‘Lil Kev’ Director Musa Brooker on Animating Kevin Hart’s Childhood in N. Philly

Earlier this month, BET+ premiered Lil Kev, a new adult animation series loosely based on the early days of actor/comic Kevin Hart, when he was raised by his single mom in North Philadelphia in the early 1990s. The show, which features the voice talent of Hart himself, Wanda Sykes (as his mom), Deon Cole, Gerald Johnson, Cree Summer and many others, is co-created by Hart, Matthew Claybrooks and Michael Price and directed by animation veteran Musa Brooker (The Boys, Black-ish, Waffles + Mochi).

Brooker was kind enough to answer a few of our questions about the new show, which has a different, edgy look and is definitely not your cookie-cutter prime-time animated fare:

Animation Magazine: Congrats on the success of your new show, Musa. Would you fill us in on how you got involved with this fun project?

Musa Brooker: You know, I actually started working on Lil Kev back in October of ’23, so it has been a bit. The show, itself had been in development for a while. There was a previous iteration that I know the showrunners and Kevin Hart had been working on this for a few years. I think they actually sold it a few times; one of the things that the show’s co-creator and co-showrunner Matt Claybrooks says is that it didn’t work out in the past because we needed to find the perfect partners. So, they teamed up with BET+ and ShadowMachine, and it all took off.

As you know, the show is based on Kevin’s life growing up in in North Philadelphia, which was certainly a rough and tumble area in the in the ’90s. It still is a little rough, but it has great people. So, one day I actually got a call from David Ichioka, the producer at ShadowMachine, whom I had worked with a long time ago at Will Vinton Studios on a show called Gary and Mike. So he told me about the project — and I was already a big fan of Kevin Hart’s comedy and movies.

I was born and raised in West Philly myself, so I was very excited to be part of this project and very pleased that they thought I was  the right match. So we started out with the showrunners, who are writers, but not visual artists, so I was brought in very early to help lead the visual development team. It was really exciting to be part of a project from the ground up: They had some early scripts, but the writers room started up about the same time as we were starting visual development. That’s why we had this really great back and forth between the writers and all the wonderful artists. We had a great small team of viz dev artists who just did a fantastic job. I actually got to hire some former students which was really lovely and some folks that I had wanted to work with, and David brought some people in that he thought would be a great mix as well.

On the Show’s Visuals: One of the things that was really important was that we wanted to try something that was visually a bit daring and little bit different from the standard adult animation space. We didn’t want to frighten away people who were used to that specific prime time look, but we also didn’t want people to mistake it with a kids show. So, we wanted to find that mix. I’m an old school cartoon fan and also a big comic nerd, so one of my touchstones was that classic Calvin and Hobbes inky line and those painterly backgrounds of Bill Waterston’s world. We started out with lots of different looks and styles and we gradually whittled it down with the team and with the showrunners to find something that everybody was happy with, and I think we landed in a nice spot.

I want to give a shout out to our art director Amanda Lake, who played a big part in developing the look of the show. She was originally one of our visual development artists, who then joined the team as art director for the whole show. We had a wonderful group of artists, designers, background and character painters. I also want to shout out to Richard Lee, our background supervisor who has a really wonderful way of drawing and line work, (we called it wonkiness) which became an important part of the show. We were also fortunate to have Cameron McClain was our character lead who kept the consistency of the initial designs that we created throughout the series. All three have been hugely responsible for the unique way our show looks.

The city was a big influence on the show; not just the visuals, but also the jokes, the humor of North Philly … it’s almost like another character in the series. I usually go back home a couple times a year, but I actually made some special visits when we were early in production to go around. My mother still lives there, and she was nice enough to drive me around and I had my phone and was taking lots of pictures so that we could reference specific things on the show. Back in LA, I was there for most of the records, and the showrunners were very collaborative, so I was able to throw in some ideas, and the actors were also able to improv a few things here and there. We had some great moments where we able to throw in some of Philly’s specific culture, names and references.

Now, ShadowMachine in West Hollywood was the show’s lead animation house, right?

We did all the viz dev at ShadowMachine and most of our storyboards were done in L.A. Most of the designers were in-house, but we had some artists working from different locations in the country. We had a couple of designers in New York. Overall, it was a hybrid production. Our show was actually the first production completed in the new ShadowMachine building in West Hollywood. Our overseas partners on the show were Toon City in Manila. They were really great to work with, as our show has a very different look, but they were great partners and really met the challenge.

