Hi, I'm Moose, and at New York Comic Con,
I had the privilege of sitting down
with one of my all time favorite voice actors.
The one and only Phil Lamar. From 'Static'
to John Stewart, Hermes Conrad to Samurai
Jack, Phil has played some of the most hilarious
and heroic characters across TV, film,
and video games.
Why couldn't you do those names in alphabetical order, mon?
That would have been much better.
I began by asking him about how he got his start in showbiz
and why he made the switch to voice acting.
I did my first cartoon, actually, in high school,
Mr. T?
Yeah. Which was just a weird one
off type of thing
and I never realized then,
or at any point, that I would come back around
to cartoons again.
But weirdly enough, that's where my career started
and that's where the heart of it lives now.
While we were doing 'Mad TV' we'd would do claymation pieces
and that's why I was really getting my mic
time, you know.
And then after 'Mad TV' I had a little more
time, and I began to actively focus
on doing more voice work
and it just started to click.
You know I started getting, you know, I got
'Weekenders,' 'Futurama,' you know these
things. And not only was I getting steady work
I was getting great shows
with fantastic writers
and producers and fellow actors.
I mean, the first few shows I did.
I was working with
Grey DeLisle, Jason Marsden, Kat Soucie,
Billy West...
It was the best way to start,
it's like, "oh I see how to do it at
an incredibly high level
and that's what I'm going to aim for."
after finding his voice in minor roles, Phil's career took off after playing
two of the most important superheroes of the modern
era, in a time where Black superheroes were
nowhere near as visible as they are today.
Phil helped bring to life two characters who paved the way
for a new era of representation: Static,
and the Green Lantern, Jon Stewart.
Working with Denis Cowan
and Alan Burnett
and Dwayne McDuffie on 'Static,'
all you knew is this was a great show.
We were dealing with topics,
but it wasn't the, you know, 'Diff'rent Strokes' very special
episode kind of things, just like, "this is a day in your life.
Some days are more heavier
than others" and they were able to capture that feel
in a Saturday morning cartoon, you know?
and the fact that it was the only African-American
superhero with his own show
was a happenstance.
I mean it wasn't like anybody was trying
to make that.
And in fact that one of the reasons the show didn't have a longer
life was because of the hurdles that it faced.
We didn't have any toys.
And of course Saturday morning is not about ratings.
It's not about quality.
It was about toys.
Yeah. And the fact that 'Static' wasn't
generating merchandising is the reason
they canceled.
Bro, if you think about these things too much, your head will explode.
Well and even with 'Justice League,' again, diversity was
not a buzz word.
But Bruce Timm looked at the Justice League he was putting together
and he was like "I don't want to see seven white guys
save the world every week," because to him,
from a creative standpoint, that's boring.
It wasn't as exciting. It didn't give him as many, as much
story to tell.
So again, it wasn't about politics,
it was about quality,
you know, excellence, like, "what is the best story we can tell?"
And also, I mean, I think the reason
that John Stewart resonates
with people is, again, because
they took that character places
that most legacy characters don't get to go.
And the fact that he wasn't burdened by
as many decades of continuity
and whatnot, and also people's expectations.
In brightest day, in blackest night,
no evil shall escape
my sight.
Let those who worship evil's might,
beware my power,
GREEN LANTERN'S LIGHT!
It's been years since Phil first stepped into these iconic
roles, but like a lot of his animated peers,
their performances have stuck
with fans far more than any live action actor.
What is it about the voice actors
that just make these characters so iconic
and make them last so much, and have such an impact on us?
I think it's twofold.
It's, one: people engage
with animation at a different level
than they do
with on camera stuff.
And I'm not exactly sure why,
but some of it is you come to it younger,
you know, when you're in this impressionable stage,
and you take it in,
just on a DNA level,
and you carry it with you for the rest of your life.
You know, there's also something about voices,
in particular
Sweet pyro of Cairo! That's true!
I remember the first episode of 'Scooby Doo' I ever
did. You know, I was playing just some, you know, guest
character,
but when Casey Kasem walked into the studio,
he got behind the mic,
and they said "Casey, can you say a couple of lines as Shaggy
just so we can get a sound level?"
