Stevie Vallance
A collection of projects by Stevie Vallance's production company.
Tooned In!
Adventures in Toonland Animation has never been so hot - the genre now has its own Oscar and stars make big bucks doing voiceovers. Could our own ALEXANDRA GILL make it in the business? As she discovered, it's all in the attitude.
By ALEXANDRA GILL, Saturday, December 8, 2001 - Page R1 VANCOUVER -
I am Phaeton, leader of the Neosapiens. I stand 8 feet 6 inches and weigh 400 pounds. Can't you feel the confidence radiating off my lumpy bald head as I prepare to announce, via interplanetary TV, that the Martian Commonwealth is about to declare war?
No? Neither does my director.
"You're mocking your power," says Stevie Vallance, cutting in through the headphones from the studio engineering room. "What I want you all to find," she says, turning to the rest of the class behind her, "is the part of you that can connect to the character. You are a powerful woman, Alex. I want you to feel like a powerful woman. Use your masculine energy."
Very good. We try again.
"Fellow Neosapiens," I bellow into the microphone.
"Slow it down," Vallance interjects. "I want you to see that cameraman in front of you and turn him into a worm. Then face the audience and just really mean it. Can you use your arms?"
Yes. I am strong. I can do this. Ha!
Cartoons, as anyone who has tuned into prime time in the last decade can tell you, aren't just for kids any more. Likewise, cartoon voices have come a long way since 1928, when Walt Disney cast himself as Mickey Mouse in Steamboat Willie, the first commercially released cartoon with sound. Today, the actors who voice the characters on The Simpsons earn $100,000 (U.S.) an episode. Celebrities such as Mike Myers and Cameron Diaz have helped propel computer-animated films like Shrek to the top of this year's box office. And now that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has deemed animated features worthy of their own Oscar -- the first will be handed out this March -- the 'toon boom, it appears, has finally come of age.
If, however, you are one of the countless wannabes hoping to break into this lucrative industry on the strength of that one great Groucho Marx impression you practise in the shower or on your kids -- be warned. The art of infusing life into these diabolical monsters and fuzzy little critters, as I quickly discovered during an intensive three-day 'toon workshop this month, is not nearly as easy as it sounds.
The most common misperception about being a 'toon, Vallance explains on the first day of class, is the belief that it's all about voice. "I have people come up to me all the time and say 'I have 100 voices.' I'm sure they do. But I bet they don't have 100 characters." Mel Blanc, the legendary radio actor who voiced most of Warner Bros.' classic Looney Tunes characters, did not create Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck and Sylvester by changing his voice, explains Vallance. He did it by changing his attitude.
"All these personalities are inside of you, just waiting for you to give them life," says Vallance. So if we're really serious about pursuing a cartoon career, she suggests we all rush out after this workshop and sign up for every acting, voice-over and improv class in town. "Or therapy."
We are an assorted group of seven, each having forked out $450 (plus taxes) for three five-hour weekend workshops that will apparently teach us everything we need to know about how to get into this business.
Rochelle, who works for Air Canada, is testing out a potential new career. Sandy, an account manager for an insurance company, is looking for a new lease on life. "I have a well-paying job, but it doesn't make my heart sing," she explains.
Andy, a working actor, has already taken the plunge. "I quit my day job three weeks ago," he tells the class. "I couldn't handle anything that was real any more."
Tom, an aspiring actor, has taken voice-over classes before, but his demo tape isn't getting any response.
Keith, a young radio grad, is looking for a way to use his vocal training without having to move to the sticks to work as a DJ.
Eric is a restaurateur who does standup comedy on the side. He saw an ad for the class in The Georgia Straight, Vancouver's alternative weekly, and decided to investigate his childhood dream.
Then there's me, the reporter, with absolutely no theatrical training, sense of comic timing or obvious talents (other than a raspy voice, which I've often been told could earn me a killing in the phone-sex trade). But, hey, it sounded like fun.
Blame it on Bart. When The Simpsons crashed through prime time, the business of animation voice-over work changed forever. Suddenly, it became cool to be a 'toon.
Up until the 1970s, a relatively small talent pool supplied most of the cartoon voices in Hollywood. In addition to Blanc, who died in 1989, there was Daws Butler (Yogi Bear, Huckleberry Hound and most of the early Hanna-Barbera characters), June Foray (Rocky on The Bullwinkle Show), Stan Freberg, Paul Frees, Don Messick et al.
