Celeb voices yeah or nay?

[carlaird]

I hate all these celeb voiced films now
I think that you never see the character you just see the actor like Ellen in Nemo
If the story is good like Mermaid
you dont need any "star" voice
After a while in Ave Q you forget the puppetier is therer and just see the puppets!

[lord-of-sith]

Yeah, while sometimes a celebrity voice can be highly beneficial(see: Robin Williams in Aladdin), it can also be bad.

Dreamworks is a terrible culprit of casting celebs for voice just because they are celebrities. I remember reading an article when Madagascar came out (from EW) where the mentioned how it was hard to animate the lion because Ben Stiller's voice tended to soung angry. If the voice has a problem like that, DON'T CAST IT! That made me mad that they so outrightly stated they cast him just because he was famous.

[Lazario]

For the most part, I'm completely against celebrities doing voices for characters. After The Rescuers, but not by fault of The Rescuers in any way shape or form, it just became a stinky novelty. Plus, Fox and the Hound had the worst use of celeb voice actors in a long time. Mickey Rooney, sounding older than God, as the voice of a teenage character? Same with Kurt Russell, pushing 30 at the time. Then, Sandy Duncan. Impossible to remove the face from the voice.

[carlaird]

It should have ended wirh Robbin Williams!
LOOK WHAT HE STARTED
He was great
and so was Pat doing Ursla
BUT in truth I think gienne would have been grreat with a great voice over artist as well
just think
they could have picked TIFFANY for Ariel!

[Lazario]

I had a hard time with Robin Williams at first. My biggest problem with him is that he did more than one character voice. He's too big for a movie. He takes away the darkness of the earlier scenes and makes everything too silly. But now, I find his Genie to be more entertaining than when I was a kid and everyone would laugh at every last thing he would say. I felt like the only non-braindead kid in class when they would show this in school.

[SpaceAce]

It should have ended wirh Robbin Williams!
LOOK WHAT HE STARTED
He was great
and so was Pat doing Ursla
BUT in truth I think gienne would have been grreat with a great voice over artist as well
just think
they could have picked TIFFANY for Ariel!

Then we wouldnt have had James Woods as Hades.

[Lazario]

Then we wouldnt have had James Woods as Hades.

Good point. How irritating... Alright, he's the sole exception.

[slave2moonlight]

I think it helps greatly when the character looks a bit like the actor, as I always felt Genie looked like Robin and Hades looked like Woods. It's a bit harder to take with, say, an animal character that just looks like an animal but sounds like a celeb. In general though, celeb voices don't bother me that much unless I have the feeling they were cast purely for their name and not how they fit the role.

[lord-of-sith]

In general though, celeb voices don't bother me that much unless I have the feeling they were cast purely for their name and not how they fit the role.

I agree 100% here are the big celebrities who have done voices for characters that I believe were because they actually were perfect for the part:

Robin Williams - Genie
Jeremy Irons - Scar
James Earl Jones - Mufasa
Rowan Atkinson - Zazu
James Woods - Hades
Demi Moore - Esmerelda
Tom Hulce - Quasimodo
Eartha Kitt - Yzma
and though I'm not sure she's a BIG celebrity, Pat Carrol is genius as Ursula

[Simba3]

I think that sometimes having one celebrity, two tops, can be good for a film. It can create and generate a lot of buzz around a movie. For example, I think it would be good if "The Princess and the Frog" had at least one fairly big name celebrity name attached to it. Sure, it has Anika Noni Rose, who is amazing, but not everyone knows who she is. There is a lot riding on "The Princess and the Frog" and a celebrity voice could draw a lot of attention to the film and help it to succeed.

However, I don't think every film needs to have a celebrity voice attached to it, and I think anything over two can often be overkill.

[blackcauldron85]

I think that using a huge celebrity as a voice should only happen when that person actually earned the role. Don't just stick a celebrity on a film if he or she isn't perfect for the role! I think that Robin Williams was perfect for the Genie- he's zany and quick...great job.

The film should come first, and the marketing should come second. Make sure that the film is a quality film, and then worry about how you're going to market it. A good film should be able to market itself- commercials will help, but word-of-mouth will also help.

[MK Sharp]

For the most part, I'm completely against celebrities doing voices for characters

What about Edward Brophy as Timothy Mouse or Cliff 'Ukelele Ike' Edwards as Jiminy Cricket?

[Poody]

Boooooo!!!! Yes, there are some I don't mind..... but it's rare.

