00:00I play Claudia.
00:02I play Misa Hayase.
00:03Claudia drives the boat.
00:05Excellent woman of power.
00:07Oh, and she's a little sassy.
00:08She's very into her work.
00:09Because in the Japanese, the same voice actress does Claudia and the narrator, I do both.
00:17She really cares about her friends, and she really cares about her co-workers, and she
00:22really cares about somebody else.
00:24What I knew about Macross was basically that it was one of the original shows that Robo
00:29Tech was based off of.
00:31I had never heard of it.
00:32I remember watching Robo Tech, and I actually had a Lisa Hayes doll.
00:36So I looked it up on the internet and discovered that I had been living under a rock, apparently,
00:42because it was everywhere.
00:43I didn't remember a lot of it because, you know, being that young and trying to remember,
00:48do I remember seeing this on television?
00:50No, not really.
00:51So for me, it was coming into almost a brand new show.
00:55And it's huge.
00:57Very, very huge.
00:57You know, I've done a lot of work for Matt Greenfield over the years, and anybody who
01:02knows what I've done over the past eight or nine years knows that fighter pilot's kind
01:08of my thing.
01:09So Matt didn't audition me.
01:10He just said, come on and do this.
01:13I was actually at a convention in Las Vegas, and I got a call from Paul, who does our scheduling,
01:20and he said, you know, I need you to come in as soon as you get back from Vegas.
01:24We came straight to ADV, and I was handed this piece of paper by Matt.
01:28And he's like, okay, well, you're going to read this, and it's for Macross, and you're
01:32going to be this, you know, strong voice.
01:34And I was like, what am I doing?
01:36I have no idea.
01:37And he said, oh, you're playing Misa Hayase at Macross.
01:40And I was like, great.
01:43It is really cool.
01:44I mean, you definitely know when you're recording that you're doing something important.
01:49And then he explained to me, okay, well, this is the show that Robotech came from.
01:52And I was like, oh, well, I'm very familiar with Robotech.
01:55And then when I put two and two together and realized that, oh, Misa's lit.
01:59Oh, probably what made him think of me from Misa, we did a show a few years back called
02:05Razafon, and I played a character named Harika Shto.
02:09And I can see a lot of equivalences in Harika and Misa.
02:14There's this caring and tenderness towards a certain someone, but on the same side, this
02:20wall, this kind of exterior, this harsh exterior that they've built because they are women of
02:26power.
02:26I was in a rock band for a lot of my college years and out of college, and I just
02:34kind
02:34of had a rock and roll feel to me.
02:38And I like barking orders.
02:41You know, that's where my strengths are, and that's where my voice is deeper, and I can
02:44get very loud and aggressive and powerful.
02:47It's the girly shows I'm not so good at.
02:50I want her to have a pride about her.
02:52And so when I go into the booth, it's always standing up very straight and having this booming
02:58voice.
02:59However, when she's just being Misa, and she's talking to Claudia, or she's talking to Hikaru,
03:04or whoever, it's kind of a more introverted stance.
03:09I kind of bring my shoulders in and kind of bring it all inward, because she is kind of
03:14a shy little girl on the inside.
03:16There's little changes in the voice.
03:18You'll notice when she's barking orders, she's very serious and very harsh.
03:22But when she's just having a conversation with someone, she's a little more careful about
03:28the words she uses.
03:29She's a little more careful about not hurting anyone's feelings or making sure that she's
03:35saying things the way that they're meant to be said.
03:38For me, the first time was the hardest, the first couple of volumes, because all she did
03:43really was bark orders.
03:45It was just brah, brah, brah, brah, brah, and fighting with Hikaru and all this.
03:49Once we got to the point where her wall started to come down and you saw the true Misa, for
03:54me, that's when I really, as an actor, started getting really excited and thinking, okay,
03:58well now I have to find this whole other aspect to this character.
04:02I'm hoping when people watch it, they don't, I don't want that to come across as, oh, well
04:07that's where she changed her voice or whatever to make her seem more demure.
04:11But it's more of, I hope that when they see her, they see an entire person, a multifaceted
04:17person and not just a character that barks orders or does this or does that.
04:21She's just such a multifaceted character.
04:24The more challenging aspect isn't Claudia.
04:26It's the narration because there's so much of it and it goes on for so long.
04:32I've found that it's easier to do if I haven't really read it very closely.
04:38If I'm just going with what I see immediately.
04:44And the very first narration we did, we kind of set a bar really high with a lot of energy
04:51and very much movie guy, you know, very much like action film narration.
04:57I've kind of had to keep it at that level.
04:59I remember the first time I recorded, I didn't know there was so much narration
05:02and I really pushed on the first one and that said, okay, now there's about 20 more.
05:07Just like that.
05:10Well, I didn't pace myself quite well enough.
05:12But so the narration is the biggest challenge.
05:14It is kind of campy in a lot of respects.
05:19And the way to play camp is to play it completely seriously and just completely serious.
05:25This is the most grave thing that's ever happened.
05:28And the more seriousness you put into it, the campier it sounds.
05:33So that's kind of how I've approached the narration.
05:36When you stand up straight, you have a different type of voice than you would, you know,
05:40if you're kind of curled over and bent over, it kind of helps you feel what the character's feeling.
05:47For example, when I did Noir, you know, I played a character named Kiriko who was this quiet assassin,
05:53but she, you know, fought.
05:54She could kill anyone in a moment's notice when I was doing Foley,
05:59because basically the sounds when she moves around or whatever.
06:02That's basically all she did.
06:03She didn't talk a whole lot.
