VO Buzz Weekly: And now it’s time for our good friend DC Douglas. Our guest has been described as outspoken, opinionated and super talented. He is known for his work in the “Resident Evil” franchise as Albert Wesker, Legion in “Mass Effect”, and Chase in “Transformers: Rescue Bots”. He is an accomplished on-camera actor, filmmaker, and when he’s not doing all of that, he’s always just a little controversial. I hope you guys are ready because you’re about to get buzzed with the fabulous DC Douglas!
Chuck Duran: Excellent. Yeah, I’m actually very excited to have you here. I’m more excited DC, right now. And I’ll tell you why, because I actually believe DC is a way bigger celebrity than he thinks he is.
DC Douglas: You are?
Chuck Duran: You’re somebody I love. This guy, we’ve been working together for years and actually met you before we ever worked together.
DC Douglas: Yes, you don’t like in 1996. Rizzo and I came by here looking for a place to rent and you were over here. And I saw the exact, like I made it like a VO joke, like maybe I should bring my CD by. Like, yeah whatever. We ended up working together and that was pretty steady, right? Like I saw you almost every single week.
Chuck Duran: Yeah, I worked with them. I moved to LA, I was doing campaigns for you. And I was like, oh geez, yeah exactly. So and this was back, and she made, she made the beef smell really nice. She’d always makes the beef smell.
DC Douglas: Yeah, but that was back then when you used to work at Popeye’s Chicken, right?
Chuck Duran: Yes, when I was a baby and stuff like that. Let’s get right to it, ’cause I know you have a lot of fans out there. And some of them don’t know this, and I actually don’t know the whole story of how this whole thing happened. But how did you start? How did your career start in the voice over business?
DC Douglas: Accidentally and luckily. When I first came to Los Angeles in 1985, I came to audition for six acting schools I had found through the Yellow Pages, which was like the internet but you could hold it. And so I went to these different, and I was looking for financial aid because I didn’t have the money. And it turned out only one of the places I auditioned for had financial aid. So I made the decision very easy.
Chuck Duran: I guess you found your place.
DC Douglas: Exactly, which was at Harmon Actors Workshop. But during that audition process, I misread one of them in the Yellow Pages. It was Barbara Gill, I forget what the title was, but it was Barbara Gill who had a place down on Florence, like in not a very good neighborhood. But I went down there and I met her and she’s a lovely woman. She had kind of a 60s hairdo. And I went in there and I had two monologues prepared, which is what you do for acting schools. So I had them, I had my classic and then my modern.
And I said, so I walk in and she’s like, okay. And she’s so you’re interested in, I go, I prepared two monologues. She’s like, okay. So I go and I perform “Johnny Johnson”. And it was all, and afterwards she’s like, this is really embarrassing I think about it and say, that was nice. She’s, you know, I’m not an acting teacher. I am a voice over coach. And I said, I really don’t know what that is. And this is, she explained what voice over was. I had never heard of this concept before. And it’s kind of funny, it’s really actually difficult to explain to people when you don’t know it. And then it’s, it’s the boy, it’s if you don’t see them, that’s voice over.
And anyway, she was with ICM. She had been working since then, probably the early 60s. And she said, listen, you know, when you find your acting school, if you’ve got time and you have it in your budget, I would love to train you because you have a voice for voice over. And I was like, and it was true because it turns out she was right. Well, I was 19 years old. People would call the house and they would, I think, start selling me stuff. They thought I was the man of the house. Far from it.
And so I, I took her up. I ended up going to Estelle Harman’s, but I had six months before it began, the semester was gonna start. So I thought she was really inexpensive and I said, I’m gonna go. And I started going weekly to her. And I gotta say, it was actually one of the, it laid a foundation for my acting. And I think it goes both ways, you know, acting laid foundation for your voice over and vice versa. Because I learned word color, I learned a lot of the technical things by starting with voice over first. And then going into the acting and working a mic and all of that.
So when I went in, when I finally got to Estelle’s, and I was working on scripts, it was, I already knew how to color the words. Now it was about actually bringing life to it. So she was the first woman who started me on that path. And then I veered away from it because I didn’t come to LA to be a voice over actor. I came to LA to be an actor in writing, maybe a film actor.
And then years later, I was still non-union, what have you. And there was this non-union agent agency called Lamashtu Allant, lovely people that worked there. Katie Vaughn actually went on to become a casting director, a big casting director. But anyway, so I signed with them for voice over and started doing these, like the 1-900 lines, 976 lines. Oh hey, you know, like, why you never know, oh, like, now he’s mine. ‘Cause I mean, he’s like, that is for everything. It’s this is like for kid things and all sorts of stuff.
So I started doing like this and then I’m like, hey, this is actually kind of very easy money. That sounds horrible, but it would exit. It is really, when you think about somebody’s digging a ditch or something. And anyway, and so we started using it to support myself. So that’s sort of how I got in it.
Chuck Duran: Well, you’ve come a long way, baby. I mean, I remember when we were in that booth talking about the bank of somewhere that you can’t even pronounce. It was big for me.
DC Douglas: Yeah, it was. I always give credit, there was actually somebody, one of the fans, we did this thing where we put out for fans on my Facebook and Twitter to ask me some questions for the show because they’re all big fans.
Chuck Duran: Absolutely. And somebody had asked me, and I’ll find it, and I will say the name before the end of this program, but they had asked me like what my big break was for VO.
DC Douglas: Right, that was, no, but I think you had made a comment about, you could say it’s instantaneous.
Chuck Duran: You have been, this is not, this is not about an instantaneous journey. You have been in the trenches day, every day, after year. So we could say it’s instantaneous in about 25 years.
DC Douglas: No, I guess it was, it was about like 12 years into it that I ended up finally, because I’m granted, I was split between two careers and I didn’t focus enough on it to probably have had that break earlier. But yes, Deb Coloma of love, you awesome. She was just wondering when and how I got my first video break. And I would say Marc Quinn is my first big VO break. He was at Abrams, Rubaloff & Lawrence. They had a voice over department. But I had, I put together my own reel, was sending it out. And I sent it out with a cover letter that said, I’ve just had my breast implants removed. You should see me, I’m a new person. And I think it might have offended a few people.
Chuck Duran: Yeah, but he liked it.
DC Douglas: So he was dogged, totally. Like we hit it off. And I would say that that is what really started, got my union voice over career going really well. So and then, you know, he left the biz for a while. I went with a couple other agents, great agents, agencies that got me other things, got me a cartoon and all that. And then I’m back, I’m finally back with him again. So he’s moved agencies as well. But you started in the video game world.
Chuck Duran: That was, you know, actually to be honest, I started commercially. Well, no, actually a looping. I was with a group, the Coley Sound, and they used to get all these B movies in. And the girlfriend, the guy who owned the place, started a loop group. And somehow I don’t even know how I made the connection to get into that. But I got into this group.
Stacy Chang: Oh, through Luis Chavez who was, okay.
DC Douglas: Teacher, yeah, she hooked me up with them. And so I started doing some looping with this. And every now and then they would need like an extra, like she would get a call for something extra. And so the first VO gig that was not me looping, like doing the background, for those who don’t know what it is, it’s, you’re in a restaurant and all the people in the background are talking.
