From the mind of Jerry Seinfeld comes Dreamworks’ new animated film, Bee Movie, starring Seinfeld himself and Renee Zellweger. The film follows the life of Barry B. Benson (Seinfeld), a recent college graduate bee who yearns bigger and better things than making honey for the major corporation in his city. When offered the chance to fly outside the bee world, Barry enthusiastically accepts. After exploring the world of humans, Barry meets Vanessa (Zellweger) and breaks the rules of his bee society by talking to her. Soon, Barry discovers that anyone can purchase honey at any grocery store, and thus begins his primary of goal of stopping this injustice by suing the humans for stealing from the bees. I was fortunate enough to participate in an interview with Seinfeld to discuss Bee Movie, as well as his transition from his popular show to the big screen.
When asked about the target audience for the movie and how it related to his television show Seinfeld responded, “One of the things I’m most excited about and how this all kind of came together in the end is there doesn’t seem to be any specific target audience for it. We’ve played it for little kids and we’ve played it for adults and college aged students, and everybody seems to find it funny. So I’m very happy that I feel like this movie is really a very good companion to the type of humor that we did in Seinfeld, in that it’s like – if you like comedy, you’ll be able to relate to it. And it won’t seem like it’s for kids or for some other group of people.”
When asked about the transition from television to a computer animated cartoon, Seinfeld responded, “It wasn’t a transition for me in terms of comedy, but it was more learning the technology and how that works and learning to speak the language of animation — and, you know, having people explain to you how these movies are made. As far as the comedy, that wasn’t an adjustment for me. I do the same kind of ideas and writing that I did for the TV show or in my standup. I think the movie has the same kind of tone.”
Finally, after countless questions about the movie, I asked Seinfeld about his time at the Oscars, and if he had stirred up any controversy when he made jokes poking fun at the monetary expense of going to the theater. “I don’t know. Maybe I did, but nobody said anything to me about it. I think the biggest problem I had was people were wanting me to host the show the next year, which I really don’t want to do because it seems like a very painful experience.”
Seinfeld’s Bee Movie will hit theaters November 2.