STEVE BLUM Visits the Pod of Rebellion!

Karabast! The group is joined by the great Steve Blum (voice of Zeb Orrelious) this week! Many Star Wars Rebels memories are shared and many stories are told. Steve also talks about his humble beginnings and odd jobs he had before he found his iconic success as a voice actor.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Every character has a life story. Even if it's a
stormtrooper with a thirty second lifespan, you have to imagine
that they've had a whole life before that moment that
you see them on screen. And so not only are
their mannerism is going to be a little bit different,
their phrasing is going to be a little bit different,
their movements, whether you know we're just voicing that or not,

(00:20):
there's going to be some differentiation there because they're different
people with different stories.

Speaker 2 (00:36):
Hey, everybody, welcome to the Pod of Rebellion. My name
is Vanessa Marshall, the voice of Harris and Doula Specter two.
And today I have with me Hi.

Speaker 3 (00:45):
I'm tsur Car, voice of Sabine Wren Specter five.

Speaker 4 (00:48):
And we also have What's Up Taylor Gray as Ridger
Specter six, and we have Hi.

Speaker 5 (00:55):
I'm John Lee Brody, nonspector but full on moderator of
this podcast. And usually this is where I say we're
going over episodes such and such, but today is not
that day. This is an episode that I feel like
a lot of you have been waiting for. This person
does not need much of an introduction, But even if
I gave this person an introduction. It would probably take
two hours because of how prolific their career and their

(01:15):
life is. Guinness World Record most prolific video game voice
Voice of a Generation. There's so many great accolades I
could tie this person, but above that, this person is
a dear friend to all of us, and I'm going
to throw it to this person so they can give
their official Potter Rebellion introduction.

Speaker 1 (01:30):
Well, Hello, Potter Rebellion. I am so happy to be here.
This is Steve Bloom, the voice of Garret Zebradios. Also
no respective for to no mess with me real.

Speaker 6 (01:44):
Yay?

Speaker 7 (01:47):
Yes, sound of one hand clapping.

Speaker 5 (01:51):
Right on the Simpsons episode right, it's right there, We're
doing it right here, Steve. Welcome to the pot of Rebellion.
As we all know, as our audience knows, May the
Fourth was a couple of days ago. There's May the fourth,
There's Revenge of the fifth. Today's return to the sixth
is what we're gonna call it, but it's also return
of Steve Bloom. I'm so happy you're here because over
the past eight episodes were so Taylor, Tia, and Vanessa

(02:15):
have been shared with me so many stories of in
the booth and everything, and they, of course her name
came up a bunch. Freddy's name came up a bunch.
I can't wait to just hear some of your memories.
And I guess that's where we can jump off with.
Let's start at the beginning of when you first met
these three amazing humans in the booth and was there
a point where you knew, oh, we have something special here,
Because for me as a viewer, I knew from the

(02:36):
first frame you all were together that we had something special.
But I'm curious of your point of view, and then
all of you can weigh in on that.

Speaker 1 (02:43):
Yeah, it was like meeting my family for the first time. Honestly,
thanks to the genius casting that they did behind the
scenes for all of us, they matched our personality so
well to these characters. There was no effort at all.
It really felt like the these people have been my
family my whole life, and I was just so grateful

(03:04):
that they took a big, old stupid gamble on me
and brought me into the room with them. But man,
this is one of the few casts that I've actually
stayed in touch with also, and I love these people.
I don't see them frequently enough, But yeah, I think
walking into that room was such a pleasant surprise for
the first time because we all started out separately doing

(03:25):
our little shorts. I was in England at the time
doing mine at a Transformers convention. It was all very
surreal for me. I didn't really believe I was in
a Star Wars show. I've been working on Star Wars
games forever, but this was my first real Star Wars show.
So walking into that room it became visceral really fast.
And Dave coming in and being the ringleader and kind

(03:48):
of introducing us to our own characters and to the
other characters immediately tied us together as a family. I
felt an immediate fondness for these guys. Yes I'm saying
it out loud. Don't tell Freddy, Please, don't tell Frick. Yeah,
but it was just one of those things where it
was effortless is the best word I can use to
describe it, because everybody fit the role so well and

(04:09):
and fit the personalities of these familial relationships so easily too.
So you know from the first moment, especially with Taylor,
where you know it's like a toll big brother.

Speaker 8 (04:22):
Can I say.

Speaker 1 (04:26):
To the point where you know, he was just a
pest at first to me, but he became my brother
and we didn't go through the past part because I
loved him immediately. Sorry Taylor, But but and Vanessa I've
known forever and she's my sister, always has been te
oh my god, this goddess walks into the room.

Speaker 7 (04:43):
And yep, I go, oh my god. I got to
play in the same way with her. So yeah, it
was incredible from day one.

Speaker 3 (04:51):
Steve, if I could blush, I would be blushing. I'm
glad you said that. Mean well, sorry, no.

Speaker 6 (05:01):
Not that far, because yeah, you can catch that check now.

Speaker 3 (05:13):
I just meant I'm glad you said that it felt
effortless because you're right, like it just it has always
felt so easy, and maybe that's why we have remained
close friends ever since. It has as we've been talking
about for eight episodes or something like that. You know,
it's been a while, and it doesn't even feel like

(05:35):
this was eleven years ago that we started. How can
that pos I was only five years old. Taylor was
a zygo So I think that, yes, you're right, you
reminded me it did. It did feel effortless, and it
has ever since, and that's probably why it's so easy

(05:57):
for us to stay close and in time be you know,
continue our relationship far after, long after the show's ended.

Speaker 4 (06:05):
Can I say so, admit to something that I completely
completely forgot until right now. Early on, I remember telling
my friends and I told my parents. I had done
a few shows before where you're a regular on it,
and in a live actually show, you're there every day,
so like you're there seven am to seven pm every
day with everyone, and so you naturally you didn't even
see anyone else.

Speaker 8 (06:25):
And we started the show.

Speaker 4 (06:26):
After like the first like five episodes, I told my
mom was like, oh, this is a shame, Like I
really like everyone, but we only see each other once
a week, once every two weeks. And I was like,
I don't think we're gonna get close. I literally said this,
and I said this to my friends. I was like,
I just wish that this was like other shows where
I was with them every day and we could bond.
And I was like really sad about this. I was like, oh, well,

(06:47):
I don't know how close, like how much of myself
to give, and like I was so confused with it.
And then after a season, I was like, oh, it's
still gonna happen, Like this is amazing and in fact,
like even closer than and other shows where I was like, oh,
it's not necessarily the time spent together. It's like how
you're spending the time together, and.

Speaker 8 (07:06):
You bringing that up.

Speaker 4 (07:07):
It was so so easy and seamless. But I remember
being genuinely worried, like I don't know if I'm going
to like really get to bond with everyone and like
how much I can share my personal life and this
and that, and so I love all you guys, and
it's been beautiful that this is ten years on and
look at it.

Speaker 8 (07:23):
Yeah, I realized it.

Speaker 7 (07:25):
Was that long. Wow.

