SpongeBob SquarePants 25th Anniversary Special Edition
Back to where it all began, with voice actors Tom Kenny, Clancy Brown, Bill Fagerbakke, and Rodger Bumpass. PG. 6
Cast and crew discuss the incredible influence and legacy of the show that began 25 years ago. PG. 10
Celebrating the fan favorites who may have only had an episode or two but managed to make a lasting impression. PG. 20
The brains behind the tunes of SpongeBob explain how the music helped create a phenomenon. PG. 26
Savage Patrick, FlowerBob, Frankendoodle, and how SpongeBob became a meme machine
PG. 30
LETTER FROM THE EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS
Q: W HO LI V ES I N A P I N EAP P LE UND ER T H E S EA?
A:We all have for the last 25 years!
That’s 25 years of supremely silly subaquatic surrealism that we, as a crew, and you, as our amazing audience, have been submerged in together. Twenty-five glorious years since Nickelodeon first introduced the world to Stephen Hillenburg’s quirky cast of characters that he discovered in a town deep on the ocean floor called Bikini Bottom. More specifically, one humble little goofball we all know (and love), Mr. SpongeBob SquarePants.
We’ve been so lucky to be part of a crew that has grown and morphed over the years in surprising ways. There are talented folks who have been with us since the very beginning and new members who grew up loving the show that they are now helping create. This is the secret formula to the show’s success. We get to work with an amazing group of artists who act together to produce an internal continuity of creativity, a style of humor that’s unique to this carefully curated group’s sensibilities. Together, in a place where every department has always been focused on making their contribution to each episode as funny and strange as it can be.
It all starts in the writing room, where we try to keep the stories super weird and the comedy both verbally sharp and visually cartoony. We all grew up loving cartoony cartoons,
and that’s the kind of show we strive to create. These stories are then passed to the rough storyboard artists, who are like each new episode’s first directors. They choose the funniest posing for acting and create the clearest setups to sell every story beat and gag. Now it’s time for our actors to make the characters come alive in the
recording booth. What was already funny with text and illustrations on a page becomes exponentially more so with the performances of our amazing cast under Tom Kenny’s voice direction.
After that, we take all this material into the animatic editing phase, where we try to cram as much (and there’s
always too much) of these wonderful moments into an 11-minute runtime. Next up in the pipeline are the supervising directors and their teams of the best illustrators, who, along with the color, background, and prop departments, hone all this rough material into the final package that is then shipped to our partners at Rough Draft Korea. After they complete their months-long, frame-at-a-time animation magic, we get the finished scenes back, and the process of post begins. After the scenes are edited together, sound effects and music are composed and mixed to help add the last important layers of comedic spice. And we get to repeat this whole process 52 times per season!
It’s such a rewarding feeling to watch each episode come together with the help of so many talented individuals. It’s just as amazing to see how much of an impact SpongeBob has had on our audiences, both young and old, as well as on culture at large. The popularity of the flagship show, SpongeBob SquarePants, has allowed us
to expand this universe of characters into multiple spinoffs (Kamp Koral: SpongeBob’s Under Years and The Patrick Star Show), theatrical movies (The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, two sequels, and a third in production), streaming movies (Saving Bikini Bottom: The Sandy Cheeks Movie and Plankton: The Movie), games (too many to list), and even a Broadway musical that is now being staged by theater departments in schools across the country.
All the various spinoffs that we develop with the same core group of writers and artists adhere to the style of comedy that Steve developed from the very beginning. In every project we start, we strive to create a piece of entertainment that both children and adults can enjoy. And for us, it’s such an enjoyable and rewarding process because we simply write stories and gags that we’re entertained by. We’re the first test audience for everything we make. And in our cartoon laboratory, we constantly work hard to surprise each other with new stories and gags. That moment of sparking creativity where a new idea catches us off guard and produces an involuntary laugh is what we’re all addicted to and try to repeat as often as possible.
We’re so grateful to you all for being on the same kooky wavelength as this funny little group of artists who live and work in the conceptual world of Bikini Bottom. You know we’ll be working our Bubble Basses off to continue making stuff that keeps everyone’s spirits in stitches of uncontrollable laughter. You know that weird sound that SpongeBob is constantly making… I can hear it now! [Finger wobbling an Adam’s apple] YaaHahahahahahahahaha!!!
◄ MARC CECCARELLI AND VINCENT WALLER EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS
Starting a new job brings an interesting clash of emotions—the rejuvenating promise of a fresh start mixes with the anxiety that several unknowns produce. You hope you like your boss, that you gel with your coworkers, and the gig lasts long enough to provide stability. Few people go into their first day thinking they are settling in for a quarter-century run of a lifetime.
SpongeBob SquarePants’ pilot episode, “Help Wanted,” is an eight-minute introduction to creator Stephen Hillenburg’s animated aquatic wonderland. The 1999 pilot introduces viewers to the world of Bikini Bottom and some of its most iconic characters—the curmudgeonly Squidward Tentacles, money-obsessed Mr. Krabs, village idiot Patrick Star, and the titular, childlike SpongeBob, finally ready to apply for his dream job as a fry cook at the local patty joint, The Krusty Krab. SpongeBob isn’t the only person who landed a dream job with “Help Wanted,” as voice actors Rodger Bumpass, Clancy Brown, Bill Fagerbakke, and Tom Kenny (Squidward, Mr. Krabs, Patrick, and SpongeBob, respectively) were also submerging themselves in a new venture that would change their lives, the world of animation, and pop culture itself, forever.
[The following interviews were edited and condensed for clarity.]
GETTING THEIR FEET WET
While the voices behind the “core four” had experience in voice acting, they each came to SpongeBob SquarePants with differing expectations and levels of investment.
TOM KENNY: I had worked on Rocko’s Modern Life, a Nickelodeon series created by Joe Murray. I was doing stand-up at the time. I was
trying to break into voiceover, especially animated voiceover, which was my dream job.
Carlos Alazraqui, the voice of Rocko, was also a stand-up comedian. Joe Murray said, “Is there anybody funny that would be good for [Rocko character] Heffer?” And Carlos said, “Yeah, there’s this guy, Tom Kenny.”
So I met with Joe, and he hired me to be Heffer. Then, on that show, the creative director was Steve Hillenburg. Joe Murray put together this amazing crew of guys just getting their feet wet
in the animation business. That’s where I met Steve and a lot of the other SpongeBob builders.
CLANCY BROWN: I had been working in voiceover a little bit. I had sort of put my toe in and decided that I really liked it. I had done a couple of series that didn’t last very long. But I
Early art from the pilot shows a Krusty Krab name tag with SpongeBob’s original name, “SpongeBoy.”
The oral history of the
SpongeBob SquarePants pilot,
“Help Wanted,” as told by the cast.
BY NICK HARLEY
knew I liked doing it. It was a good gig. I got a call: “Would you come and do this thing?” I said, “What kind of voice is it?” And they said, “It’s this kind of a character voice. It’s a crazy Nickelodeon show.” [Animation Studio] Klasky Csupo was doing a lot of Nick’s shows then, and this wasn’t Klasky Csupo. I had a friend who was
writing on Hey Arnold!, so I called him up and said, “What’s the story?” And he goes, “I know it’s going to be good.”
