Director James Bobin has worked with all kinds of comedy greats, from Sacha Baron Cohen in Da Ali G Show to Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement in Flight of the Conchords, and now he’s returned to direct the Muppets once again in Muppets Most Wanted. Nerdist spoke with Bobin at the premiere of the new movie and asked what it was like for the director to work with the Muppets again. “It was really fun,” he said. “It was like seeing old friends again. It was really great, I loved it. I mean, I’m a fan of them growing up so working with them the first time was a joy, and this time was even better.”

Does Bobin feel like working on Flight of the Conchords prepared him to take on the Muppets? “Yes! It literally did because Bret and Jemaine are like two innocent kids, like, slightly nerdy weirdos, and the Muppets are similar people, so yes.” Bobin went on to say, “[I]f you look closely in this movie you might see Jemaine in there somewhere. And of course Bret writes all the music so they’re always in my life. So I always try and keep them around somewhere, because they’re such good guys.”

Bobin has the follow up to Disney’s Alice In Wonderland, Through the Looking Glass, coming up next, but does he think he’ll work with the Muppets again? “Who knows? We’ll see how this one does first, but, yeah, I hope so. I think this movie tees it up very well. I think this movie says you can do anything with Muppets and it’s kind of, they can go anywhere, and you know, they’re really fun and this movie is just bigger and brighter than the last one, so I think, hopefully.”

Muppets Most Wanted hits theaters today.