'Phineas and Ferb' creators Dan Povenmire and Jeff "Swampy" Marsh, along with cast members Alyson Stoner, Vincent Martella and David Errigo, Jr. join the Variety Studio presented by GoogleTV at San Diego Comic Con 2025.
00:00Summer belongs to everyone, so have some fun.
00:03There's nothing badder to do.
00:05We all sang it at the same time.
00:07The words hadn't been written yet.
00:09And that's never happened before.
00:11And then we jumped around the writer's room
00:14like crazy people so excited for us.
00:16Like, that's what we're naming this episode.
00:48In a room somewhere with a bunch of other lunatics
00:51doing these shows and writing this stuff
00:54and making these voices and writing these songs.
00:56So it's really nice to actually get to come out
00:58and feel a fan reaction
01:00because we don't do what we do on stage.
01:02We both came from theater before.
01:04We were both in bands.
01:05And we liked that interaction with the audience.
01:08And I think that's what Comic-Con really gives you
01:11is that feeling of, oh, what we're doing
01:13is not just going out into the ether somewhere.
01:15People are enjoying it.
01:16Somebody will tell you a story
01:18about why the show connected with them
01:20and their family and a moment.
01:22And it's wonderful.
01:24The character cosplay.
01:26That was impressive today.
01:28Really cool.
01:29Quite a range, including someone from Love Handle.
01:32Yes, Bobby Fabulous.
01:35That may be the first time I've seen a Bobby Fabulous.
01:38And it was the first Max Modem I'd ever seen, which was...
01:42I've seen a Max Modem before.
01:44Oh, wait.
01:45With the Lindana.
01:46Where was it?
01:46With the Lindana.
01:47Yes, with the Lindana.
01:47With the Lindana or something.
01:48Yeah.
01:48Pretty good.
01:49I love it.
01:49I love that people are still coming up with new characters
01:52to cosplay how many years now into making this show.
01:55We're just getting started.
01:57Wealth of options.
01:582026.
01:58Just a whole treasure trove.
01:592026 episodes, so I'm ready for it.
02:00Whoa.
02:00That's everything more.
02:01Teed you up like that, Hank.
02:03Thank you so much.
02:04Do you want to sit here?
02:05I would absolutely love that.
02:10No, I do have to ask about a moment that has recently gone
02:14a little viral on Twitter because attack of the Candace suit.
02:18I have seen so many clips everywhere of people saying,
02:24oh, my God, she's eating Jeremy.
02:28Did you?
02:29How did you come up with this?
02:31And that's just in the opening credits.
02:33It gets worse from there on in.
02:37We like doing comedy that's absurd and disturbing sometimes.
02:45We like to push that envelope a little bit.
02:47And this season, we've really been pushing that envelope a lot.
02:53The Lord of the Firesides episodes, Candace suit, attack of the Candace suit.
02:57The Mothman?
02:58The Mothman.
03:00You look at that, and his leg is just blah.
03:03His right leg is just blah.
03:05And you're like, oh, that makes me feel some kind of way.
03:08We're not taking risks.
03:10We're not pushing the envelope.
03:11We're not doing our jobs.
03:12Yes.
03:13Exactly.
03:14Now, I do want to talk about one of my favorite sort of running gags from this season,
03:19in which we have seen Buford continually suggest this idea.
03:25He wants a bread bowl hot tub.
03:27Bread bowl hot tub.
03:27The season is young.
03:29Bread bowl hot tub.
03:29It's reasonable.
03:30The season is young.
03:31I think it's reasonable.
03:32I think everyone should.
03:33If we can put soup in it.
03:34Everyone should have one.
03:35Soupy, jacuzzi, and a loaf.
03:38Yeah.
03:39Are we going to see it?
03:41Am I going to see it?
03:42There's at least 10 more episodes left in this season.
03:44We all want Buford to get his bread bowl.
03:47Yeah.
03:48Okay.
03:50But no spoilers.
03:51We can't tell your secrets.
03:54Now, I'm curious.
03:55Do you guys have a dream invention for Phineas and Ferb at this point?