KENNY: Steve was ready to pitch his own show. He was kind of working on this thing in his spare time. He invited me to his small rented apartment in West Hollywood and showed me the
show bible. It was all there. He showed it to me, and I just fell in love with it. He was like, “I want you to be SpongeBob. You know, you kind of are SpongeBob: hyperactive, work your ass off, always trying to look at the sunny side of things.” He intuited all that stuff from knowing me. So I had the gig from the get-go, which is very unusual.
But Steve did say to me [the network] is kind of pushing for Fred Savage because The Wonder Years was really big at that time, and I thought, “Oh well, it was nice while it lasted.” He said, “Oh no. You’re SpongeBob. You laugh like him, you think like him, you cry like him. You’re SpongeBob. It’s not going to be anyone else.”
BILL FAGERBAKKE: Coach had ended in ’97. I was figuring out my own career. I kind of wanted to stay away from sitcoms. Animation had started for me around ’94 or something like that. I think [Hillenburg] heard some of my work on Beethoven and Gargoyles. I think that just opened his mind to me reading for Patrick.
RODGER BUMPASS: When SpongeBob hit, it was just another cartoon, another audition. Back then, you had to go to your agent’s office or the third-person casting place and physically get there and do the audition. And then you got the job. I got the job.
“I
GUESS THIS THING WORKS”
The pilot was recorded in 1997 and was eventually picked up to series. Just like their journeys to the show, the cast had varying reactions to their first visit to Bikini Bottom.
BUMPASS: We did the pilot. I got a copy of it, took it home to my family, played it for them, and they all fell asleep. So I just let it go and said it was just another cartoon. The only cartoon I’d ever been a part of that lasted any length of time was Where on Earth Is Carmen Sandiego? and that lasted for four years. I said, “Well,
okay, this is another cartoon; it’ll last maybe a year or two or whatever.” Then I saw the snowballing reception we had from our fans. I was a little surprised. Pleasantly so, you might say.
BROWN: I was just trying to make sense of the pilot. I couldn’t quite grasp what was going on. The problem was, of course, that it was very obvious what was going on. It’s very simple. The key to SpongeBob, generally, is that the simpler, the better.
We went to the studio—it was a big room. Stephen started out in the booth. I’d never had a creator or a director sit in on the recording. In terms of having fun, it really did stand out. But the pilot itself, to me, was very strange.
When we finally got it animated, and it was going to air, they gave us a videotape. I took it back to my house and showed it to my daughter, who was then four years old, and said, “What do you think?” She was mesmerized by it. She wanted to watch it again. And she wanted to watch it again. And she wanted to watch it again. And I was like, “Okay, I guess this thing works.”
FAGERBAKKE: I didn’t really understand it. I was kind of dismissive of it. I thought it was like preschool stuff. I thought it was just going to be one [recording] session because you never know. You’re just trying to book one thing and do your best. It was really weird because there were anchovies in that episode. We had a tank of helium in the recording studio for us all to be the anchovies. I thought, “This is the craziest $600 I’m getting here.” It was fun. The people were cool. I just thought it was for little kids. I was happy to do it but I forgot about it.
And then 10 months later, I get sent a VHS video. Halfway through watching it, I was just blown away by this creation that Hillenburg had executed—this magic carpet of creativity and humor and wit and rhythm and characters weaving together to respond to each other in such a wonderful, engaging way. It was so great.
KENNY: When I saw the finished pilot, it was as funny as I had hoped it would be when I saw the storyboard —before I ever met any of these other actors or heard them voice the characters. It was every bit as funny and charming. I remember going home to my parents’ house in Syracuse, New York with a VHS copy of the pilot and playing it for my folks. They’re just regular folks, you know, blue-collar people. And my dad said, “That’s a really cute show. I think that’s really got a chance.”
HAVING A WONDERFUL TIME
One element of the pilot that left an immediate impression on all of the cast members was the
inclusion of a cover of the song “Livin’ in the Sunlight, Lovin’ in the Moonlight” by ’60s artist Tiny Tim.
FAGERBAKKE: By the time we hit Tiny Tim, my mind was shattered.
BUMPASS: It was genius using Tiny Tim’s music in the show. I wish we could have done it more often and have it be kind of a theme because it’s so silly. It fits our atmosphere and our energy so well.
BROWN: [Tiny Tim is] the perfect soundtrack. Rest in peace, Tiny Tim. Part of his act was that he was just so guileless. I love to believe that Tiny Tim was the person who we saw on stage. You know, because he would always bow and be so gracious.
4 5
He was just as simple and sweet as SpongeBob is.
KENNY: [“Livin’ in the Sunlight, Lovin’ in the Moonlight”] was the perfect choice because it’s a song about loving life, loving the world, having the most fun that you can, sung by a personality who’s a total outcast, who’s a total oddball, who could never do anything other than what he wound up doing.
At first, I was like, “That’s a strange choice.” And then I realized that it was really the only choice ever. Of course, SpongeBob and Tiny Tim are the same. But only Steve would have seen that. Only he would have connected those dots.
I opened for Tiny Tim as a stand-up in the early ’90s. So yeah, crazy. There are two degrees of separation between me and anybody in the history of the job. I’ve been around a long time.
LIKE AN ORCHESTRA
1) A background drawing from the pilot shows the exterior of The Krusty Krab, the local restaurant where SpongeBob applies for his first job.
2) An early look at the hungry, Krabby Patty-demanding anchovies in the pilot.
3) Original sketch of SpongeBob.
4) Storyboard of SpongeBob’s Krusty Krab colleagues, Mr. Krabs and Squidward.
5) The pilot’s anchovies would go on to appear regularly in the series.
Why does SpongeBob still resonate 25 years later? The cast credits the vision of Hillenburg, who tragically passed away in 2018 from complications with ALS.
BROWN: [Hillenburg] was always trying to pull the complexity out of it. He didn’t want any outside references. He didn’t want a whiff of anything that was current. You know, he was like the Simpsons. You just don’t want any of that stuff in there. You want to keep it as simple as possible. The pilot is about a young man applying for a job for the first time. And he’s nervous. He doesn’t know that he’ll be particularly good at it, but it turns out he is. He wants it bad enough, and he gets it. I mean, it’s really that simple.
BUMPASS: That was the cool thing about Steve—he had the concept. He had everything in his mind. And when the right execution came out from his actors, he knew it right away. It’s like Mozart; he didn’t have to write the thing down and then change things. He knew what he wanted. Fortunately, we all were what he wanted.
KENNY: Steve knew exactly what he wanted. I’m just an instrument in his orchestra and I want to play what he wants me to play. Steve was such a dedicated music listener. He cast the show tonally. It’s like an orchestra. It’s like “Peter and the Wolf,” you know? Like Tchaikovsky. I had never run into anybody who cast a show that way. Obviously, you want people with voices that fit the drawings. And he wanted people with chops, like comedic chops, who would know where the jokes need to go and stuff like that. But it was also tonal as much as anything else.