[Kyle]

they should only consider weather or not if the celeb is right for the role, and what they'll bring to the character. dont just cast a celeb because their famous and hope the movie brings in more money because of it. thats what dreamworks does and most of the time the celebs suck at it. you cant just go hiring anyone to do voice acting. voice acting requires a different quality than live action stuff does. and when these actors are used to useing their own face and gestures to act its hard to get them to pull it off right.

and the most famous celeb in the world cant rescue a poorly developed character.

[pap64]

You guys forgot Tom Hanks and Tim Allen as Woody and Buzz respectively .

In my opinion, voices should be casted according to the story's needs. So if a certain celebrity can provide it then fine. However, I too hate the practice of hiring big movie stars just for the sake of celebrity. The great Billy West once said that a great deal of the time these celebrities only bring their egos into their role, not their performance. So in Shark Tale you are only seeing Will Smith's ego, not his talent as a voice actor. Billy also said that they are some of the mos ridiculously overpaid voice actors in existence. He used Cameron Diaz as an example.

Not only that, you can tell that sometimes these people are not having fun. In the DVD features they complain about how you need to say the same lines over and over, how hard it is to act without any references etc. etc. They are divas in the recording studio, yet the execs want more forget that a film that be a winner without the aid of these people.

Pixar is perhaps the only studio who knows how to properly cast their characters. They use both star power and local talent to their benefit. Cars had a lot of big people, but most of the time the best performances were done by the smaller actors (like Larry the Cable Guy as Mater).

Look at Ratatouille, for example. That movie had no major star power. True, we had some veteran actors and comedians but you never noticed them because of how their celebrity status is not the main focus. I honestly didn't know Anton Ego was voiced by a legendary Oscar winner until I looked it up on Wikipedia.

Best of all, the movie took people who were Pixar employees and turned them into really good actors. Emille's acting was great. I didn't know he was voiced by one of Pixar's guys until I read about it.

The movie became the year's biggest critical and commercial hit and the characters became endearing and just plain fun. It was so good that if it wasn't for the fact that its an animated film it would've gotten an Oscar nomination for best picture without any issue.

Sony's Surf Up also did a good job at hiding its celebrities. I didn't know Shia Lebouf was the voice of Cody, nor that John Heder was the chicken surfer. The voice actors are also very small ones, which is surprising because Sony couldn't resists advertising the fact that they got Martin Lawrence for Open Season (which, IMO, had some of the most boring voice actor in a movie yet, save for Shaw the hunter).

Now compare this to Shrek the third. While the movie was a BIG success due to hype it was one of the most poorly received movies of the year. The quality dropped big time, especially when compared to the first 2 movies. And it had all these great celebrities which brought NOTHING to the story.

See where I'm getting at? Notice how films with little to no star power became highly celebrated successes while movies with exaggerated casting are forgotten in weeks. It is NOT about who is doing the actor, its about how you bring the character to life, and it seems animators are forgetting this fact more and more with each movie released.

Perhaps the absolute WORST example of celebrity acting gone awry is Doogal. Good GOD that movie was awful...

They hired like 10 actors, and it was perhaps one of the worst casting jobs I had ever seen. I mean, John Stewart as a villain with a spring for a body? William H. Macy as a snail? (On another note, I read that he was supposed to have voiced Nemo's dad in Finding Nemo, but the Pixar crew thought he wasn't good enough for the part. After seeing Doogal I see why. Will's a good actor, but he lacks the heart to do voice overs...). KEVIN SMITH AS A NON SPEAKING FARTING MOOSE????????????????????

Jesus! The casting was crippled even more by atrocious lines and dialogue...

I really hate that movie...

[SpaceAce]

KEVIN SMITH AS A NON SPEAKING FARTING MOOSE????????????????????

So he played Silent Bob in that movie too, huh?

[carlaird]

I agree with poody Dont take away from voice actors!
Celebs may be great but there voice actors that are better!
think Mel Blac! or KASEY KASAM
as for James Woods
it was James Woods you liked not the character he voiced thus, as I said earlier you never drop the actor from the character!

[UmbrellaFish]

It's okay is the celeb is actually good. If not, then don't use them. Like people have previously said, Dreamworks is terrible about that. For that matter, who would watch their movies if they didn't have celebs, anyway?

[271286]

It's okay is the celeb is actually good. If not, then don't use them. Like people have previously said, Dreamworks is terrible about that. For that matter, who would watch their movies if they didn't have celebs, anyway?

I ONLY watched Madagascar because David Schwimmer voiced the giraffe... and I was SO dissapointed! Besides Davis as Melman the movie is utter SHIT!

[Ariel'sprince]

I don't mind if the actor is celebr as long as the voice is good (like Jodi Benson) thought it can be good if it's a celeb (like Amy Adams) but still.
I actually like Dreamworks's voices (for exmaple the voices in Shrek and Shark Tale),thought they only cast celebs.