CMU School of Drama


Friday, April 13, 2012

Bender, Batman, and Dr. Zoidberg come together for one documentary, I Know That Voice


io9.com: For the upcoming documentary I Know That Voice , the voices of our most beloved cartoon characters are finally stepping out of the sound booth to show you what their career is really like.

5 comments:

Pia Marchetti said...

I wish I had the skills to be a voice actor. I think its an amazing craft. Seeing these actors speak as their characters is so bizarre because I so deeply associate their voices with their cartoon counterparts - I've forgotten that the characters are even voiced by human beings.
As a fan of Futurama and Spongebob Squarepants and someone who is generally interested in voice acting, I really want to see this movie. I'm looking forward to it!

Luke Foco said...

This is going to be a great documentary. I love watching or listening to the commentaries on DVD's of Futurama and Family Guy to hear how these characters came about and the process in the animated television world. I appreciate also the level of time and detail that is put into modern video game soundscapes and their voice over components so that will also be an interesting piece to the puzzle.

Matt said...

First question: where's Mark Hamill? Too often the debate arises which is better: Heath Ledger's Joker vs. Jack Nicholson's and, Ceasar Romero's? Marh Hamill, as a voice helped define and immortalized the character. (You could also ask where's Arleen Sorkin, actress who voiced and immortalized Harley Quinn.)

Second question: with the accepted of the above Mark Hamill, who made it before turning to voice work, do you want to see what the man behind the curtain really looks like? Oz is more powerful before the gang exposes him.

Cartoons, and now video games, introduce such powerful and inspiring characters to see their human counterparts limits that power. These characters are surrel, they exist in their own world. Humans and cartoons shouldn't exist, it's like the end of Coolworld when you see Kim Basinger in real life; it's not the same.

AbigailNover said...

This looks fantastic and I can't wait to see this movie. I am an avid fan of Futurama and I have looked up a bunch of the voice actors before out of curiosity. I was really tentative that after watching them on youtube I would forever see their true faces when watching the cartoon, however it had a weird opposite effect. I just see cartoon characters when I watch the actors. It's really incredible to see someone who just likes like a normal person suddenly speak in the voice of their character. I was also really interested in the element of musicality of the voice. I'd be interested to hear some further analysis of that especially of the process in developing the rhythm.

A. Surasky said...

I think it's really fantastic that a documentary is getting put together to highlight all these voice actors who we, as audience members, don't get to know much about, but really have a wide breadth of skills, and are really at the very core of what we love about many of the animated characters that we get to watch on TV. As Pia noted, it's often so strange to hear these characters that many of us have grown up with come out of the mouths of real human beings because these actors (along with the animation teams who help create the world and the characters) do such a good job getting into character. I find it interesting to see that the video game industry has become what many of these voice actors are turning to for work, and how even in the trailer, it's clear that it's a bit different in terms of working in that medium than others in the past for these actors. Overall, I think this would be a really interesting documentary to watch, and I look forward to hopefully seeing it!