FAGERBAKKE: It’s really something where you just get lucky. You don’t know that Tom Kenny is going to be this wizard who’s also like a machine. I don’t know if anyone else could do what Tom does vocally and sustain their voice; sustain their mechanism. It’s incredible. Same with Rodger Bumpass. My god, the screaming! The discipline of that is what always impresses me. And Clancy Brown? Man, he just does that. He does things that I can’t do without hurting myself. I think the ongoing challenge with something like SpongeBob, to me, has always been the balance of humor and innocence. And it’s really hard. Because when you’re just driving out material, like you’re just fulfilling work demands, it’s tricky to stave off cynicism. So, one of the keys has been the ability to sustain that essential innocence of SpongeBob. You know, and when he slides into something that’s weirdly sophisticated, it’s never fraught with cruelty or with a demeaning kind of perspective. That is the commandment of the show, and I think that it’s why people respond to it.
BUMPASS: I am so grateful to be a part of something so iconic in people’s lives. People always tell us, “Thank you for our childhood.” So, gratitude is the main thing on my mind.
KENNY: It’s been nothing but a beautiful, beautiful road. I can’t believe it’s been 25 years.
T H E P OW E R O F
Stephen Hillenburg’s SpongeBob SquarePants changed the landscape of animation forever when it debuted in 1999. Now, over two decades later, Den of Geek chats to the cast and crew about its huge impact, continued success, and the future of the beloved series.
BY ROSIE KNIGHT
Though it might be hard to imagine, there was once a world where it was impossible to take a swim in Bikini Bottom. Over two decades later, multiple generations have ventured under the waves to visit the kindest cartoon hero in his pineapple under the sea. SpongeBob SquarePants, now 14 seasons into its run, has been translated into over 30 languages, is the inspiration for multiple theme parks around the world, and is the heart of an ever-growing spinoff universe. But it all began with the late Stephen Hillenburg, whose uniquely unconventional approach to making the show was key to its success and longevity.
LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT
“My audition was unlike any audition I’ve ever had before or since,” Bill Fagerbakke, who brings Patrick Star to life, recalls. Instead of recording his audition for the role in his agent’s office or at a nearby studio, the actor was pleasantly surprised to find himself in a conference room with an unassuming Hillenburg, who had a
tiny cassette deck sitting next to him with a plugin mic.
“I thought, ‘This is interesting.’ He had single-panel drawings of all the characters. He was just so gentle. He said, ‘Okay, I want to hear you read for SpongeBob’s best friend.’ So he played Tom Kenny for me and told me that Patrick would need to balance him out, which was my wheelhouse. I’m a professional moron if you will,” Fagerbakke laughs. “Luckily, he saw
One of creator Stephen Hillenburg’s early drawings of SpongeBob.
me as the character.”
Carolyn Lawrence had a similar experience when she read for Sandy. Wandering into what could have been anything from her third to billionth callback, she found herself in a conference room with Hillenburg—armed once again with a microphone.
“It was an unusual setup! It was so informal. In a way, it almost made me more nervous,” Lawrence shares. “It set the tone for the whole thing because he did things the way he wanted to do them. That’s a beautiful skill; so many creatives don’t have that opportunity, so there’s something innately powerful in him that he was able to manifest it that way.”
It would go on to be Lawrence’s first full series booking and the beginning of a 25-year journey as the adventurous squirrel known as Sandy Cheeks. “It was so exciting for me, but I had no idea what it would become. No one did, no matter what they say.”
Memories of an unusual audition process for the role of SpongeBob is something that prolific voice actor Tom Kenny immediately recalls. “Steve had me go to his house! I went over, and we went into his back office, and he said, ‘There’s a show I’ve been thinking about pitching at Nickelodeon; I’d like you to be the title character. So see what you think of it and if you would be interested.’
What actor isn’t interested in getting paid? Like, I don’t even have to look at it; the answer is yes,” he laughs.
Hillenburg shared the show bible with Kenny, introducing him to all of the Bikini Bottom residents, including Mr. Krabs, Squidward, and, of course, SpongeBob. There was one thing in particular that immediately stood out. “These little concept drawings of the characters doing different things in their lives were super charming. Black-andwhite pencil drawings in Steve’s inimitable style. The way he drew the characters, I can instantly pick
it out, you know?”
“My earliest memory is him walking me through the world and me just falling in love at first sight,” Kenny shares. The memories are extra fresh for the actor, who recently found himself near the apartment where that first meeting happened. “I was actually recently just over in that area, and all the memories came rushing back. I was driving by; I almost had to pull over.”
Mr. Lawrence, who plays Plankton on the show, had known Hillenburg for years before SpongeBob, thanks to their work on another cult classic animation, Rocko’s Modern Life. “We were best buddies doing that show and learning about it,” he says. “We had similar sensibilities, similar ways that we told jokes, and both of us had shows we wanted to get made. Steve’s got through the Hollywood gauntlet, and so Steve called me up—and if I had gotten my show at that time, I would have called him, too.”
MY EARLIEST MEMORY IS JUST STEVE WALKING ME THROUGH THE WORLD AND ME JUST FALLING IN LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT.
— TOM KENNY
Soon, Hillenburg recorded this pilot with Mr. Lawrence auditioning for every single character. “I actually did the Plankton voice for SpongeBob. It was stupid, but I got big laughs from it. And afterward, Steve came up to me and said, ‘If I had any guts at all, I’d go with your voice as SpongeBob because it’s this deep, crazy voice. But this doesn’t feel like it’s it. But I think it’s Plankton.’”
Hillenburg wrangled to have his lesser-known cast lead the series and hired Kenny without really doing
wide auditions for SpongeBob, which was something the actor remembers well. “There were Nickelodeon folks who wanted to cover their butts a little bit, like, ‘Maybe we should listen to a couple others and judge them against each other?’ You know, they probably should have done that!” Kenny laughs. “But Steve was like, ‘Nope, I’ve got my SpongeBob, he fought for me.’”
He did cast one sure thing, though: legendary character actor Clancy Brown, who read for the role of
Left: SpongeBob has a Krabby Pattythemed dream in season 12’s “Dream Hoppers.” Below: 1) An original drawing of “SpongeBoy,” as SpongeBob was first known. 2 and 3) Some of creator Stephen Hillenburg’s “inimitable” blackand-white pencil sketches.
Mr. Eugene Krabs, SpongeBob’s spendthrift boss who would go on to become a fan-favorite character. “Donna Grillo [the series’ casting director] sent a script to my manager, and I read it, and told him I’d be happy to audition for it, but I have no idea what’s going on in this thing,” Brown recalls. Once he got in the room and heard the other characters come to life, he had a realization: “Was this one special? Yes, it was.” But when it comes to the single memory that stands out from those early days for Brown, it’s something that’s still true to this day. “This is the most fun I’ve ever had. We had a lot of fun recording the pilot, and it’s always been fun. It’s never not been fun.”