Well, when they shoot that scene, they’re not talking, they’re pretending they’re talking. And so the two actor leads can, and so we, people know that I know, and so we come in afterwards and we pretend, we try to find the mouths that you see on camera for the final cut and add in the voices for that. And then they bury it with the sound effects of a restaurant and all that. Mash your wallah, then there’s all sorts of stuff, especially with battle scenes where you rip your voice. And we did a lot of those, which were not fun.
But anyway, she got like a call to do, for someone to do the voice of a robot for an AT&T ride at Epcot Center. And so I was the voice of the AT&T ride back in like ’93 or something. Wow, yeah, that was like my first real. So that’s actually where it started when she was doing all of the looping stuff. So when I realized that looping was not necessarily rewarding as an actor, there were two things. One was, I would look on screen and go, why am I not playing that character? I was one of the, the other one was, it was a John Savage in the “Speed” film. And it’s a thing where he’s a mafia guy and he comes in and there’s this large guy that’s done something bad. So he’s going to torture him and he takes out a knife and starts cutting him around in a circle all the way, like turning around as he’s cutting him.
And so I was the voice of that guy because they didn’t have the map or so on. And I’m like, and I got to do, and I was so excited. It’s like, I’m gonna stand out in this film. I was there, the whole, I was so into it. I was, I had tears in my eyes when I was done. It was beautiful. And so a year later, it’s on TV, it’s on like Showtime or something. And I thought, I need to see my performance. And so I’m like, I tape it and then like fast forward to it. And there it is, and it starts. And you hear me go “aaaah!”, and then the opera music playing in the background takes over and you don’t hear the rest of the performance.
Stacy Chang: So I gotta say, man, it’s really cool that you actually, you know, put out a blog blast, you’re asking your fans and in question for questions about business that they would want to know, and me, it kind of personal, or even, but I’ve read some of these questions and some of them are really, really great. So the question were very complementary to what we were asking. So we’re all on the same.
DC Douglas: That’s great. All right, yeah.
Stacy Chang: So, but here’s one. This is from, this is one of my, like the first, one of the first times I realized that I had fans from video games. And I did, she may even been a fan, but prior to video games is a, no, what this is, it’s ZTL Fire. And so she goes, so she goes, what are the issues that gonna hurt a voice actor’s vocal performance? Can the elements of like smoking affect vocal performance?
DC Douglas: Well, actually, that’s the smoking thing is kind of interesting. Watch, you get really radical in here for a second. Smoking can actually add a lot of depth and gravel and nuance to a voice that you may or may not be able to control. A lot of voice actors who have, who just smoke, it’s one of the, it comes like part and parcel of it. It lowers the voice, it gives you all this other stuff. Absolutely shortens your life at the same time. So you can have like a good, short career with it. But I prefer to have this voice and let age make it even lower in deeper and more nuanced. And I’ll take you.
Stacy Chang: So do we! Well, not only that, I think that when you’re in the business of voice over, longevity is more important.
DC Douglas: Longevity is definitely important. And also, you’re in the business of manipulating your voice. So all of these little things that you do with your voice and make it lower and stuff like that, it sounds like you can actually manipulate to do that stuff without smoking. I know a lot with some of the smoking thing, you can use milk, which I would say in general, you don’t want, you don’t want no dairy unless you want to fake that kind of smokers, yeah, you do it and then you kind of work with the phlegm a little bit. Also, I’ll notice like for me, waking up in the morning, but you know, I love to do promos in the morning.
Stacy Chang: Yeah, or after 2 a.m.
DC Douglas: Tonight, like I could, it’s very funny ’cause late at night watching television shows and then you like, see a promo. You’re just, start talking just like here and it’s like, but I like man, just put a mic here and give me money.
Stacy Chang: Questions, right? Learn how to, learn how to manipulate your instrument. Don’t smoke.
DC Douglas: Absolutely. What else we got?
Stacy Chang: Yes, ma’am. I’m sure that there are many, many moments that stand up. But in your life personally, or in your career, what is like a memorable moment to date for you? You got to have at least one.
DC Douglas: Besides being on VO Buzz Weekly?
Stacy Chang: Oh, you mean like a voice over memorable moment?
DC Douglas: Did he fall asleep for a second though? Are you remembering his promo voice? What’s my leg, my memorable for voice over, voice over? Like what is a career highlight? It’s funny, because I always see myself as having several careers. There’s the survival career, which is half the, yeah, can relate at all. Then there’s the film/TV stuff, and then there’s the, another’s the voice over stuff. Well, so for voice over, a highlight career, there’s a couple.
There’s one standing in the booth and you’re doing, I’m doing copy for a Geico thing. And then on the thing they go, yeah, you’ll be back for more. And like, I will? And then realizing that it’s a national campaign and at the end that it’s gonna go on for a couple years. That was remarkable. I thought it was one spot, turned into 14. You know, that was, that was a highlight. But that was like a slow unraveling of it.
Another one, and this would be video game world, would be there’s three, actually. Another thing about, so good question. The video game one would be having done Wesker in “Umbrella Chronicles” and not realizing how big it was. And then discovering through fans whatever that it was actually a big thing and people are upset because they had taken over the voice from someone else because they moved production from Canada to LA. It wasn’t anything else. I mean, you had nothing to do with it. I wasn’t a scab about it or anything.
But then they called me, I got the call that they wanted me to come back to do “Resident Evil 5”. They wanted to see if I could do the physical stuff. But I’d thrown out my back before that.
Stacy Chang: Jacked a lot? No.
DC Douglas: No, no. My work, I’ve been working out for the last two, like two years. And I haven’t thrown my back at all. I threw my shoulder out today a little bit from from going too much on something. And I tweaked the neck and that was it. But that’s not a bad guy. Walked in here one arm was lower than the other. We’d a Rambo his back into the place.
Stacy Chang: But this one was because, I know, I just bought a house. Thank you, Geico. And was renovating it. And I had lifted these cement things because I wanted to be part of the renovation.
DC Douglas: Right, saying the check was just not enough. And so I looked at this stuff and then the next day my back was out. Then I got the call, would you also be willing to come in and audition to do the, and I said, they go, it won’t move anything too difficult. So I show for the audition like, and so, you know, the Japanese director, very nice people and all. But he’s like, okay, you take off and then you roll and then you jump and you flip. Do I understand it?
But the highlight would be that they, it was, they decided they were gonna do facial mocap for the characters. So and it’s funny, it’s a highlight in a good way and a bad way. Because it’s, as a voice actor, you used to be completely anonymous on the mic. I can be doing all sorts of things with my hands, whatever that gets me to go, make up for easy boys. You know, you do that and it’s not seen. And all you hear is just the voice.
But when with the dots and then they have the cameras and the lasers and they want you perfectly still and everything, but they want it all very big for the, so that the computer picks it up better. I’m sure it’s probably the technology is even so much beyond this now. And this is only three years later, whatever, four years later. And so, and then no gestures, because you get in the way of the camera and the lens, right? And so you’re gesturing down here, but you try to be still and they say you’re talking to a couple of people and you want it. So I want to go ba bla bla bla bla bla bla. Can’t do that. It’s like you have to go, Bob, Mary, should do sir, whatever you’re doing. It’s like with, so just constricting.
