Tom Kenny’s Net Worth, Biography, Stats, etc. Net Worth: EST $16 Million
Tom Kenny, the voice of SpongeBob SquarePants on the popular Nickelodeon show, is an American actor, comedian, singer, and voice actor.
Tom Kenny illustrated biography
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1. Introduction
Thomas James Kenny was an American comedian and actor born July 13, 1962. He has been the voice of SpongeBob SquarePants’s main character in related media since 1999.
He has played numerous characters on screen and become the voice of many legendary characters that have impacted children’s lives.
Mr Show and The Edge are two of his live-action comedy-variety programs. Two Daytime Emmy Awards and two Annie Awards for his voice work as SpongeBob SquarePants and the Ice King are among Kenny’s many honors.
2. Tom Kenny’s Early Life
On July 13, 1962, Thomas James Kenny was born and raised in Syracuse, New York. Theresa (née Donigan) and Paul Kenny were his parents.
He grew up in the late 1960s and early 1970s and enjoyed painting and record album collecting. In first grade, Kenny met Bobcat Goldthwait, with whom he would become lifelong friends.
In their mid-teens, they noticed an advertisement for an open-mic night in Skaneateles, where “Bear Cat,” comic Barry Crimmins, would perform.
He and Goldthwait attended the function and gave tributes to Crimmins under the names Tomcat and Bobcat, respectively. Goldthwait then adopted Bobcat as his stage name.
Goldthwait explained Kenny’s stand-up performances: “Tom would get up there and talk about his therapist, and he didn’t even have a therapist; he just loved Woody Allen.”
Kenny attended Catholic Bishop Grimes Junior/Senior High School. After graduating from college, he spent around eight years touring the nation doing stand-up comedy before moving on to other settings.
3. Tom Kenny’s Rise to Success and Career
After making his screen debut in How I Got into College (1989), Kenny went on to perform in several TV series and movies, including Shakes the Clown (1991) and Comic Book: The Movie (2004).
In the early 1990s, he hosted Friday Night Videos’ “Music News” segments on television. He played regular cast members in the sketch comedy series The Edge, which ran on Fox from 1992 to 1993, and Mr. Show, which ran on HBO from 1995 to 1998.
His live-action roles include Patchy the Pirate in SpongeBob SquarePants parts and Uncle Howee, a hyperactive kids’ show presenter with unusual abilities, in R. L. Stine’s The Haunting Hour: The Series episode “Uncle Howee” from season four.
Voice Acting
According to Kenny, he does the voices of “a lot of sweet yellow characters for some reason.”
He said, “Think a Stan Laurel, Jerry Lewis kind of child-man,” describing SpongeBob’s voice as somewhere between that of a child and an adult. Not precisely a Munchkin, more like a youngster, but not in the voice of a Charlie Brown character from television.”
At a casting call in Los Angeles, California, Joe Murray tried out Kenny for voice acting parts in Rocko’s Modern Life. The producers once asked Kenny to stand in for Charlie Adler while he wasn’t there. On Nickelodeon’s The Fairly OddParents, he provides the voice of Cupid.
Joe Murray believed that Kenny “brings so much” and “adds writing to his roles” after viewing his earlier work for Rocko’s Modern Life. As a result, Murray cast Kenny in many roles on another of his projects, Camp Lazlo, including Scoutmaster Lumpus and Slinkman.
In CatDog, he provided the voices of Cliff and Dog.
He provides the voices of several characters in The Powerpuff Girls, such as Rainbow the Clown, Snake and Little Arturo from the Gangreen Gang, Mitch Mitchelson, the Mayor, and the Narrator.
He provided the voices of several characters, including Eduardo in Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends; Dr. Two-Brains in WordGirl, a PBS Kids program; and the antagonists Knightbrace, Mr. Wink, and the Common Cold in Codename: Kids Next Door.
In the 2004 television series The Batman, Kenny plays the Penguin.
He provided the voice of Rick and Morty’s Squanchy.
In the animated television series Transformers, he has many roles. Among the characters he does voice acting for in this series are Waspinator, Isaac Sumdac, Starscream, and his clones.
In addition, Kenny provided voices for several characters in the animated series Xiaolin Showdown and the Autobots Wheelie and Skids in the live-action Transformers movie series. On Dilbert, Kenny voiced Ratbert, Asok, Dilbert’s shower, and a few other little characters.
In the animated children’s program Super Robot Monkey Team HyperForce GO!, he portrayed Mr. Hal Gibson.
In 2009, Kenny joined the cast as a regular voice actor in the Fox comedy series Sit Down, Shut Up.
He plays the dual roles of Happy’s interpreter and the mysterious caretaker, Muhammad Sabeeh `Happy ” Fa-ach Nuabar, who is preparing for a terrorist strike. The series first aired on April 19, 2009.
The other key cast members include Will Forte, Nick Kroll, Cheri Oteri, Henry Winkler, Will Arnett, Jason Bateman, Kristin Chenoweth, Kenan Thompson, and Will Arnett.
In Adventure Time, he portrays the Magic Man and the Ice King. 2011 saw Kenny replace Ken Sansom in the Winnie the Pooh role of Rabbit. Kenny played Woody Johnson on Comedy Central’s Brickleberry from 2012 to 2014.
He provided the voices of several characters in the following Cartoon Network shows: Miles from Tomorrowland’s Leo Callisto, Daddo in Henry Hugglemonster, Dr. Otto Octavius
on The Ultimate Spider-Man and Mixels’ Sumo.
