Photo illustration: Vulture. Photo: Everett Collection (Universal Pictures, 20th Century Fox), retailer, Netflix, Nintendo, courtesy of TheStewartofNY/WireImage

Kenan Thompson has spent most of his life as an actor. Appeared in both all things and D2: Mighty Ducks In 1993, at just 15 years old, Thompson came of age on screen. Perhaps that’s why when he joined saturday night liveJust 10 years after he started appearing on Nickelodeon, Thompson felt like a fully formed comedian, confident in his voice and style and able to express himself in almost any situation. He may have been relatively young, but he had more credits and (arguably) more experience compared to other cast members.

23 years later, Thompson is like this. SNL‘ has been on the show for the longest time to date, and is the bedrock on which many of the show’s sketches were built. Whether he’s delivering straight lines to the camera or showing up somewhere wearing a ridiculous wig, he’s down to earth, and that’s probably what audiences (and Lorne Michaels) like about him. With Thompson, you know he can tell a great joke with a quiet confidence, no matter what he’s talking about. David Ortiz’s “Big Lunch” update desk or He posed a “Black Jeopardy” question to Michelle Obama on an episode of his podcast.

It’s nice to think that his calmness might translate to Thompson’s role as father to girls Gianna and Georgia, ages 7 and 11. He certainly incorporated it into his new picture book, Unfernie Bunnycombines stories that will make kids laugh out loud with messages about perseverance and self-acceptance.

One thing’s for sure: Thompson knows good kids’ content, whether he’s creating it or consuming it. With that in mind, here are the books, games, and movies that Thompson and her daughters love.

Photo: Giles Keate/Universal Pictures/Everett Collection

We don’t have a movie night every week, but Wickids when they came out. we saw super mario bros movie. If there’s an anime we can watch together and I have time to take her with me, I’ll go.

I bought all the popcorn buckets for my collection. eviltoo. i am big wizard of oz fans, like me With I grew up in the church, so I’m very close to that whole story. I love the whole concept of friends going on a journey together and somehow getting through it. So we definitely enjoyed Wickids. I had never seen a Broadway play either, so I saw the Broadway play and the first movie in the same week. That was fun.

Photo: Netflix

K-POP Demon Hunter I have been talking to my daughters since the beginning. I think it’s the neon hair and the upbeat, happy, colorful energy of the genre.

I grew up in an era of branded children’s television. There were many programs like night rider I love Transformers and this and that and all that, but when I try to show them to my daughters, it’s very depressing. Because after 2 seconds of watching it, the girls realize they don’t want to watch it anymore. They want what’s latest for them. demon hunterEven if I’m like, “Hey, this Jean-Claude Van Damme movie is pretty cool.” They barely listen to me.

So I’m waiting for them to get a little older so they can settle down and really appreciate everything I grew up with. Because there are so many good ones out there.

Photo: Universal Pictures/Everett Collection

When it comes to work, I don’t want to be like, “Hey, check out this old guy here.” Mighty Ducks or heavyweight”I never want to do that. I want them to come up to me and think, “Dad.” I saw this movie that you starred in and I really liked it. ”That is my ultimate dream.

[That being said] they saw troll in real time, and of Grinch It was great to see them put two and two together because I was watching it in real time. That gave me immediate feedback. They asked me if it was a “bricklebaum”. [in The Grinch] I found that as opposed to being able to immediately identify my own voice, it allowed me to disguise myself enough to become a character in the story rather than just Keenan.

Really, every time I leave the house, I’m going to do something that brings me right back into their lives. I have no intention of working in a steel mill or anything like that. I’m going to work on something pretty amazing. So it’s like, “Hey, you should think I’m pretty cool, kids.”

Photo: Nintendo

we play a lot mario kartAnd I usually play as Raccoon Mario or any other Mario.

My daughters always fight when we play. Because one person has a competitive spirit and the other cannot let it go. So it becomes a little tornado of compromise, and it’s hard to find the bridge to say, “Okay, here’s the compromise. Just agree on this one thing. Yes, they won that game, but there’s another game. Okay, now you win.” you know? Now we have to do a tiebreaker, and we have all these simple rules, like best of three, and that kind of thinking. If you agree to it, you can continue playing. If not, you will have to exit the game and the screen will be blank for a while.

Photo: Ekin Howard/NWSL via Getty Images

A big girl got me into soccer. She plays soccer, but I didn’t know much about soccer until then. I feel like I watched it too, but didn’t really engage with it that way. But now I know a lot and I like to see how she engages with it and how she herself learns about it. It was so much fun exploring together.

Soccer is played all year round so now we also have very nice folding chairs. It never stops. She practices two or three times a week and has games every weekend.

new york women’s soccer team [Gotham FC] We won the championship this year, so that was big. We attended one of their “Bring Out the Kids” games and were able to interact with the players. It was great. And then when they won the cup, I was like, “That’s great. This might be something that gives my daughter some kind of subconscious involvement and sticks with her to it.” She’s pretty good at it, so if she follows her instincts down that path, she’ll see where it goes.

there are really good radio stations [94.7 The Block]a radio station that just plays a compilation of songs I’ve been listening to since high school in the late ’90s and early 2000s. But it’s crazy that it’s the exact same hip-hop that I grew up with and now it’s old school hip-hop.

As a matter of fact, they have not been involved in any songs yet, but they have stopped complaining and asking only for their own songs. Now they’re willing to at least listen to what’s on the radio, so I’m like, “Okay, let’s discover new music.” I mean, the only reason I love the Gap Band and the Ohio Players is because my parents played them.

When the girls were little I always said goodnight to them [Our World] series, like good night new york city, good night arizona…They were everywhere. I loved getting the different variations. good night georgia Then I told my daughter it was about me. Alongside the original, it was a great tool for putting them to sleep Winnie the Pooh This book is all about old words, so you can understand it in 2 seconds. It’s perfect.