The newest block of Animation Domination cartoons makes its triumphant debut tonight at midnight (ET) on FXX, and leading the way will be a brand new episode of Lucas Bros. Moving Co. The series stars twin brothers Kenny and Keith Lucas, as well as a variety of guest voices from comics and celebrities that we all know and love. For example, rapper Action Bronson joins the brothers tonight as a character named Uncle Taco, and their ensuing turf war will likely have the target audience laughing over many, many taco wrappers.
Chances are, if you’re not familiar with this absurd and hilarious animated series already, you know the Lucas Brothers from their supporting roles in last summer’s blockbuster comedy sequel, 22 Jump Street, in which they lived across the hall from Jonah Hill and our boy C-Tates. There’s more to their comedy, though, than simply meets the eye, as everything they love to make fun of and/or celebrate is something that is near and dear to our hearts. Professional wrestling, the 90s, Channing Tatum, tacos… the Lucas Brothers are basically our family.
So when they took some time to speak with me this week about the new season of Lucas Bros. Moving Co., it didn’t take very long for the conversation to get weird and fun.
UPROXX: How would you describe Lucas Bros. Moving Co. to someone who has never seen it before?
Kenny Lucas: If you’re familiar with animation, I’d say it’s like a blend of The Life and Times of Tim and the surreal nature of Adventure Time.
Keith Lucas: It’s an absurdist comedy and definitely for stoners. If you smoke marijuana, you may have a greater appreciation of some of the jokes that we use. It always starts off very simple and then just spirals out of control. That’s the basic format of the show, so if you appreciate things getting weird and absurd, then you’ll appreciate this show.
Kenny: Infused in all of that is an appreciation of 90s pop culture.
UPROXX: Is this series your brainchild and something that you guys had been itching to do, or was it a concept that the network came to you with?
Keith: We did a set on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, and Nick Weidenfeld, who is the head of ADHD (Animation Domination High Def), saw it and reached out to us, and he asked us if we had any ideas for an animated show. Kenny pitched an idea…
Kenny: … It involved Master P taking over Brooklyn with a gold tank, just some weird idea that I had in my head. They liked it, so we just sort of expanded from there, and we worked really closely with Nick to make it a show and flesh out the idea. But it wasn’t the sort of thing where we always had this vision. We always have weird ideas and wanted to attack the 90s in a certain way. We just needed to figure out a way to do it, and animation was the perfect vehicle.
UPROXX: How difficult was it, with your laid back styles, to provide voice work and get used to acting through animation? Did it take some getting used to or did it come pretty naturally?
Kenny: In the beginning, it was a little rocky, but with our background in stand-up and sketch, it wasn’t too difficult to get used to. With animation you just have to emote a little more, whereas when we’re doing stand-up, it’s more dry comedy. That was the learning curve.
Keith: When we first started, we were really hesitant to get animated and emote more than we should. But with a little time we got a lot better with it.
UPROXX: Do you guys have any specific animated series or just styles, especially going back to that 90s era, that you’re influenced by?
Keith: There are a couple things, actually. Kenny mentioned before The Life and Times of Tim, that’s a really big influence of ours. But also Clone High, which was created by Phil Lord and Chris Miller…
Kenny: … Beavis and Butthead and Daria, too. Those early MTV shows had a tremendous impact on our styles now.
UPROXX: You’ve already had plenty of well-known celebrities and comedians provide voices on the series, including Hannibal Buress, Eric André, Michael Che, Isiah Whitlock Jr., Tyler the Creator, Michael K. Williams, and even Jake “The Snake” Roberts. Who are some of the actors and celebrities that are on your wish list as the show gets bigger and better?
Keith: I would love for Larry David to provide a voice in some sort of capacity. That’s sort of like my dream. Dave Chappelle. Jonah Hill would be awesome, if we can get him, and Channing Tatum.
Kenny: Yeah, if we could get those two dudes, that would be awesome. Even getting Phil and Chris to work on it in some capacity would be great.