Speaker 2 (07:26):
When we were at the San Diego Comic Con, you know,
of course Tia and I were granted access to the
Mando MRK community with helmets and paintbrush. I mean, we
were sobbing that night. I remember that first party. But
the next day, I believe we went to like ten
thousand press junkets, one of which was on a boat

(07:49):
and then there was another. There was another like Entertainment
Weekly photo and we did kind of like a Charlie's
Angels pose together and there's a picture of the two
of us, and I think Mary Elizabeth was in the
picture too, where we're we're about to get on this boat.
I mean, the whole thing. I've never known such panemonium
in my life. Like you guys are on camera people,

(08:11):
you probably are used to the whole red carpet that
da dada. At that point I felt like, oh, okay,
I see where we're going with this. Like I mean,
I felt close to you instantly, and the way that
I sort of became like space mom for real, you know,
feeding people and whatever else, like our personalities definitely, I
mean T and I talking about New York Giants scores

(08:32):
all the time and this and that. Like, But for me,
when we were in San Diego together and I remember
by the end of the day we found a pretzel
vendor and we basically got like eight pretzels and we
were like wow because we were so starving to death.
But it was only at that point that I felt
I felt, oh, this is this is forever, meaning us

(08:54):
as a group as a unit, that we hanged tough,
we go without food, we do the grind, we sold on,
we you know, posed for the picture. It was for
me that was a next level experience and still to
this day, the headshot that I use is when we
went to the IGN interview. The woman took a picture

(09:14):
of me that day, and it's like the best picture
of the really kid. Yeah, and I think her name
was her first name, Cherry. I have to look it up.
But I reached out to her because somehow I saw
it in the IGN stuff and I said, may I
have access to this photo? And she gave me rights
to use it and it's on my website. And I mean,
granted that's ten years ago. I may need to like

(09:36):
refresh and get real with myself, but hey, what's up,
space mom? You know hot space mom. It's hard to
say I may even go with my mullet shot as
my new headshot. But I mean, I know you can
see the resemblance, right, I know those of you who
are listening, those are listening, Uh yeah, it's it's the
usually send it to us well at any rate. But

(10:00):
I'm just saying, like, for me, that was a very
special weekend where I kind of felt like, oh, this
isn't like a passing thing.

Speaker 9 (10:08):
You know.

Speaker 2 (10:09):
Yeah, I photo, yeah, but I'll also send it.

Speaker 8 (10:13):
To you, but I didn't.

Speaker 4 (10:14):
Really I'm jumping at the I've never you don't really
research your friends except when you're doing a podcast.

Speaker 8 (10:20):
You know what I mean.

Speaker 4 (10:22):
Like, I like looked you up, which is very funny,
and like ten years then I looked you up online, dude,
eight hundred and eighty five projects on IMDb. That Like,
it's stupid, that's crazy, that's unbelievable.

Speaker 7 (10:38):
It's quantity not quality.

Speaker 8 (10:40):
Yeah, that is. I mean, it doesn't even surprise me.

Speaker 4 (10:44):
But I'm like, how is there enough time to do that?

Speaker 3 (10:48):
Well, it looks really good for his age. He's actually
ninety two years old.

Speaker 8 (10:51):
I am, this is true.

Speaker 5 (10:53):
Yeah, whatever, Like I say, Asian, don't raise the but
whatever genetics you have clearly.

Speaker 8 (10:59):
Puts. I want to dive into multiple things that I
wrote down.

Speaker 4 (11:02):
But I also, because I know you your whole past
as a sexy musician, I'm playing that.

Speaker 8 (11:08):
I always loved those stories that you would share.

Speaker 7 (11:10):
Oh god, dude, it's so scary.

Speaker 1 (11:12):
I actually reached out to the guy I used to
play with years ago and he sent me some audio
from some of the stuff that we used to do.

Speaker 7 (11:21):
It was terrible. Oh my god, it was no, it
was bad. It was really bad. But yeah, we were
playing the whole circuit in Hollywood. We did the Troubadour
was our home. We were there every week we played
he played.

Speaker 3 (11:34):
Did you play Rainbow Room? I feel like you told me.

Speaker 1 (11:36):
Well, Rainbow Room is a different thing. Rainbow Room was above?
Oh god, what was that above? It was there was
a club there. Yeah, and Rainbow Room is actually above
that's where the demons go to hang.

Speaker 7 (11:48):
So that's it's like the after party room. The Rainbow
Room is the after party room.

Speaker 1 (11:52):
So you go up there and all the demons are
hanging by their feet and dripping.

Speaker 7 (11:58):
Yeah, oh god, what was that? It was the Rock.

Speaker 1 (12:00):
Now, it wasn't the Roxy. We did play the Roxy,
but it was. It was like near Gazaaris are one
of those clubs you know.

Speaker 4 (12:06):
Well the rocksy in the Rainbow Room share a parking lot.

Speaker 7 (12:09):
Now, so that's what it was.

Speaker 4 (12:10):
Yes, Roxy is right next because we would go from
the Rainbow to then there's a place called on the Rocks,
which is the place above the Roxy, which that place.

Speaker 8 (12:19):
That that's going to be part of Rebellion after Dark.

Speaker 2 (12:28):
Mullets mullets only, Mullets only for entrance, Yes, below the.

Speaker 8 (12:32):
Waist, Yes, let's go. I'm telling you. Every session was
more faun with steep it.

Speaker 1 (12:42):
I know.

Speaker 7 (12:44):
We all have.

Speaker 2 (12:46):
There's there's a shirt that has a story, well, the
space momming as you do. When people's stomachs would growl,
I would say, I'll be right back, and I would
go get them a banana, because that's sort of the
tried and true. You put one of those in your gut,
that sound stops immediately. So I would go in the kitchen.

(13:07):
I would grab snacks. Plus, of course, my endless bag
of treats, like my purse had jerky keto, snacks, nuts,
you name it. But I didn't carry bananas. So but anyway,
so Steve texts me this hilarious gift of a stormtrooper
with a banana for a gun, given their aim is

(13:29):
so true, you know, and I decide, you know what,
I think I'm gonna make t shirts out of that,
and that'll be like a thing. And I was giving
them out for free to fans. And there are people
and so if you do have a I think you
guys are known as the potassium Troopers.

Speaker 8 (13:44):
Right, So.

Speaker 2 (13:48):
That's no, No, there's a six is it?

Speaker 8 (13:50):
Six?

Speaker 9 (13:51):
One?

Speaker 3 (13:51):
Seven?

Speaker 2 (13:51):
The folks up six months? What's this area code for Toronto?

Speaker 6 (13:55):
No?

Speaker 2 (13:55):
Six one. Seven is Boston.

Speaker 4 (13:57):
There's six. It's the six because says.

Speaker 2 (14:00):
Exactly so with all the dudes in a lot of
the dudes in Toronto they represent with their Potassium Trooper shirts,
and when I go to these events, they show up
with them. But the backstory is that Steve found this,
but I didn't want to print it without getting the
express permission of the artist. And Stephen Quick is a
lovely gentleman who.

Speaker 9 (14:18):
Lives in the UK, and he's like, not only will
I let you use that image, but then he painted
Hara with a banana that is right up there, but
you can't see.

Speaker 2 (14:28):
I don't know how to show you the Hara banana pick.
I'll have to post it on socials.

Speaker 5 (14:33):
We'll cut it in because we're going to make this
a social clip so people can see what we're talking
about it.

Speaker 8 (14:37):
We'll cut that in.

Speaker 3 (14:38):
Well.

Speaker 2 (14:38):
I hope that that those of you with your Potassium
Trooper shirts will represent in the replies to the social
post here. But we have Uncle Steve to thank for
this whole thing. I love you, Steve.

Speaker 7 (14:54):
I didn't remember that.

Speaker 2 (15:00):
Yeah, that's that's all you. That's all you.

Speaker 3 (15:03):
Yeah, and so influential and you don't even know it.

Speaker 7 (15:06):
That's so weird. But the things that I influence are
the scary scary part.

Speaker 4 (15:11):
Yeah, well, Steve, I got this tattoo because of you.

Speaker 8 (15:19):
I remember I shaved the area so you could get it.

Speaker 1 (15:22):
Well.

Speaker 4 (15:22):
Thanks.

Speaker 5 (15:23):
So you see a lot of Toronto Storm Troopers won't
be getting cramps in their and their calves or their hamstrings.

Speaker 2 (15:28):
So that's just the positive influence people in Florida. There's
all kinds of I mean, I printed a ton of shirts.
The Kevin Weir who was in the five oh first
the La Garrison. Kevin Weir worked with you know, he
he fitted all the gear for all the troops here,
and he's like, oh, well a friend of mine has
a T shirt company. I can print how many do

(15:49):
you want? And so I had this massive box and
I would just take them to conventions and give them
to people, or I would do giveaways on uh that
thing Twitter that's formerly known as but we would do
giveaways on that. And then we also had those fruity
pebble t shirts the Rebels. Yeah, we had we had

(16:13):
a lot of We had a lot of swag although yeah,
not licensed sorry apologies, apologies, not not licensed. Well, that's
the thing.

