.
“And it also keeps it fun for me. Doesn’t make it such a heady type of approach. It’s stressful enough doing live TV, you know what I mean? I might as well have fun.”
It’s a reflective tone he hits more than once during our interview. Again, Thompson never says whether he’ll be leaving his post at S.N.L.; weeks after we speak, he’ll tell Ellen DeGeneres that he plans to stick around, maybe until 2020. “It’s the best job in the world,” Thompson will say. “I can’t see myself just walking away from it like that.”
When we speak, though, Thompson certainly seems to be surveying his time on S.N.L. with some wistful pre-nostalgia. “I might as well have fun,” he repeats. “I mean, it’s 16 years’ worth of stress. Looking back on it, I wanna be like, ‘But yeah, I had fun at the same time.’ ”
And where he once viewed his early S.N.L. years somewhat sheepishly, he seems now to be coming full circle.
“It was weird for me for a long time, because I was such a fan of the show before associating it with being the same show—only with me on it,” he says. “It was, like, am I doing a disservice? Am I throwing it off by being a Nickelodeon kid that’s come onto it? Am I sullying it in any way?” Now, though, his approach has changed. “Eight or nine seasons in,” he says, “I started to be able to look back at the show and be able to watch it and think, That wasn’t so bad.”
PLAYING THE LONG GAME
With 16 seasons under his belt, Thompson is the longest-running cast member in S.N.L. history. Here’s who he had to outlast to clinch the record
The ace impressionist stuck around for 14 seasons—and joined the show again in 2014 as its announcer.
Late Night’s future leader ended his 13-season tenure as both head writer and “Weekend Update” anchor.
The Grover Cleveland of Studio 8H banked 11 non-consecutive seasons as a performer and writer before entering politics.
Portlandia’s co-creator spent 11 seasons on S.N.L.—and still haunts 30 Rockefeller Plaza, as the bandleader on Late Night.
Ten seasons of Saturday Night Live? That’s a lot of “Ladies Man” sketches.
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Ready yet? Get Set! All That is back! Catch All New All That when it premieres June 15th at 8:30/7:30c on Nickelodeon USA! Click the following link for more info!: http://nickalive.blogspot.com/2019/05/nickelodeon-usa-to-premiere-all-that.html
Did you hear? Nickelodeon and the duo behind viral pop-up phenomenon Saved by the Max are teaming up to open a Good Burger pop-up restaurant!: http://nickalive.blogspot.com/2019/06/nickelodeon-orders-up-all-that-inspired.html
Subscribe to the All That YouTube channel today!: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6UzskfVDPkJ5aSe755ZGgQ
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