03:59Do you have your own hot tub bread bowl?
04:02I think if we did, we would just put it in the show.
04:05Yeah.
04:07We're just like, whatever the next thing in our brain is, what if they do this?
04:11Yeah, let's do that.
04:12Because it's always just come up with a simple idea,
04:15and then how would Phineas and Ferb do it and make it huge and spectacular?
04:21We have an episode where what they're doing at the beginning of the day
04:25is hitting stuff with a stick,
04:28seeing how far they can stand away and hit something with a stick,
04:32and then that becomes a huge project for them.
04:36So sometimes you start with the simplest thing.
04:39You had a day where they just helped their dad build a bookshelf.
04:41Building that bookshelf.
04:42That happened.
04:43That happened.
04:44And they did.
04:45Well, I know one of you did have a dream come true this year.
04:49Vincent, Pop Crave said you stunned.
04:51It's true.
04:52What did that mean to you, that moment?
04:55It meant everything to me.
04:57It took me 32 years, and finally, on my birthday,
05:03Pop Crave said that I stunned.
05:05And now most celebrities, and not that I am one.
05:09Wait, you didn't say stunted?
05:10No, they didn't.
05:13Because they post random pictures of people drinking coffee,
05:18and they're like, Ariana Grande stuns a new photo.
05:20Stuns.
05:21Stuns.
05:22And on my birthday, as my birthday gift, apparently,
05:25they said that I stunned.
05:26I mean, you asked if you stunned, and they said that.
05:27What were you doing when they said you stunned?
05:29I was looking stunning, Dan.
05:31No.
05:32He's the number one stunner.
05:33Yeah.
05:35So my birthday's in October.
05:36We'll see if I stun again.
05:38It's very, very hard to stun back to back.
05:42Right.
05:42I feel like the pressure is on.
05:44The three-peat stun has never been done before.
05:47Not even Ariana Grande.
05:49Let's just see if I can make it to back-to-back championships.
05:53Can we get a teaser?
05:55Can you stun?
05:56Show us.
05:57Oh, my God.
05:57The wrist face?
05:58I just met him outside.
06:00I'm not even kidding.
06:01I just met him outside.
06:03It was great.
06:04I really am hoping that you can pull off that three-peat.
06:11Somebody call the Guinness book.
06:13Man's got a dream.
06:14Music is such a key part of this show.
06:17I've always been partial to Squirrels in My Pants.
06:19That's my number one earworm.
06:21But what's your favorite song?
06:22Understandably.
06:24That was funny.
06:27That was really good.
06:28Right under the radar.
06:29Do each of you have a song that stands out to you after all these years that you're like,
06:35that's the one?
06:36Oh, that's the one?
06:38Summer Belongs to You is my favorite.
06:39Yeah.
06:40Love that song.
06:41That's my favorite for many different reasons.
06:44I think it's like a quintessential Phineas and Ferb song, just in its feel.
06:50It sums up the whole feeling of the series in a great way.
06:55And there was so much story happening at the end of that.
07:00And Candace gets her first kiss in that thing.
07:03It's the first time she acknowledges her brothers, that she's proud of them,
07:08and they did something really great.
07:10And it just, you know, and also when we wrote it, it was like this magical thing
07:16where we were just like, we were working, you know, we knew we wanted to build to a chorus,
07:21you know, that should be up here somewhere.
07:23And we had like this B section building up to it.
07:25And then when we really worked out, we were like, okay, we should go from the minor to the seventh.
07:29We just got to this chorus, and I just started singing those words.
07:35And we had not thought of a title yet.
07:37We hadn't thought of a title for the episode.
07:40And I got to, it's like, yes, it's true, summer belongs to you.
07:44And then Martin and Swampy, like, summer belongs to you, summer belongs.
07:48And then we all sang the second half of that chorus.
07:52Summer belongs to everyone, so have some fun.
07:55There's nothing bad to do.
07:57We all sang it at the same time.
07:59The words hadn't been written yet.
08:02And that's never happened before.
08:03And then we jumped around the writer's room, like crazy people, so excited for it.
08:09It's like, that's what we're naming this episode.