Speaker 4 (16:26):
Outside of Rebels of I mean eight eighty five. I
don't know how you choose what is your favorite. I'm
still curious about what is your favorite project or character?

Speaker 7 (16:38):
How do you choose? Dude?

Speaker 8 (16:41):
That's why projects.

Speaker 7 (16:45):
It depends on the week.

Speaker 1 (16:46):
There's probably more than that too, because I did years
and years of anime too that I wasn't even credited on.

Speaker 7 (16:52):
I don't I don't know.

Speaker 8 (16:53):
It's hard to say. It's week to week.

Speaker 1 (16:54):
It's different like some weeks when I just worked on
Transformers one recently, so Transfers was my favorite. Again, so
cool because I played Starscream and Transformers Prime and a
few other projects.

Speaker 7 (17:06):
I don't know.

Speaker 1 (17:06):
Cowboy Bebopa still lives on and go to conventions. It's
still just as popular now as it ever it was,
maybe even more so, which is crazy to meet twenty
five years ago, which led me to meet the lady
who is now my wife, Mary Elizabeth mc govern our
own governor Price. So Bebop is president in my house

(17:27):
all the time. That's actually from Bebop. That's my voice
from Spike's last word in Bebop. That's the word bang.
That's the audio file.

Speaker 8 (17:35):
Force I have that one too, but a little bit
of a different image.

Speaker 5 (17:39):
Right, Well, once again, pot of Rebellion. After dark, We're
going to have a whole deep dive into Taylor's Sleep
of tattoos.

Speaker 3 (17:49):
Steep reel talk. Who's your favorite past mates? Let's be real, Kenny,
Oh god, I.

Speaker 7 (17:58):
You I just wanted myself. I don't know.

Speaker 3 (18:02):
No, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. Eight hundred plus, I mean
eight hundred and eighty what was it?

Speaker 4 (18:08):
Eighty five is what i's this morning.

Speaker 3 (18:11):
That's literally like five lifetimes of work, more more than
five lifetime.

Speaker 1 (18:16):
So well, the thing is, though, I've had conversations with
Freddie about this, that you know, when you're on camera,
you guys make a lot more money than we do.
So like twenty six episodes of Cowboy Bebop and a movie,
I made less than one episode of Rebels, So what Yeah,
so we got to literally work by quantity. And all
the video games that I did most probably most of

(18:37):
my credits, at least half of my credits I think
are video games have been like over four hundred video games.
There's no residuals on that, and most of them were
at scale. So you know, just to make a living.
I had to keep going constantly, and it's it's a
constant hustle. So you know, part of it is just
it's a numbers game and you got to just keep
working saying yes to the exercise every time.

Speaker 5 (18:57):
You know, that's a great thing to bring up because
people I see those credits, and because the perception, unfortunately,
is there's this unilateral perception if you're in the entertainment industry,
whether you are number one the call sheet one hundred
million dollar movie, or if you're just on that movie
as like a day player, people think you're just like loaded.
It's like, oh, you're in this movie that made a
hundred million dollars, you must be doing great. And I'm

(19:18):
so glad you brought that up, Steve, because we brought
that up a little bit here on the podcast too.

Speaker 8 (19:23):
We do talk about episodes, but we do.

Speaker 5 (19:25):
Talk about that very thing where one me, I can
speak very objectively. I wasn't on the show. I happen
to love you all very much as humans, but I
wasn't on the show. You know, voice acting gets pegged
is like a lesser form of acting by certain people,
but in so many ways from where I'm sitting it's
so much more difficult, just like there's difficulties to be
on camera, just like there's difficulties to be on stage

(19:47):
on Broadway to try to win a Tony Award, And
it's just unfortunate that that's the case. Eight hundred eighty credits.
But most of those, it's not like you're a billionaire
because you did eight hundred eighty credits. It's like you're saying,
it's mostly I got a necessity you got to do.
That's keep the bills paid. Yeah, I would do.

Speaker 1 (20:03):
Five episodes for one hundred and twenty dollars so with
no results.

Speaker 7 (20:08):
Yeah, back in the day.

Speaker 8 (20:10):
This is why we have bought I Get you Own Hawaii.
Well he does, but he got there eventually. I mean,
Vanessa knows what this is.

Speaker 3 (20:18):
Like.

Speaker 1 (20:18):
We've been in the trenches together for years, and I
worked with Vanessa on you know, really good projects that
we did get residuous for mostly Yeah, so we were
lucky enough to work together on those. But even those,
the pay rate is so much less than other things.

Speaker 2 (20:34):
And like, yeah, it's interesting, like Young Justice, Spectacular, Spider Man,
those things, But then you cut to now things that
are streaming on Netflix, and this and that it gets
even smaller it does.

Speaker 7 (20:45):
Yeah, we get it's just crazy.

Speaker 3 (20:48):
If anyone out there wonders why actors go on strike
or feel like they have to go on strike, this
is a pretty big part of why we have to strike.

Speaker 1 (21:00):
Yeah, especially now with AI and they're stealing our voices
and they want to use that indefinitely and not bas
at all. So yeah, whatever living we were able to
make before is in jeopardy unless we stand up right.

Speaker 8 (21:11):
Yeah, See, Steve, I.

Speaker 7 (21:13):
Have a question down the room, didn't it.

Speaker 8 (21:16):
Well, let's bring it back up.

Speaker 5 (21:17):
And this is a question that I'm going to throw
to Steve, but I want to also throw it to
the three of you as well, Tia, Taylor, and Vanessa. So, Steve,
I remember reading an interview of yours from like twenty seventeen,
and this is around like when we first met, when
we started doing the YouTube channel with Freddy and everything,
and I remember when you talked about how you were
always like Stormtrooper one through three on video games and

(21:38):
how you got to find your own voice because legacy
characters are usually just taken by people that are much
higher on the food chain for whatever reason. But you
said you always found a way to individualize Stormtoper one,
Stormtroper two, Stormtrooper three. I would love for you to
get insight into what that is for you, what that's
like for you, And then Tia Taylor, Vanessa you three,

(22:00):
I've done some much very prolific work on your own two.
How do you find your individual voices from project to
project or from voice.

Speaker 7 (22:06):
Boys A great question.

Speaker 1 (22:08):
Wow, Well, most of the time that I've played Stormtroopers,
I would cross it out no matter what it said,
and just changes to Stormtrooper number three. Because it's sort
of a running joke because in the video games, I
did a lot of video games before Rebels and played
a ton of Stormtroopers, and they're basically three of us
who voiced all of the Stormtroopers in those games, and
so I always called myself Stormtrooper number three, so I

(22:29):
didn't want to be number one. So that said, and
I tell my students this all the time, that every
character has a life story. Even if it's a Stormtrooper
with a thirty second lifespan, you have to imagine that
they've had a whole life before that moment that you
see them on screen. And so not only are their

(22:50):
mannerism is going to be a little bit different. Their
phrasing is going to be a little bit different, their movements,
whether you know we're just voicing that or not, there's
going to be some differentiation there because they're different people
with different stories. So I've always tried to create a
backstory for every character, even if they only have a
few moments to live. You know, I just I think

(23:11):
about what memories they might have, what got them there,
you know, what led them to the empire? Were they
taken as children and forced into it or did they
do it willingly? All that crap goes through my mind
for a fleeting second, and then you have to make
that choice and jump in and do it. But it's
become sort of automated over the years too, because in
the early days, really an anime is where it began,

(23:34):
where we didn't have the script until we walked into
the room, right and though it was voiced before by
the Japanese artists, we had to put our own stamp
on it, and we had no prep time at all,
So we had to come in with a point of
view for every character, and even Stormtroopers deserve that love.

Speaker 8 (23:53):
I love it.

Speaker 3 (23:55):
One of my favorite things Steve. We've been rewatching obviously
for this podcast, and I hadn't seen any of these
episodes for you know, ten years since they came out,
and I've been just delighted and amused that one of
the like easter eggs for me rewatching has been trying
to pick out all of the voices that are yours.