Another cast member who has fond memories of that auspicious first recording is Rodger Bumpass, the voice of Squidward on the now iconic show. “I remember that first day very clearly. In fact, because it’s in Burbank, I often pass by that studio—we didn’t record at Nickelodeon at that time—a little studio called Porto Studios, which has since been taken over by other people, but the building is still there,” he recalls. “That’s the first day I met Steve, Bill, Tom, and Clancy. We were the ones in the first episode. It was amazing.”
A DAWNING REALIZATION
After crafting their little family of oddball under-the-sea adventurers, the cast settled into the life of making an animated TV series as the world fell in love with SpongeBob and his friends. It was around season three when Mr. Lawrence first
realized that the show was growing into something bigger than he originally could have imagined.
“I just remember standing on a corner when a car pulled up, and there was a SpongeBob air freshener hanging from the rearview mirror. I was just going past, and I thought, ‘Wow, people are responding to it.’
We were seeing it everywhere, but that moment mixed with the recognition becoming bigger, like everybody was paying more attention. When I would go to meetings, if I were trying to pitch something, it was different. It’s like the show had
Above: Initial sketch and illustration of some of Bikini Bottom’s colorful residents. Right: SpongeBob and pals celebrate Sandy’s birthday in season 10 episode “Feral Friends”—including Mr. Krabs’ daughter, Pearl, and buff crustacean Larry the Lobster.
arrived, but I hadn’t realized.”
The massive success of the show first started to dawn on Carolyn Lawrence when she saw merchandise popping up in her everyday life. “I have a distinct memory of being in Target, and there was merchandise, and I was standing behind a kid who was talking to his mom about buying something. And I had that moment
of like, ‘This is so weird. Like, should I explain to them? Do I say who I am? Would they even believe me? Do I even believe me?’ That was probably the most surreal of all those moments.”
For one of the cast members, the explosion of merchandise inspired their own impressive collection that’s about to become Guinness-certified. Rodger Bumpass, who brings Squidward to life, has an extensive collection inspired by the eclectic nature of the SpongeBob ephemera, which made the voice actors realize just how much of a smash they had on their hands.
“When I would go into a place like Target, what got my attention was that it wasn’t just in the toy section; it was in the bathroom section, it was in the kitchen section. It was in the auto supply, cards, and video sections. Every single department had representation of our stuff. So I said, ‘You know, I’m a collecting kind of obsessive guy, I think I’m gonna start doing this.’ And it outgrew my apartment at the time. Now it’s outgrown my house, and I’m submitting to Guinness as I genuinely believe that I have the largest collection.”
For Fagerbakke, the realization that they had created something
bigger than they ever expected came in a far more personal shape, taking place at the gates of the school where he picked up his daughters. “A sea of 20 seven- to nine-year-olds would just come running at me screaming, ‘Patrick! Patrick! Patrick!’” he laughs. “I was thinking, ‘What’s happening, what’s going on?’ That was really, really something. That was really great.”
He also recalls the moment he felt that SpongeBob had transcended
WE HAVE THE BEST FANS EVER.
— CAROLYN LAWRENCE
into the true mainstream. “There were a couple of key media moments that were significant,” Fagerbakke says. “The New Yorker, I think, wrote a full-page printed feature on our crazy little cartoon, and The Wall Street Journal, I think, also had this article on SpongeBob.”
Even then, Fagerbakke, the cast, and SpongeBob’s creator weren’t certain of any kind of longevity, let alone for two-plus decades. “It wasn’t until we got wind of them wanting to do a film that the show really kind of built into something that was going to be more than just a cartoon in production for three seasons. That very easily could have been. I think that was part of the momentum that carried us into season four, and then that first film was so delightful. That was really a reflection of Hillenberg’s vision of the show.”
The 2004 movie cemented the success of the series, and ended up
bringing current SpongeBob Executive Producer Vincent Waller back into the fold after an early exit. “Early in the series, I got hired on SpongeBob and I did about a season and a half before they fired me,” he laughs.
His return as a technical director for season four would be auspicious and mark the arrival of an important member of the SpongeBob family. Waller had begun his career as a caricature artist at Six Flags before moving to LA and getting work on iconic shows such as The Real Ghostbusters, Captain Planet, The Ren & Stimpy Show, Cow and Chicken, and many, many more. His brief stint on SpongeBob originally only lasted a year, but after his return in 2005, Waller never left—and he now steers the SpongeBob ship alongside Executive Producer Marc Ceccarelli, another creator who worked on SpongeBob for years before he finally joined the team full-time in 2010.
“It was a baptism by fire,” he shares. Together, the pair built up extensive credits on the series and found themselves in charge of not only the original series but also showrunning new additions such as Kamp Koral. How does it feel to have taken that decades-long journey and end up in charge of something that means so much to so many people?
“I mean, honestly, it is a dream come true. The crew we have is amazing. I mean, our schedule is insanely busy,” Waller says. “We’re both up at the crack of dawn and work well into the night. But it’s always fun doing it. My wife says all she ever hears coming out of the room when I’m working is laughter.”
“I just feel like I finally ended up where I belong,” Ceccarelli smiles.
“Writing stories and coming up with just funny, surreal gags was something I had always been doing, even when I wasn’t doing it to get paid. So to find this place where that’s what I’m doing and making money doing it, it’s just like Vincent
said, it’s a dream come true. I just feel like I’m finally home.”
THE POWERFUL IMPACT OF SPONGEBOB
Soon, the impact of SpongeBob had grown outside of the shelves of big box stores and movie screens and into people’s lives, as Brown recalls. “When it hit me that it was in the consciousness was when someone showed me a picture of a child’s headstone that had SpongeBob on it,” he says. “That got me. It still gets me. That’s deep. That’s when it went to the next level. Like, wow, this is something that’s special and super worthwhile if it can provide some kind of comfort and memory to that deeply tragic situation.”
Brown wasn’t the only one who saw the moving impact of SpongeBob in real life. As we speak to Mr. Lawrence, he sits in front of a portrait of Plankton painted by a young fan, and it has its own heartbreaking story attached to it. “That was done by a kid who had brain cancer who was in Make-A-Wish, and he did paintings of all the characters, and gave them to us,” he explains. “So he’s gone now, but, of course, I kept it here, and I see it every day, and there’s something in it that I can’t describe. Like, our show struck this kid enough that he was compelled to meet us and paint for us. So it’s very sad, but also sort of inspiring.”
The love SpongeBob SquarePants has inspired is something that the cast is deeply aware of, as Kenny explains. “It’s something that is in my consciousness every day, in a good way. Thanks to Steve, he hired us all, he gave us—the cast and crew—this gift, where we get to work on this thing that matters to people,” Kenny says. “And it’s mattered to people for a long time across generations, and that’s amazing.”
“Fans and kids make art, and that is always our favorite,” Brown shares.
