I had the best time ever when I recorded Super Robot Monkey Team Hyper Force Go.
I got there a few minutes ahead of my call, because it’s the first time I’ve ever worked for Walt Disney Feature Animation, and there was a ton of paperwork to fill out.
Filling out the forms was a challenge, because I kept losing my focus when I’d hear the voice of Brain, as in “Pinky and the” come out of the guy sitting across from me. Then there was the jaw-droopingly beautiful Tia Carrere, who positively floated into the lobby to work on Lilo and Stitch.
The fact is, the lobby at that studio was filled with a “who’s who” of voice talent, and I was just stunned that I got to be around them.
I got my forms filled out, signed in for the session, and sat there, breathing deeply and repeating to myself, over and over again, “Don’t go fanboy. Don’t go fanboy. Don’t go fanboy. Don’t go fanboy.”
By the time I was called into my session, I was (more or less) calmed down. Well, as calm as one would expect, given the circumstances.
I walked down a long hallway, and into the recording studio. It looked just like you’d expect: Two engineers sat at a huge desk covered with dials and faders, a producer sat on a small couch, and another producer sat near him at a table covered with pages from the script, character drawings, and a sweating can of Diet Coke. The whole room is dominated by a large glass window that looks into the sound booth, which is empty except for a music stand, headphones, and microphone.
When I walked in, I shook hands with the producers, who introduced me to the actor who had just finished. You wouldn’t know his name, but you’d sure know his voice! He said to me, “It’s great to meet you! I’ve been seeing your name all over town.”
“In a good way?” I said.
“Yeah! You’re on voice sheets all over the place. What have you been working on?”
“Well, I’m Aqualad on Teen Titans . . . ”
He snapped his fingers. “Yes! That’s it! I was just over there. Man, they love you!”
I had to bite down on my lip to prevent a Howard Dean Scream from escaping. I smiled, and hoped nobody noticed my trembling hands.
“That is so cool!”
One of the producers said, “Did you see the Master of Games episode that was just on?”
“Oh, you mean the one where Aqualad gets punked by Speedy?” I said with a laugh. “No, I was out at a show the night it was on. But I think they’re sending me a tape.”
He laughed along with me. “That was my episode.”
Uh-oh. Did I just piss him off?
I tried to save it with a joke. “Why you gotta be hating on Aqualad?”
“It was part of setting up Speedy,” he said, “but I tried to make Aqualad as scary and tough and cool as possible.”
“Rock.” I said, and threw a little, mini-goat by my waist. I noticed that my pinky was still shaking, so I put it down quickly.
“Well, I’ve got to get out of here,” the actor said. “It was great to meet you!”
“You too,” I said.
The producer called me over to his table, and showed me the character sketches. He gave me a run down on the show, and then he said, “I really like your voice, so just do whatever you want to do with this.”
“Really? Cool!!”
“Yeah. When Disney asked me who I wanted to play this role, I told them to get you, because I knew you as Aqualad.”
This is where I would have done a backflip, just like Todd Bridges on Diff’rent Strokes, if I was able to do that sort of thing. See, until he said that, I didn’t know why I’d gotten this job. I thought it may have been because I used to be on Star Trek, or because I was a minor celebrity, or something like that. Those are okay reasons to get a job, I guess, but he just told me that I earned this job because of my work on Teen Titans,and that’s the greatest feeling in the world.
“Gosh, thanks, man. That’s so cool! I hope I don’t disappoint you.”
The session director, a young woman who immediately puts me at ease, tells me that they’re ready, so I walk into the booth.
When the door closes behind me, it’s like I’m standing in the Cone of Silence. The only sound I hear besides the ringing in my ears is the excited pounding in my heart. On the other side of the glass, I watch the director press a button on top of what looks like a garage door opener. Her mouth moves as she looks at her script. A moment passes, and she looks up at me, expectantly.
I realize that, in my excitement, I’ve forgotten to put on my headphones. Whoops.
“I guess I can hear you better with these on,” I say with a laugh, and they laugh back.
The producer and director talk a little bit about the character, and give me incredible creative freedom to play around with different voices.
This is the most amazing thing in the world. I can feel their confidence in me, and it creates twice as much confidence in myself. I feel like I can do no wrong, so I clench my hands into fists, grit my teeth, tense up my whole body, and deliver some lines into the mic in this voice that I think sounds kind of cool.
“Hold on, Wil.” She says, and turns to the producer. Her thumb slips off the “talk” button, and all now I can see them talking, but I can’t hear a thing they’re saying. Judging by their body language, they’re happy. There’s a lot of nodding and smiling.
Wow. This rules!
I watch as the director nods vigorously, and thumbs the “talk” button. “That’s fantastic, Wil,” she says, “Let’s record this.”
What? I hit it on my first try? Really?! Cool!
This is the same thing that happens when I work on Titans: all the people involved, from the producers to the director to the actors, are super supportive, and encourage a creative environment, so I feel comfortable taking huge risks and playing characters that I’d never try on my own. I know it probably seems like it would always be like this, and maybe it is in the voice over world, but for the past several years, the bulk of my on-camera “acting” has been in auditions where that supportive, creative environment simply doesn’t exist.
We roll tape, and start recording. After most of my lines, I watch through the glass as the producers and the director talk with each other. I can tell that they’re happy with what I’m doing, and my spirits just soar. I totally haven’t let them down, and a few times, the producer talks to me himself. “That’s just awesome, Wil,” he says, “That was really, really cool.”
Man, I wish I could do that backflip. This is really fun.
I only have 17 lines in this show, plus some crowd voices, a few random kids, and stuff like that, so I’m finished in less than an hour. When I take my headphones off, and step back into the Cone of Silence, I understand why so many people work so hard to make it into the voice acting world, and how lucky I am to be here.
When I walk out of the recording booth, one of the producers, who has been sitting on the far side of the room with a sketchpad, (either looking at character models to see if the voice I’m doing matches up, or sketching character models based on my voice — I’m not sure) jumps up and meets me at the door. He extends his hand, and tells me how much he liked what I did, and says, several times, “We’re going to have you back. We’re going to work with you again.”
I try to remain professional, but I can’t completely contain my enthusiasm. I tell them how much fun I had, and that I hope to come back for more shows in the future. They all assure me that I will.