(24:17):
I don't know if you guys are doing this as well,
because of course they're all different, they're all unique. They're
all you know, layered and interesting, and they have accents
or they don't. And but I always know when it's you.
I think there's probably some more in there that I
didn't even realize for you. But every time I'm like, oh,
it's deep. It's just a fun little Yeah, it's a

(24:38):
fun little easter eggs that I you know, and also
your voice is sprinkled all throughout the show like much
more than just zeb But it's a fun little game
I play when I'm rewatching it.

Speaker 7 (24:50):
Hopefully it's not a drinking game.

Speaker 3 (24:53):
We'll talk about that on the after Dark.

Speaker 8 (24:56):
After Dark.

Speaker 3 (25:00):
Vanessa had that drinking game for us.

Speaker 8 (25:01):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (25:02):
I came up with one that every time Harris says
hang on, which is like a thousand times.

Speaker 8 (25:09):
Yeah, I think that there you go, it's Taylor's already playing.
I mean, right, hang on, how for you, Steve?

Speaker 4 (25:19):
Was I really and I've said this for I don't
have much to go off of, Like my comparisons are
in a different world of this. And the only other
animated thing I think I've done was with Mary Elizabeth
actually she directed me. Oh but outside of that, Like,
how how is Rebels different than other projects? Because for me,

(25:41):
I thought you always recorded together. I thought you heard
the line before, you heard the line after, And then
when I did the one with Mary Elizabeth, I was
so confused. I was like, well, how did they say
the line to me?

Speaker 8 (25:51):
You know what I mean?

Speaker 4 (25:51):
But because I'm just thinking of your the scope that
you can look at things with so many different projects,
like how is Rebels different to you?

Speaker 1 (26:00):
Well, for the first half of my career, I worked
in a vacuum. For anime, we work alone, and a
lot of most video games too, we work alone. So
getting to work on a prelay show like Rebels in
the first place is just a lot more fun because
we do get that back and forth banter we get
to play. But it was so different for me because
there was so much interactivity with the writers, with Dave,

(26:26):
the people behind the scenes, We got to know them.

Speaker 7 (26:28):
I never get that luxury.

Speaker 1 (26:31):
So when David would come into the room and he'd
basically lay everything out for us and give us the
full scope and you know what he's trying to express,
you know, with his view on life, even we didn't
get that on any other show. I'm the only other
show that I can equate that to was Wolverine and
the X Men, where the the producer of that show

(26:54):
would come to the room and scream at us and
just say, you.

Speaker 8 (26:56):
Don't understand, You're all gonna die.

Speaker 1 (26:59):
And we were good friends with him too, and it
was fun, but it wasn't like that with Rebels. David
would sometimes in a four hour session, he would eat
up an hour of it just talking with us and
making sure that we really understood the context of what
we were doing and the stakes too, so that I
feel like it increased the gravity of the show tremendously

(27:19):
for me when we had that background for it, and
also that direct interaction with the creators of the show too,
the writer's producers, everybody who was in that room. Sam
working in the background yeah.

Speaker 2 (27:34):
The first session that we had Ezra had not been
cast yet. You were in Manchester, in a closet somewhere,
or whoever you were in the UK, Birmingham you were,
you know, you were some nice person gave you their
closet to do the session. But I'm in there.

Speaker 7 (27:54):
Yeah, close to the truth. I can elaborate on that
if you want that.

Speaker 9 (27:57):
Well.

Speaker 2 (27:57):
I thought, yeah, I thought you were like, oh, I
have session and someone nearby charitably gave you their studio
near the event.

Speaker 8 (28:04):
Is that right?

Speaker 1 (28:05):
I was a Transformers convention and they sent me. They
put me in a cab and they sent me out
to the country and there was this like world class
studio owner. Oh, I didn't want to go into his studio.
He had a studio in London and one in Birmingham,
I think, and he didn't want to go into his studio,
but he had a home studio. So I went into
his home studio and it was like mon pockhettl These

(28:25):
these old sweet people who let me into their house.

Speaker 7 (28:28):
They offered me a cup of tea.

Speaker 1 (28:30):
They bring me upstairs into this booth with no air conditioning,
and I'm just sweating my.

Speaker 2 (28:34):
E's That's what I remember, Yeah, it was a closet booth,
for sure. We well conversely, just so we're clear, And
this is when I knew this was like another level
of sort of this is not how normal voiceover jobs go.
I'm sitting there Tia and Freddie, and I don't know
Freddy from I've never seen his wealth of work. I

(28:56):
guess it's just not my demographic. I'm not I'm neither
you know, for or against. I'm sort of neutral and
respect him as a human being, of course. But I
slowly realized as that session is going on, like, oh,
this guy is a huge deal. And I mean I
was somewhat aware of that, but in a way we
were all strangers. But they take out this huge bible
that Okay, this is where you all sleep, this is

(29:19):
the living quarters, this is the area of that blah
blah blah. They gave us like this massive bible that shows,
you know, sort of all the permutations. This is your character, mad,
these are the basis of your character. Hara was originally
supposed to be a portly maternal character. She became this.
You know, I've never seen anything. I've never seen this
extensive research. Maybe it has existed for other cartoons that

(29:41):
we've done, Steve, but it was never shared. And this
was the as a person who likes to eat, they
ordered us lunch and it was sushi.

Speaker 3 (29:52):
Okay, okay, that was one time, just for the rest road.

Speaker 2 (29:57):
No, no, no, I understand, but I'm trying to tell
you that I never felt so respected Nie that was.
I was very touched by that that that that was
a nod to our humanity. And they were like, you know,
we have a ten year plan here. This is a
really big deal. I mean I got a sense of like,

(30:17):
oh my goodness, no one's ever bought me lunch before.

Speaker 8 (30:21):
Yeah, every session that was well, of course.

Speaker 2 (30:24):
But you're you so yeah, but that's writer. That's what
we were dealing with and trying to familiarize ourselves with.
Then I'm telling you that that never happens ever. So
it was a unique situation there. And now, okay, that
was the first day and that never happened again, as
it as it couldn't because no one has that in

(30:44):
their budget. But we were never hungry. I'm not saying
that we suffered in any way, but but I will
say that that set the tone for me that they
cared enough to show us such a bible that we
took that amount of time you're saying, so some times
he took an hour like huddling us up like sometimes yeah,
like a hockey team, you know before we hit the ice,

(31:05):
like he had to, you know, get with us and
give us the game plan. Equally, they did that, and
presumably had you been in Los Angeles, you would have
been there. And you know, had they figured out who
Ezra was, Ezra would have been there as well. But
that just signaled to me, this is a very special
thing that may this is as good as a cats.

Speaker 8 (31:26):
Guys.

Speaker 1 (31:27):
Two things hit me in that way really hard. First
was when d Bradley Baker came into the room and
he walked up it up to me and Dee and
I have worked together on a million projects, and he said, yeah,
I know you've worked on some big projects before, but your.

Speaker 7 (31:41):
Life is about to change. And went yeah, okay, right,
sure it did.

Speaker 1 (31:44):
It did, And then cut to We're we're all shuttled
off to Orlando and I'm in a parade.

Speaker 8 (31:50):
We're all in a parade. Oh yes, convertible.

Speaker 1 (31:54):
Cars with our characters on it before anybody knew who
we were. Yeah, and the line the streets and they
were cheering for us, and I was saying, what the
hell's happening here? I've never experienced anything like that since.

Speaker 3 (32:08):
Yeah, that was a surreal That Star Wars Weekends was
a whole like a surreal experience. And same for that
first San Diego comic Con. I feel like that was like,
no one had seen a second of our show, and
yet five thousand people filled up that huge hall and
word there and enthusiastic and wonderful and welcoming and excited,

(32:32):
and yeah, I was like, what are they here for?
They don't even know the show yet. And of course
that was just my first inkling at what Star Wars
fandom is like.

Speaker 1 (32:41):
But my god, it was crazy. But like you said, Vanessa,
respect was a huge thing. D and I went to
Sandy you comic con. Both of us were there for
different things. But we had a movie called The Box
Trolls that was, oh right, it was in I think
it was hall h It was a huge, huge, all
eight thousand people or something. D and I weren't even
invited to it. And we're on the cover of that.

