This is Serious Business, the area of All Along The Wallpaper which will rely less on humor and focus more on giving a serious look to the world, mostly the entertainment world. This first article focuses on defending the often under-appreciated art of voice acting and more specifically argue as to why voice acting should be honored by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, or the people who created the Oscars.
I will begin by saying why I think the Academy (and many laypeople) feel that voice acting doesn’t deserve to be respected. I will follow this by saying why it should and what made me decide to write this. Finally, I will determine different possibilities of what should be done about it.
Voice acting isn’t as respected as live action acting for one simple reason among all others: You cannot see the actors. With live action actors, you see the complexities of emotion on their faces along with seeing them interact and noticing their chemistry. With animated actors, it’s either not there, or at the very least not as noticeable.
Similarly, until recently, animation was seen as child’s play and little more by the general public. It brought to mind the static animation and stale acting of old Filmation cartoons just as much as it reminded people of the pure joy felt while watching the fluid animation and brilliant writing of the old Looney Tunes cartoons.
Most if not all of the criticisms against animation are, quite frankly, bullshit, at least generally. True, you cannot see the actors and to the untrained ear the quality of the voice acting in “Milton the Monster” may be indistinguishable than the quality of Mark Hamill’s revered turn as the Joker in Batman: The Animated Series. However, once you know what to look for, it’s easy to see (or rather hear) that in many ways voice acting may be even more difficult. You have to emote using only your voice. In voice acting, the famously rubbery face of Jim Carrey is useless. He has to change vocal inflections to get laughs, not just stretch his chin. Chemistry is also there in animation. To see that, you have to look no further than the average episode of Avatar: The Last Airbender. The whole cast of that show, especially the three leads (played by Zach Tyler Eisen, Mae Whitman, and Jack DeSena) have enormous amounts of chemistry, enough to rival a close knit group of friends in a long-running sitcom.
As a sidebar, I must also note the rise of motion capture actors, especially the great, criminally underknown Andy Serkis, whom many (myself included), feel as though he was robbed by not being nominated for Academy Awards for playing Gollum in The Lord of the Rings or as Caesar in Rise of the Planet of the Apes. Annoyingly, most arguments regarding voice acting hardly apply to motion capture, considering that the entire face is copied into computer generated images.
For those who are curious, I decided on writing this article after seeing her today. Without giving anything away, Scarlett Johansson‘s character never appears onscreen (or even exists in the traditional sense), yet she is the most emotional and fully-realized character in the film, yet I know that she will most likely not be nominated for anything. At least Joaquin Phoenix will be nominated.
There was a lot of controversy when the Academy introduced the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature because they felt that it was basically just a consolation because animated features being nominated for Best Pictures is rare at best. Personally, I feel like it’s better than nothing and is a step in the right direction. I feel that the Academy should consider a similar award for voice actors if nothing else. At least it would be a start.
In Siskel and Ebert’s review of Aladdin (above), Gene Siskel says that he felt that Robin Williams would most likely be the first animated actor to be nominated for an Oscar due to his great performance as the Genie. Sadly, he was wrong, but it’s good to know that someone in a high place agreed that they deserve honor.
Before signing off, enjoy this honor to voice acting:
Next time in Serious Business:
Defending Affleck as Batman.
All Along The Wallpaper 