Let the Games Begin!

After thousands of submissions, we are ready to kick off "The Super Awesome Contest to Become the Next Big Voice Actor!"

Will and Christy are blown away by the level of talent just waiting to be discovered.

Find out the details on the finalists, where everything stands and what’s at stake! 

Needless to say..."Put your voices where your mouth is."

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, Christy, Hey, what's going on? Will? How are you? Oh?
But can I can I be real? Can I be real?
It has been a while of me just being um
inundated with entries. Ye yep, we've got which is which?
Which is a great transition to what our episode is

(00:20):
about today. We are we're doing a smaller, shorter episode
because this is all contests we want to talk about.
You know, people like when we talk together, so it
makes its weird a longer episode. I'm like, we talk
each other in time, and I don't like talking to
you at all, so it like getting like people loving
us talking is strange considering we hate talking to each other.

(00:43):
We like talking about love. It's uh, it's time, people,
It's time. Next week we are starting the contest what's
it called, Christie? Really, after all the entries you've had,
some contest become the next big voice actor. Yeay, yay,

(01:03):
I did it. And that was from looking at all
of the amazing subject lines that you guys put in
your audition tapes or your reels. Yeah, and in your videos,
and my god, can we just can we please talk
about it? Like? Can we just talk about it? Okay?
So now we can actually talk about Okay, who there
are so many talented people out there first, a ton,

(01:26):
a ton. Yeah, let's start it to beginning. Yeah, I
was gonna say, so, here's what I would start with.
I would start with a thanking everybody who who entered
the contest, but be thousands of submissions, thousands, thousands of submissions,
which is awesome. Um, we are thousands. So there are,

(01:49):
just like you said, some incredibly talented people out there.
We set out with one goal, which is finding somebody
who could be our colleague. Day one, put you in
a booth, here you go, go and from I think
we're gonna be able to do it. I honestly think
we're gonna be able to find exactly that there are

(02:10):
some super talented people out there. I know, I know.
I mean my expectations were were It wasn't that they
were low. I just didn't have any expectations. I just
I went in with a completely clean slate, saying to myself,
you know, uh, there are a lot of amateurs and
like and talking about your first experience of putting yourself

(02:32):
in front of an you know, a new environment. You're
putting yourself in front of a microphone or a recording device,
or you're putting yourself on a video that you're not
normally doing that right, and you're and you're putting yourself
out there. I felt so proud of all of you guys.
I felt so inspired, honestly, like, I want to redo

(02:56):
my animation reel. Like I'm not even kidding you seriously,
because you know, I've been really shy for a really
long time about using my voice. We've talked about it
a little bit, but yeah, I just want to I
just want to stop you right there, very quickly, because
I always found that odd. I mean, I don't find
it odd because you're an actor and actors were insecure people.

(03:19):
But when, especially when we would do the live shows,
when I would occasionally turn to you with one of
Joe Woe's pictures and I was like, now you go,
and you're like, I don't want to, but then you
do it. You're always great. So it was just it
had nothing to do with talent for you. It was
just you were nervous about kind of stepping up and
doing it, which is similar to the people that are
entering the contest. I completely empathized with that feeling that

(03:41):
they were having as they were probably likely pushing send.
A lot of people would say, Hey, this is me,
and I hope that you like what I do hear,
you know, and I was just like, yes, like let's
give you a shot, let's give you a listen. And
there was just it was just amazing. It was a
really beautiful experience. Yeah, I think it was. I think
exactly exactly what you said is I agree with you

(04:03):
one hundred percent. It was. It inspired me, It truly
inspired me to It also made me think about my
first ever voiceover audition. Do you remember the first time
you audition for anything? Vio actually curious about yours because
I started doing audiobooks when I was very very young,

(04:26):
and so I kind of remember just being in the booth,
so to speak, at a very young age kind of
thing where that to me was where I was learning
like the techniqus of oh my gosh, I'm in a booth.
It's so quiet, you know, you're this little kid, and
then like you have this like microphone, which is very
like strange, you know. And I still to this day