(33:03):
We are the Box Strolls. We created the language and
they brought in all the on camera celebrities, but d
and I were excluded from the screening. They wouldn't even
let us into the screening for that. So that's what
you used to do, that's what we mostly get, But it
was very, very different with Lucas, and Lucas has been
great to me for my whole career with them, from

(33:26):
the very beginning, even the first games. Before I was
working at Star Wars Games, I worked on a couple
of Lucas's very first games, Lucasfilm's games, and even they
were really kind and really nice, and the people behind
the scenes were amazing to work with.

Speaker 3 (33:39):
So I mean maybe Taylor and I were sort of
spoiled in that way that we just sort of showed
up not knowing what we were doing, hoping no one would.

Speaker 2 (33:48):
Notice that we didn't know to do.

Speaker 3 (33:54):
Like that was our you know, that was our first
foray into like being on a you know, being on
an animated show and you know, doing voiceover work, like
real legitimate voiceover work, not just like a one off.

Speaker 8 (34:07):
Here or there.

Speaker 3 (34:07):
And yeah, I mean I didn't know that what a
gift it is to get to record with your co
stars every single episode until I did another show and
I was like, but where is everybody? This isn't fun,
this doesn't feel good. Yeah, all all of that stuff
where you like take I was like, this is wonderful

(34:29):
and not knowing that how how special and out of
the norm.

Speaker 4 (34:33):
A lot of that stuff was yeah, very much So
well so.

Speaker 8 (34:39):
Steve, I have a question.

Speaker 5 (34:41):
I have a question for you, kind of piggybacking on
how you individualize characters and extending on the question rather
and how you gime my backstory. I want to kind
of dive into your backstory a little bit again. From
that same interview from twenty eight seventeen, you talked about
some of the odd jobs you had before your voice
career started taking off of you. You like refilled fire extinguisher,

(35:02):
chip and nails, dances on the top. You were the
thunder from down Under apparently was your uh here your
Australian moniker, but refilling fire extinguishers working. We're working at it.
But we're going to have that part of the social
clip too. Jac's never put thing, so we're gonna have
it all set up. Working at a pet store, you
were working at Empire, I think Empire Entertainment. The people
who are horror fans, and I'm a huge, huge horror fan.

(35:24):
Empire Entertainment made movies like The Reanimator and Gholies and
Goolies is that movie where the monsters come at you,
like from the toilet and everything like that.

Speaker 8 (35:32):
It's hysterical.

Speaker 5 (35:33):
But because you have such a great appreciation for your career,
you never seem like you never come off entitled. You know,
eight hundred plus titles. Some people can come off as
that was that grind. I'm sure. I'm sure that grind
contributed to having that feeling of gratification, But also did
any of those skill sets you got from those odd

(35:55):
jobs transfer over to those backstories to your characters of
those eight hundred plus voices?

Speaker 1 (36:00):
They did, and in a lot of different ways well.
Working at Empire, my first job there was as a
warehouse guy. I was moving props around, and then I
worked as a PA, so I was basically taken the
boss's dogs to go get de skunked.

Speaker 7 (36:16):
With that.

Speaker 1 (36:17):
It's crazy with a shag carpet kit in my crappy
used truck and I had to drive them forty miles
because they didn't want to go to the vet around
the corners. My truck would stink for six months. It
was that kind of stuff, making bank runs with you know,
five hundred thousand dollars worth of gold in my car
and I had to do it without a guard. Crazy

(36:37):
crazy stuff that I was doing to that company. So yeah,
that's where the gratitude came from. Also, one of my
first jobs also, I was working in the mailroom. When
you're a PA, you work in the mailroom too. One
of my very first jobs. And we were in Hollywood,
and one of my first jobs was picking up condoms
in the parking lot from the night before because it
was a hidden spot.

Speaker 7 (36:58):
So wow, so that was pleasant. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (37:01):
So all of that stuff, plus I serviced fire equipment
in downtown LA.

Speaker 7 (37:07):
I worked on skid row.

Speaker 1 (37:10):
With junkies and unhoused people throwing up on my shoes
while I'm trying to work and working in the pet store.
I had a lot of really crazy jobs and I've
used them all. Probably the most direct job that I
had was probably in the fire service business. I used
to service fire extinguishers in downtown LA and so I

(37:34):
was out in the street on the curb, literally working
in the street on skid row and pouring this ABC
powder back into the extinguishers after I fire them off,
and then I clean out the insides and put them
back together and recharge them. And so I was doing
a loop group session for some movie at some point
where we were talking about fire protection equipment, and I

(37:56):
knew about fire protection equipment, and generally we try to
do our research before we go in for a big
looping session, and usually it's it's jargon for you know,
police calls, fire calls, airport jargon, that sort of thing.
And so we had all studied up for this thing.
But Ad and tell us there was a big scene
in a firehouse and a lot of jargon about fire equipment,

(38:17):
and so they said, oh god, we didn't prepare for this.
Does anybody know anything about fire equipment? I went, they
went what?

Speaker 7 (38:23):
I went, Yeah, what do you need to know?

Speaker 1 (38:25):
And they said, well, we have this thing about fire
extinguishers and nobody knows anything.

Speaker 7 (38:28):
I know.

Speaker 2 (38:28):
Oh my god.

Speaker 1 (38:31):
I came up to the microphone and I just did
this whole scene and they used all of it. And
usually all that stuff gets stuffed way down, but they
actually used all of that stuff. So there are those
kinds of moments that I never thought I'd use for
anything anywhere in my career.

Speaker 7 (38:44):
Wow, But just the humiliation.

Speaker 1 (38:47):
Of doing things like picking up condoms made me appreciate
every moment of voiceover work because even though we don't
get you know, we're not rich, but it's still so
much better than any of the other jobs that I
ever had to work with people like this, I get
to you know, I made a new family in this business,
and voiceover people are are my family now. I mean

(39:10):
pretty much everybody I've ever worked with I'm really good
friends with still, even you know, if I haven't seen
him in thirty years. So yeah, it's just that profound
appreciation goes a long way, but it does come up
and things come up. You know, pet store people want
to know things about pets in a looping sessions, usually
looping where that stuff really comes specialty things, office supply.

(39:31):
Worked in office supply. I worked at pet Boys for
three years, so I knew a lot about tires. Who
knew Yeah, So yeah, I feel like, you know, every
little piece of experience you have is usable in what
we do, whether you're on camera or not, even if
it's just an emotion, you know, you you know what
it feels like. To get a gut punch when you

(39:54):
know you're pumping up a tire and you get slammed
in the chest by a tool. So you know you
can try like that, you can translate that effect into
something else, so it's it's all worthwhile.

Speaker 4 (40:05):
Deep.

Speaker 3 (40:05):
Have you considered writing a memoir?

Speaker 1 (40:09):
I tried, but I'm I got my attention is is
just so limited. I actually have about five hundred pages
of a novel that I was writing, an autobiography kind
of thing sort of that I was writing a long
time ago, and I just sort of dropped it. I
have the pages somewhere and I'll get back to it,

(40:29):
but I would read it back in it.

Speaker 7 (40:30):
I just bored myself.

Speaker 5 (40:31):
I didn't think, well, I would be first in line
for that. And also if you want help, like if
you need something like dictated for you, just tell me
and I'll type it up for you. Like I feel
like I think everybody in this room. I think everybody
has their story. I think you don't have to be
somebody who's a public figure to have a story that
people can relate to and something that's compelling. But your story,
in particular, Steve, just from you telling us service and

(40:53):
fire extinguishers. We're going to pat start picking up condoms,
which now I know why z that was so angry.

Speaker 10 (40:57):
I never where that came from now though, So you
know springs, beck A s bring in your bringing your
object and smell it. God, whether rubber meets the road.

Speaker 7 (41:11):
Literally, that is.

Speaker 4 (41:16):
What I forgot about rebels. The amount of incredible buttons
on scenes that were not used that weresed by Steve
were incredible.

Speaker 8 (41:25):
There were so so many.

Speaker 4 (41:27):
If there was just a weird, any little silence at
the end of the scene, Steve's gonna come in with
something that is gold.