How long did it take to deliver the 10 episodes of the first season?

We started in October of 2023 and wrapped in late November of 2024. This was the first time BET had done an animated series in a long time. It was exciting to work with ShadowMachine and with Kevin.

What would you say was the toughest aspect of directing an adult animated show that looks different from the usual fare?

Overall, it was a challenging project because we were starting a new series from the ground up and having to establish the look and the feel and set up that world. I think that it was fun, but it was challenging because there was no precedent. We didn’t have anything to work from, besides the written words earlier on, so that was also exciting. For me personally, this was the first time I’d worked on this scale —  as most of the work I have done in the past has been short-form … animated segments, music videos or web shows. It was exciting to be a storyteller in this longer format. I had supervised other directors both at Six Point Harness and at Stoopid Buddy before, but never for a 22-minute-long series . So I had to learn to delegate in a different way. So much of directing is delegating and communicating with the team, and it was all a different beast than what I had done before.

How involved was Kevin Hart on the show?

Well, the whole show is based on his life. He recorded his own voice,. But on a day to day basis, it was our showrunners  and producers who were directly involved. Kevin would show up and approve and review things and of course, he was there for the voice records. He was a big part of the show, and we got some really great feedback from him, which really helped bolster the confidence of the crew in everything.

Animated shows based on young versions of comedians seems to be a whole sub-genre on its own … Bill Cosby, John Candy, Howie Mandell, Rosie O’Donnell, Ellen DeGeneres, to name a few. A few months ago, we also got Everybody Still Hates Chris (with Chris Rock). Why do you think this trend is still continuing?

I think it’s often easier to get a project made when there’s a big name involved, especially someone that’s funny and engaging, and so I think that’s really where that pattern comes from. We’re certainly part of that genre, but what’s different is our show is targeting an adult audience, which can be tricky because in America, people often associate animation with children’s fare. Although Lil Kev is about a kid growing up, it definitely has adult situations, humor and language. I think it’s also visually different than a lot of those other shows. Of course, this is definitely no shade on those others shows. I just think it’s always s great when something looks different visually.

What do you hope audiences will take away from Lil Kev?

First of all, I hope they laugh, because our show is first and foremost a comedy. We want to make sure people see the humor, but there’s also a lot of heart in the comedy. There are these moments that convey real emotions and feelings. You know the comedy is a bit on the absurd side, but the heart is still there. I think it’s really important to be able to connect with these characters even if they’re exaggerated. There are some real situations because it’s an adult program; we weren’t afraid to touch on some spicy humor. I just hope people enjoy it and tune in to BET+ to see it. They’ve been producing some great shows there, and I hope it draws people in to watch the show and to watch the network.

We’ve gotten a pretty good response so far, so hopefully that will continue, and we’ll get a second season. It would be great to play in this world a little more and develop the characters even further. There’s a lot of character development over the course of the series, which is also a little bit different from other animated shows. We get to see some progress in the characters over the season in regards to how they look at the world and how their relationships change. But most of all, I hope our show will make people laugh.

What is your take on the animation scene in 2025, the possibilities and threat of AI, the job scene, etc.?

I try to be eternally optimistic. It’s funny, because that’s actually the heart of Kevin’s character in the show: He chooses to see the good side of things even though he knows that the world’s a bit rough. So, that’s kind of my take on the animation industry right now. It’s a bit rough out there for a lot of people who are looking for work. I hope that more people can find work. I’ve been hearing about things improving and a few more animated productions being made, but there are a lot of people out of work, and that’s scary.

And there are some real concerns about AI. I do want to believe that AI is simply a tool that we can use as artists, and that it won’t put people out of work. There’s this analogy, which is a bit faulty, but let’s compares AI to the invention of photography, which didn’t eliminate painting. But, it opened up the expectations and a whole new world for painting, which really wasn’t there before. So, I am hoping that we will experience the same thing with AI — in that it allows artists to help facilitate ideas and improve efficiency in some ways. I think, however, that it is going to be very hard to keep up the quality of animation without illuminating the human factor. True art comes from artists, from designers, writers, etc. Good ideas always come from humans, not from machines. So, hopefully things will even out, and there will be more work for everyone, and we can continue to thrive. But it’s definitely a scary and complicated moment for a lot of people.

Lil Kev is now streaming on BET+. The premiere episode is also available to watch in full on the BET Plus YouTube channel.