(04:46):
I have a love or hate relationship with the presence
of a microphone and a camera. Really, but I have
a love part of me of the camera of the
not the camera of the microphone, because the microphone can
truly bring out even the type of microphone that you use,

(05:07):
which we should get into in reviewing some of these
um the type and quality of microphone that you're using
can change. It can pick up certain parts of your voice,
right like some microphones that engineers use. I don't know
if you guys know this pick up like tenier sounds
tinier means like, I don't know the more nasal parts

(05:27):
right of your of the voice. So if you're singing
recording music, it'll sound tinier, or if you're in an
animation focused character, it might just sound a little different
if you're if the quality of just your voice is
being amplified. And then there's other ones I think that
are more basy and some of the more older vintage

(05:48):
microphones have more grit to them. It's yeah, it also
depends on how they record them. Some of them are
ribbon microphones, some of them are I mean sophone. It's
like it's I wish I knew. I don't know enough
about microphones, but I'm sure Brian or somebody would know this.
But it's it's it's the actual ribbon is inside. I
think that vibrates that picks up your voice. So there's
different ways that different types of microphones that pick up

(06:10):
different things. And so Corey Burton, who is a legendary
voice over actor, is a microphone nerd, like to the
point where I mean he literally has the pictures on
his phone like most people a pictures. Pictures are their kids. Literally,
And he said to me one time, you know, he's like, oh,
I bought this one. This is from the nineteen thirties
and this gives me this kind of resonance and this
one does this. And he said to me one time.

(06:31):
So I said to him, what should I get? And
he said, always just find the microphone that loves your voice.
He said, you won't know, you might not know what
it is, but if you're so the microphone I'm working
on right now, for instance, is everyone's saying, oh my god,
it's so expensive. It's not. It's the X. It's an
MXL nine thousand. It's an older microphone, is probably twenty
years old, twenty five years old. Jason Marsden bought this

(06:52):
for me as a gift. I think it was one
hundred and fifty bucks. One hundred and sixty bucks back
in the day. And I've all he's used it because
it just it works for my voice. It loves my voe.
Really is a factual representation of your voice, like when
I'm with you. Yeah, I think that. I think that's right.
I think it really does. It just this microphone loves
my voice and so and I will say that like

(07:14):
in reviewing these, we had to not play casting agents
because casting agents are so critical that if something isn't like,
you know, professional grade, they're immediately clicking off and so us.
But we didn't do that. And I know because you

(07:35):
know and I know that Will was extremely extremely thorough
even the way that you documented um all the different
um qualifying people. You know what I'm saying. But like
it's it's and it's also really beautiful because not only
did we kind of even the playing field through keeping
an open mind and listening to all of your auditions,

(07:56):
but we also kind of read your backstory. There are
some fantastic people out there that are really taking a risk,
and I mean, we couldn't be happier with all the
talent that we were exposed to. Yeah, No, it's very
very very exciting and we're getting into it. We are
getting into it. It is starting next week. Before we
get there, though, I do want to give a big

(08:17):
shout out. We've been making sure we do this because
a lot of the people that entered the contest came
because of Critical Role, because our friends a Critical Role,
and there are some some incredible GMS, DMS, RPG players,
tabletop players that have been doing voices for their parties
and their friends, and so we want to give a

(08:40):
huge shout out to our friends a Critical Role who
really helped us get the word out there and remind
everybody that season two of the Legend of Oxmachina is
on Prime Video. If you haven't seen it yet, if
you're a fan of animation and you're like I just
haven't gotten into this one yet, go start at the
beginning started season one. It will suck you in instantly.
It is a wonderfully written, acted, animated show. It hits

(09:05):
on all cylinders, and you know, it makes it so
much better because it's done by some incredibly beautiful people.
They really are wonderful. So thank you to everyone at
Critical Role and everyone at Prime Video two who helped us.
And you know, again, everybody at iHeart who you know,
they really helped us make this possible. This was a
dream Christy and I had from the beginning and we

(09:26):
certainly could not do it by ourselves. And so yes,
a definite shout out to everyone at iHeart Prime Video
and Critical Role, So thank you so much. We are
starting the contest next week officially, and I wanted to