Speaker 3 (41:33):
H actually noise, it might see some kind of.

Speaker 8 (41:45):
That's what I usually did. So we're going to use
that on this podcast too.

Speaker 5 (41:49):
If you're like our commercial bumper, like when we have
to do our ad reads, that's where we're going with
your permission, of course, if you.

Speaker 7 (41:54):
Can do whatever you want. I don't care. My life is.

Speaker 8 (41:55):
Open, open book. Well not yet.

Speaker 5 (42:00):
We just came back to that, Yeah, so I want
to bring it out. We're gonna get towards the end
of this hopefully you come back. We hope this is
the first time many times to come back, because we're
only eight episodes. Into the series so far, and there's
such great arcs with zeb there's a great arc with
Asian Kallis, of course voiced by the great David Oyel.
You two had this great dynamic. Well, we're not there yet,

(42:20):
so I don't want to jump into that prematurely, but
you know you had alluded to sometimes you go into
an anime JOBB and you're just seeing you based on
the cold read when you're in the booth. That to me,
what I got for them is, Oh, working on your
craft outside the booth is so important. To make sure
your knife stays sharp, so it becomes second nature once
you get into the booth. That said, you do teach

(42:42):
people to hone their craft. And I would love for
you to talk about blum Box Studios and why you
started it, why you keep it going, and where people
can find you if they want to get a career
in voice.

Speaker 1 (42:51):
Act and well, first, I want to give a shout
out to Vanessa because she was one of my early teachers,
So thank you for doing that, Honey, God so great.

Speaker 2 (43:00):
Glenn was so incredible. She in the middle of our class.
Fox booked me on a promo and I didn't want
to cancel the class, So I said, let's take the
class in the booth with me so they can see
just how stressful it is. Because you get you get
three beeps and they send you the script. You totally
read it cold and hope that you do to picture,

(43:20):
and then they put it on the air. They don't
have time to you know, you know correct, They like,
you're I mean, you're just you're in, you're out. They
don't have time for the pain. So I think it
was good for them to see just how you have
to be literally ready to rock and drop everything and
uh and then but Gwen found the produced spot as well,
which I think is still on bloombox. So it is, yeah,

(43:42):
but it was, it was. It was really delightful. And
so many of your students are just such good human beings.
I've I've become friends with many of them, and they're
they're delight They're delightful humans.

Speaker 7 (43:52):
I'm really lucky. That's why I keep doing it.

Speaker 1 (43:54):
I started it by accidents, sort of at conventions. You
guys know this, You've done a bunch of conventions. Everybody
that comes up to our table always says one of
the first questions is how do I get into voiceover.
Everybody tells me I have a good voice, and so
you know, you've got twelve seconds to give them an answer,
and it's like ah, And I would just go look
at Dee Bradley Baker's site, I want to be a

(44:15):
voice actor dot com. Yeah, for years, to the point
where I actually printed up cards with D's website. I'd
hand those out, have a big stack of my table,
and the people around me just kept saying, you have
to start teaching. Because you had every panel that we
did at every convention, it would become a teaching moment.
People would come up and you know, and it would

(44:36):
be more than just voiceover. It would be like life lessons.
And I did twenty years of of what do you
call that? The where you're trying to improve your life.
Basically I can't even think of like self help kind
of thing. Yeah, but I did twenty years of that

(44:57):
kind of work, and I went to therapy. I did
a lot of stuff to try to fix my life
and make it better and just get a better understanding
of why I made the choices I made and how
I can make better choices and just be more aware
of my surroundings. So those kinds of conversations would come
up at every convention over and over and over again,
and you know, it's like three hundred times a day
with people. So finally, my ex Trina just kept bugging

(45:22):
me and buggy me and bugging me to start teaching.

Speaker 7 (45:24):
I went, all right, fine, I'll just I'll do something.

Speaker 1 (45:27):
But I had to deconstruct thirty years of voiceover and
try to figure out a way to put it in
you know, palatable chunks so that I could use this
as a curriculum for students. And I thought, that's it.
I'm just going to do, you know, a few classes.
I'll record them by myself, and I'll just do a
little thing where it's like a little subscription that they

(45:47):
can get it, you know, monthly, and I'll go for
maybe a year. And that was my goal, was to
do like a year. And I was doing two classes
a month at that time, and the students started really
respect and I kept getting all these success stories from them,
and not even necessarily in voiceover, but in their lives
where they would like, our tagline is unleash your voice.

(46:10):
And so a lot of these people who go to
these conventions felt like that was the only place in
their life they could actually speak their mind and be
who they were, whether they were on the autistic spect
somewhere on the spectrum, or if they were trans or
you know, somewhere on the outskirts of what, especially the
current society sees as acceptable. For that one moment or

(46:33):
for a couple of days at a convention, they felt
like a whole person, and they had people there who
would support them in that. And I thought, Okay, I'm
doing something that's much bigger than Voice over here. I'm
doing something of value, and for the first time in
my life, I felt like I was doing something of
true value. And so I kept doing it, and then
I it kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger, and
then I after thirty classes, I went, oh my god,

(46:53):
I'm out of information. I don't know what else to teach.
So I just thought, well, I'm going to ask a
couple of my friends and see if maybe they'll come
in and they'll do a class with me. And like
Fred Tatoshow was one of the early ones, and Andrea
Romano and you know, people that I was just working
with at the time, and they said, yeah, sure, I'll
come over, and they just came over to my house
and my studio and we sat in there and we

(47:13):
just talked, and I would research them and ask them
very pointed, non fan questions that what I thought might
help my students about their struggles and their journey too,
because it's all relatable. The struggle is the most relatable part.
And here we are now. We just finished class ninety nine.
We're about to do class one hundred.

Speaker 10 (47:33):
Oh.

Speaker 1 (47:33):
I've been going for years and it is not financially sustainable.
I have we had two years where I could actually
draw a little bit of an income, but.

Speaker 7 (47:45):
It's costing me money.

Speaker 1 (47:46):
I had to put one hundred thousand dollars into the
school this year alone just to keep it.

Speaker 7 (47:50):
Because I have staff, I have people that I pay.

Speaker 8 (47:52):
I paid them.

Speaker 1 (47:53):
I try to pay them better than I was ever
paid my life in any job. I flew them out
here for a retreat and rented a house for them.

Speaker 7 (48:01):
I just wanted to as a boss.

Speaker 1 (48:03):
I've never been a boss before, and I just wanted
to treat them how I always would have loved to
have been treated.

Speaker 7 (48:09):
So I got to do that thing. That was awesome.

Speaker 1 (48:12):
It is not sustainable now, so I'm actually considering selling
it at some point if there's even market for this
type of thing, as everything is archived. But these stories
that they come back at me with and I see
my students also at every single convention everywhere in the world.
My students are everywhere, and whether they are past present
students or people have just signed up, they will come

(48:33):
up to my table and they will tell me their
story and it's and I don't get to spend that
kind of time with them in the context of the class,
So I get to actually build these relationships with these
people and learn from them too, and know that, you know,
I can't really do a lot to make the world
a better place, but I'm doing what I can, and
this is my way of giving back at this point.

Speaker 7 (48:55):
And it's super gratifying.

Speaker 4 (48:57):
That's beautiful, state, that's incredible.

Speaker 8 (48:59):
Were Steve Yes, you can find us at Bloombox Studios.

Speaker 1 (49:05):
Order now get a complete set of Ginz You Knights.

Speaker 3 (49:10):
You're a good Eggs, Steve.

Speaker 7 (49:12):
I try.

Speaker 1 (49:13):
I was rotten for the first half of my life,
so I thought I'd boil it up and try to
do something different.

Speaker 3 (49:20):
Well, for what it's worth, I do the same thing
with you. And when people come up to my table
or come up to me and you know, out in
the real world or at cons or whatever, not that
cons aren't you know what I mean, at CON's and
are outside in the real world. They asked me, you know,
how do I become how how can I become a

(49:42):
voice actor? And I basically just refer them to you.

Speaker 8 (49:47):
And deep Brodnie Baker.