As the original troupe retired or passed on, there was a rush for new voices in the seventies and eighties. Many hailed from the comedy circuit, improv groups, radio or on-camera acting. And that's when Vallance, who also teaches her Tooned In voice-over workshop in Los Angeles, fell in to the wacky world of animation.
"It beat waiting tables between gigs," she says of the 'toon jobs she did between her regular TV roles on series such as Knots Landing, The Ropers and Night Heat. Then it finally dawned on her that she was making more money with her witches and robots than she had ever earned in her career. In the past 20 years, Vallance has worked on more than 50 different animated cartoon series. The petite actress and vocalist, echoing many other actors who have made the transition, says it's been a liberating experience.
"In L.A., I was always cast as the girl next door or the Holly Hunter type." In animation, however, she was free to play all kinds of characters -- everything from the Proud Heart Cat on the Care Bears to Miss Clavel and the frisky little dog Genevieve on Disney Channel's Madeleine, a series for which Vallance also received an Emmy nomination for the parts she directed.
"It didn't matter any more how big my tits were or how blond my hair was," says Vallance, who is relatively small-busted and brunette. "And it's also great because you can go to work looking like crap."
Still, outside the industry, cartoon actors were rarely recognizable by name. That began to change in the nineties when big-name celebrities suddenly clamoured for cameos on The Simpsons. But the nineties also ushered in Beauty and the Beast, the only animated feature film to ever compete for Best Picture at the Academy Awards. Many actors groused over the nomination, arguing that it would downgrade their profession. But by the end of the decade, when advances in computer animation and new competition provided by the DreamWorks studio created a slew of animated features, those same big-name actors had all jumped on the bandwagon.
Antz featured the star-studded cast of Woody Allen, Sharon Stone, Gene Hackman and Sylvester Stallone, while the marquee for Toy Story was lit up by Tom Hanks and Tim Allen -- much to the chagrin of Billy Crystal, who rejected Allen's role and says he has regretted it ever since. This year, Crystal voiced the lime-hued ball with one eye in Monsters Inc., which ranked as the largest opening in Disney's history.
Casting celebrities isn't always a sure-fire recipe for box-office success. And some have very strong reservations about the fad. Mark Evanier, a TV and comic-book writer who created Garfield and Friends and directed the TV series, says the practice of casting celebrities has created a lot of "inferior" voice work.
"It's sad to think that if Bugs Bunny were created today at some studios, they'd decide Mel Blanc wasn't well enough known and cast Pauly Shore," Evanier writes on his Web site, which includes an extensive tribute to classic cartoon voices. In an e-mail correspondence, he adds that the casting of celebrity voices can also be partly attributed to the latest trend in TV -- animated shows such as King of the Hill that try to emulate the look and sound of situation comedies (i.e. the characters aren't cartoony).
For every Susan Sarandon cameo, there are still huge casts of TV characters to be filled in the rapidly growing cartoon cable market. Over the last decade, Vancouver has become a voice-over haven for outsourced U.S. productions because of its proximity to L.A., cheap dollar and lower rates for talent.
Despite the proliferation of voice-over work in Canada's so-called Cartoon Capital, some say it's almost impossible to break in to the business because the same small pool of established actors are used again and again.
"That's a myth," says Vallance. "I constantly hear producers say they're sick of the same old voices. If you're really good, you'll get in." And now, she's going to teach us how to be "brilliant."
Day Two: My name is Alex. I am 76 years old. And I am so happy to be here. Truth be told, I do not feel brilliant. I feel rather foolish. I close my eyes, as Vallance instructs, and try to feel the wobbliness of age as I attempt to balance myself with an imaginary cane. Vallance throws me another layer. "You are 76 years old and you are a sea captain."
Ahoy, matey. Have you ever been to sea, Billy? Oh, no. That's Captain Highliner.
Now I am a 76-year-old sea captain and I like to drink. "Hiccup," I belch, smiling foolishly at the bottle of rum in my hand. This is much better. I've found the part of me that can connect to the feeling of wooziness.
Vallance tells me to find my sea captain's laugh. He sputters up brine and phlegm.
"Now open your eyes and read," Vallance instructs, holding up a script sheet for a 70-year-old horror-film scream queen. I'm now supposed to use the voice of Captain Morgan and turn it into this crusty old dame with a cigarette dangling out of her mouth.