08:11That's what we're like, it's so.
08:12We did have a momentary thought that we could go out on the road as a man band.
08:17But we nixed that.
08:18It was very momentary.
08:19It was not a boy band.
08:20The image of y'all hopping around gleefully is a new memory.
08:26Core memory has been unlocked for all of us.
08:28It's like when Paul had some amazing, I mean, this season, we got Michael Buble to sing a love song about a zoetrope called Toby McTrope Face.
08:37Made me think we did Let's Spend Half a Day Together with Kate Pearson of the Beach of E2s.
08:42I just wish that song was longer, because that was an amazing song.
08:45I have a hat for that, to me.
08:47Like, I love Alan Cummings.
08:48We got to write a song for Alan Cummings, which is fun.
08:51Good.
08:52And he killed it.
08:52Now, Allison, I grew up admiring you, watching you on TV.
08:59And then as I grew older, I started admiring you for different reasons, as you were very courageously using your platform to talk about what you've been through.
09:10And I'm so excited that you have your memoir coming out soon.
09:22So, I'm so curious what made you want to, obviously, you've been speaking about this online for years.
09:31What made you want to put this into writing?
09:34You've been teasing it on your social media that we're going to hear things we've never heard before.
09:38And also, what was that experience like?
09:40Because I know it can be difficult to relive, you know, when there are painful memories, putting them into writing.
09:46I wanted to make sure that this was a confessional for all of the wrongdoing I experienced on Phineas and Ferb.
09:53Just kidding.
09:56It's actually an ode.
09:58It's a love story.
09:59I love this group of people.
10:02And semi-well-adjusted is just a farce.
10:05It's actually only about working on Phineas and Ferb.
10:07No, I recognize that so many young performers, young athletes, young academics have experienced very similar struggles.
10:15But no one has ever unpacked why it happens and what we can do differently.
10:19So, I'm now a mental health practitioner.
10:21And I wanted to connect some new dots across child development and media culture and the industry.
10:26And I think more urgently, since we're all sharing this very interconnected digital world, we're actually seeing that experiences once reserved for people in the public eye, things like managing parasocial relationships, issues with privacy, safety, mental health issues around just tech use slash overuse for some of us, are now things that everyone with a Wi-Fi connection and a smart device can experience.
10:50So, I wanted to surface some really timely conversations and explore what the heck it means to be well-adjusted if the society itself is a little sideways.
11:02You know what I'm saying?
11:03Yes, absolutely.
11:04And I think it's timely because, you know, people like myself who grew up watching this are adults now and able to process this a little more clearly than maybe we could when we were kids.
11:14I feel like I was so inspired by Jeanette McCurdy's book last year and learned so much about her experience as well.
11:21And so, I'm excited for you to have the opportunity to do the same.
11:24And I must say, the best way to go about reading and listening to the book is to read a chapter and then watch an episode of Phineas and Ferb.
11:34It's a great...
11:35Palate cleanser.
11:36Palate cleanser.
11:37For real.
11:38For real.
11:39True bright spot.
11:40Right now, this very moment, pause this interview and go pre-order this book.
11:45Aw, so kind.
11:47And watch the new season of Phineas and Ferb, available on...
11:51Disney Plus.
11:51Disney Plus.
11:52Disney Plus.
11:53Disney Channel.
11:53Disney Channel.
11:54Do you not know the network that we're with?
11:58I don't think you still own a TV.
12:00Do you?
12:00Yeah, I actually don't own a TV, so...
12:03But I have seen all of the episodes of Phineas and Ferb.
12:05Yeah.
12:06That's right.
12:06Because you do own a smart device.
12:09That's right.
12:09Yeah.
12:10Well, it brings us back to mental health issues.
12:15And here we are.
12:16Well, everybody, grab your smart devices, glue yourself to them, watch more Phineas and Ferb as we watch the rest of the season and see more in 2026.
12:25And I want to thank all of you so much for taking the time to chat.
12:31No, thank you.
12:31No, thank you.
12:32No, thank you.
12:32No, thank you.
12:34No, the owner is...
12:35No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
