FanX Flashback - Star Wars Voice Actors Panel Highlights (FanX 2023)

 

Beloved "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" voice actors James Arnold Taylor, Ashley Eckstein and Matt Lanter took the stage at FanX 2023, providing some fun moments for those in attendance. The panel was subject to a lot of topic restrictions, due to the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike, which was still in full swing at that time, which, in retrospect, just wasn't a whole lot of fun. However, the actors were able to express their gratitude to the fans, and JAT even got Matt to talk about "Timeless" for a second, which we loved.

Here are a few highlights from what was, all things considered, a fun little panel from last September:

Gratitude for fans:

James Arnold Taylor: [The responsibility of being a member of the "Star Wars" franchise is] not something that we take lightly. You know, there are so many amazing, talented voice actors involved in "Star Wars," from Jim Cummings – who’s here – to Corey Burton to Dee Bradley Baker, Tom Kane, Phil Lamar, Nika Futterman, on and on and on. Ashley Eckstein, Matt Lanter…

Ashley Eckstein: James Arnold Taylor!

JAT: Catherine Taber, uh… this guy, James Arnold Taylor. We don’t hold it lightly because we are huge "Star Wars" fans, and we are blessed to be a part of this. So, we’re just thrilled to be able to have you all come up to the table and say that and tell us your stories. We just thank you for that. [Audience cheers]

AE: And we know how much it means to you because it means that much to us, so thank you, thank you, thank you for all of your support. Thank you for sticking with us. [In the voice of Ahsoka Tano:] "You’re stuck with me, Sky Guy." [Audience cheers]

On the difference between live action and voice acting:

Matt Lanter: It's a whole different process: you're behind the microphone, your technique has to be pretty good or else you're not going to be heard very well, you have to bring out all the emotion [while] being kind of confined…

JAT: No looks, so Matt Lanter can’t rely on those hunky good looks. You can’t look into the camera because there's no camera – it's just a microphone! And then, you have to rely on being able to convey everything with just your voice. It is also, when you’re doing animation like "The Clone Wars," we did it just like this. We were in the round. We read together. We were in the room together. When you’re doing a video game, you’re alone in the studio. If you’re doing an animated feature film, you’re usually alone. So, each one of them has their own challenges. Each one is different. But you’re always, hopefully, conveying the right emotion and character and don’t get them confused. That would be bad.

AK: I will say – because we get this question a lot – a lot of people come up to us and they say, "How can I be a voice actor?" Well, voice acting is just acting, at its core, so I say, if you want to get into voice acting, get into acting. I started in theater, and then I actually went to film and television, and then I went into voiceover. So, the techniques are different, you know, like Matt said, but, at its core, it’s all acting.

ML: Yeah, just using different tools to bring a character to life. And, you know, there’s just different… You’re hindered by some things in live action, and the opposite goes for VO – but it’s all acting. You’re right.

Matt Lanter talks about "Timeless":

JAT: You’ve done a lot of time travel. What was your favorite episode? What was your favorite era?

ML: If I had been on a show where we time-travelled…

JAT: You were on a show where you time-travelled!

ML: We can talk about it, right? It’s done. It’s over.

JAT: Oh, I get it.

ML: …The whole "strike" thing…

JAT: [As Obi-Wan Kenobi] "You didn’t hear this." [Audience laughs]

ML: I had a lot of really fun episodes. I liked… We had a Nazi Germany episode that I thought was really fun. It was a great episode. My character was… That sounds really weird, I know: "The Nazi Germany episode was fun." My character got to fan-boy over Ian Fleming. […] But that was a fun episode for me. And also, behind the scenes – as a cast, as a crew – we just started to have a lot of fun in that episode, so it stands out for me.

*****

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Until next time.

FanX 22: Disney's Jodi Benson gives advice to future "Little Mermaid" stars

Disney legend Jodi Benson - best known for her role as Ariel in the 1989 animated classic "The Little Mermaid" - held a Q&A panel at FanX Salt Lake Comic Convention last weekend. Throughout the 45-minute session, Benson reminisced on her career as a voice actress and even treated fans in attendance to a full performance of "Part of Your World."

One of the highlights of the panel came when a school teacher asked Benson what advice she would give to the young girl who will be playing Ariel in their upcoming production of "The Little Mermaid." Here's what Benson had to say:

Well, first of all, she needs to have fun, and she needs to be real and authentic and vulnerable. It’s not like you’re acting. Ariel just is. I mean, she’s just a regular 16-year-old girl who just wants something more. It’s a really sweet, sweet story, so I think as long as she’s just being real and doesn’t feel like she has to perform or act something out, it’s going to be beautiful. You need to fall in love with Ariel, right at the very first second and then root for her throughout the whole film, the whole stage show.