He began to speak.
I can already taste those chocolate covered hot dogs!
And the hair on the back of my neck stood up.
And I was transported back to when I
was 8 years old with a bowl of cereal in front of the
TV, watching 'Scooby Doo.'
There's something about a voice, the quality of it,
like when you hear your mom's voice.
She doesn't sound the same now as she did when you were four, she's
aged. It's different,
but there is something in there
that your body on a chemical level responds
to her sound.
I always feel like
as a voice actor, I'm really at most a
third of the character, because without
the art and without the writing the
characters are not whole, you know?
And the fact is, 'Samurai Jack,' 'Justice
League,' 'Futurama,' those shows
in and of themselves are works of art the writing,
the design, all of that stuff comes together
and impacts you as a viewer.
Like, "this is amazing!"
Phil made his name in animation,
but in 2001, he made his mainstream videogame
debut, portraying the twisted terrorist Vamp
in 'Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty.'
I asked Phil what it was like stepping into Hideo
Kojima's extremely strange saga.
With 'Metal Gear,'
I had the benefit of having played
'Metal Gear Solid 1'
and loved it.
It's like, you remember trying
to, just like, "I'm just going to shoot my way out!"
No.
Iif you don't do the stealth, you're dead.
And I loved it. And the cinematics was so amazing, it was
unlike any game at the time,
with what Kojima was doing in terms of storytelling
and 'Metal Gear,' you couldn't just have
random people say the lines anymore, you know?
Like, "I'm going to get you!" It wasn't that,
it was so much more emotional,
and you know, it was complex.
So, I mean, I had the benefit of knowing how
the game worked so I could figure out
you know, oh this is a line that I'm saying,
you know, as an attack line.
I shudder to think what some, you know, older
actors who had never played a video game would have done
in the boots, like [BABBLING]
"What am I saying?"
But Chris Zimmerman was the voice director
and she is a genius.
So she was always able, I'm sure, to get, you know,
performances out of people, like, give them enough information
to get access whatever they needed to do it emotionally.
In 2016, videogame voice actors participated
in a highly publicized strike for fair pay
and better working conditions.
Phil was a vocal supporter of the strike so we talked
about some of the unique challenges performers face
in video games compared to cartoons.
The the main two challenges are
the work itself.
There's so much of it.
You know, when we talk about vocal stress
because again most video games are violent
and you have to do tons of death screams.
But even without the death,
to talk for four hours straight,
I mean, you ever gone out with your buddies to a bar?
You know, you get there,
you get there at 8:00, by 11:00 you've been talking
over the music and everything, you go out to your car,
how does your throat feel?
Not great.
Yeah, gosh, "I sound like this," that's just
talking.
You don't actually have to be, you know, killed
or electrocuted
or cut in half with a chainsaw.
So there is a much greater
amount of work,
you know, physically that's required, plus
also just culturally, because
you know, games come out of the tech world,
and initially there wasn't really a lot of
performance. It was programming
with a little bit of, you know, voices
or whatever sprinkled on top.
Remember, I'm the monkey and you're the cheese grater. So no messing around.
But now, it's become so much more cinematic.
And, they have become.
the largest growing sector of entertainment.
It is entertainment.
This is not just, you know,
programming.
So a lot of the people involved
in that world still don't get it.
They don't get the fact that you've evolved.
You're now an entertainment company, you know,
and you're depending on artists,
you know, for the work you create.
And they're depending on you for their livelihood.
You know, so, you know, a game sells
650 million dollars worth of
units or downloads in a weekend.
Doesn't it make sense to share
some of that with the people who helped you make it?
And I'm not just talking about the actors I'm talking about, you know,
the programmers and stuff who slaved for 20 hours
during crunch time to get it done.
But their culture is "No.
Only the people who own it get
to benefit from that success."
Which is weird and dumb.
From videogames to animation, voice actors are slowly
starting to earn more respect.
There's still one area of entertainment where they're still not
getting their due:
Big budget movies.