“I have a wall full of it, too. Yeah, it’s just the best ever. I actually got some fan mail that I haven’t opened because the whole envelope is illustrated, and it’s brilliant. And I’m like, ‘This poor guy, he did such a beautiful job, and he’s totally screwed because I’m never going to open it.”
THE FUTURE OF SPONGEBOB
The world of SpongeBob has expanded in the last few years with the addition of the prequel series Kamp Koral: SpongeBob’s Under Years, the sketch show-inspired The Patrick Star Show, and the upcoming Saving Bikini Bottom: The
Sandy Cheeks Movie. For the man behind the titular character, the world expanding means one thing. “It’s another SpongeBob job!” Kenny says. “I’m just happy to still be this character in all these iterations; each one is a unique puzzle.”
With The Sandy Cheeks Movie on the horizon, Carolyn Lawrence has never been happier, seeing her colleagues as more than even close friends. “I always say we’ve become that crazy family,” she laughs. “All families have that relative you really, really like, and then you have that relative who kind of makes you crazy, that relative who really, really annoys you, whatever it is, but you love them all.”
That’s unique in show business
Opposite: Creator Stephen Hillenburg’s original sketches of SpongeBob SquarePants captured the character’s infinitely expressive potential, which has been realized in animation through the show’s 25 years (left), as well as several movies and spinoffs. Below: SpongeBob creates a friend out of bubbles when all his pals are busy in the season two episode, “Bubble Buddy.”
“Everybody’s very grounded, very humble about it. I think it’s just become a part of our everyday lives; I wonder what it feels like to be on the outside looking in.”
As for what excites her the most about the next era of SpongeBob, Spinelli is full of ideas. “I’m excited to continue to explore other characters and what we can do with them,” she says. “The ones that we don’t quite know so much about but who we’ve teased in the past, like Mr. Krabs, are such legendary figures; that’s a character I’m eager to see what we can do with.”
When it comes to the man who brings the owner of The Krusty Krab to life, he’s already satisfied. Well, for the most part. “Mr. Krabs has fulfilled every dream. He’s been a sword-fighting swashbuckler, he’s been a commander in a war movie,” Brown says. “He’s done all these characters that I would love to do.”
So what does Brown dream of for Krabs, then? “I just want to see him hand over a giant check and try to cash it or something. I’ll throw that out to the writers. That’s the dream scenario.”
and something she credits to SpongeBob creator Hillenburg. “I don’t know, I think a lot of casts truly don’t get along,” she says. “But we’re different. And I think that goes back to the magic of Steve and how he innately knew that we’d be good as humans together,
not just as actors.”
For Claudia Spinelli, SVP, TV Series Animation, Nickelodeon, being involved with a show that’s so massively successful and beloved still feels surprising. “All the people who work on the show, everybody’s very down to earth,” she says.
No matter how the SpongeBob universe shifts or grows, the heart of the character and the series’ humble roots are key to its longevity. That’s why people still love it as much as they do, Kenny tells us. “I think maybe that’s why SpongeBob has continued to survive and thrive even in the gigantic hole that Steve left in his absence,” he says. “It’s still an animated show—a cartoony cartoon that’s run by animators who know the bolts of animation through and through.”
The ensemble in Bikini Bottom continues to grow as real-life friendships are forged offscreen.
BY JAVIER REYES
The world of SpongeBob SquarePants—a pop culture behemoth that’s still going strong even after 25 years—isn’t just notable for its titular star or his best buddy, Patrick. It’s not just Sandy Cheeks and Mr. Eugene Krabs; a whole host of vibrant supporting characters liven up Bikini Bottom.
If you looked back, you’d never believe just how popular these characters would remain to this day, even though some have only appeared for an episode or two or just had a recurring bit in the margins. Anything from DoodleBob—a cartoon drawing of SpongeBob that gains sentience
and likes to shout “Me Hoy Minoy!” repeatedly—to a drill sergeant who throws school kids through a door for speaking unprompted, has had a lasting legacy. There’s even a character who’s celebrated for simply shouting, “MY LEG!”
“Fred, the ‘My Leg’ guy, started as a quick little joke in the background audio of the show,” says Mr. Lawrence, who is also the voice of Plankton and the head writer for SpongeBob. “It is crazy because it’s something that people ask me to yell all the time wherever I am, especially at the Comic-Con stuff and other personal appearance stuff we do. They just want me to scream it. That’s all they
need, and they’ll be all, ‘Yep, that’s enough, dude. I got it.’”
SpongeBob SquarePants thrives as not just a vehicle for the Spongy lad but for an entire universe of indelible characters and moments.
“It’s sort of like being in a Broadway play where you get to play a character for 25 years, and you’re always playing that guy, and they keep writing new things for this play,” Lawrence says. “It’s sort of like a play that never ends.”
Fascinatingly, the play’s popularity isn’t just about the main cast. While SpongeBob, Patrick, Squidward, and
LARRY THE LOBSTER
BUBBLE BASS
Sandy are big draws, the show has also created niche avenues for the bit players to shine.
The voice cast of the show—many of whom have been with it since the very early days—may have some ideas on why that is. Dee Bradley Baker, who provides the vocals for several background characters, including Bubble Bass and Squilliam Fancyson, points out that animation gives you an “unlimited latitude with how to take the story and how to portray it.”
“With SpongeBob, the writing is very important, but a lot of that writing is visual writing… It’s a visual composition of what’s playing and ideas and references that make a joke that don’t necessarily have a verbal aspect to them whatsoever,” Baker explains. “It’s purely visceral; it’s purely emotional; it’s not confined to the physical world.”
The zaniness of cartoons has been chronicled many times, but there’s still often a cornucopia of interesting ideas lying beneath the surface. You can’t make the same condescending mistake—whether intentionally or not—that has often been made about animated shows and movies.
“It plays to the cheap seats, and it’s unique because of that,” says Baker. “At first glance, it may seem simplistic or blunt or silly, but if you look at it, it’s very sophisticated and plays to a lot of different age levels and is also very free and very brave,” says Baker.
KAREN
PEARL
SpongeBob has plenty of variety to be found within its many escapades over the years, with everything from Squidward’s brief soiree with a town of folks that live exactly like him to the gang learning about life insurance. It drags you in with some story of SpongeBob and Patrick going out jellyfishing and then, all of a sudden, becomes a commentary on friendship and what makes people happy.
All of this culminates in fullyfledged characters who are about as recognizable as any others in entertainment. Why? Because they are relatable.
“I feel like SpongeBob is kind of this microcosm; we all know the characters in real life,” says Jill Talley, the voice of Karen, Plankton’s computer personal assistant and wife. “I don’t know one person who watches the show that doesn’t do that thing where you go, ‘Oh my god, so-and-so is such a Squidward’ or ‘You’re so Mr. Krabs.’ There are people in all of our lives who mirror those characters.”
With so many characters—the main ensemble, the supporting, celebrity guest appearances (for example, a fish fellow named “Don Grouper” played by Jon Hamm), and the tiniest splashes like “Hoopla!”—the series has the
ability to capture every type of person. And few do it better and more expansively than the incredibly bizarre, wholesome, and flat-out hilarious coterie of sea-dwellers from Bikini Bottom. The sheer number of characters created shocks the cast, too—like Lori Alan, the voice of Mr. Krabs’ affable daughter Pearl, when the show had the late Betty White for the episode, “Mall Girl Pearl.”
