Thank Comedy Central for resurrecting the animated series “Futurama” tonight. The sixth season premiere is tonight and features the original voice cast, including Billy West (who voices Fry, Professor Farnsworth, Zoidberg, and Zapp Brannigan), Katey Sagal (who voices Leela), John DiMaggio (Bender), Phil LaMarr (Hermes Conrad), and Lauren Tom (Amy Wong). You can only imagine what a table read sounds like for this bunch!

West says that the dynamic of the cast helps with their performances:

“It helps to riff with the other actors. We fool around a lot and we make each other laugh, and that promotes a good energy in the room. That’s what puts me in the mood.”

Sagal (“Married… With Children”, “Sons of Anarchy”) elaborates on what their table reads for “Futurama” sound like:

“It’s like a disjointed radio show, except with big breaks, because these guys, as you can tell, are very funny. So sometimes it takes us a while to actually get to the work — but we get there.”

DiMaggio adds that the history that this cast has had for over seventy episodes made it easy to reunite for this sixth season:

“When you’ve worked with each other for as long as we have, it all comes naturally. You always know something’s coming from the other guy — but something unexpected.”

Maurice LaMarche, who voices several supporting roles, describes working on “Futurama” like this:

“It’s like when your uncle’s gonna tickle you, but you just don’t know where.”

“Futurama” is a sci-fi brainchild of show creators Matt Groening and David X. Cohen. Cohen reminisces about how the partnership began:

“I think Matt zeroed in on me as the nerrrrrd of the ‘Simpsons’ writers, though many people on that staff could have easily qualified. I got very excited, because my background was as an actual science student. I studied physics and computer science. I’ve always been very interested in actual science — and also science fiction.”

The pair’s goal was to produce an animated show with a distinct sci-fi bent and “character-oriented humor”. Cohen explains:

“Maybe the character is a robot, maybe he’s a giant lobster, but underneath we wanted them all to be people the viewers could sympathize with. We wanted to base our stories around actual emotions and themes that viewers could relate to.”

Watch “Futurama” on Comedy Central, Thursdays at 10/9pm C.

[Source] AP