And so it’s so, talked about like, and all in the voice, it’s all in the voice. At the same time, you’re overacting in the face to get the computer to recognize it. So that was a highlight. But it was a highlight because it was like, the most recent one was, was, you know, it was an audition. I don’t even think about, was for this cartoon for “Transformers: Rescue Bots”. And they wanted a thing like a “Dragnet” voice over, which is very similar to a lot of commercial stuff I’ve done. So I just, you know, threw it, whatever. And where’s Chase? Chase? Well, Chase now sounds different than what the audition was. Sir, I believe that we can, do you know you’ve been breaking the speed limit, sir? And I believe that we need to, it was all very fast and very right with him. It’s like my voice essentially. Which, but, but now, but now Chase has a little more of a voice like this, a little bit more like “Star Trek”. I didn’t, and a lot of it’s a lot of its comedic delivery and right timing stuff. But it’s very, very much my voice. Which is, you know, this is what you guys have some amazing voice over people on this show. And I’ve done cons with some amazing voice over people.
This is why I don’t consider myself an amazing voice over person. I glue, I consider myself a lucky voice over person. I’m, as an actor, this is the thing. The guys who going to go, voice over, I know I’m kind of segue into something else, voice over, who wanted to, voice over, I am good guys, gals, whatever, you know, you, they go because they do funny voices. They’re always doing, and their mentor, their mimics. And that’s something that wasn’t me. I didn’t do a lot of funny voice. I mean, I did the funny voices ’cause I was 13. And by puberty hit and I didn’t have to do with my energy. But I was not like, I really wanted like impersonate this voice or that voice. I mean, sometimes it did when you were not the man of a thousand voice. And, and, but I wanted to act. I wanted to be on camera. I wanted to be in these alternate realities and and live in the moment. I’d get another character through the voice, like I would find a voice for the, for my character. But it was not something extremely, and obviously I had to fit what this face looks like, which by the way has only recently come in to look, the same five years old. And I look like I was 16. And I was going, can I, can I plug be on “21 Jump Street”? And so that’s how I got it. So like, when I would have go to work at a voice, it was like, I had time, I had the signs, I’ve had several days and all of that. These guys, these other people you on the show, they’ve got 20, 30, 40, 50 voices maybe in their heads already. They already know how to go to, if they have dialects, you know, yeah, I think of ducks 10 with dialects. So just how many, awful out like that.
Stacy Chang: Yeah, I can’t, I’m not that guy. I’ve got a couple dialects that I can do only because I kept getting acting jobs over voice over jobs where I would do the same. So it sticks with me. But other stuff, it’s like, it’s like I can learn it for the day. I learned in Irish accent one day. I was great that day. I was, it was a, it was a stage performance. It was great. It was, they needed me for the same one day come into an Irish accent. I’m there with the tapes and I’m learning it as best I can. And I walk in and they’re like going great accent. Like, thank you, I’m gonna forget it tomorrow. And I did. I can’t do an Irish accent right now if you ask.
DC Douglas: Well, but not every character, and you have a very successful commercial career. And then it’s very much about being real and conversational. So not everything in voice over is about the goofy voice.
Stacy Chang: That’s true. There’s a little commercial site that a lot of people don’t know about. And it’s actually, and it’s sad in some ways, it’s actually the more financially rewarding site of it if you get these national campaign, or even if you just get like one, like you get one, like TV commercial that just happens to do well and these, that the company decides they’re gonna keep running it for a years. I have one now, Netflix. I play, I do, I have like two lines I think, six words. I’m not sure the voice of a tiger in the Netflix think it’s the rabbit, the tiger and all that, the guy. And it’s like that just, I keep getting checks for that. And it’s like, that’s, you know, you, but with other work, with video game, with video games, you’re paid for the session. That’s it. You don’t get anything else. With cartoons, a lot of the times it’s, it’s, you know, it’s very nominal what you might get with the residuals. Unless you’re unlike major network primetime or it’s a hit show. But most of these are, you know, it’s contract to contract, you know, for each episode.
DC Douglas: Exactly. Exactly. He doesn’t think it’s a big deal. And I’ve talked to him about this and he’s like, yeah, but it is a very, very big deal. And for all you people out there, a lot of you are gonna probably relate to some of this. You’re saying, you know, I wasn’t, I’m not the guy of a thousand voice, you know, so you know, we’ve had those guys here. You know, the Jess Harnell, Jim Cummings and, and Ron Paulsen’s and all stuff. And you’re right, these guys have like just so many voices under their, their hat. They’re just like instantly boom, boom, boom, boom. You’re not that guy.
Stacy Chang: No, you were never that guy.
DC Douglas: No, you never thought you were that. I’m crap.
Stacy Chang: Stacy does have, yes. But you know, when, when DC and I were working, you know, together a few years ago and doing stuff, I remember that DC had a job he was working somewhere. He wasn’t making his income from doing voice over, which is what he wanted to do. Remember at a survival gig?
DC Douglas: Right, that I had a survivor gig, survival gig. Most actors in LA do have it. And there’s nothing wrong with that. But here’s the, here’s that, here’s a little thing. He says to me, and I remember this, I still remember this. He says to me, my goal this year is to have a home studio in my house and to, and to work from home and to make a six-figure income from my home and stop doing my survival.
Stacy Chang: Yeah, okay. And I’m like, great, DC, because everybody says that. Everybody wants that. Well, he actually did it because I monitored him in my mind. And I’m like, it’s not Scientology. No, he’s got studio coming. Oh man, I got it down. Another die and I got my this and my dad dude to do boy. Okay, great. I’m building my own website, doing Flash and, do you remember, I’m like, you did that? He’s like, yeah, I did it myself. He did it himself, right? Builds his own website, goes out there, does all that. Finally, he, he literally, he doesn’t have to have a job anymore. He’s making all his money from voice over. And I’m like, that is amazing that you actually made that happen. And, you know, he says, oh, thank you guy, go and thank you this, because he feels that he has been lucky and gotten some major, major, major gigs, which you have. But I gotta say, man, that you have worked your buns off in marketing yourself to get people to notice you, even the people that aren’t in that area.
DC Douglas: Listen, that’s, that’s the thing that whether it’s voice over or on-camera acting, that’s, you, you have to always be marketing yourself because no one else is gonna know. So, so let me ask you something. I give you away too many of your secrets. Why don’t you share with us a couple of the things that maybe somebody can do to promote themselves better, to get out there, to maybe like make things happen for them this year?
DC Douglas: The very first thing is, is, is, you have to make that commitment. I’m gonna go about taking them back even further. Because all these people, you know, I constantly get like emails, I’m sure everybody who’s been on the show says it’s, they get emails for people going, what do I do to get into voice over? Just that, the fact that they’re writing me asking that question shows that they’re not thinking outside of the box. They’re going, I think if I can ask another famous person, and I, you know, and I’m guilty of this too. And as an, as an actor, I would write like, you know, when Spike Lee came up, “Do the Right Thing”. Well, I sent him a letter and I’m going, I’d love to like come in and like to be the guy who says a line and ending for a Coke or something in one of your scenes, just to be one of your films. And it really was me going, well, you just hire me because this is hard. And then consents that, what you’re doing. And it’s like another VO guy’s not gonna be able to get you any workers. I mean, later on, when you see each other and you know each other’s work, then yes, who you know helps a great deal. But when you’re starting out from nothing, you’re just a name on an email coming to, coming to me, how can I help you? Or you were asking me to be your, your, your parent, your trainer, your, you know, all these things for you. And I guess you have to do that for yourself.