(09:50):
give you a quick breakdown because people are like, well,
what is the contest And we're not going to get
too specific, but here's what it basically is. We've talked
about this. We are going down from our thousands of
entries of submissions to sixteen those sixteen It's gonna be
crazy and it's going to be Here's how it's gonna happen.
Here's how we're gonna try to do it anyway I'll

(10:11):
say so, we are going to go head to head
two contestants an episode. We are going to have one
of our friends come on, one of our voiceover friends
who has been in the industry for a long time.
That is going to help us judge. We are then
going to go again one on one for an episode.
So say you know, episode one is going to be

(10:32):
contestant A against contestant B, and we are going to
play some games. We are going to make up some characters.
We are going to maybe read some ad copy. We're
gonna throw some stuff at our contestants. They're going to
go back, Oh I am too, and they're gonna go
back and forth, and then we are going to very
nicely ask them into our waiting room where they're going

(10:53):
to sit, and then the three of us, you and I,
Christie and our guests are going to discuss who moves
forward and that person then to the next round. So
we you know, are gonna go head to head until
we are down to the final two. The competition is stiff,
it really is, and to have to go from thousands

(11:13):
of entries to picking sixteen is a very difficult thing
to do. And there are gonna be let's be honest,
there are going to be some very good, very talented
people who didn't get picked, and we are going to
discuss who moves forward until we get down to our
final winner, who again we've talked about our prizes, is
going to get flown out to Los Angeles. You get

(11:33):
a thousand dollars spending money, You get to record some
promos for I hear voices. You are then going to
come to lunch where you're gonna meet Christy and I
and your new agent from cees D, as well as
having a session with Sam Regal or Mary McGlenn from
Voxmachina and Critical Role. It is gonna change somebody's life,

(11:56):
and we're very exciting. That's the aim. And I and
say that based on the talent that we have to
pick from, that's definitely gonna happen for someone. I think,
So I really do. I think, you know, again, we're
gonna pick somebody talented to where they're going to meet
their agent. They're gonna start, you know, nowadays it's after
the pandemic. You do all of your auditions and everything

(12:16):
from home, so it's not like you got to move
to Los Angeles. It's not like you got to do
any of this kind of stuff. And so they're gonna,
you know, I imagine, I'm not not trying to make
this up, but you're now signed with an agent. You're
gonna start getting copy that you're gonna have to start
auditioning and reading, and then it's up to you. Then
it's up to you and your talent. Nobody's going to
hand you anything after that. Once again, I want to

(12:45):
just run down the list of thank you's, because we
have a bunch. Thank you so much to iHeart for
helping us. Obviously, we also of course want to thank
Prime Video who has helped bring critical role on board,
and thank every all my friends over their critical role
for being responsible. And all the actors that have come
on our show as guests, all the actors that are

(13:08):
going to come on our show as as guest judges. Um,
we this is it really takes a village. Sam and
Mary who have you know, Sam, Sam Regal and Mary
McGlynn who have volunteered their time to the winner, ces
D who has uh stepped up and said heck yeah,
well we'll sign the winner. You got it. Um, Just
one person after another that has really come on board

(13:32):
to help make this contest possible. We're so excited and
again we are as excited, if not more excited than
the person that's gonna win. We really are because I
can't wait. It's gonna be so much fun. It's a
ton of work on our end, It is a ton
a ton a ton of work, but it is so
worth it. Thanks everybody. Remember we're we're getting there, and

(13:55):
tune in because it is going to be a wild
ride to see who is going to take the title
of the next Big Voice actor for one last time,
at least in this version of I Hear Voices, because
the contest is starting. And man, do I now mean
this more than ever. If you think you got what

(14:16):
it takes to be one of us, step up to
the microphone and put your voices where your mouth is. Yes,
thanks everybody. I Hear Voices as hosted by Wilfordell and
Christy Carlson Romano. Executive produced by Wilfredell, Brendan Rooney, Amy Sugarman.
Our executive in Charger Production is Danielle Romo, Our producer
is Lorraine Verawez, and our editor slash engineer is Brian Burton.
And that was my announcer voice. Some side effects of

(14:39):
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falling down the Coco melon rabbit hole, sneezing due to
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