Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie - David Soren Interview

Super hero alert!!  There's a new guy on the big screen ready to win the hearts of the millions of readers who first discovered him in print! 

Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie is a new 3D computer animated superhero comedy  based on the children's novel series of the same name by Dav Pilkey. The film is produced by DreamWorks Animation and Scholastic Entertainment with animation production provided by Mikros Image. It is directed by David Soren, written by Nicholas Stoller, and stars the voices of Ed Helms, Kevin Hart, Nick Kroll, Thomas Middleditch, Jordan Peele and Kristen Schaal. 

In the film we find two imaginative elementary school students, George Beard (Kevin Hart) and Harold Hutchins (Thomas Middleditch), hypnotize their mean-spirited principal, Mr. Krupp (Ed Helms), into becoming the dim-witted superhero known as Captain Underpants, created by George and Harold. Together, they set out to a journey to stop the mad scientist Professor Poopypants (Nick Kroll), his giant minion the Turbo Toilet 2000 and henchman tattletale (snitch) genius Melvin Sneedly (Jordan Peele) from destroying Captain Underpants, taking over the world, and annihilating laughter forever.

This year marks the 20th anniversary of the Captain Underpants books and director David Soren (who hails from Toronto) couldn't be prouder to be the man to bring this super hero's story to the big screen.

"20 years ago, I happened to be in a book store. I had just moved to LA, and I stumbled across the first Captain Underpants book in the store. I picked it up and started leafing through it.," Soren told me during our recent interview. "I thought 'this is really silly and looks fun', and before I knew it I read about half the book right there in aisle and thought,  I wish I came up with this idea myself. It’s so good. Years later, I had kids of my own and read them to my son and my daughter. And when DreamWorks approached me to direct the movie, I was very familiar with the books and a huge fan.

I spoke with  director David Soren (Turbo & Merry Madagascar) about working on the film, Dav Pilkey's involvement, his casting choices and why he thinks everyone loves Captain Underpants.  

Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie soars into theatres on June 2nd.