“What an honor. I wasn’t even in the same room with her, but just to know that I had two degrees of separation… is a pinch me again moment,” says Alan. “Pearl got an episode at the mall working at the Old Lady’s store, and then what’s so sweet is that Betty White’s character (Beatrice) sort of shoos her off into the real world.”
That level of world-building, where everyone has that one character they like or even one particular scene they always remember for some reason, doesn’t come easy. You need the talent, yes, but you also need the talent to have freedom. “You don’t have corporate people or people who are trying to make something that’s a replication of something that’s a
I DON’T KNOW ONE PERSON WHO WATCHES THE SHOW THAT DOESN’T DO THAT THING WHERE YOU GO, ‘OH MY GOD, SO-AND-SO IS SUCH A SQUIDWARD’ OR ‘YOU’RE SO MR. KRABS.’ THERE ARE PEOPLE IN OUR LIVES WHO MIRROR THOSE CHARACTERS.
— JILL TALLEY
MRS. PUFF
replication of something else,” Baker says. “And now, even more so with the dawning of AI is that, with SpongeBob, you have human beings who are telling very human stories, and they’ve allowed the creative wackjobs to be running the boat.”
You can’t nail down the success of SpongeBob to just any one thing, but if there is an element that the cast has in common, it’s chemistry. They each light up like a Christmas tree when asked about their castmates. You can sense the genuine support they’ve had for each other over such a long stretch of time. They share all the memes, have gone to all the reunions, and they have created a genuine family outside of the soundbooth. Much of which originates from, and can be attributed to, the late Stephen Hillenburg, the man who created SpongeBob
“I mean, the secret sauce is Steve; he was the guy, the only guy in the kitchen, and made the secret sauce before he showed it to anybody,” SpongeBob actor Tom Kenny says.
But even more than the literal makings of the show, Hillenburg helped foster a lovingly creative and accepting environment—one that wasn’t like the other jobs out there. Mary Jo Catlett, who voices Mrs. Puff, says she’s had work before where some sort of prima donna would take her best lines for their character instead. Such a thing doesn’t happen with SpongeBob, and Kenny helps to carry on the legacy by encouraging a collaborative, all-encompassing community on the show.
“I was getting on a plane, and I was behind this little girl and asked her for something, then said thank you,” says Catlett. “And her eyes went really wide, and she said, ‘Are you Mrs. Puff?’ It was great. It’s wonderful to be recognized, and when people say, ‘I knew when I heard that voice. I knew. I knew I had heard that voice before…’ It makes me feel very good.”
From all walks of life, SpongeBob seems to be universal. You’ll find many fine people, both young and old, continue to make references to a specific gag or moment. But while fans have a strong relationship with the show, the main cast experiences it in their own way, too: a space to
commune with one another. “We check on each other. We’ve been through a lot,” says Alan, who gets noticeably excited after being asked about the cast while gleefully showing off her Patrick Star lamp as an aside. “We’ve been through kids growing up and parents passing and other big career accomplishments.”
Their knowledge and history together don’t just make the show better but specifically make doing the show better, too. “Sometimes, if you feel like you’re not bringing it or you’re messing up a line, you can get nervous, but you’re in front of friends, and you know you are. So that’s a big help,” says Talley.
Creating and maintaining the world of SpongeBob SquarePants—or any other artistic endeavor, especially of this scale—is never easy. But for the many hard-working people behind it, from the cast to Nickelodeon and beyond, it never got better than when they could work together
“I think that we are more about trying to make people laugh, and hopefully that came through,” says Mr. Lawrence.
After 25 years and counting, some might say it did. It absolutely did.
FRED
B I K I N I B O T T O M T H E
WAV E S S O U N D S
T I L L M A K E
How the music of SpongeBob SquarePants helped create a pop culture phenomenon.
BY TONY SOKOL
For the musical staff at SpongeBob SquarePants, every morning begins with the potential to bring “The Best Day Ever.” That song was co-written by Andy Paley and the voice of SpongeBob, Tom Kenny. It debuted in the credits of the 2004 feature film, The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, and captures the anticipatory joy of riding the Bikini Bottom wave.
“That is SpongeBob’s philosophy of life,” Kenny tells Den of Geek. “He jumps out of bed singing, ‘This is gonna be the best day ever.’ Sometimes it’s not. But he goes to bed and believes tomorrow is gonna be.”
The sentiment still reverberates because the songwriters craft lasting tunes. The sounds and music of the
beloved animated series have broadened its appeal and prolonged its impact. As Paley explains, “We aim for two things: songs that can be enjoyed outside SpongeBob, and records that, if you’re in a car with your kids for eight hours, wouldn’t drive you crazy. Songs get short shrift on kids’ cartoons. We were like, ‘let’s write great songs.’”
Like the secret ingredient that makes Krabby Patties so delicious, the songs of SpongeBob contain a special spice: the Bikini Bottom denizens. “These songs are about characters,” Kenny says. “[Creator]
Steve Hillenburg did the hard work of making those personalities. The characters are so strong they almost write themselves.”
Hillenburg was pleasantly surprised. “Originally, Steve didn’t envision the show having as much music,” music director Nicolas Carr says. “He wanted effects to punch the humor, but music lifted the show to another level.”
Geography influences musical identity, and if the location is a pineapple under the sea, local rhythms run deep. “Hillenburg knew that music would be as important as those flowers in the background,” Kenny recalls. “He said, ‘You know those old Betty Boop cartoons, those crazy Hawaiian records? I wish somebody still played like that.’”
SpongeBob’s musical team had deep roots in a number of genres. “Bikini Bottom is somewhere in Polynesia,” Carr explains. “So, there was always
Right: Music is integral to SpongeBob SquarePants, with many of Bikini Bottom’s residents picking up an instrument over the years—from SpongeBob’s ukulele to Squidward’s beloved clarinet. In THE iconic season two episode “Band Geeks,” the characters form a band that features Mr. Krabs on keytar, Patrick on drums, and Sandy on electric guitar.
this Tiki motif. I gathered a trio, and we created our own version of wacky Hawaiian Tiki music. The guys I work with do a lot of Western swing, so the steel guitar became central to our sound.”
The pilot’s first musical interlude brought an essential component. Hillenburg was a big fan of ukulele music. “[SpongeBob composer] Sage Guyton plays a lot of it,” Paley says. But the first time ukulele is heard on SpongeBob, it is strummed by an icon.
“Steve thought that Tiny Tim’s ‘Living in the Sunlight’ encapsulated this character’s personality: living in sunshine, having a wonderful time,” Kenny explains. “Tiny Tim was a total oddball in the world, the way SpongeBob is.”