Speaker 3 (49:49):
Not only are you guys two of the best to
do it like, and I'm not saying that because you're
my friend and you're on our show. I'm saying that
because I genuinely mean, like, it doesn't get better than
Steve Woman Steve Bradley Baker. But also, you guys are
both you just both happen to be like genuinely wonderful

(50:10):
human beings. So who better to learn from than people
who know their craft so well and are also just
really nice, nice people.

Speaker 1 (50:18):
Well that was kind of my hook is, especially since
I started bringing guests. I would announce somebody like Vanessa,
and the students would just go out of their minds
because they're massive fans of hers, and she comes with
a completely different perspective than anybody I've ever brought in.
And this wealth of knowledge and information and life experience,

(50:39):
and her stories were incredible and it's so rich. It's
such a rich way to learn. And I remember going
to college and I was thinking, God, this is so boring.
I hate this. I really didn't enjoy most of my school.
So to be able to bring in my dear friends
to tell their stories and impart information at the same
time in a really fun, interesting way is I think

(51:01):
the best way to learn, especially if people have been
following her for her whole career. You know, that's a
life moment that could be a benchmark moment for a person.
And we collect those little bits. I don't know if
we were doing it back then with you, Vanessa, but
now we collect some stuff from the chat as it's
going through the class and we will send it to
our guest and we'll just say, this is the impact

(51:23):
that you had on some of these people, and just
see their heads exploding, you know, when she comes up
with some gem that they never even considered that they
can actually their lives can actually change in that moment,
and that's a that's a big deal.

Speaker 7 (51:39):
That's a really big deal.

Speaker 1 (51:40):
It's a big burden to carry at this point, but
it's also one of the most gratifying things I've ever
had in my life.

Speaker 5 (51:48):
Well, I have no doubt that a great karma you
put out there is going to come back to you.
And also just unleashing your voice. That's such a powerful statement.
And you know, as somebody with AHD, I am also
on the lower end of the auto spectrum, which a
lot of people don't know.

Speaker 8 (52:02):
Now you do if you didn't know, awesome.

Speaker 5 (52:04):
You know, when it comes to academia, the confines of
that is so restricting for somebody whose brain is neurodiverse
like mine, but which you're providing is something that it
is educational. Maybe it's not a four year university, but
for them it's a million times better. Just like somebody
who does fit well in like a four year academia,

(52:24):
they probably won't be into bloombox studios And that's totally fine,
and I think that's what people need to know. It's like,
there's not just one unilateral school or place of education.
There's it's whatever fits with you. And we just talked
about an episode where you know, there's episodes where asrask
to find as balance in the forest, You've got to
do that with ourselves. What's the yin young, What's what's
your lukewarm? Because that's always going to be different from

(52:46):
everybody else, So you providing that. It's just a wonderful thing.
I don't think a lot of people know about it,
and hopefully people will catch you in a bit, you know,
hopefully we can contribute to more people knowing about it,
and whether it goes on or not, you know, your
legacy with that is going to live on through your students,
and I think that's amazing.

Speaker 7 (53:02):
I think it will. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (53:03):
And by the way, we do celebrate neurodivergence in our
classes too. We just had Corey Burton in recently and
I didn't know for years. He's one of the he's
a genius, one of my favorite voice actors of all time,
and I didn't know for years that he was on
the spectrum. And he was diagnosed with Asperger's I think
in his forties, and he just didn't know why he

(53:26):
felt the way he felt, and suddenly something opened up
to him that made him feel like he had a
little bit more of a place in the world besides
his craft. I mean, he's a genius and he's amazing,
and he has had this incredible career. He's Captain Hook
for God's Sake, among a million other things. But we

(53:46):
had this really deep conversation about his struggles and how
he sees the world differently from other people and sometimes
it's hard for him to look people in the eye
and sometimes things are overwhelming for him. And so many
of my students could relate to that. I think everybody's
on the spectrum somewhere m hm. And so to celebrate
that and the superpowers that you have too, I've I've

(54:09):
seen you in action.

Speaker 8 (54:10):
John and my hyper focus. Yeah, dude, your genius.

Speaker 1 (54:13):
You're amazing and and it's it's wonderful to celebrate that
rather than make people feel like other because we don't
understand it, So we try to cast a little light
on that too.

Speaker 2 (54:25):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (54:25):
Absolutely, And you know we are in the month of May.
We're not just celebrating May. The fourth of May is
also well one API Heritage month, so shout out to
my fellow Asians. But also it's mental health Awareness month.

Speaker 8 (54:35):
So I knew that.

Speaker 5 (54:37):
You know, coming into this, you're you're such a positive
and beautiful person. See that you were going to bring
some and we've had such positive vibes on this podcast
so far, but we knew you come. We were all
so excited because we're like, Steve's going to bring some
sort of energy today. And I think for anyone out
there listening for Mental Health Awareness Month, we're talking about
self care, We're talking about a lot of themes. You know,

(54:57):
this is a place where we want people to feel
seen and heard. You know, that's it's we're using rebels
as really a jumpstart to the conversation, but what we
really want to do is celebrate individuals, which is what's
all about. We've talked about rebels on here, but really
we just we're just friends hanging out having a conversation.
And for anybody out there, look if if you get
that late adulthood spectrum diagnosis like I did. To me,

(55:21):
it was like when you learn the twist of like
an m Night Shamalan movie and you're like, oh, okay,
hold on, I need to rewatch this movie now. Holy crap,
this all makes so much sense because it led to
this whole thing. So to me, it's like for me,
it felt like a piece of the puzzle I knew
was there, but once you uncovered it, like an open

(55:41):
world video game. I was like, oh, okay, well, now
let me do a backlog. Oh that's why this relationship
didn't last. That's why this friendship kind of went cuphoot.
But it can be a scary thing, but it's also
one of the most liberating feelings because now, to use
like an anime term, like you're unlocking your final four
absolutely anything, you know.

Speaker 1 (56:01):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I didn't realize it was Health Awareness month.
That's that's amazing. I just finished a two week cleanse.
Oh god, yeah, I lost eighteen pounds. I did the
Master Cleons and eighteen Yeah, and it's sixty three years old.
It's really hard to do and work. I used to
do it every year back in my twenties and thirties
and I haven't done it in forever. So yeah, if

(56:24):
I can do it, you guys can do it. And
it's a it's like a full reset. So yeah, I mean,
you don't have to do it as as harsh as
I did it, but yeah, man, you.

Speaker 8 (56:31):
Might have gotten us our first sponsor with that.

Speaker 5 (56:33):
So this episode is now brought to you by Garden
of Life Master Cleans.

Speaker 3 (56:40):
The Master Cleans, the Lemon and.

Speaker 1 (56:43):
The Lemon, and yeah, lemon, pure maple syrup and cayenne
pepper and water for ten days.

Speaker 7 (56:50):
But I did like a few days pre.

Speaker 1 (56:52):
To that, and then coming off of it, you can't
eat solid food for another few days. So it's today
was my first actual meal in fourteen days.

Speaker 8 (56:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (57:01):
When I first moved to LA for some reason, I
decided I was going to try the Master Cleanse, and
let me tell you, I lasted. I don't even think
twenty four hours. Definitely not twenty four hours. I was like, nope,
and that tells you a little something about my willpower.

Speaker 1 (57:21):
I was like, yeah, it would strop for everybody. And
the first three days are absolutely brutal.

Speaker 7 (57:27):
They're terrible. You feel like you just want to die.

Speaker 1 (57:29):
Yeah, but you're cleaning toxins out of your body, and
some doctors say that it's not safe for you. So definitely,
if you're going to do a check with your doctor,
guys beforehand, make sure that you are healthy enough to
withstand this, because your body's going to go through some literally, but.

Speaker 7 (57:46):
You clear out.

Speaker 1 (57:47):
It's They say that the body regenerates cells every seven years.
All the cells in your body regenerate every seven years,
and you're kind of doing a jump start for that process.
So you're not regenerating everything, but a lot of me
is regenerating right now and I can feel it.

Speaker 8 (58:01):
So you are, is what we're saying.

Speaker 7 (58:02):
Yeah, I survived this one. You haven't knocked me out yet.