Additionally, he has voiced characters in TV commercials for Experian (talking modem alongside DC Douglas), Best Buy (as an elf for a Christmas spot), and Talking Hank in the Talking Tom and Friends YouTube web series.
Kenny is most recognized for lending his voice to Spyro the Dragon in video games, taking over for the late Carlos Alazraqui.
He provided Spyro’s voice for the first time in Spyro 2: Ripto’s Rage! and did it again in Spyro: A Hero’s Tail before Jess Harnell took over. In Spyro: Year of the Dragon, he provided the voice of Sgt. James Byrd is another character from the series.
In the Spyro Reignited Trilogy, a compilation of contemporary retellings of the original Spyro trilogy, he played both of his roles again. In addition, he provided the live voice of Crash Bandicoot at E3 1997, taking turns with Carlos Alazraqui.
Legnahcra, the maître d’ of Virtuous Harmony, and Kenny appeared as guest stars on HarmonQuest.
Moreover, he provided the voice of Fethry Duck in the 2017 DuckTales film. In 2022, he also voiced Benito Mussolini and other characters in Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio.
In the Adventure Time: Fionna and Cake spinoff series from 2023, Kenny played Ice King once more.
SpongeBob SquarePants
Kenny met marine researcher and animator Stephen Hillenburg while working on the animated series Rocko’s Modern Life.
Building on his experience in marine research, Hillenburg started formulating his idea for an ocean-themed television series following the 1996 termination of Rocko’s Modern Life.
Hillenburg stated that he chose the sea sponge to inspire the program “because it’s a funny animal, a strange one.” In 1997, Hillenburg asked Kenny to play this role.
The SpongeBob SquarePants television series debuted on Nickelodeon on May 1, 1999. It got profitable very quickly.
In addition, Kenny provides the voices of Gary the Snail, SpongeBob’s father (Harold SquarePants), the French Narrator (a spoof of Jacques Cousteau), and the live-action character Patchy the Pirate.
For his performance as SpongeBob in SpongeBob’s Truth or Square (season 6, episodes 23–24), Kenny was awarded the 2010 Annie Award for “Voice Acting in a Television Production”.
He also provided the voice of SpongeBob in the sequel, which was released on February 6, 2015. In 2018 and 2020, he received the Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Performer in an Animated Program.
In 2019, the television program commemorated its 20th anniversary. A television program called “SpongeBob’s Big Birthday Blowout” was shown in observance of the occasion.
One noteworthy sequence features the voice actors of the show’s key characters playing live-action renditions of their roles.
While this wasn’t the first Spongebob Squarepants episode to combine live-action characters with animated scenes, it was the first time the voice actors had performed a live-action scene together.
It was acknowledged that the show’s creator, Stephen Hillenburg, who had died a year previously, was being honoured by its screening.
He played Patchy the Pirate in the live recording of the Broadway show SpongeBob SquarePants later in 2019.
In 2024, CBS aired Super Bowl LVIII. Nickelodeon, the network that broadcasts Spongebob Squarepants, is owned by Paramount, the network’s parent corporation.
To maximize its NFL broadcasting rights agreement, Paramount chose to host an “alternative” Super Bowl show on Nickelodeon, focusing on family entertainment.
The show was billed for “kids of all ages, from 2 to 102” on the channel’s website. Spongebob and Patrick were there alongside live-action hosts Nate Burleson and Noah Eagle for the Nickelodeon program.
Tom Kenny and Patrick’s voice actor, Bill Fagerbakke, used motion capture in addition to real-time character improvisation. Kenny said that people who weren’t football fans could still participate in the game because of the Nickelodeon broadcast.
4. Tom Kenny’s Personal Life
When Kenny was working on The Edge in 1992, he met Jill Talley, his wife. Together, the two have worked on several shows, such as SpongeBob SquarePants, where Talley plays Karen Plankton.
They were also featured in The Smashing Pumpkins’ “Tonight, Tonight” music video. Nora (born 2003) and Mack (1997) are their two children. California’s Studio City is home to the Kennys.
5. Tom Kenny’s Net Worth
Tom Kenny is widely known for being SpongeBob’s voice actor, and with good reason. But his acting and comedian career began long before he was cast as Bikini Bottom’s well-known sponge.
For almost eight years, Tom performed stand-up comedy all over the world. Once back in the United States, he began accepting acting roles in TV shows and movies.
The public needs to be made aware of his pay. Nonetheless, you can determine his income quite well by looking at the box office figures of some of the movies he produced.
He voiced Bob Sanders in the movie Battle of the Sexes, which brought in over $12 million worldwide. He soon voiced Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature, which brought in more than $46 million at the box office worldwide.
In Michael Bay’s last Transformers movie, Transformers: The Last Knight, he also provided the voice of Wheelie. Despite people’s distaste for Bay’s adaptation of Transformers, this film brought in $605.4 million worldwide.
Additionally, he voiced the hideous bunny that Ant-Man gives to his daughter in a Marvel movie. This film grossed over $519 million globally.
Nonetheless, Kenny’s most well-known part is that of SpongeBob SquarePants, for which he has appeared in two films: Sponge on the Run and Sponge Out of Water. He reportedly earns about $50,000 a week while contributing to the show.
After deducting all of his earnings and possessions, Tom Kenny’s 2024 net worth is projected to be $16 million.
6. Conclusion
Tom Kenny is a fantastic actor and comedian who has appeared in some of the most outstanding children’s programs and worked on several projects.
His talent and perseverance have allowed him to achieve enormous success worldwide.