UPROXX: And talking about Jake “The Snake” Roberts, you guys are huge wrestling fans. Is that something you’d like to explore more, especially going back to the 90s era of the WWF and WCW?
Keith: Absolutely. I would love to do an episode on the Monday Night Wars. That’s a big thing for me.
Kenny: We plan on centering an episode around Bret “The Hitman” Hart, and we would love to get “Stone Cold” Steve Austin or The Rock, or both, to provide some sort of voices.
Keith: We were thinking about making Stone Cold the governor, just something silly with a character like Jake the Snake, but more of a professional role. Stone Cold has a great voice.
UPROXX: Who are some of the celebrities on this season that we can look forward to?
Keith: Questlove is going to be on the show, and he does a great job.
Kenny: Jillian Bell from Workaholics and 22 Jump Street. Action Bronson does a great job in one of the episodes. He’s probably one of my favorites. And YG is on it and he’s great as well.
Keith: Hannibal Buress, Jerrod Carmichael, Michael Che, Jermaine Fowler – they’re all great, too.
UPROXX: Going back to the wrestling thing, let’s get away from the real world for a second. If you could face off against each other as managers of a four-on-four Survivor Series match, which wrestlers (all-time) would you pick to fill out your teams?
(At this point, they played best-of-5 paper, rock, scissors to determine who would pick first, and Keith won.)
Keith: My first pick is Bret “The Hitman” Hart, for sure.
Kenny: “Stone Cold” Steve Austin.
Keith: “Macho Man” Randy Savage.
Kenny: Hulk Hogan.
Keith: Hulk Hogan, really?
Kenny: I thought pairing Stone Cold and Hulk Hogan would be dope.
Keith: Kurt Angle.
Kenny: The Rock.
Keith: The last pick, I need power. The Undertaker.
Kenny: Shoot, I knew you were going to pick The Undertaker. I’m gonna go with… I need power… Andre the Giant.
Keith: Okay, so I’ve got Undertaker, Kurt Angle, Bret Hart and Macho Man.
Kenny: Solid team. I have The Rock, Stone Cold, Hulk Hogan and Andre the Giant.
Keith: That’s a good team. It’s solid.
Kenny: No Shawn Michaels.
Keith: I wanted to pick him, but I just couldn’t pick him. I was going to pick him over Kurt Angle, but I despise Shawn Michaels.
UPROXX: You’ve referred to yourselves as a comedy tag team before. But as we all know, every great tag team partner eventually turns on the other guy. How do you guys manage to keep the tag team together and remain so cool?
Kenny: It depends on which tag teams you look at. The Legion of Doom stayed together.
Keith: You have to deflate the egos. With The Rockers, Shawn Michaels was always the center of attention, so you always knew that they were going to break up. Even in the Hart Foundation, Bret Hart never really turned on the Anvil, he was just so much more talented so they needed to break up. Me and Kenny are exactly like the Bushwhackers. They never turned on each other, because they were so similar. They never had one person who was better than the other.
Kenny: A tag team depends on cooperation. Whenever there are two alpha dogs, they’re gonna break up. I’d say we’re the Bushwhackers. We’re silly, we dress the same, we just like to have fun. No one ever thought the Bushwhackers were going to be the dominant tag team in the WWF. They were just fun. We’re the modern day Bushwhackers.
UPROXX: There are so many good animated series today, like Archer and Bob’s Burgers, and now Lucas Bros. Moving Co. will get so much more exposure. Is this a series that can hang for the long run, or is there a bigger picture for you?
Kenny: I believe in this show’s longevity and I would hope that in a few years we could be mentioned with those shows. That’s our plan.
Keith: We’re certainly aspiring for that. I don’t know if we’re there yet, but the foundation is there. If we keep exploring and building on it, we could reach that level of some of the great cartoons. That’s the goal, we hope that it’s a classic and people think back fondly on it and appreciate what we were trying to do, making black comedy absurd. You don’t see that a lot in mainstream TV, and that was one of our goals – to make this as absurd as possible.
