DreamWorks Animation’s Bee Movie is, obviously, all about bees, but Patrick Warburton has no regrets that he wasn’t hired to provide the voice of one of the yellow and black creatures. Warburton’s perfectly happy to have been a part of the movie playing Ken, a character he describes as the “somewhat unstable insecure boyfriend” of a perky florist (voiced by Renee Zellweger) named Vanessa who’s sympathetic to the plight of bees. To say Ken’s put out over Vanessa’s bizarre friendship with one particular bee, Barry B Benson (Jerry Seinfeld), is putting it very mildly.
Patrick Warburton’s No Stranger to Voiceover Work: Warburton’s done a lot of it the past few years. “It's been a lot of fun because I've got four kids,” said Warburton. “They can appreciate or enjoy most of it, except for some of the Adult Swim stuff. ..On the Bee Movie, you work with Jerry Seinfeld. I didn't come in for a single session where I wasn't working opposite Jerry, which was really unusual to be working with not only the producer and creator and voice talent that he is, but because it's Jerry.
It's a very unique experience going in and doing voiceover. Usually when you do voiceover, you're isolated in a room. You do it by yourself and there are just so many people involved, half the time you don't know the names of those in the room running the show. But working on the Bee Movie, you get to come in, work directly right opposite Jerry. So that was certainly the most fantastic experience I've had working, doing voiceover work.”
Warburton revealed he never does anything special to prepare his voice, even when the script calls for him to let loose with some screaming. “I don't know how to preserve a voice when you're screaming so when there's a lot of screaming, I'll usually try to put a hold on it and say, ‘Can you just make this all at the end of the session because I won't be audible after I do this probably.’ But I've lost my voice a number of times screaming. Joe screams in Family Guy. Ken does a lot of screaming. I would just totally lose my voice at the end of that.”
The Reality of Voicework: “It's interesting,” said Warburton. “There's almost less limitations. There are fewer because you can do anything in the cartoon format. You can be big or loud or tiny or wherever you want to go with it. If it works, it works. If it doesn't, there's that safety net. You can try it a number of different ways. Since you have that opportunity to try a number of different things, I guess you should and go from one end of the spectrum to the other, vocally. Whatever works ends up working. On camera, you don't really have that opportunity. You have to try to find it and make it work and believable. You can do anything in a cartoon, so it's less limiting to me.”
Working with Jerry Seinfeld: Occasionally Seinfeld would make suggestions or do line readings. “He actually does know what he wants so he will guide you in that direction. At the same time, he'll let you just pick up the ball and run with it and do whatever you want too and see what happens,” explained Seinfeld. “So it's a really good mix, working with Jerry, of him encouraging you to go in a certain area and letting you do whatever you want going in that direction.”
Although Warburton’s much more experienced when it comes to voicework, he didn’t offer Seinfeld any advice. “I would never give Jerry a tip. I can't even give a tip in child care anymore. Not that he's caught up to us. We have four, we still have more.”
A Very Strange Love Triangle: Asked how he got into the mindset of being a part of a love triangle involving a bee and a florist, Warburton replied, “Well, if you're just looking at the emotion of insecurity, just being insecure about a relationship, it doesn't matter who or what it is. If you find that they're stepping on your toes, if they're moving in, you can get really insecure. You start to forget that it's a bee. It's not a bee, it's a relationship. She's having a relationship with somebody other than you, and that just makes Ken lose his mind. So it's fun.
It's really fun getting to be involved in something that's so absurd. It's absurd, but it's real. I think there's a real - you can accept the reality of the fact that he can't compete with a bee. He's not a bee. Obviously, there's something going on there, but you think that you can accept the reality. It's fine.”
Sticking to the Script: There wasn’t much improvisation by the voice cast of Bee Movie. “No, the boards are pretty specific. Each page is like glued to a board of cardboard,” explained Warburton. “They keep really good track of what's written and what they've got there. For the most part, there are a few days where we would go off a little bit and just try something else, but for the most part, it was all storyboarded specifically. Lines are pretty specific by the time you're recording. And that's the only time I show up. That's my only involvement. They know exactly what they want at that point. It's pretty specific but there was a little bit of improvising going on in regards to what Ken did for a living. He was selling fake diamonds for a while. That was really funny. He'd talk about these diamonds as like a multi-level marketing thing. These diamonds were developed by NASA for the astronauts' wives. That's what they were developed for.”
The Jerry Seinfeld Experience: Warburton has nothing but love for Seinfeld. “He's involved me in a number of his projects he's been involved in. I find him to be very gracious and down to earth. I actually got to sit down and have a dinner with him, his longtime friend and manager George Shapiro the other night. That was really special because I've gotten very little just one-on-one time with Jerry. That was very cool. I think with Jerry, a lot of what you saw of him in the TV show is not far from the man himself. He has a very clever, comical, whimsical perspective on things, a very insightful one. At the same time, I guess if you're just hanging out with him, he's not always trying to make people laugh in the room. When that happens, it's an effortless thing with him. From my perspective, it seems that fatherdom has been a very wonderful, special thing for him. So we're happy for him.”