Benson also shared a humorous story about being offered the role of Barbie in "Toy Story 2."

[Panel moderator: They didn’t audition you for that particular role.]

No, and that was really weird because I’m only used to auditioning for things. No one’s ever called up and said, “Hey, do you want this job?” I mean, it just doesn’t happen in the theater world. After “Mermaid,” I got a call first from Don Bluth Studios, saying, “Hey, do you want to do ‘Thumbellina’ with Barry Mannilow?” And I’m like, “Well, yeah! Sure, but do you want me to come in and audition?” They’re like, “Nah, you’re good! It’s good. You’re great.” […] And then [the opportunity] came up for Barbie in “Toy Story” [and] I got a call from Pixar, going, “We’d like you to come in and record the voice of Barbie in ‘Toy Story 2.’” I was like, “Great! I’ll be ready for an audition. Do you have some words or lines?” [Pixar said], “Nah, we’re good. We know Barbie’s in there somewhere. We saw Ariel, we loved you, and she lives in there. We’ll figure her out.”

So we played with a box of Barbies – the producer and the directors literally played with a box of Barbies – and we started to talk to each other. They were talking to me. They looked really silly, as grown men going [imitates high-pitched voice] “Hi! How are you?” […] We did this Barbie thing and then kind of came up with it and started to record it. I had to physically act it out – because I’m a theater person, I had to act everything out, physically, which is very strange in a studio.

[…] Mattel was there, and this was a big deal because Barbie had never had a voice before, so [they were] explaining this to me and I’m like, “Excuse me, but I actually did the voice of Barbie in a workout Claymation video in 1988 or ’89.” You could see the executive looking at me and [imitates nervous laughter] “I knew that!” I didn’t want to embarrass her, but I just said, “Actually, you know, I did give Barbie a voice. I don’t know – do you want that voice for Barbie?” She said, “No, we’ll discover a new voice.” …It’s the same voice from the video. [Audience laughs] If you put them side by side, you’d be like, “Yep, that’s Jodi.”

Barbie was super fun. She was supposed to be in the original, but Mattel was like, “No, we’re not going to have Barbie in an animated cartoon.” And then they saw how well it did, financially. [Audience laughs] “Toy Story” was a big old hit, and then Mattel was like, “Hey! What’s it look like for ‘Toy Story 2’? Maybe Barbie can come back. Is she invited back?”

Money talks. Money talks.

One final note of interest from the panel was that Benson said she is not going to have a cameo in the upcoming live-action "Little Mermaid" remake but that she is helping with press and publicity for the new film to help the movie succeed.

*****

Did you attend FanX this year? Did you have a favorite moment from a panel or a celebrity interaction that you enjoyed? Let us know in the comments section, on Twitter (here and here) or on Facebook.

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#FanX17: Jennifer Hale discusses her voice-acting career

Salt Lake Comic Con FanX 2017 guest Jennifer Hale has been acting and voice-acting for nearly 30 years. Her staggering 348 IMDb credits date back to 1988 and include an impressive blend of television, film and video games. She is perhaps most widely recognized for lending her voice to the female version of Commander Shepard in the "Mass Effect" video game franchise, but has also acted as superheroes (in animated incarnations of "X-Men" and Marvel's Avengers, and as Captain Marvel in "Disney Infinity"), as princesses (she's been Cinderella quite a few times), as characters in "Halo" and "Star Wars" video games and - my personal favorite - as the dimension-hopping scientist Rosalind Lutece in "Bioshock Infinite," to name just a few of her many roles.

Hale brought her proverbial bag of tricks to Salt Lake City last weekend, where she appeared on several panels, including the fan-favorite "Twisted Toonz" panel, which you can watch in its entirety at the bottom of this post. But before all the craziness of the convention began, she appeared at the opening press conference, where I had a chance to chat with her about her career.

SotT: All right, Jennifer, tell me a little bit about your career and, also, have you ever been to Utah before?

JH: “This is my first time to Utah. It’s absolutely beautiful. I love it.”

SotT: It’s good weather this week. You picked a good week to come.

JH: “Oh, my gosh. Completely lucky. I love it. I’m primarily known for cartoons, video games, that kind of thing. I’ve been voice-acting for a long time. I’ve done, I think, around 190 video games now, and a lot of cartoon series. I don’t even know how many, but that’s what I do.”

SotT: What was the first voice that you ever did professionally? Do you remember the first job that you got?

