Tom Kenny & Rodger Bumpass Relish The 'Comfort Food' Aspect Of 'SpongeBob SquarePants'

Tom Kenny and Rodger Bumpass reveal their first responses to seeing SpongeBob SquarePants in CGI, and how it won them over.

During a roundtable interview with CBR, SpongeBob SquarePants cast members Tom Kenny (SpongeBob) and Rodger Bumpass (Squidward) talked about their initial reaction to the CGI-look of Kamp Koral: SpongeBob's Under Years and SpongeBob SquarePants: Sponge on the Run, how they and series creator Stephen Hillenburg were won over, and what's at the heart of the franchise — regardless of the media it's presented in.

SpongeBob SquarePants premiered in 1999, making the twenty-plus-year-old show one of the longest-running programs in modern animation. Along the way, the series has morphed in unique and exciting ways, inspiring a Tony-winning Broadway musical, multiple films and the upcoming prequel series Kamp Koral. The latter mimics the CGI-animation style that was incorporated for parts of the 2015 film SpongeBob SquarePants: Sponge Out Of Water, which is a departure from the look of the original series. However, that shift in design hasn't led to a radical altering of the show's style of comedy and character, which Kenny was quick to point out.

As Kenny explained, the heart of the franchise is that "it all goes to character. Character, character, character, and as long as the characters are who they are, and are true to their blueprint, because you don't want cartoon characters to change, really. You don't want SpongeBob to have an arc. You don't want Squidward to have an arc. 'Wow, he's so different in this movie than he was in the third one. Wow.' Cartoon characters stay the same, you know what I mean? Charlie Brown is always Charlie Brown, that's what's comforting about it. Bugs Bunny's always Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck's always Daffy Duck, Popeye the Sailor Man is always Popeye the Sailor Man. There's not like a, "Maybe I'll give up spinach and not punch people anymore." Yeah. You don't want Popeye to do that. It's the comfort food aspect."

Kenny even admitted that the animation shift to CGI initially caught him, some of his fellow-castmembers, and even series creator Stephen Hillenburg by surprise. "[Hillenburg] and we were a little unsure about the CGI thing, too. SpongeBob is such a determinedly 2D classic animated looking show." But their wariness was calmed by the producers of the new series, who were also responsible for the still-running original series. "They were able to find a way to take that CGI and lend it the same squashy, stretchy, kinetic, the craziness of 2D, classic animation. That was a puzzle they worked really, really hard to figure out, and I think are still learning on Kamp Koral. I think it's fun to have to learn new tricks when you've been doing something for a while, so it doesn't become stale."

Looking back at his own first impressions, Bumpass agreed that "the animation change... that might be a little jarring at first. I find it the more I see it, the more I like it. And it dovetails also with our characters. We're showing them fresh and new, in a different age, in a different environment. You're being introduced to new aspects of the entire show, both character-wise and overall presentation-wise. So if my perception is any indication, it will be nicely adjusted to by anybody watching the show, both the CG and the characters."

For Kenny, the response to the new show's style was similar to his feelings when the Broadway musical adaption was announced. "We had the same trepidation about the Broadway show, going to see the Broadway show like, "wow. SpongeBob doesn't happen in the real world — the physicality of the real world. Can you take what SpongeBob is and put it on a stage with human beings?' And that's another code that they managed to crack, another Rubik's Cube that they managed to solve brilliantly, and put any reservations we had to rest. Yeah. They're good at figuring this stuff out."

Bumpass specifically cited the way the live-action show adapted Squidward's design as part of his view on taking the original series and finding ways to successfully adapt it. "A great example of them solving that problem was Squidward's character on stage, because in the cartoon, we make him anthropomorphic by combining two legs to make two legs. In the live-action, you've got to take a real human being and turn him into a multi-legged person, and their costume design was absolutely perfect like that, but it's a great example of how they've solved this dilemma."

Kamp Koral: SpongeBob's Under Years stars Tom Kenny as SpongeBob, Bill Fagerbakke as Patrick, Rodger Bumpass as Squidward, Clancy Brown as Mr. Krabs, Carolyn Lawrence as Sandy, Mr. Lawrence as Plankton, Mary Jo Catlett as Mrs. Puff, Jill Talley as Karen, Lori Alan as Pearl, Carlos Alazraqui as Nobby and Kate Higgins as Narlene. The SpongeBob SquarePants prequel will premiere on Paramount+ on Mar. 4  The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run will make its debut on Premium Video-On-Demand (PVOD) & Paramount+, ViacomCBS’ highly anticipated global streaming service, on Mar. 4.

More Nick: 'Kamp Koral: SpongeBob's Under Years' and 'The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run' to Debut on Paramount+ on Thursday, March 4!

Originally published: Friday, June 12, 2020.

H/T: YouTube /@Vailskibum94.

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