The comparison came at a price. “It cost a lot of money to license that song,” Carr says. “When I saw that, I thought, ‘I got to work on this show.’”
sonic blank slate. The colorful imagery informs the music, which then in turn complements the action again. Through it all, the humor begins to take on new life.
The comedy comes from the unexpected as much as the familiar. Carr proudly boasts that he’s a “B-movie horror buff,” who “loves old corny soundtracks.” The team uses the APM and the Paramount music libraries. Only about 30 percent comes from his original music library.
SpongeBob’s incidental music is just as distinctive as the songs. It only takes a few notes to know exactly what is happening with a taste of what’s to come. “Nick will weave together six tracks, and you won’t hear one change,” executive producer Vincent Waller says. “He’s a genius at making it not feel abrupt, even though moods change quickly.”
Carr, a veteran composer for shows such as Adventure Time, Camp Lazlo, and Rocko’s Modern Life, considers each episode of SpongeBob SquarePants a
Carr splices these disparate sonics into a unified sound that is unique, yet still emotionally recognizable. “When we do Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy episodes, I harken back to the ’60s Batman TV show,” Carr says. “I add my own guys to put our spin on it. Then we find the right moment to cut it into the show.”
Some background music is neither melodic nor regulated by time signatures or keys, but by mood. “On occasion, when I see a scene, I’ll know I need an undulating vibraphone, with tremolo and echo,” Carr says. “I often throw in a little theremin, like the old sci-fi movies used to have.”
Carr does not chase after perfection because barnacles add character. “I look for mistakes,” he says. “I like first takes—that’s the most honest performance. I’m a drummer, I play guitar, I can build it all up.”
Soon, noteworthy musicians came running to guest on the show. James Burton, Elvis Presley’s longtime guitarist, contributed to a handful of songs as did Flaco Jiménez, considered the most famous Mexican accordion player of all time. Paley, a longtime writing partner with the leader of The Beach Boys, even remembers bringing another legendary figure into the fold:
DAVID BOWIE AND HIS KIDS LIKED THE SHOW. HE VOLUNTEERED TO DO IT. HE DIDN’T REQUIRE ANYTHING OTHER THAN, ‘SEND ME THE SCRIPT.’
— VINCENT WALLER
SpongeBob makes wonderful music as Squidward’s clarinet in season one’s “Sleepy Time.”
“We had Brian Wilson on two different recordings, and one of our tracks is the last thing Tommy Ramone of The Ramones ever played drums on.”
Not only players but singers from every genre wanted to jam with the SpongeBob crew. “Hillenburg was reaching out to musicians from the beginning,” Waller says. “Musicians who loved SpongeBob were reaching out to him. He definitely grabbed those reins and ran with them.”
Director and Spinal Tap guitarist Christopher Guest, Gene Simmons of KISS, The Cramps’ Lux Interior, The Spice Girls’ Victoria Beckham, and the metal band Pantera all booked Bikini Bottom studio time. “David Bowie and his kids liked the show,” Waller remembers. “He volunteered to do it. He didn’t require anything other than, ‘Send me the script.’”
The artists only have to bring their voices. “Most guests haven’t written the music,” executive producer Marc Ceccarelli says. “It’s either [composer] Ego Plum or Nick.” Guest vocals go through the SpongeBob process. “The episode’s writer does the lyrics and teams with a composer,” says Carr. “Showtune songs go to Eben Schletter. A mock-up with a rough vocal guides the artist, who sings to the demo. When it’s being animated, we refine the track.”
Even the theme song, “SpongeBob SquarePants,” is universally recognized as iconic. All across the world, the phrase, “Who lives in a pineapple under the sea?” engenders the correct response.
“It’s definitely iconic,” Paley confirms. “You can ask, ‘Who lives in a pineapple under the sea?’ and people know the answer.” The song often shows up in the least expected places, too. “I was watching a special on hardcore prisons,” Carr tells us, “and one place had inmates march to the SpongeBob song like a Marine chant.”
That’s more than a crossover hit. It proves the Bikini Bottom sound is a pop-culture phenomenon.
SpongeBob makes a clarinet out of a bubble gum wrapper in season one’s “The Paper.”
Patrick’s “Is mayonnaise an instrument?” line from “Band Geeks” became a meme.
SpongeBob belts out “Sweet Victory” in one of the show’s memorable musical numbers.
SpongeBob voice stars Rodger Bumpass
and Bill Fagerbakke firmly grasp their legacy as internet meme icons.
BY ERIC FRANCISCO
Of all the colorful characters who inhabit Bikini Bottom, outside of SpongeBob, Patrick Star and Squidward may be the two who have inspired the most memes. Their human voice actors, Bill Fagerbakke and Rodger Bumpass, respectively, know all too well about their show’s prominence on social media and TikTok. Just don’t ask them what memes even are.
“You lost me when you said the word ‘meme,’” jokes Bumpass, who voices the cynic Squidward, in a Zoom interview with Den of Geek. “I really don’t have a great definition of what a meme is. The phrase ‘bumper sticker’ comes to mind.”
“It’s an interesting thing to ponder,” adds Fagerbakke, the voice of SpongeBob’s best friend and lovable oaf, Patrick Star. Fagerbakke is even less plugged-in than Bumpass, who at least
has a verified Instagram account. Fagerbakke believes any memetic success is owed to the show’s late creator, Stephen Hillenburg. “It all starts with Stephen and who he was as a human being. He was a really gentle, lovely, ferociously creative soul. It all starts there.”
SpongeBob SquarePants premiered on Nickelodeon on July 17, 1999. In the 25 years since, the show has become more than an evergreen pop culture phenomenon. On the internet, the outlandish adventures of an impossibly optimistic sea sponge (voiced by Tom Kenny) and his friends—or barely tolerant coworkers, in the case of Squidward—have inspired too many memes to count. There’s Mocking SpongeBob, there’s Primitive SpongeBob, there’s Savage Patrick, there’s Blurry Mr. Krabs, there’s Unsure Squidward, there’s It’s Not My Wallet, there’s I’mma Head
ALL THE THUMBS UP
SURPRISED PATRICK AND SPONGEBOB
SUSPICIOUS SQUIDWARD
Out, there’s Imagination—it’s all barely scratching the epipelagic zone.
But how and why is SpongeBob SquarePants a meme generator? How is this show so flexible and adaptable it encompasses the hopes, dreams, fears, and woes of multiple generations?
There are a few obvious answers that may explain why. For one thing, SpongeBob SquarePants arrived in time to appeal to millennials and the first crop of Gen Z, all of whom grew into adults with knowledge of Photoshop and media editing software. Upon maturing and moving into virtual spaces, these generations shared a common reference point in the show’s unforgettable brand of madcap humor.
As Mashable writer Chloe Bryan observed in a 2018 piece about the memes: “Aside from its ubiquity, the show is just relatable. Its cast of characters is not only huge but
dark. Steve Martin said, ‘This will pass. I’m gonna go this other way.’ He positioned himself just right for people to come out of this genre of darkness and go back to silliness. I think that’s what SpongeBob has done.”
