Phil LaMarr tries his hand at improvising the voices of 12 random cartoon characters that he has never seen before.
Using similar techniques like he used for Hermes Conrad (Futurama), Samurai Jack, and Green Lantern (Justice League), Phil brings these characters to life.
- I have jagged teeth,and I eat angel birds.They are your souls [gobbles].Hi, I'm Phil LaMarr.I've played a lot of different characters.I played Hermes on Futurama.the samurai known as Jack on Samurai Jack,the Green Lantern in Justice League,Bolbi on Jimmy Neutron, Ollie Williams.- It's gonna rain.- On Family Guy.I'm about to play some new characters,based on some images Ihave never seen before,so hopefully it'll be voicesyou've never heard before.The man alone in bed, awake at 3:20.Oh, this is the thirdact of that Pixar movie.I am wrought with guilt.Everything is not going to be right.I can't sleep.I can't even close my eyes.Or, maybe he's a little calmer.Maybe he's just more of this guy.Well, there we go.I'm just gonna be up,'cause I just got home from the club.And until I come downoff all of these drugs,I'm just gonna lie here in my pajamas.Honey, turn out the lightin that bathroom, would ya.All right, now we've got ayoung probably a teenagerin his karate gear.There's two ways we can go with this one.He can be a real black belt.Yeah, hi-yah.I have studied the martialarts since I was four,and I can break all the boards.Or, he might be the dudewho just like watching karate movies,but he's not actually [mumbles].Uh, no, I ain't never actually done karateor spelt it, but I love it, man.Ka, don't you look at me wrong.I'm a karate chop your butt.Now we've got our stereotypical,cartoon, smart kid.I'm guessing he's not our hero.He's somebody who's in our heroes class,and always gets the A'swhen our hero doesn't.He doesn't understand whatyou need to be socially cool,so he speaks in equations[gasps] sigma [mumbles].You know?Or, he might be a little bit cooler,'cause you know nerds are runningall the studios now [laughs].Sure, I can do that, Mrs. Watkins.Can I have the chalk please [mumbles].R squared pi [inhales].Can I go the bathroom, please?And now we havea big, goofy, hairy monster.This of course makes usthink of Cookie Monster.But that's copyrighted,so we gotta go a different direction.We've got the one big guy.So maybe he's a little off,but he's got a big smile [laughs].Hi, is everybody ready for dinner?He could be something thatwe encounter in the woods.Maybe he's a little scary, huh [laughs]?Don't worry, I won't hurt you.I just going to chew you a little.This is an owl.But he looks very sort of Old World,so you have to have sort ofa black and white voice here,something in the continental realm,plus the fact of all of thatdetail and cross hatching.This is someone thatyou take very seriously.This is a man of breeding andwisdom from the Old World.I've got a top hat behind my back,so you know that I have statusand I will not deal with foolishness.Or, he might be a little softer.He could be, even thoughhe looks very serious,he could also be a comic character.Hi, I am your silly uncle [laughs].Oh, I'm sorry I accidentally signed overthe deed to the castle, we're homeless.Now you've got a guy with a grillwho's very happy to be grilling.I mean, he's not GeorgeForeman, but he might be.I can't afford a George Foreman grill,so I got a Forge Georman grill.How ya' doing?I'm Forge Georman, and thishere is my little tiny grill.You can only fit one burger on it,but it's one good burger.He's your uncle, who'srunning the cookout,that's also the family reunion.Hey, boy, where you been?I ain't seen you in so long.Get on out here and bring me that ketchup.I'm gonna make myspecial sauce [chuckles].And tell you momma to bringme out some my special drink,the purple one.Now we have a great, big,white Sasquatch, guerrilla type guy.But he's also in a good mood,so basically you've got abig primate here, right?Oh yeah, oh, hi.Welcome to the forest.You're looking for the bathroom?It's this tree right here.Or, I love this.This design might workmight nicely for a villain.Well, if you come into my forest at night,it's not just good night moon,it's good night you.Well, now you've got a delivery guy.I got a little experienceplaying these guys.So hey, maybe he's somebodywho's just happy to behere, right [laughs]?I got all these packages.Although, I don't know.This guy's got that big man chin.I think he's got a littlemore ego than that.Oh, don't you worry,I've got your packageright here [chuckles].I've got all your packages right here.What, you mean some peoplemake more than one trip[chuckles], amateurs.'Cause it looks like Patrick,if I ever wore a baseballcap which I never do.Okay, wow.We've got some late nightAdult Swim type stuff happening here.Hey, when I created this cartoonI was like a little high [giggles].Don't worry about it, it's cool.But I have created a person,I have antlers,and I have jagged teeth,and I eat angel birds,so try and make sense of that, hey.Oh, and I'm a little bit of the devil.Yeah, see the fire and my trident?Yeah, so these birds, theyare your souls [gobbles].Or we could just go, oh, man.I'm up here on this thingand anybody else hungry?So we got cocky guy on a skateboard.[laughs]Who's either got a verycrazy path behind him,or yo, man that's my tag, dude.Right, what's up?You see what it says, right?You know I'm an influencerand escape artist,so get with it, dude [hisses].Or, yeah, man maybe it'slike this cool cat, right?What you waiting for, let's hit it, yeah.Let's go, olly, olly,oxen free [chuckles].What I'm seeing here issort of a period guy,and he's got a folder that says secretso he looks like a detectivebut he's obviously a secret agent,probably one of these hard boiled types.I've got the secret filesthat I need right here.Don't you worry, Jerry'snot gonna get these.We're gonna fight the axispowers, you better believe it.So he's in the '40s, he's got a '40s hat.He's gotta be in the '40s.He's fighting the war.Or if this guy wasn't ourhero, if he was the bad guy.Yeah, he's still in that period, sure,but I got what I need,and you're not getting it backtill I get some sommeliers.The he just gets alittle more edge to him,gets a little more edge, right.Don't make me fill you fullof lead, something like that.Now this is something I can relate to,tribal wolf wearing a cow skull.I am a predator,and I live a predator life.All in my tribe we eat meat.Ew, who put these plants in my meat food?You know, a lot of peoplecome up to me and say,"I wanna get into voice acting."How do you get into voice acting?"I'm like, I don't know.Get on a sketch comedy show on Foxand then do cartoons,probably not the best path.I came from a worldthat was very differentwhen voice acting wasn't a thing.I didn't choose to be a voice actor, yes.I was an actor who gota job on a cartoon, yes.But with acting, or with anything,the key is find a way to do it.If you have friends whoare artists or animators,they're gonna need voices.Go in there, help them out.The thing is you gottaget in your mic time.You gotta get in your practice.Figuring out ways to solvethe problem of performance.Every role you're givenis a problem to be solved.There's a character on a page,how do I make that real for an audiencewho is going to watch or listen to it?That's your job,and you gotta practice it to get it right.I'm Phil LaMarr, and thishas been my personal takeon some really new cartoon voices.