We are learning how to create characters for our repertoire and the sources of inspirations are seemingly limitless. Eric gets in touch with his feminine side by placing his hands on his hips and caressing his chest. Rochelle becomes evil by swearing. Sandy pulls Julia Childs out of a nasal sound that comes from the top of her head. Tom turns an impression of Elvis into a thug. I buzz around the room trying to be a vacuum cleaner and think of the Charles Adler quote Vallance read to us earlier: "Animation acting is sketch comedy on a Quaalude."
The perfect cartoon doesn't always come naturally. When Mike Myers finally saw a full-length rough cut of Shrek last winter, he hated the thick Canadian accent he had created for his green ogre. "I instinctively knew I could do better," Myers told Entertainment Weekly. He had used the initial voice because he thought it sounded scary, but later realized he had missed a crucial note of vulnerability.
Witness the power of celebrity cachet. Although one-third of Myers's scenes had already been animated, DreamWorks executive Jeffrey Katzenberg gulped and agreed to let him redo the voice. Myers looked to his mom for inspiration.
"My mom read fairy tales to me," said Myers. "She's from Liverpool, and she's a trained actress. For me, Curious George was from London. So I went, Aha! Shrek should have the Scottish accent of somebody who's lived in Canada 20 years."
The revisions increased the film's $40-million (U.S.) budget by $4-million because the animators had to create new mouth movements and gestures for each new line reading. Katzenberg says it was worth the artistic price and the choice appears to have paid off: When the movie-industry year ended on the U.S. Thanksgiving weekend, Shrek captured first place at the box-office, grossing more than $267-million (U.S.).
Day Three: Andy had an audition this week. "I pulled all sorts of stuff from class," he tells us excitedly. "I kept thinking 'They're boys and they're 10 and they have lots of energy bugging out their eyes.' I felt really good about it." We all put our coffee cups down to give him a big round of applause. This truly is beginning to feel like therapy.
After taking us through the art of creating a great demo tape, Vallance gives us two characters. We have 20 minutes to rehearse. An agent is on his way. This is for real.
I am Medusa, an evil vampire and second-in-command to the leader of the Bad Monsters.
We scatter around the studio, circling the adjectives on the script and trying to make sense of the copy. Who am I talking to? What else is going on in the room? I have no idea who swamp beast is. But I don't think about that as I enter the studio. I only think about my big metaphorical penis and remember that I have to grab the agent's attention with my first three lines.
"Face it, vampire!," I scream. "Your power is so far gone, you can't even control a dog!"
"Wow," Vallance exclaims. "This one's scary." The agent leans back and looks bored. "I'd like to hear some real sarcasm in there," Valance adds. "Medusa's pretty tongue-in-cheek, isn't she? She's pretty you."
Turn the negative into a positive, I think, repeating the refrain we've had drilled into us: "She meant that in the best possible way." I try again.
"I love it," says Vallance, "but take the last line and end with 'Jesus [bleeping bleep].' Just say it. You are so sarcastic. You are such a bitch."
The agent gets up to go to the bathroom. "Oh, Jesus [bleeping bleep]." I give it my all.
Ralph Streich of Lucas Talent Agency says I wasn't terrible. "Uh, a little green. But for someone with no background in acting, your read was excellent." He suggests I think about commercial voice-overs.
Not everyone in the class is discouraged when Streich tells us that he received 400 animation voice-over submissions last year -- and only signed one person. (He later tells me that he would be interested in hearing a demo tape from Keith.)
Everyone's eyes light up when he says that a good portion of the 50 cartoon actors on his roster are earning incomes in the six-figure range. The going rate for animated TV voices in Vancouver, he tells us, is about $1,000 an episode. Each episode takes about four hours to record.
Most of my classmates are determined to pursue their cartoon careers after graduation.
"Totally," says Tom. "Especially after listening to some of those CDs. There was one that sounded a lot like me. With a little work, I know I can do that too."
Keith plans to put a demo tape together very soon. "The class was really encouraging. Stevie was able to get reads out of me I didn't know I had."
Rochelle, however, says she had a lot of fun, but doesn't believe she has the drive to take it any further. "Still, I'm glad I took the course. I always would have wondered."
I tend to agree with her. (Note to editor -- you snivelling swamp beast -- I'm sticking to my day job.) I was just paid to learn how to say that, with feeling and without therapy. In the universe of my alternative reality, that's about as powerful as you can get.