So it starts with, I would say, is it, did you research what it is? How to learn voice over? And there’s, there’s thousands of books out there about that and websites and VO Buzz Weekly with all these interviews with people. You can learn so much about it. And then from there, you know, so, so let’s say you’re at a, going to your question, those of you who have, you’ve, you’ve, you know, your voice, you know what you can do. Obviously you’re over, always still learning about what we do. But you had a place now really that’s got wanting, I want to get out there.
Well, you, you need to brand yourself. And I think you probably talked with this with other people previously, like CDs or whatnot. And that, that’s the thing, is that what is your voice? What is it that you represent? And brand yourself that way. How would you describe in three words your, the qualities of your voice? Then it’s, it’s how do you present yourself to me? If it’s just a, you know, a name on an AOL email to me, that’s not really presenting yourself very well. But if it’s, you know, if you’re Bob Smith and it’s bobsmith.com, okay, now I’ve got, now I’m gonna go to bobsmith.com because I want to know more about you. Maybe you put your three words in your signature. So you know, Bob Smith, the voice of, you know, poop, and bobsmith.com. So when I go to bobsmith.com, you got a picture of a big poop and if you’ve got little poops with your little audio players for your demo reels, you know, now I’m starting to get a sense he’s the poopy voice. I like this guy.
Stacy Chang: We’ll be stealing those things.
DC Douglas: Still this idea, like I say, I want to help you, but I don’t want you my, to be about competition. So go with the poop idea. It’s a winner, right? And, and, and, but you, and you did that. You said yourself, you’re in, but yes.
Stacy Chang: But the thing is, you set an intention, but an intention without action and purpose and focus and it’ll just, helping by saying, listen, I need to do this by a certain time. You know, it’s so funny, I no offense to those of you who are really into “The Secret”, but it, but “The Secret” essentially is, is going, you visualize, you need to visualize a goal. Because if you don’t know what the goal is, you don’t, you can’t take the incremental steps to get to that goal. So you, you visualize, you put it out there, this is what I want. And now you gotta go do it to get there. And now you will start to discover, you break it down. So what are the first steps that I have to do? And what are the next steps? And what are the next steps? And don’t, don’t put into your formula, so and so is gonna help me at this point, or sones is gonna help me at this point. Because really no one helps you at one point. They do, but when they do, it’s like, it’s, it’s like that’s remarkable. Thank you. Because there are a lot of nice people this business. And there’s a lot of mean people too. But no, but it’s, it’s, it’s, if you’re a good person, if you’re a person that other people like being around, that when you get into the business, you get a job, I get a job, say with Chuck. And Chuck goes, hey, you know, I dug work of DC, he was fun or whatever. And I’d, I’d work with Chuck. So all of a sudden someone goes, hey, I’m looking for a demo reel. Oh, you got, we’ve got to use Chuck. Now there may be other demo places out there’s I, but Chuck, like Chuck is great to be around. He’s a good person. And it just so happens that his work as excellent as well. And so it’s vice versa. Chuck goes, you know, I like to work with DC, he was fun. Someone needs a voice on that’s kinda, you know what, DC’s got a voice for this. And he may know five other people, but he liked working with me. And so I get, so that’s how that works. So you can, doesn’t work into your formula. It’s just something that’s a natural evolution from it.
So yeah, so it’s, it’s, it’s setting up the steps. And as far as you guys that are ready to do that, it’s, it’s, you know, it’s brand yourself, have a website, is the website, he’s easy to follow as to what you’re offering. And, and then start presenting yourself to people. Don’t spam people necessarily. Represent yourself. It all depends too, if you’re, you know, if you’re good, if you’re living in Bakersfield or if you’re living in New York or Atlanta or LA, you do different kinds of careers that you’re gonna have. So you have to take that into consideration. I have a thing of my website where I break it down, city folk and country folk, and explain how you can, you know, and I brought this years ago, but I think it’s still fairly applicable. You know, if you’re gonna, if you’re a country folk, you’re gonna want to have to create your little own home studio so that you can do internet work. I know, but if you’re city folk, yes, you know, it’s good to have it so you can send in auditions, but you don’t necessarily have to have it because you’re gonna have people representing you, sending you out for auditions and what exactly.
Stacy Chang: Yeah, yeah. I would recommend that you guys check out DC’s website, let’s not cut, and just check out how he markets himself and how he places himself and positions himself. And if you look at that and then you look at what you have and say, hmm, am I positioning myself professionally like that to actually have somebody say, I want to hire that guy if they went to your site now?
DC Douglas: And I will, and I will say after all of that speech that I just gave is that I’ve moved on to a new level of the way that I’m promoting myself, which is basically saturation. It’s, it’s the established guy. So I’m, it’s more about you go there and you’re inundated with the amount of work and the kind of work that I’ve done. I no longer have to tell them the kind of voice I am. I’ve got all the examples of what I am as a voice.
Stacy Chang: So when you’re starting out, you have to guide people into knowing who you are.
DC Douglas: I think absolutely.
Stacy Chang: Absolutely. But I mean, in now, you don’t, you do now. I could just be DC Douglas saying these are all the things that I do.
DC Douglas: Well, and you’re very prolific on Twitter and Facebook and not like the addiction of the instant reward and going hello and they go hello.
Chuck Duran: Well, that concludes part 1 with DC Douglas. But be sure and tune in next week for part 2. It’s gonna be crazy.
Stacy Chang: Absolutely. And in the meantime, you can find us on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest at VO Buzz Weekly. You guys take care out there and just remember, you always have time for a little buzz.
PART 2
Stacy Chang: Hey everybody, I’m Stacy Chang and I’m Chuck Duran. Welcome to another episode of VO Buzz Weekly. Are you guys ready for more DC Douglas?
Chuck Duran: I am. Let’s do it. Let’s hit a few more of your fan questions there.
Stacy Chang: Yes, all right, here we go. Okay, we’re going to get deep. This comes from either Heart or Wart or Hort. I think the W might be silent. Do you feel your political life hindered your career or do you feel it opened new doors? And I’m going to say I think that it opened new doors. I don’t think it hindered my career.
DC Douglas: We, we, we story because the voice over guy have to do with political, it may have opened different doors you didn’t anticipate. This is actually a fascinating question because a lot of voice over people going, they, you know, we have different clients, we have corporate clients and things like that. And we think that we should just keep our personal opinions to ourselves so that they don’t know about it and whatnot. And I felt this way too. Well, no, but I did for the longest time on my blog, I did not write about anything political. I tried to be nice about everybody and everything. But in my personal life, and I didn’t consider myself to be a public figure, I’m a voice over, but I’m known for voice over stuff, which means that I’m not known.
Chuck Duran: He’s faceless, I’m a faceless guy, right? It’s not like on camera I had some show going or whatever anyway.
DC Douglas: The, but also will say that I felt like my blog was kind of insincere in the way that I wrote it because I was never fully honest and fully myself in it. And to be a good writer, you really should be fully embodied about with everything that you are, which now he is.
So what happened was is that I have a habit, not anymore, but I used to have a habit that when when I saw oppressive organizations doing things to other people that upset me, that I would like to find the phone number and call them and say I think that you guys are, and I did it to Fred Phelps his family actually. I had talked to his wife on the phone for 20 minutes one time and…
Stacy Chang: Very passionate you are.