JH: “Yes! The first job I got was at a production house called Babble Studios. It was a commercial… I don’t remember what it was for, but I was [in distinct voice] doing a valley girl, because that’s what I could do at the time…”

[INTERVIEW IS INTERRUPTED BY VOICE OVER PA SYSTEM]

SotT: Do you have a favorite voice or a go-to voice that you always do?

JH: “I don’t have a go-to. I have, like, a million things that I like to do. My favorite thing is to mix it up. [Deepens voice] I like to be everything from a superhero [changes to high-pitched voice] to a psycho! [Laughs]”

SotT: When did you realize that you could do different voices? Was that at a young age or was it when you were a little bit older?

JH: “No, I really didn’t think about it, honestly. I was working in a video production house… [A radio station] asked me to come next door to an audio studio and do a radio commercial, and I … didn’t even know you could get paid for that, and that blew my mind. Then I was fortunate enough, when I moved to L.A., my first job was a cartoon series, and I jumped in and learned from the best!”

SotT: What is one voice that you’ve never done that you’d like to do? Like, a dream role?

JH: “Anything Jess Harnell does. [Laughs]”

SotT: Good answer. Good answer.

#SLCC15 Flashback: Dee Bradley Baker

Last, but certainly not least, in SotT Underground's three-part series of #SLCC15 Flashbacks is this short interview with Dee Bradley Baker, whose 415 IMDb credits include work as Perry the Platypus on "Phineas and Ferb"; more than a few several characters in the animated DC Comics universe; and the gigantic talking statue, Olmec, on "Legends of the Hidden Temple," to name just a small handful.

As this interview immediately followed the chat with the "Animaniacs" crew, it will be presented in a similar question-and-answer format, as follows:

--

SotT: Well, I just found out that Rob [Paulsen] wants all of your jobs…

DBB: “Oh, he can have them. I’m tired of this. I’m going to go be a CPA. I need to break out of this job.”

SotT: Well, we’re glad to have you here.

DBB: “I’m very happy to be here.”

SotT: What is one of your favorite things about doing conventions like this?

DBB: “The best thing about conventions, to me, is how inclusive and accepting the entire tone is. Everybody can be into their own weird thing, as far as they want to be into it, and everyone’s ok with that, no matter if you’re a superhero or a monster or something from a comicbook – or from anything – and I just wish that all of humanity operated like that… that everyone could be who they are and to be into their own weird stuff and just let everyone else do their own thing. I think that’s… that’s what human beings should be doing, so that’s why I love comic cons.”

SotT: Two questions for you: first of all, which of your characters that you’ve done did you enjoy doing that most, if you had to pick one, right? And also, same question I asked [the “Animaniacs” actors], if you could do any other character that you haven’t previously done a voice for, who would it be?

DBB: “It’s hard to choose, from amongst my children, a favorite, but I love doing Momo and Appa in the [‘Avatar: The Last Airbender’] series and the clones in [‘Star Wars’] ‘The Clone Wars,’ in particular. … Klaus [of ‘American Dad!’] is a lot of fun. Cinnamon Bun is just such an insane character on ‘Adventure Time.’ It’s hard to narrow that all down. I just like them all so much. To be … a character I’ve never done, I would love to be the Riddler [from ‘Batman’]. I think that… I could lock into the Riddler and give a great Riddler.”

SotT: All right. Well, that would be good. I'd be down for that.

--

For more information about Salt Lake Comic Con or to purchase tickets to an upcoming event, visit saltlakecomiccon.com.

#SLCC15 Flashback: A-Town vs the Animaniacs

In part two of the three-part, overly belated series to wrap up interview blogs from Salt Lake Comic Con 2015, I had the awesome opportunity to spend three minutes (yes, just three since the people in front of me took like 10 minutes each) with the voices behind the Animaniacs at the SLCC15 press conference in September. Not only are Rob Paulsen (Yakko), Jess Harnell (Wakko) and Tress MacNeille (Dot) supremely talented, they're also supremely nice, and I was thrilled to be able to get any time with them at all, to be honest, as these voice actors - and Harnell, in particular - have become a must-see (must-hear?) attraction at the past few Salt Lake Comic Con events. This was a cool interview for me, considering the fact that the Warner Brothers (and sister) taught me all I ever needed to know about U.S. capitals, presidents and all the words in the English language. (In retrospect, I'm not sure I truly realized in my young age how amazingly brilliant those songs were!)

In order to replicate the most authentic experience possible, instead of summarizing our conversation, journalism style, I've decided to transcribe it all and just post it like it happened. Enjoy!

--

SotT: Well, first of all, welcome back to you two [Jess Harnell and Rob Paulsen]…

Jess: “Thank you, pal. It’s good to be back.”

Rob: “Thank you. It’s good to be here.”