They think that, well, LeBron
James makes hundreds of millions
of dollars for the NBA
and Nike. He'll make hundreds of millions of dollars
for us, which doesn't make any
sense at all.
Why would somebody who is
a Cleveland Cavaliers fan
suddenly want to go watch your animated
feature just cause Lebron's in it?
It's like, "no, I like him when he makes jump shots,
I don't care what he says.
But,
part of it is, these things are so insanely
expensive that executives
need to justify their costs.
And so, when you have a list full of celebrities,
that makes it seem like a better bet.
And there are certainly some on-camera people
who are fantastic voice actors who bring humor
or a persona like Chris Rock.
You hire him,
you get this voice,
and you put that into a character,
It's something just makes that character a little bit more funny.
But then there are times when it's like, "OK dude,
nobody is paying to hear
Brad Pitt."
He's a great actor but...
How can I do anything else?
My friend.
Phil's solidarity with his fellow performers is no surprise.
Thanks to the unique nature of the biz, voice actors
have formed a supportive, tight knit community.
Because it really is a village.
The way that the work is done,
a lot of the time you're working
with the exact same people week in
and week out, sometimes day in
and day out, you know,
and you run into each other at the studios
and it's always been that way.
I mean it was just that same group of people doing all the work.
And that mentality has continued, it's,
you know, it's very close knit.
And if there's a part that, you know, somebody
sings in audition to me and I'm like "that's not really my wheelhouse,
But you know who would kill that? Rob Paulsen.
I would recommend him,
because there's not the competition that you find a lot in on camera.
Everybody feels like, one: there's enough work for everybody,
and two, if it's not meant for you,
you won't get it anyway.
You know I find that it is,
of all of the realms of entertainment I've worked in,
probably the most merit based, you know,
95 percent of the time, if I don't get a job,
when I hear the person who did? They're better than what I did.
Voice actors have never been more visible,
and the future of animation looks brighter than ever, thanks
to a new renaissance of talented creators dreaming
up amazing stories and compelling characters.
More people are aware of that work
and there's also a nostalgia factor, like
a generation that grew up watching cable
cartoons.
Those you know, 24 7
Nickelodeon are now adults
and they have this huge sweet spot in their
hearts for those cartoons.
And now, they know who those people
are. And because of the Internet, they have access
to us.
It's like, "I'm going to follow Rob Paulsen on Twitter
and tell him I loved Pinky."
People just feel a greater sense of connection to these
things from their childhood,
you know, and the real
twist has been in the last seven years,
I'd say, where it's not just nostalgia,
but also current animation,
like the new 'Voltron' on Netflix.
There are people who are as deep
in a fandom for that as there
are people who were watching
'Futurama' 15 years ago.
They care and they have access.
So I think that's been the shift in the change.
And for us, it's great because,
you know we're performing alone
in a dark room to
a microphone.
So it's sort of delayed applause,
you know for the performances.
We're in the middle of a second renaissance,
and it's interesting because it's not CGI.
It's not like, over the top action,
you know, toyetic mumbo jumbo where you have to sell vehicles and fortresses and stuff like that.
It's just quality animation--
That's hitting people where they, I mean, like, what
Rebecca Sugar's doing on Steven Universe.
She could start a religion,
because that show affects
people, like, on the deepest deepest level.
And they love it.
And that is just so wonderful to see,
you know, that she, once she was given a chance by
a major corporation, because
you know, a generation before, that would have been an independent
thing that people were passing around, tapes,
saying "hey, did you ever hear of this thing?"
But the fact she's got a major platform to do something that
authentic, you know, is, you're right,
that's that's what makes this time a really special time.
How'd you get so talented?
Don't focus so much on talent, Stephen.
A piece of art is a conversation.
Every choice you make is a statement
Be true to yourself, and people will appreciate your honesty.
your honesty.
Phil LaMarr was one of the coolest people I've ever
gotten to interview, and I want to thank him so much for taking
the time to talk with us.
He didn't even have anything specific to plug,
but if you're interested in his future projects, you should
check out 'Goblins Animated,' a Kickstarted
DnD-inspired animated series starring some of
the most beloved and talented voice actors in the entire
industry.