DC Douglas: Yes, well and he deserved it. Anyway, during the healthcare debate of 2010, listen, I’m all for healthy debate. And if you don’t want healthcare in the country and all that, I’m all for all of that. But there are, there of the Tea Party, there was an astroturf portion of it, which was headed by FreedomWorks. And they’re the ones the bust in all the people that were that were going crazy, calling Barney Frank a derogatory word for sexuality, which was the thing that got me. And Barney Frank’s the kind of guy that just says it like it is. He doesn’t lie, he doesn’t lie about that kind of thing. He just says, yeah, he didn’t, he didn’t care either. But it got me because, you know, that, that’s just the thing. It’s like whenever it’s a minority or it’s a small group of just whatever. Anyway you, I’m want to call them now. You’re going to stand up for those, me give me his phone, give me anyway.
So I, I called the group and I left them a message. And I just asked them about the ratio of mentally challenged people that work for them, something to that fact. Anyway, this, they decided to take it and run with it because they went to my Facebook page. Now here is an example of great promotion. I promoted myself so well, my website, Facebook and Twitter, they found me. They went, he must be big time.
Chuck Duran: Yeah, it was just the way I promoted myself. But they decided to go with it, he’s big time. And then they waited and then I posted that I got a gig. I got a new GEICO gig. I had already done the major campaigns and those were actually done. This was a small internet campaign that I’d gotten. And they saw that the president of the group posted on the Breitbart website about me and basically said everybody call GEICO and call him and harass them and get them fired, that kind of thing. And within a day, GEICO decided that they were going to maybe go in a different direction with the voice over. Totally understand why they did it. And I would have, if I, if I was in part of head of that department, I would have said, you know what, let’s just cut our losses and go. And…
DC Douglas: But what I wasn’t going to let go was FreedomWorks getting away with it. So I decided to then come out of my shed and battle back. And I put out the press release and that caught fire. That was what, like shooting a pee like out of a straw over a mile and and having it land in a thimble. And all of a sudden I’m, the next morning MSNBC wants to interview me, Fox wants to interview me. It was like, it was breaking news. It was like D, was like, like the front page of every newspaper.
Chuck Duran: It was, it was, was not that bad. But I got it, it feels like that when you’re in the middle of it, when you’re like, you’re at ground zero of the storm and you’re handling it all and you’re like going, what’s the next press release?
DC Douglas: Yeah, so anyway, that was how it began. The way that I, and I went to the inter, I went on Geraldo, I kind of responded to all this stuff and whatnot. But I didn’t feel like I closed the chapter properly. So a month later I, what I called a tweaked nipple, I put out the Tea Party PSA, which you can go to teapartypsa.com to see it. And that was my response to it. And that hit big. And so like a month later, it was like whoop, we’re about, we’re back into the ride again, we’re in the rodeo. And that was fun. And that’s when he ended up going on Joy Behar’s CNN show and and whatnot.
But that also brought me all these fans. So it opened new doors. It also brought me more work. I had like three clients of mine that said we’ll never work with you again, blah, blah, blah, you should get out of tinsel town and see what real people are like. Like, oh, so we’re all fake over here? I have a mortgage anyway. So I lost three, but I gained like probably like 20 in that week, the people going, we, we love that you came out and spoke your mind.
And then I started to think, then I had a voice over person actually ask me, no, she wrote a blog post and I, and sent it to me and I read it. I forget her name, I’m sorry. But she wrote a very thoughtful blog post about, what is our duty as a, as, as a VO artist? Are, are we to keep our opinions to ourselves so that we are considered a, a, a clean voice that can be used for whatever the thing is? Well, now here’s the thing, you know, there, this now bleeds into another subject. Oh my God, I could go on and forever about this stuff. But another subject of, of, of political commercials. I do a lot of political commercials. I get paid for, I’m multi-partisan. I don’t, you know, you want a Ron Paul ad, I’ll do a Ron Paul ad. You want a Romney ad, I’ll do a Romney ad. I’ll do any one of those ads. Now other people might look at me and be disgusted with me. I’m like, hey, it’s what I do for a living.
Chuck Duran: Yeah, you’re a voice actor. If no one is going to change their vote because they use DC Douglas as the voice over. And they’re not saying this voice over brought to you by DC Douglas. It’s just a voice. It’s what is being said. It’s the images, it’s all the other things. And also, if you’re going to change your vote based on a commercial, you’re an idiot and there’s nothing we can do about idiots. I’m sorry, we can’t, they’re crazy.
Stacy Chang: I’m not sure what you mean, DC. Be more clear.
DC Douglas: So I’ll do all of that. But now here’s the thing, I’ll do, I’ll so, I’ll do a commercial for, so like for obviously, you won’t do anything everything.
Chuck Duran: Well, no, no, if, if it’s actively promoting racism or violence, then, then obviously I wouldn’t do something like that. You know, those kinds of things. But that’s, you know, but if it’s this debatable stuff, it’s the stuff that’s within the general public domain, then of, of, of, of debate that, that is reasonable, then yes, I’ll do all of those.
But the, the thing is, I’ll take the money from this, this conservative politician that I don’t necessarily believe in. And then I’ll use that money to, not have to work that weekend. Instead make my own little tweaked nipple video about something, you know, and put that out. And it helps support me do that. Or I’ll use it and I’ll donate it to kiva.org, not donate because it’s actually micro-lending, awesome place, kiva.org. Or donate to an actual place that, you know, all sorts of things you can do. You’re taking the money from there and putting it somewhere else. A voice is going to do that commercial no matter what. Let it be my voice and let me take that money and put it to good use. That’s, that’s all I think about in that regard.
So it, no, but it opened doors. I got more fans, I got more work out of it. The GEICO campaign had turned out that it was just a small little internet campaign. So, I only lost out on a, on a couple grand. The, the advertising agency that was involved with all of that, you know, they, they, they understood what was happening. And they said, we just, you know, they had to get out of the, the firing line. And but then they had me back a year later when things were cool for another campaign. And I mean, things, you know, so it’s like the people that it mattered to for me, it, it, it, it was fine. And, and it, and it introduced me to so many more cool people, so many nice people that I met through, my fan page and all of that. So that’s fantastic.
Stacy Chang: So, so it actually helped. I, I would say all in all, it definitely helped. Now, now, now, if you had it to do all over again, would you have done the same thing? Or do you think you maybe would have played…
DC Douglas: I had it all over to do like mean before the phone call, like how the, time go just before the phone call. So just before the phone call, I, I was going off to do see a movie. So I would have just left early. Would I have done it again knowing that all this was going to come from it? Yeah, yeah, I think it would have.
Stacy Chang: Okay, yes.
DC Douglas: Because, because I, I, I have a higher profile because of it. And it’s what you do with that profile. And, and I have, and oh, and here’s the biggest thing that I forgot to say is that the freedom of me being able to go back to my blog and say, okay, you know what, this is what I think, this is how I feel. I can be fooling myself. And listen, if that’s going to cost me work, if I have to shut up and not be honest about how I feel about something and, and, and in order to, to, to make a little more money, it’s like, well, then, then what is my life about really? Is it about greed or is it about living my life fully? I got one life. I die and it’s over.
Stacy Chang: You got to be, but that is, that is part of your brand. And if the idea is that you need to authentic to who you are, this is part of who you are. You are passionate and vocal and opinionated. But at the same time…
DC Douglas: You want me to do a commercial that, that’s, that, that’s promoting or, you know, an Orwellian Republican thing or something, I’ll be more than happy to give you that Orwellian voice. Now real quickly, a lot of these videos that you make, I’ve seen probably most of them and they’re funny as heck. I gotta say, very creative, very, very creative. So if somebody wanted to go to a place where they can see all of these, is there, you have a YouTube channel?