Speaker 8 (58:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 7 (58:07):
In fact, I have a clause in here somewhere you're there.

Speaker 8 (58:09):
Oh yeah, here they come.

Speaker 7 (58:12):
They hurt every time they come out.

Speaker 1 (58:17):
Yeah, yeah, Bob and gave me those.

Speaker 2 (58:21):
That's awesome.

Speaker 5 (58:23):
So stay, where can people find you on social media?
Or do you want people to find you? I guess
maybe I should have asked first to respect it and boundaries,
but yeah, where can they find if you want them
to find you?

Speaker 1 (58:31):
I dove off most of social media these days, so
I just got back onto Signal and currently on TikTok
and blue Sky. So it's on blue Sky. I don't
even know what my name is on there. I think
it's just my name. Yeah, I got off, I got

(58:52):
off all the other things, so I have to understandable.
Yeah it is bloom spew b l u m s
p e w dot blue sky dot. So yeah, bloomspuu
was what I used for Insta and TikTok and Twitter
and all those other things before. And I just I
had to I had to leave for many, many reasons.
But this guy, this guy is where I'm hanging out now.

(59:13):
And it was weird because I went from like close
to two hundred thousand followers to six thousand followers and
I don't care anymore.

Speaker 7 (59:20):
I really don't care.

Speaker 1 (59:21):
Yeah it's liberating, right, Yeah it is. And it's just
a nice, friendly environment. And I shared dog pictures and
talk about life and it's it's so good.

Speaker 7 (59:30):
It's so good.

Speaker 1 (59:30):
I spent way too much time on socials before. But
you can also find us at bloombox Studios dot com
and uh or Steve bloom Voices dot com for fans stuff.
And I announced all of my upcoming appearances and things
there or actually my son Brandon does, he does that
for me, So got to go.

Speaker 5 (59:47):
Well, Steve, one of our goals is we want to
do live shows with this podcast, so maybe you'll have
maybe we'll come out to Hawaiian and do a live
show with you, or get some sort of a I
remember when we did the role playing game thing where
Freddy We're talked about doing like a convention tour, but
maybe this is like a belated version of that. Because
our goal is to do live shows because you want
to connect with the really amazing Star Wars Rebels fans

(01:00:08):
that I've been able to see here and there. So
I think maybe that could be something to come. But
if anything, we would love to just have you back anytime.
This was so much fun. We could probably talk to
you for days, but we all have stuff to do, unfortunately.
I mean I don't, but I think everybody else does.

Speaker 1 (01:00:22):
But I love you guys, and what a joy to
be able to join you on this. Thank you for
inviting me.

Speaker 8 (01:00:27):
This is amazing, huge.

Speaker 7 (01:00:31):
Virtual hugs to all of you.

Speaker 2 (01:00:33):
Wieve, do we have fact checks? Do you have a
fact check for us?

Speaker 11 (01:00:36):
Jac I have a couple of things.

Speaker 2 (01:00:41):
Oh my, okay, you.

Speaker 8 (01:00:43):
Light about everything. Those were condoms, them all.

Speaker 1 (01:00:51):
He didn't throw them away, the collection of them in
my bathroom.

Speaker 11 (01:00:56):
It's really awkward, unfortunately, loving that Juicy, you.

Speaker 7 (01:01:02):
Have no idea.

Speaker 11 (01:01:03):
You guys are all talking about hanging out on Sunset Strip.
I love hanging out on Sunset Strip in my younger days,
so I just thought i'd fill people not in the
know in a little bit about that. I believe what
you guys were talking about is the upstairs of the Rainbow,
there is a loft and it's called the Layer of
the Hollywood Vampires, a drinking club started in the seventies

(01:01:28):
by Alice Cooper that had members like Keith Moon from
The Who, Ringo Star from the Beatles, Mickey Dolan's from
The Monkeys, and Harry Nilsson and then Steve. You also
mentioned Gazaries a little bit of history on Ghazari's. They
were world famous for their dance contest, which is as
much as I will say about that, which then turned
into the Key Club in the mid nineties, and.

Speaker 8 (01:01:50):
Then oh yeah, High Stage, Yeah yeah.

Speaker 11 (01:01:53):
And then One Oak, which was like part of a
New York club and now I think it's empty. I
think it's empty. Area code for Toronto, one of the
first area codes established in nineteen forty seven is four one.

Speaker 8 (01:02:09):
Six four one six. That's it, four one.

Speaker 11 (01:02:12):
Six, and then there's six four seven, which is a
newer area code from two thousand and one. And then
you mentioned Corey Burton just in case somebody doesn't know
listening to this. Corey Burton cad Baine, count Dooku and
also got his start in Star Wars, providing the voice
of Luke Skywalker in the Disney read a long book

(01:02:35):
for Star Wars a New Hope in nineteen seventy nine.

Speaker 8 (01:02:39):
Oh wow, he's nice, JC, Thanks, this will be good.

Speaker 5 (01:02:44):
This is our treat at the end of every episode
every week as we get these fact checks.

Speaker 7 (01:02:48):
Yeah, thanks for keeping me honest.

Speaker 3 (01:02:50):
Wow, Jesse, is that private drinking club still open?

Speaker 7 (01:02:58):
Assumption he's gone tonight?

Speaker 8 (01:03:01):
What was the address again? Well, that's our after dark
live show. Meet us all there tonight.

Speaker 7 (01:03:08):
You do have to have prehensile feet and the tail
to go.

Speaker 2 (01:03:11):
No pun By the way, I did a seven day
cleanse that was like a billion dollars and I gained
seven pounds, So what Yeah, dude, I don't know my body.
If I starve it, it eats itself and gains weight.

Speaker 8 (01:03:26):
I can't.

Speaker 2 (01:03:27):
I don't know. Everybody's different. I wish that worked for me.
But anyway, whatever you're doing, right, Yeah, well that's nice. Yeah,
It's not my path, y'all. Mine is one of moderation.
I'm maintaining a sixty pound weight loss at this point
for twenty years through moderation. But it might be an
Italian thing. My people need eed a little of this

(01:03:47):
a little then, just balance, balance, that's my gin young, that's.

Speaker 5 (01:03:53):
The safe cleanses ben if for Vanessa Marshall, is what
we're getting from that.

Speaker 2 (01:03:58):
Either that or have a gratitude who facilitated whatever they
were doing was not kosher who knows well.

Speaker 8 (01:04:06):
Shout out to Kafy gratitude.

Speaker 5 (01:04:08):
Yeah, thank you Jace once again for the awesome fact check.
I wasn't sure where what you're going to have for
us today, but as always you always deliver.

Speaker 4 (01:04:16):
Steve.

Speaker 5 (01:04:16):
Thank you so much. We can't We loved having you here.
Hopefully hope to have you as like a recurring guest.
Remember everybody rate, subscribe, tell all your friends about this podcast.
Happy May the fourth, Happy API Heritage Month, Happy Mental
Health Awareness Month, Be kind to each other, be nice
to each other, take care of yourselves. And without further ado,
Steve our our outro. We say, cue the music, So

(01:04:37):
do you? Will you do the honors and tell JC
to cue the music.

Speaker 1 (01:04:41):
Yes, May the Force and the Ashla be with you, JC,
cue the music.

Speaker 5 (01:04:46):
Care Potter Rebillion is produced in partnership with iHeart Podcasts Producing,
Hosted by Vanessa Marshall, TiO Sircar, Taylor Gray and John
Ley Brody Executive producer and in house Star Wars guru
slash backchecker J C.

Speaker 8 (01:05:03):
Reifenberg.

Speaker 5 (01:05:04):
Our music was composed by Mikey Flash. Our cover art
was created by Neil Fraser of Neil Fraser Designs. Special
thanks to Holly Frian, Aaron Kaufman over at iHeart, Evan
crascoor At, Willie Morris Endeavor, Tresa Canobio, George Lucas for
creating this universe we love so much, and of course
all of our amazing listeners. Follow us on Instagram at
Potter Rebellion and email us at Potter Rebellion Podcasts at

(01:05:25):
gmail dot com