Tom Kenny's voice is now world famous after more than 20 years of playing Nickelodeon's longest-running cartoon, SpongeBob SquarePants. But Kenny has a career that goes far beyond Nickelodeon.
Kenny has starred in raunchy avante garde comedy sketch shows with Bob Odenkirk, voice acted on everything from adult cartoons to several kids' classics (besides SpongeBob), and appeared in a handful of sitcoms and movies. Thanks to SpongeBob, Kenny has a net worth of $16 million, but how did he get such a lucrative, and iconic gig?
9 He Acted In A Low Key Rom Com In 1989
Kenny began as a stand-up comic and is a lifelong friend of Bobcat Goldthwait, a popular comedian who is now a director. The pair dabbled in comedy together during the earliest days of their show business careers, with Goldthwait continuing in the field whereas Kenny focused more on acting. Eventually, Kenny got his first break when he landed a role in the 1989 rom-com How I Got Into College. The film flopped at the box office but Kenny's career endured.
8 He Hosted Friday Night Videos
Kenny eventually broke into voice acting in 1993, but he still had a handful of live-action roles in television and film both before and during this time. In 1991, he played Binky in Bobcat Goldthwait's raunchy comedy Shakes The Clown, which Goldthwait both starred in and directed. For television, Kenny did a handful of TV films and sitcoms, but most notable was his job as the host of Friday Night Videos, which was NBC's answer to MTV. Kenny hosted the show from 1990 to 1995, but again, he was still voice acting. One look at his filmography and it would seem that when Kenny is doing one gig he is always working on something else at the same time.
7 He Was In A Popular Gen X Sketch Comedy Show
Kenny did many TV shows in the 1990s but hardcore fans of his probably remember him the best as a cast member of the HBO sketch comedy series Mr. Show. Mr. Show starred Bob Odenkirk and David Cross and featured them and a cast of their fellow Gen X-ers as they lampoon everything from social issues to politics of the 1990s. As many already know, Bob Odenkirk went on to become an icon as Saul Goodman in the Breaking Bad universe, and David Cross became a comedy icon as Tobias Fünke in Arrested Development.
6 He Did Nickelodeon Cartoons Years Before SpongeBob
While he was doing all of these live-action roles, Kenny was already growing his now highly extensive voice acting resume. SpongeBob might be his most famous voice-acting role, but it is not his breakthrough role, as they say in Hollywood. Years before SpongeBob, Kenny played Heifer Wolfe in Rocko's Modern Life, another iconic Nickelodeon show.
5 He Was Also On Several Cartoon Network Classics
Both during and after his time on Rockos Modern Life, Kenny was loaning his voice to a laundry list of shows on Nickelodeon's competing network, Cartoon Network. There, Kenny did a variety of voices for shows like Dexter's Lab, Cow And Chicken, and I Am Weasel. Also, he voiced both the Mayor and the Narrator on The Powerpuff Girls and he was Carl (the nerdy neighbor) on Johnny Bravo. Years after SpongeBob made him famous, he would return to Cartoon Network to play The Ice King in Adventure Time.
4 He Was On Several Adult Cartoon Shows
Kenny's roles range from the family-friendly to the raunchy. Mr. Show and Shakes The Clown are far from the family-friendly end of his spectrum. But those are also both live-action roles, if one wants to know what adult cartoons Kenny has been a part of, look no further. Kenny was the voice of Ratbert in the short-lived Dilbert show. He was also in Futurama and in an episode of Dr. Katz Professional Therapist.
3 He Does Video Games Too
Those old enough to remember the earliest versions of Playstation (the ones that had no internet connection) remember the earliest of their games. One of the most popular was Spyro The Dragon a small purple dragon who was tasked with saving his elders. Guess who was the voice of the plucky purple fire breather...
2 He Joined SpongeBob In 1999
The rest of the story tells itself from here. Kenny landed the role of SpongeBob and the show debuted in 1999, and ever since then it has been a powerhouse institution for Nickelodeon and a huge moneymaker for their parent company, Viacom. The show was estimated to be worth $8 billion of Viacom's total revenue in 2009, making it a key asset to the company. Kenny's voice is used for practically every SpongeBob-related product, be it toys, video games, promotional materials, and more. Not only that, Kenny continued his extensive voice acting career and has been in several movies and TV shows ever since. As of 2022, he has over 500 credits on IMDb.
1 His Career Today
Here are just a few of those 500 credits; he was the voice of Rabbit in 2011's Winnie The Pooh, the operator in The Animatrix, Scoutmaster Lumpus on Camp Lazlo, Cupid on The Fairly Oddparents, Greedo in Star Wars: The Clone Wars, and various voices for Rick and Morty, Scooby Doo, The Tom and Jerry Show, and Bojack Horseman. Feature films include 3 Transformers movies, Ant-Man, and, of course, the two SpongeBob SquarePants feature films.