Stacy Chang: YouTube channel?
DC Douglas: Well, it’s a actually, all of it gets funneled right through my website. Do you like how that…
Stacy Chang: So they can find them all at dcdoug.com?
DC Douglas: DC, that’s the viral section of there, playlists. And, so there, the producer section has a lot of my older short films and things. And then there’s a viral section and then there’s, you know, and it goes to earlier ones too that I’ve done. There’s, there’s, all the way back to like one of my favorite, which is “How to Comment on a YouTube Video”, which came out of me having to delete all these comments that were on my video from the Tea Party thing. And I thought, oh, I’ll leave him now. Did that pretty wicked. So, so go check it out at dcdouglas.com and you guys will have a good laugh.
Stacy Chang: Yeah, so you have a film, a short film, “The Crooked Eye”. Tell us more about it. And involves your mom, does it not?
DC Douglas: Yeah, she, among the things that she does, one of the things is she’s, she’s a painter, artist, all this stuff. But she also writes. And she had written a short story. This is like way back in like ’95. And I remember asking her if I could make a film about it. And she said yeah, and like she believed I’d even do it. And I didn’t get around to doing it for, 10 years. But then I finally, realized I could, I had the funds to do it. And I thought where I could do it on the cheap. I was going to, that turned out to be completely wrong. But, but I decided I was going to do it on green screen. And that way I could just shoot, the actors in a day or two. And, and then this friend was going to help me out with the, the graphics and stuff. Turned out the friend had his own issues. And so what was going to be a free service had to become a paid service. And then it turned out I had to hire four more people and then a company. And then it became a major production.
Stacy Chang: So it’s pretty cool though.
DC Douglas: It’s live people in a CGI environment. It’s her short story. It’s mainly a narrative with a voice over, which connects to VO Buzz Weekly. Linda Hunt does the narrating of it.
Stacy Chang: Love.
DC Douglas: And, and I did as a surprise for my mother. And she came out for the screening. I’d lied to her and I said, I’m doing a short with Linda Hunt, you got to come see, it’s called “Oxygen”. And, so she’s in the, she’s in the theater there. And I go up to the front and I go, and then I go, so Mom, you think you’re here to see “Oxygen”, but actually you’re here to see something very different. And then I just let it roll. And so she’s like going, what the hell is this? Until the title comes on, she’s wow, like, oh, I wrote that.
Stacy Chang: Oh, that’s awesome. It was very cool. Is this a like an anniversary or a birthday or anything special?
DC Douglas: No, this was, I always wanted to, you know, I mean, it’s a family of artists. And, my sister’s an artist as well. And but, you know, but we’re also gypsies. And so we’ve been, we’re spread out across the, the land. And so this was a neat way to have actually kind of worked on something with her, though, you know, long distance and not realizing we were working on it. So I, I adapted it and all that. That’s really sweet.
Stacy Chang: And, yeah, it’s an came out really well. Do we have, I think we have, you have a trailer, trailer?
DC Douglas: Yeah, yeah, let’s, let’s check it out.
Stacy Chang: Let’s look at it, “The Crooked Eye”.
[Trailer plays]Stacy Chang: Now what’s cool about that, what’s cool about that is, is Linda Hunt’s voice. Now this is what fascinating because, you know, as a voice actor, I’m used to directing actors. And, from way back, I had, I’d written plays and directed and then also seen work when you’re in classes. So I’ve been on both sides that way. But I had never been on the other side as a director of voice over. So this is what was fascinating was, and this is also very intimidating. It’s, it’s Linda Hunt, it’s an Academy Award winner. Linda Hunt’s coming in. I’m gonna direct her? I don’t think so. I think I’m going to say hi, just do what you want on the mic and we’ll just, I trust you exactly.
DC Douglas: But what was fascinating was watching her work. First off, she’s a sweet, wonderful woman. I ended up working with her again on “NCIS: LA”. But, and she remembered the film, thought it came out great and all that, which was nice. She comes in and she goes into the booth there. We did it at Buzzy’s, Buzzy’s of course. And apparently that’s like where she just goes there to record. And, and he’s like her engineer and that kind of a thing. And, but the, her process is different.
So you have a line and you go in there, like so for instance, most of us, I would think, when we, we’ve got our narration, we will have read it and probably read it and read it and read it before we got into the booth. So that when we get in there, we’re going to give the performance and then just see what the director wants to take. So I go, you know, what mistake, would I, like, do you feel your political life has hindered your career or do you feel it opened new doors? What do you think, director? That’s how we would normally, you know, that kind of a thing.
Well, with her it’s, do you feel that you, do you, do, do you feel that your polit-, do you feel that your political life has H-, do you feel your political life has hindered your career? Do you feel, and it’s like this process. And then she’s like, ah, do you feel that your political life has hindered your career or do you feel it open new doors? And you’re like, that was good. Was that, so it’s a wild pro-
Stacy Chang: Apparently James Earl Jones works this similar way.
DC Douglas: Did she do that with every, like with every line, it was through everyone. She like, she would feel it, she, and it wasn’t like, like a lot of false starts. She’d go through it, but then she’d go, she immediately go back. She’s like, there’s a better way to do it. She kind of knows what she want, right? And then we were through it and I’m like, I’m happy, I got my money’s worth, baby. And she’s like, she’s like, no, let’s go, she goes, we have time, let’s go again. Great.
Stacy Chang: And, yeah, it was, it was a wonderful experience. So I had so much good stuff.
DC Douglas: Well, I know that, that’s something that you’re really proud of. I know that you are. I think it’s the best film I’ve ever done.
Stacy Chang: Yeah, and it is, and it is really cool. You guys got to check it out. They can check it out at crookedeye.com, crooked E-Y-E, crookedeye.com. Get on, you’ll love it. It’s really, really cool. You guys did an awesome job on that. Absolutely. So, if you were not a performer of any kind, what do you think you would do as a career?
DC Douglas: I’d be a gerbil. No, I’m sorry. Would you be a, I, I expected a different question.
Stacy Chang: If you were not a performer in any capacity, what do you think you would do? You know, I got to have to say, when I, I had as a survival gig, I, I, I, I edited actor demo reels and stuff for many years. And then I would also do edit my own films. But the editing is a, that’s a performance in a way too. But editing is a lovely experience because you can shape, you can save things, things like a, somebody like a film that is like in bad shape, you can, I loved the idea of problem solving. That’s what it is. I love problem solving.
So even when I had, I was an accountant for a while, bookkeeper.
DC Douglas: You were?
Stacy Chang: Yeah, for like three years. But like reconciling and then like, where’s that 32 cents? Yes, you find that 32 cents and it is ecstasy.
DC Douglas: That is, that’s like a, sh-, I’m out of here. Forget about the birth-
Stacy Chang: To us here, I know, if my checkbook is not, just take it out of my, I have to balance to the penny or I will not sleep.
DC Douglas: It’s like I’ve got to find, editor putting pieces together.
Stacy Chang: Yeah, yeah, it’s, but again, but editing is, there’s a lot of problem solving. And I think the same thing with, and, but it’s also creative.