Citing a debt to Looney Tunes, Bumpass feels SpongeBob’s safety in nonsense made it a hit with its young audience—and kept them referring to it into adulthood. “It’s simply fun, and that’s what you should want in entertainment. You just want fun.”
Fagerbakke again believes the show’s power rests in Hillenburg’s vision. The word that the creator used to explain the show on the actors’ first day of recording was “innocence.” And while SpongeBob memes can get cynical and dark, the show proves to be a reliable reference precisely because it’s a potent reminder of an innocent time.
BIKINI BOTTOM IS A PLACE WHERE A LOT OF GENERATIONS REALIZE THEY FEEL COMFORTABLE AND SAFE…. SOMETHING AUTHENTIC IN THE MATERIAL LENDS ITSELF WELL TO MEMES.
— BILL FAGERBAKKE
varied in personality, which means every human quirk imaginable (SpongeBob’s disarming earnestness, Squidward’s angsty cynicism) has its moment in the sun.”
Bumpass and Fagerbakke aren’t really online, at least to the degree their peers and audiences are. So they admit to, ahem, not firmly grasping it all. Still, they have their own theories. Bumpass suggests SpongeBob zigged where other cartoons of its time zagged, like Futurama and King of the Hill (“Which are wonderful themselves”). The actor owns a vast collection of memorabilia that is all visible on Zoom; during his interview, he shows off a three-dimensional figurine of the universally relatable meme Squidward Looking Outside His Window. He uses comedy history to make a point. “I go back to Steve Martin,” he explains. “In the ’60s, humor was dark. Very political, very
“I think it’s a kind of safe space,” Fagerbakke says. “Bikini Bottom is a place where a lot of generations realize they feel comfortable and safe. Now, is it the performance of Tom Kenny? Is it a weird psychological phenomenon due to the colors and shapes? I don’t know for sure. But there is something. Maybe it’s the vivid nature of the characters. Something authentic in the material lends itself well to memes and resonates because of the characters.”
While the SpongeBob actors aren’t meme-savvy, they can still name their favorites. Fagerbakke owns a t-shirt of Shocked Patrick, with Patrick sitting atop a sloth in outer space. “I don’t even know what episode it’s from. But I love the way that’s been plugged into things,” he says.
For Bumpass, he encounters “Future Squidward” with strange regularity, while “Handsome Squidward” is his most popular autograph at conventions.
SAVAGE PATRICK
I’MMA HEAD OUT SMIRKING
“People will come across the floor when they see I have that to offer. It’s a tremendous thing. People love it.”
His personal favorite, however, is Unsure Squidward. “We have a legacy thing from Ren & Stimpy called the ‘gross-up’: when someone says something and they cut to a still frame, very detailed and usually gross. I have it on eight-by-tens I sell at comic cons. When people come to my table, they pick that up and say, ‘That’s me in the morning.’ There’s a relationship to that moment, a connection. That’s a nonverbal meme.”
Easily, the most popular meme must be Squidward Looking Outside His Window. Bumpass offers this nugget of wisdom into its universality. “When we observe and don’t participate, there’s a break in our reality,” he says. “Squidward’s life is being left out. He hasn’t achieved any sort of success. He has to fall short. That is essential to his character. He has frustration and tries to compensate by being superior to others. Sarcasm is his shield.”
Both Bumpass and Fagerbakke are surprised by how far SpongeBob SquarePants has come. They each felt differently about the show’s prospects in the beginning. Take Fagerbakke, who was not amused at first. “When I first saw the pilot on the page, I didn’t understand it,” he admits. “I thought it was preschool drivel. It wasn’t until I saw the pilot that my brain exploded. I realized what a wonderful cartoon I’d been a part of. Then, I understood the nature of the characters, the visual nature of the humor. From that point, I finally understood it.”
Bumpass barely remembers his audition for the show. “It was just another audition back then,” he recalls. “You read your copy, you go home, and forget about it. I got a copy of the pilot, took it home to my family, and played it for them, and they all fell asleep.” It wasn’t until a few years later, walking into Target, where Bumpass saw SpongeBob in every aisle, that he felt there were lasting sea legs. “My wish is that we last just a little bit longer than the pyramids,” he quips.
There’s no better barometer for cultural relevance than the Super
Bowl. More than once, SpongeBob has been used to bridge the worlds of professional football and cartoons.
In 2019, shortly after Hillenburg’s passing, fans petitioned for “Sweet Victory” to be performed at halftime during Super Bowl LIII. The “Eye of the Tiger”-esque anthem originates in the episode “Band Geeks,” where Squidward enjoys a rare moment of triumph as the conductor during a football game. Bumpass isn’t sure what was meant to happen, but he was
fan of pro football, was basically “Shocked Patrick” IRL.
“I’m still coming to grips with what happened,” Fagerbakke says. He had already performed commentary over a different game a season prior when Nickelodeon aired a match-up between the Rams (Fagerbakke’s favorite team) and the Broncos. But the Super Bowl broadcast was a different matter entirely, “not the least of which
THE DYNAMIC I COME BACK TO IS: FUNNY IS FUNNY. IT JUST WORKS. — RODGER BUMPASS
aware of vague discussions for that year’s act, Maroon 5, to perform the song. “That was the proposal, I think,” he says. “Time is precious in a Super Bowl halftime show, so they decided they’d rather do their own pieces.”
Five years later, Super Bowl LVIII was broadcast on Paramount-owned CBS, allowing stronger synergy and for SpongeBob SquarePants and Patrick Star to get into the game. On Nickelodeon, Kenny and Fagerbakke conducted color commentary in character. Fagerbakke, who’s a lifelong
being constantly in the action.”
“It was exhausting,” Fagerbakke says. “It was an overtime game. To play a character within that context for four hours was nuts. I just didn’t want to blow it.”
Fans who watched the game on Nickelodeon were impressed by the actors’ performance, maybe even more than the performance of the athletes. Fagerbakke’s preparation included making notes, allowing him to deploy iconic lines at any moment. “Both games, I prepared, and was looking for
opportunities. It was funny: Tom couldn’t care less about football, whereas I was so jazzed to be there. Nonetheless, we balanced out because it didn’t matter if we knew football. It was more about having fun.”
There isn’t one clear answer as to why SpongeBob SquarePants has had such a seismic influence over the internet’s collective sense of humor. A confluence of the show’s vibrant creativity, the passion of its artists and actors, and an audience all too eager to have a laugh all contribute to the show’s rare place in the cultural canon.
“It’s that triumvirate of writing, animation, and characterization by the performance,” says Bumpass. “We are in 180 markets, over 30s languages. We, as actors, don’t do [all] the voices. That suggests and demands conclusion; there’s something other than the performances that makes this show popular in a universal way. There’s some dynamic in there, and the dynamic I come back to is: funny is funny. I think it’s just one of those intangibles. It just works.”
Fagerbakke still thinks everything goes back to Hillenburg and how he oversaw a roster of “incredibly talented people.” He adds: “I’m sure there have been meetings at studios like, ‘How do we get a SpongeBob?’ Find a Hillenburg and let them create.”
