EXCLUSIVE: 'SpongeBob' actor Tom Kenny explains * that * Leonardo DiCaprio joke from Nickelodeon's Super Bowl broadcast

In addition to playing SpongeBob in the iconic Nickelodeon series since 1999, voice actor Tom Kenny has also taken on roles in cartoon TV programming like "The Powerpuff Girls," "Rocko's Modern Life" and "Dexter’s Laboratory," to name a few.

With that kind of portfolio, Kenny seems to have left no stone unturned in the voice acting biz — that is, until he commentated the most-watched TV broadcast in U.S. history: the 2024 Super Bowl.

On Feb. 11, Kenny and fellow actor Bill Fagerbakke, who has voiced Patrick Star since 1999, put on motion-capture suits and headsets to transform into SpongeBob and Patrick for Nickelodeon's Super Bowl broadcast. The alternate telecast was what the NFL called a "kid-centric presentation" of the Las Vegas game between the Kansas City Chiefs and San Francisco 49ers that delivered an inclusive experience for all ages to watch together.

But no one expected the broadcast moments to go viral on social media the way they did, with viewers calling the performance from SpongeBob and Patrick "absolutely electric."

“We’re still buzzing from it like jellyfish," Kenny tells TODAY.com of the experience. "It’s crazy, it’s still kind of percolating, it’s great. It seems to have this half life.”

Even though Kenny has done motion capture before, and has performed as SpongeBob live, he had no clue how hosting the Super Bowl would go. Despite giving the suits a test run and seeing their set up a few days before the game, Kenny says the feeling when he heard the live crowd and started recording was unimaginable.

"I don’t know how many other people have done something similar to this," Kenny says of the unique experience. "There are not really that many people you can talk to and go ‘Hey, do you have any tips?’”

During the Super Bowl, Kenny and Fagerbakke sat in the press box next to sports commentators Nate Burleson and Noah Eagle, who explained the rules of football and what was going on as the game unfolded to SpongeBob, Patrick and viewers.

As the game turned into an edge-of-your-seat event, the Nickelodeon telecast elevated the night with a mix of chaos and hilarity, from SpongeBob and Patrick cracking unhinged jokes to robot Plankton sliming attendees and Sandy Cheeks stepping in as a sideline reporter.

The show became an immediate success, as fans turned to social media to share funny clips and commentary on the broadcast that continued to circulate days after the Sunday game.

"The Spongebob Super Bowl broadcast is a national treasure," an X user wrote.

Opening up the show with 'Sweet Victory'

At the beginning of the broadcast, SpongeBob did an opening performance of "Sweet Victory," which originated in a 2001 episode of "SpongeBob" titled "Band Geeks" when SpongeBob and Patrick join Squidward's marching band and performed at the Bubble Bowl.

While many fans praised the performance, Kenny knows that SpongeBob's singing was an extra bonus to an already impressive musical lineup.

"I don’t know if Usher really needs ‘Sweet Victory’ to give his halftime show a boost, he did pretty good for himself," Kenny tells TODAY.com with a laugh.

"He had more wardrobe changes than SpongeBob did, that's for sure, and definitely more of a gun show than SpongeBob and Patrick had, in terms of his arms, his biceps," he continues.

Tom Kenny's lack of football knowledge worked in his favor

One thing sports commentators should know about is, well, the sports they are commentating on. But for Kenny, he really didn't know much about the sport — but that might have worked in his favor.

“I don’t think it hurts because (SpongeBob is) supposed to be a total outside observer," Kenny says. "It was probably easier for me to embrace my ignorance of football than it was for Bill to hide his deep knowledge and football metric (while being Patrick). It’s easier to just not know anything than to know something and pretend not to know it. So I think feel Bill had the harder acting job.”

Fish celebrities swarmed the stadium

Nickelodeon crafted a story as to how the Super Bowl ended up in Bikini Bottom: Sandy engineered a way to bring the whole Las Vegas stadium deep underwater, which opened up the opportunity for SpongeBob and Patrick to commentate and for other sea creatures from the "SpongeBob" universe to join in on the sporting event — all of whom having no clue what football or the Super Bowl is.

Despite human celebrity sightings being at the game, including Justin Bieber, Paul Rudd, Jeff Goldblum, Beyoncé and, of course, Taylor Swift, Kenny says his favorite appearance was one of the Bikini Bottom celebrities — who happens to have a similar name to a real star.

“I actually loved seeing Clamuel L. Jackson, 'Eels on a Boat' was one of my favorite movies," Kenny jokes, making a reference to Samuel L. Jackson and his film, "Snakes on a Plane."

Other familiar SpongeBob celebrities who attended the game included Oprah Finfrey (Oprah Winrey), Shrimpothée Chalamet (Timothée Chalamet) and Billie Eelish (Billie Eilish).

Jokes that kept an adult audience engaged

Some of the Nickelodeon broadcast's funniest jokes were ones that most likely went over the heads of younger viewers.

"OK, who needs a map to help find the end zone?" Dora the Explorer said during an appearance at the game, as the Chiefs remained scoreless by the end of the first half.

Cashing in on the popularity of Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift's relationship, SpongeBob and Nickelodeon mainly referred to Kelce as "Taylor Swift's boyfriend" throughout the game.

One of the most viral lines from the game was when SpongeBob seemingly joked about Leonardo DiCaprio's dating history. Social media has long made jokes about how DiCaprio tends to have relationships with younger women, teasing that he only dates women under 25 years old.

When the telecast showed DiCaprio attending the game, Kenny ended up saying, "Leonardo DiCaprio, 25! That's about his dating history." The joke blew up, but it was also connected to a famous joke from "SpongeBob," when SpongeBob and Patrick can't stop laughing at silly jokes, including, "What's funnier than 24? 25."

“That just burst out. I had never thought of that episode or that joke or SpongeBob in relation to that trope of Leo," Kenny recalls of the DiCaprio joke. “It wasn’t until I saw him and then everything connected and I just blurted it out, and I hope that was OK. People seemed to enjoy it.”

While Kenny wasn't initially sure how people would take the more risky jokes, he thinks that playing characters like SpongeBob and Patrick, who are known to be a bit spacey and unaware, gave the two voice actors "great freedom to improvise."

“Since those personalities of SpongeBob and Patrick are so well delineated, it kind of just gives us a lot of cover. You won’t get in any Jo-Koy-at-the-Golden-Globes trouble," Kenny says, referencing the mixed reactions comedian Jo Koy's opening monologue received at the 2024 Golden Globes.

"They kind of have a free pass, they’re just knuckleheads. They don’t know any better," Kenny says of SpongeBob and Patrick.

Nickelodeon's Super Bowl broadcast proved SpongeBob's legacy lives on

The game ended with a nail-biting touchdown by the Chiefs in overtime, more than four hours since the initial coin toss. SpongeBob and Patrick's reactions to the touchdown went viral, with one clip reaching almost 10 million views on X.

"Spongebob yelling touchdown is killing me," one user wrote on X.

Kenny says he didn't realize how long the game had gone, but throughout the game, he had to juggle drinking enough fluids to keep his vocal cords wet while not drinking so much that he had to use the bathroom.

"You’re hooked up in that wetsuit and you’re full of wires and the commercial breaks are only two and a half minutes long," Kenny explains.

All in all, though, Kenny says he couldn't be happier about how the broadcast went, and how SpongeBob continues to make people happy more than two decades since the show's inception.

“Most important to us, people enjoyed it and they laughed, and it brought the people who maybe aren’t necessarily hardcore football or Super Bowl viewers to that event without alienating the people that are into football.”

This article was originally published on TODAY.com