DC Douglas: Yes, creative. Well, that’s what I’m trying to say, is I think that there is a creativity with accounting as well, when you, which seems antithetical to what accounting would be. But accounts across the world appreciate, especially at this time of year with the tax season.
Stacy Chang: Shout out to the, we need our CPAs.
DC Douglas: I would love to be a CGI guy, CGI. There you’re really, ’cause now you’ve got the computer, you got a little bit of the editing, but you also have the creation of some whole otherworldly thing. But all that stuff is problem solving as well. So absolutely, I think it would, it would be something with a computer.
Stacy Chang: Let’s grab another question from one of your fans. All right, fan question. Here’s one. Because we’re, are we near the end? Should I ask this one?
DC Douglas: You can ask anything you want, man. Anywhere we want to be. The show never has to end.
Stacy Chang: I think this is a really good one. This is from Dave or Bison. It’s probably Bison. What are some mistakes you’ve made in your VO career, stuff you would handle differently if you could do it all over again? And what I thought about this is, what is, is actually there’s a very simple answer, is the mistake is, is believing no every time somebody says no to you or says you’re not the right voice of all the, I remember, and I, and I believed it. I believed the no.
I, I submitted to one of the big agencies in, in, in Hollywood. I had my demo together and, and, and I had already been doing, you know, a lot of these other, independent the things. And I knew that everyone, and everyone was saying, you’ve got a beautiful voice. But I mean, I, I had a talent, I was an actor, I was already working on TV. So I sent the reel in and this was to a guy that was an assistant at an other agency I was with on camera wise. So I thought, this is, this is a shoe in, he knows me, he likes me and whatever. I send it in and then he calls back, he’s like, yeah, and he goes, I’m going to give you some advice for some classes or whatever, was it really not right for us right now. And I’m went, okay. And then I took down the information and all that. And then I thought, and I let it sit for a year.
And then a year later, I’m like, what, just send it out again. And I sent it out again with the cover letter about breast implants. And I got my agent who loved the reel and all of that. So what is that? What does that show you? It’s like, what, what was his deal? Either he maybe he didn’t like me or maybe he, you know, it, he, his voice, his ear didn’t hear the voice the way that his did. Or he or Mark saw the potential that he couldn’t see, whatever it was. Or I, I’ll add this because this does happen a lot. And I talk to agents all the time. And a lot of the times when an agent may say no, I don’t like it or I don’t need it or maybe go do this or try us back in a year, they just don’t need that voice at that time, that they had that category filled up. And signing you would be doing you, well, I’d just be sitting on a shelf.
DC Douglas: Exactly, which we don’t want. So sometimes it works out for the best. No, but that thick skin, that thick skin of you get knocked down, but you just get, you know, just getting back up. I mean, the thing is too, I would say is that for me, what made that one a little weird was the fact that he was giving me to go to class. I think I’m pretty solid in what I’m doing right now. But I, you have to be honest with yourself as well, is if, if you like, you know, people who send me an email going, how do I get into the business? And then they just record something at home and they go, okay, here’s my reel. And then you, and then I say no or you fire an agent, I say no. And you’re like going, well, I’m just going to keep s-, you have to have awareness of your, of your instrument and where you are in your craft. And, and at that point, I, I, I was, I was pretty clear about it. If I, I have a, I have a reel that I put together back in like 1989 that is hysterical on a cassette tape. And it’s like, and I’m like, I wouldn’t take that guy. I would want either.
Stacy Chang: Yeah, by the way, speaking of reels, your new demo that you put together, the whole video thing with the, oh, my sizzle reel video, amazing. It is so cool. When I saw that, I was like, that is really cool. Can they check that, they can see that on your site too, right?
DC Douglas: If you go to, if you go to the website and you go to the voice over, the voice over actor side, it’s the, it’s the first player of the demos. It’s the sizzle video that I have.
Stacy Chang: Probably one of the most creative demos I’ve ever seen.
DC Douglas: Probably the most times I crashed Final Cut on my computer.
Stacy Chang: Well, there you go. But it was very, very cool. Check it out. You do a lot of the cons, man. You’re the con man. What is it about doing, going to these cons that you love? I mean, I think I have an idea of what it is, but…
DC Douglas: The money. Well, I’m listen, actually, it does help. The free Sharpie. I got to say, actually, I should, does, does it help to have a good booking agent?
Stacy Chang: Yes, and I happen to be represented by Jeff Zannini of Zannini Entertainment.
DC Douglas: He’s pretty, I hear he’s a guy, right? He’s the guy.
Stacy Chang: Awesome. I hear also he also represents the band ZO2.
DC Douglas: He is ZO2 guy. Jeff is multi-talented. He books all of Rock Sugar shows. And the guy’s really, really great.
Stacy Chang: Yes, he is. But I wanted to say that I made that joke about the money thing, but I, I think I want to address that. Because I, I sometimes hear online about how some fans are like, why do you need to get paid to come? You should be, you know, you have fans and you should be grateful for that. And, and we are grateful. But the thing is, is, as with any major city, the, cost of living is high. And we have to take every opportunity for work that we can get. So that when we have to take time off to go, go to a con, we need to be, we have to get recompense for that so that we can make sure that we’re still meeting our bills and all of that. And then we can still say hi to the fans. So it’s, and it’s also work. Because it’s, there’s one of us and a lot of you guys there. And so there’s, there’s a fair amount of work.
DC Douglas: Well, but not only that, the cool thing, hold on, the cool thing is that there are a lot of, people in, in your position that actually just say no, I don’t want to do that. They don’t want to be around a bunch of people. So, so we know that you get paid for doing your time because you have to, like you just said. But the cool thing about you actually doing it is that when you go, you’re, you, you want to see, guys are great. You guys are awesome. But for example, you can get all this at dcdouglas.com. But I mean, you are all over. I mean, you’re in California, you’re in Orlando. Florida loves you, by the way. You’re going to Florida a lot.
Stacy Chang: Florida has been amazing. They have a lot of cons. I don’t know what, there’s something in Florida. But between March and July, I mean, you’re going to Florida, you’re going to, you know, Tampa, Orlando, you’re going to Salt Lake City, you’re going to Sacramento. You’re going on tour. I mean, you’re everywhere. You’re basically, he’s basically a tour artist now. There’s people in South America that have been trying to get me to go, get to a con in South America, which I’m, I’m dying for. Because, because Brazilian, that’s going to be longer than a weekend trip, my friends.