SotT: So, I was just wondering if you guys could talk about the last convention that you did here – I was working with the [Salt Lake Comic Con] staff at the time… I don’t know if anybody expected your panel to be as successful and popular as it was…

Rob: “Oh my [goodness]!”

Jess: “Was that crazy?”

SotT: It was crazy!

Rob: “It freaked us out!”

Tress MacNeille: “The panel, or the…?”

Jess and Rob: “The movie read.”

Jess: “Oh, Tress wasn’t there. It was a rock concert.” [See this full panel here!]

SotT: Yeah, it was amazing!

Tress: “Now, who was in that one?”

Jess: “Me, Rob and Jim [Cummings]. That was it.”

Rob: “Yeah, it was just Jimmy Cummings, Jess and me.”

Tress: “Just the three? Well, that’s all you need, really.”

SotT: It was crazy! And, you know, immediately, I went back to the site office and they were saying, “We have to get these guys back and we have to bring more of them.”

Jess: “Right! We got Tress MacNeille and Dee Bradley Baker, so I think we traded up.”

SotT: Yeah! So we’re excited to have you guys back. [To Tress] Is this your first time in Salt Lake City or have you been here before?

Tress: “Rob, Jess and I came here many years ago to the Warner Brothers tour, when we were touring the country… That was quite a few years ago. Yeah.”

SotT: Ok. Well, welcome back.

Tress: “Thank you. It’s beautiful here!”

Jess: “Love it.”

Tress: “I [had] friends who live in Park City, for a while. They’ve since moved … but I’m a little familiar with the state.”

Rob: “It is a really beautiful city.”

Jess: “Yeah, it’s beautiful.”

Rob: “…but everybody here connected with the convention – and I’m repeating myself – but everybody is just ‘top shelf.’ The whole organization is run so beautifully…”

Jess: “Yeah, it’s run beautifully.”

Rob: “…and we do a lot of these things – and I know, having [gotten to know] these organizers – the minutia and the logistics of running something like this…

Jess: “Oh my gosh.”

Rob: “…is freaking insane! So, to have it run so smoothly, where people show up, they meet you at the airport…”

Tress: “Yeah, I can’t even imagine the logistics!”

Rob: “…you walk out a door and two feet… there’s a car and you go and you’re checked in and your room is great and you show up… I mean, it’s fantastic. And the fans are out of their minds with excitement! Such a joy to be here!”

SotT: Well, we love you guys!

Rob: “Thank you! It shows!”

Jess: “We love you right back.”

Rob: “Right back at you!”

SotT: Thank you. One final question: if there was one character that you have not voiced yet that you would like to – like a dream character…

Rob: “Perry the Platypus! [Looks over at Dee Bradley Baker, who is sitting at the next table] Oh wait… [Rob and Tress laugh]”

SotT: Oh wait, hang on… he’s here! [Laughs]

Tress [in Irish accent]: “He’s sitting right there!”

Jess [in Irish accent]: “He’s right there.”

SotT: [To Dee] You better watch out for your job now! [All laugh]

Rob: “He wouldn’t have to worry.”

Tress: “You mean one that already exists or one that we would like to do?”

SotT: Either one. Either one. Just any character out there.

Tress: “Whose job do I want to steal?”

Rob: “You know, I got two call-backs for Fry on ‘Futurama’…”

Jess: “Oh yeah?”

Rob: “…which Billy West did, and they absolutely made the right choice. And, also, I got a call-back for Klaus the Fish on ‘American Dad’…”

Jess: “Didya?”

Rob: “…and Dee Bradley Baker is the voice of Klaus the Fish.”

Jess: “Once again!”

SotT: He got that one, too?!

Rob: “And, again, they made the right choice!”

Jess: “I could answer briefly by saying that I would love to at some point play either Batman or Superman, ‘cause how cool would that be? And I’d also really love to do Winnie-the-Pooh because my dear friend Jim Cummings, he does Winnie-the-Pooh and, like, girls lose their minds and I call him ‘Pooh Hefner’ when he does that, so I’d like to do Winnie-the-Pooh.”

SotT: How about you, Tress?

Tress: “You know what? I do all the girls’ voices, so…”

Jess: “She does! That’s true! All of them.”

Tress: “So you know, I can’t really, you know…”

Jess: “She’s covering all the bases.”

Tress: "I'm good."

--

Here is the nearly two-hour script read put on by SLCC15's incredible assortment of voice actors, which I missed because I was doing the LOST panel at the time. Enjoy it in its entirety below:

For more information about Salt Lake Comic Con or to purchase tickets to an upcoming event, visit saltlakecomiccon.com.