06:05I found it much easier if I actually kind of ducked when she ducked or, you know,
06:11kind of moved the way she moved because it sounds more natural.
06:14When I'm having a sword fight, I'm having a sword fight.
06:17You have to.
06:18It doesn't sound real unless you do.
06:20If I just stand here and go, uh, uh, uh, you know, it just kind of sounds kind of stupid.
06:26But if I'm actually moving as the character moves, it makes a huge difference.
06:29If I'm being punched or kicked or I'm swinging a sword or firing a gun,
06:33I do all the gestures.
06:36I do everything.
06:37Sometimes I have a pencil and I fight with that, um, move around.
06:40If I have to run, I run.
06:42I think that carries over with emotions.
06:44If you have a character that's very proud and you bring everything from your chest,
06:48it really makes a difference in the way the character sounds.
06:52Whereas if you have someone that's shy or introverted, they're a little more quiet.
06:56Um, the good thing about Misa is I get to do both.
06:59She gets to be this, you know, loud and strong female and then five seconds later,
07:05she's protecting her heart and she's kind of introverted and quiet.
07:09And it does make a huge difference.
07:11And I think a lot of people would be surprised if they came in and watched
07:14because you don't expect that.
07:16We move like crazy people jumping up and down.
07:20The trick is you can't move your head.
07:24It's a small booth, microphone here, very limited range.
07:28You've got a cone that you have to stay in.
07:30So you're doing all this stuff with your head still where it should be.
07:33I've been doing this for seven years now.
07:37I'm ancient.
07:39I guess I'm considered one of the veterans because I've been doing it since 1998.
07:45Back when I first started, dubbing wasn't cool.
07:49In fact, we got a lot of hostility toward the dub tracks.
07:54And since then it's changed entirely.
07:56Now it's become a very accepted way to watch anime.
08:01Jason Douglas, one of the other voice actors here, and I were friends.
08:05We had been doing theater together forever.
08:07And he basically said, you know, you need to think about doing this.
08:10I was like, oh no, I've never done anything professional like that before.
08:13No, I can't do it.
08:14I was in a theater group with Amanda Nguyen and Brett Weaver,
08:18old names that anime fans will know.
08:21And they were doing, working at ADV.
08:24So I said, well, I'm a working actor and I need to have work and they pay.
08:28So I'm going to submit an audition.
08:31And it just so happened they were having open auditions that weekend.
08:33I went and it just kind of happened.
08:36I sent in my voice tape and heard nothing.
08:40At all.
08:41About six months later I sent in another one.
08:43Nothing.
08:44So about three months later I sent in another one.
08:48And then waited and waited and waited.
08:50And I guess about a month later, Matt Greenfield called me and said he'd found my first voice tape in
08:56a filing cabinet that he was cleaning out.
08:59And he listened to it and there was a song on the back of it.
09:04And he was gearing up to do Bubblegum Crisis.
09:07And the song was a rock and roll song.
09:10And the character that I ultimately auditioned for in Bubblegum is in a rock band.
09:15You know, I didn't expect to do it.
09:18I just kind of fell into it.
09:19But now this is what I do.
09:22This is my job and this is my career.
09:23And I absolutely do it.
09:25I love it.
09:26You know what's most rewarding about being a voiceover actor?
09:30There are days when you just don't feel like looking that good.
09:35And when you're an actor on camera, you can't have those days.
09:41And being a voiceover artist, I can work regularly and not have to look good.
09:50For me, probably the most rewarding part is being able to dig a character that, yes, someone else has already
09:56done.
09:57But at the same time, being able to put your spin on things.
10:01It's kind of like a puzzle.
10:02It's saying, okay, well, I don't want to stray too far from what the Japanese have done.
10:06But at the same time, I have to make this character my own, my own person.
10:09What's rewarding is at the end of the day when it's all over, when you get to the end of
10:13the series or the end of the episode or whatnot, and you feel that character, you can kind of sense
10:20the emotions and the feelings of that character.
10:23That's kind of when I know that, okay, I've done my job.
10:27I've done what I needed to do.
10:28And especially at the end of the show when you have to let that character go.
10:33And it hurts.
10:34It's actually kind of painful.
10:35It's like giving away a little part of yourself.
10:37You know, to me, it may sound sad, but that's the rewarding part.
10:42It's like, you know, I actually put so much of myself into it that at the end of the day,
10:47it was painful to let it go.
10:48My number one goal when I go into a recording session is to have fun.
10:53Actually, it is.
10:54I've been doing this a very, very long time.
10:56And I've done over a hundred shows.
11:00And if you're having fun, if you're really getting into the artistic side of the work,
11:07it sounds so much better.
11:10How this show was never dubbed, you know, I know there was Robotech, but how this show, Macross, on its
11:15own was never dubbed, I don't see how that was possible.
11:17And then to be taken as part of this new cast, working with Mari, who I have utmost respect for
11:25as a, as a say you, as an actress, as a singer, it's just beyond your wildest dreams.
11:32I had actually met Mari before, and we became friends.
11:35So when I first, I didn't even know she was coming in to do Macross, and I came into the
11:40lobby and saw her there, and she's like, oh, Christine!
11:43It's kind of like, you know, seeing a rock band and being a fan of the rock band, and then
11:48one day you're in the rock band, and it's kind of bizarre.
11:51Anime has become this huge thing, both in Japan and here in the States, and to go back to what
11:58made it what it is today, the one show that kind of helped create the anime that we know and
12:03love today, to be a part of that is just, it's beyond my wildest dreams.
12:08It's awesome.
12:08It's awesome.
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