DC Douglas: Absolutely. You might get held there. But the, but I got to say the, but the South, South American fans of, of video games are, are phenomenal. They are like, they are passionate about it. And then there’s, there’s some fans in, England or, from one of those European places that have been trying to work on it too. I’m hoping that they can get me before the, my, that game, the “Resident Evil” game, it’s primarily “Resident Evil” too. I me, I hope they get me before, no, but before the game was like a, who cares about that game, that character anymore? It’s like, no, you’re like the fourth actor to take Albert Wesker, which a weird experience as a voice act. What is it like to step into, because he was a very…
Stacy Chang: Yeah, well, he was, he was the first one was Sergio Jones, who, I, I, I actually love to get in contact with. He did it, but he did it way back when, when the way they directed games was really bad. Because it was all, it started with the coder mentality. And it was like, here are the 47 lines, they’re completely out of order and just say them. And then now it’s back, you’ve got people like Jenny Hale, you’ve got like these people that direct it like this is exactly beautiful. And…
DC Douglas: So, but he was the one, Sergio Jones was the first one. And then I believe, Richard Waugh was second, Peter Jessop came in for a couple, and then it went back to Richard Waugh. And this again has to do with where they are production wise, where they go. And, and then they decided to have it all come to LA, and then it was me. And then it’s been me since “Umbrella Chronicles” onward. And what I will say is that it’s, it’s, what is strange is the, when I did “Umbrella Chronicles”, they played Peter Jessop’s voice. Because it to, to, to voice match. So I was voice matching his version of the character, which was very unique. And then when they brought me back for “Resident Evil 5”, I thought, well, work more on that Peter Jessop voice, who Peter Jessop is an awesome guy, by the way. And…
So I came back and then they played Richard Waugh. I’m like, oh, I haven’t been listening to that one. And then of course the character evolves, so I get to make it my own as well, which was nice. And, but these are other really wonderful, Richard, Richard was an accomplished film/TV actor in Canada. But the fans do not like that kind of change. They like consistency. And I think video game companies are, are learning that now, hopefully. For whoever has the role, that they kind of stay true to that voice actor. Because the fans now, this is a whole version, burgeoning, burgeoning, burgeoning field of voice actors being kind of getting some sort of celebrity status. And so the fans notice. And so the companies need to recognize the fans for noticing that and stay true to it as well.
Stacy Chang: Absolutely. That’s who’s buying the game. Absolutely. I have a quick question for you. Do you love doing voice over?
DC Douglas: Yes.
Stacy Chang: Okay, just wanted, just wanted to hear that. Doesn’t he sound like when he’s talking about the stuff, you can feel the excitement and he gets all excited.
DC Douglas: Remarkable, wonderful. Wonder, it’s a great, great, great business.
Stacy Chang: One more question from one of your fans. All right. Oh, yeah, okay, yeah. This is from, oh, can I say this one? Yosi Bar. Hi Yosi. My, so bear with me on this. My teacher tells us, he’s, part of this question was that he’s actually in school, one of his classes is, voice acting.
DC Douglas: Okay, which is fascinating.
Stacy Chang: My teacher tells us one of the best things to do is to really get to know your voice. I don’t understand how, how I go about doing that. Since my perspectives can differ from those I audition for. Do I just pick up some dialect tape, sit in my room playing with different voices? Not sure how to go about this. It’s actually kind of like a two-part question. So I’m going to address the, the second, it’s actually really good question. There a lot of people out, it’s question that, well, first off, I don’t know, Yosi, if you’re taking the class because it’s to fulfill obligations for, criteria for another class or if you want to actually have a voice over career. So I’m going to assume you want to have a, a career.
The, the, the, the second part here about the dialect tapes and voices, all of that stuff can definitely help you, especially if you’re looking at video games and cartoons and character voice work. Then you, the way that you’re going to def, find the voices that work in the range of your voice for all of these things is to play with these voices, is to impersonate, you know, mimic the things that you hear around you. The cartoons of celebrities. And working on dialect tapes is fantastic if you want to, to, to get the accents going, find out what works for you. By the way, in that, ’cause some people find it easier to learn the accent, by, by listening to someone who has the accent, like celebrity or character, as opposed to listening to a tape that’s just going to teach you the, the mechanics of it.
But all of that stuff is, is important about knowing how your voices in the morning, in the evening. What your, what is easy for you, what sits with you and what you have to stretch for. So I would say that for that part, commercial stuff’s a little different. I mean, you actually have a good, a lot of…
DC Douglas: Well, you, I’ve heard some coaches say about finding your voice. Because a lot of people say that, well, you need to find your voice. And a lot of people are like, what does that mean, you know? And I’ve heard it put in a few different ways, but one, one way that I’ve heard it put that, that I thought made a lot of sense is, okay, find your voice, it’s just being comfortable with your voice. And in order to, especially when it comes to voice over, you’re using your voice and you’re manipulating it. You’re doing the, the more you, the more control you have over what you can do.
And so, so that if you want to do a character voice, you go, I’m going to do that character voice and you just go for it. The more comfortable you are doing that, the better you know your voice. So it’s all about really knowing who you are and what your abilities are. If you don’t really have any training or stuff like that, it’s going to be really hard to find your voice because there’s no real voice to find yet, other than just a speaking voice.
Stacy Chang: Right, right. But this is also why you’re in the, in the class. And you’re going to work with copy. But this is, this is the thing I was talking about earlier, when I was saying branding, branding. And you want like, what are the three words to describe your voice? Where you got to find out what that is, you know, those three words are going to tell you, it goes both ways. But it’s going to tell you what, what your voice is. It’s also like an, an acting thing for actors going, on stage or in front of the camera, you know, we start with not like, what’s the character I can do? We start with who, who we are and trying to be just as natural as we are.
So if I came on here to be DC Douglas and I like, I can do character stuff and all that, but I come on to be me. And hi, I’m DC Douglas. And like, so artificial and so uncomfortable. And that’s because I don’t, I’m not comfortable with who I am. And once you’re comfortable with who you are, you can, you can just allow it to be in front of the camera. The same thing with the voice. What is your normal talking voice? As you were saying, what are the normal qualities? What is, what is it, who is Yosi? And so Yosi starts talking and then if you’re going to talk, just talk to me, not read the lines. And sound like you’re reading, sound like you’re just talking to me. You’ve been, that’s comes with picking a person in your mind’s eye that you’re talking to, making it personal. And, and then all of a sudden you go, oh, that’s who I am. And Yosi actually happens to have a very abrasive, annoying voice. And so you become Yosi abusive, abrasive, annoying. I’m totally kidding. I don’t know.
DC Douglas: Not, but that is an image and that is a brand right under everybody. I know, need to put DC on the spot right now. DC is full of great stuff.
Stacy Chang: Thank you to all of your fans for sending those questions. Absolutely. We really appreciate. Mr. Douglas, please pick a number between one and 129. This is getting odd. One and 129, one and 129. Do it, DC. One and 129.
DC Douglas: I’m, I’m going to go for 111.
Stacy Chang: 111, he went bookkeeper there for a second.
DC Douglas: You…
Stacy Chang: Totally. Okay. If you could have the personality of any TV character, who would you adopt?
DC Douglas: Oh, I would be Alan Alda from “M*A*S*H”.
Stacy Chang: Thank you. I love him. Notice it was not even a pause for that one. Fast, he’s like, oh, absolutely. I’m going to call you Hawkeye now.
DC Douglas: Oh, sadly I grew up to be Donald Hollinger from “That Girl”.
Stacy Chang: Oh my gosh, that’s so funny. Thank you so much for being here. Thanks for taking the time coming out and sharing all this. This is lovely. We really, really appreciate you coming down.
DC Douglas: Stuff, I, I, I laughed and I, you know what, I got to say, I learned a little bit more about you, man. Absolutely.
Stacy Chang: I’m sorry. I like him even more. I just finished doing VO Buzz Weekly. It’s good for me. I hope it was good for you too.
DC Douglas: And now I’m naked. No, yes. Did you get, use that, baby?
Stacy Chang: Well, that’s all the time we have. We have to go. DC’s got to get dressed.
Chuck Duran: Leave it to DC to be the first one on VO Buzz Weekly to get naked, right? It’s not a shop, crazy. All right, you guys take care and just remember to follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest at VO Buzz Weekly. We’ll see you next time and just remember, you always have time for a little buzz.
